Solid Foundation

Hope to win the Nobel Prize in Economics someday? Perhaps you, like Paul Krugman, should read more science fiction. The newly crowned laureate told Jim Lehrer last night how he got his start:

JIM LEHRER: When and why did you decide to become an economist in the first place?

PAUL KRUGMAN: Oh, that’s a little embarrassing. I was—I don’t know how many of your viewers watch science fiction, read science fiction, but there’s this very old series by Isaac Asimov, the “Foundation” novels, in which the social scientists who understand the true dynamics save civilization.

And that’s what I wanted to be. And it doesn’t exist, but economics is as close as you can get.