Kantorovich, Leonid (Vitalyevich)

(born Jan. 19, 1912, St. Petersburg, Russia—died April 7, 1986, U.S.S.R.) Soviet mathematician and economist. A professor at Leningrad State University (1934–60), he developed the linear programming model as a tool of economic planning. He used mathematical techniques to show how decentralization of decision making in a planned economy ultimately depends on a system in which prices are based on the relative scarcity of resources. His nondogmatic critical analyses of Soviet economic policy often clashed with the views of his orthodox Marxist colleagues. His most notable work is The Best Use of Economic Resources (1959). In 1975 he and Tjalling Koopmans (1910–85) shared the Nobel Prize for their work on optimal allocation of scarce resources.

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