Richard D. Wolff

To escape Nazism, Wolff's parents, both Jewish German citizens, emigrated to the United States during World War II.{{Cite web |date=2013-03-25 |title=Watch Extended Interview with Economist Richard Wolff on How Marxism Influences His Work |url=https://www.democracynow.org/2013/3/25/watch_extended_interview_with_economist_richard_wolff_on_how_marxism_influences_his_work |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=Democracy Now!}} His father, a lawyer in Cologne, Germany, became a steelworker in Youngstown, Ohio.{{Cite web |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |date=2007-01-01 |title=Curriculum Vitae and List of Publications: Richard D. Wolff |url=https://www.umass.edu/resnick-wolff/Wolff_curriculum_vitae.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070101114054/http://www.umass.edu/resnick-wolff/Wolff_curriculum_vitae.pdf |archive-date=January 1, 2007 |access-date=2025-05-17 |work=UMass.edu |publisher=University of Massachusetts Amherst}} The family settled in New Rochelle, New York. Wolff has described his European background as shaping his worldview:

"Everything you expect about how the world works probably will be changed in your life, that unexpected things happen, often tragic things happen, and being flexible, being aware of a whole range of different things that happen in the world, is not just a good idea as a thinking person, but it's crucial to your survival. So, for me, I grew up convinced that understanding the political and economic environment I lived in was an urgent matter that had to be done, and made me a little different from many of my fellow kids in school who didn't have that sense of the urgency of understanding how the world worked to be able to navigate an unstable and often dangerous world. That was a very important lesson for me."{{Cite web |last=Goodman |first=Amy |date=2013-03-25 |title=Democracy Now! March 25, 2013, Watch Extended Interview with Economist Richard Wolff on How Marxism Influences His Work |url=https://www.democracynow.org/2013/3/25/watch_extended_interview_with_economist_richard_wolff_on_how_marxism_influences_his_work |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151018090600/http://www.democracynow.org/blog/2013/3/25/watch_extended_interview_with_economist_richard_wolff_on_how_marxism_influences_his_work |archive-date=October 18, 2015 |access-date=2025-05-17 |publisher=Pacifica Radio}}

Wolff began teaching at the City College of New York in 1969, where he collaborated with economist Stephen Resnick, who joined in 1971 after being denied tenure at Yale for signing an anti-war petition.{{Cite news |date=1971-04-15 |title=Yale Denies Tenure to Anti-War Economist |url=https://yaledailynews.com |access-date=2025-05-17 |work=Yale Daily News}} In 1973, Wolff and Resnick, along with economists Samuel Bowles, Herbert Gintis, and Richard Edwards, joined the Economics Department at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where Wolff became a full professor in 1981.{{Cite news |date=1973-06-10 |title=UMass Amherst Hires Five Economists for Economics Department |url=https://www.chronicle.com |access-date=2025-05-17 |work=The Chronicle of Higher Education}} He retired from UMass Amherst in 2008, becoming professor emeritus, and joined The New School as a visiting professor in the graduate program in international affairs.{{Cite web |date=2008-09-01 |title=New Faculty Appointments |url=https://www.newschool.edu/bulletin |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=New School Bulletin}} Wolff has also taught as a visiting or guest lecturer at institutions including University of Utah, Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University, and The Brecht Forum in New York City.

Wolff and Resnick's early co-authored publication, "The Theory of Transitional Conjunctures and the Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism," appeared in the Review of Radical Political Economics in 1979.{{Cite journal |last1=Resnick |first1=Stephen |last2=Wolff |first2=Richard |date=1979 |title=The Theory of Transitional Conjunctures and the Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism |journal=Review of Radical Political Economics |volume=11 |issue=3 |pages=3–22, 32–36 |doi=10.1177/048661347901100302}} The article explored the transition from feudalism to capitalism, focusing on class dynamics and economic structures. Their collaboration extended to works like Knowledge and Class, which drew on Louis Althusser and Étienne Balibar's Reading Capital and interpreted Karl Marx's Capital Volumes II and III. They analyzed Marxian class theory as the study of surplus labor's performance, appropriation, and distribution, identifying class processes such as ancient, slave, feudal, capitalist, and communist.

{{Rquote|right|Marx used the word "exploitation" to focus analytical attention on what capitalism shared with feudalism and slavery, something that capitalist revolutions against slavery and feudalism never overcame.|Richard D. Wolff{{Cite web |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |date=2015-05-26 |title=Critics of Capitalism Must Include Its Definition |url=https://www.truth-out.org/news/item/30678-critics-of-capitalism-must-include-its-definition |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=Truthout |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150527184924/http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/30678-critics-of-capitalism-must-include-its-definition |archive-date=May 27, 2015}}}}

In 1988, Wolff co-founded Rethinking Marxism, a journal dedicated to exploring Marxian concepts in economics and social sciences.{{Cite web |date=1988-03-01 |title=Rethinking Marxism: Founding Statement |url=https://www.rethinkingmarxism.org |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=Rethinking Marxism}} He served on its editorial board for over two decades and remains on the advisory board as of 2025.{{Cite web |date=2025-01-15 |title=Advisory Board |url=https://www.rethinkingmarxism.org/about |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=Rethinking Marxism}} In 1994, he was a visiting professor at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University. Wolff continues to teach graduate seminars and undergraduate courses at The New School and lectures at various institutions.{{Cite web |date=2025-02-10 |title=Faculty Profile: Richard D. Wolff |url=https://www.newschool.edu/public-engagement/faculty/richard-wolff/ |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=The New School}}

Wolff was a founding member of the Green Party branch in New Haven, Connecticut, and its mayoral candidate in 1985.{{Cite web |last=Feinstein |first=Mike |date=2011-10-05 |title=Election History: 131 Green Candidates since 1985 |url=https://ct.greens.org/electionhistory.shtml |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111109085256/http://ct.greens.org/electionhistory.shtml |archive-date=November 9, 2011 |access-date=2025-05-17 |publisher=Green Party of Connecticut}} In 2011, he called for a new left-wing political party in the United States.{{Cite news |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |date=2011-03-13 |title=What's Left of the American Left? |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/mar/13/us-politics-us-unions |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180617142225/https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/mar/13/us-politics-us-unions |archive-date=June 17, 2018 |access-date=2025-05-17 |work=The Guardian}} He is a regular lecturer at the Brecht Forum and appears on television, radio, and in print media.{{Cite web |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |date=2017-08-04 |title=About Professor Richard D. Wolff |url=https://www.rdwolff.com/about |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170804214657/http://www.rdwolff.com/about |archive-date=August 4, 2017 |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=RDWolff.com}} Since 2011, he has hosted Economic Update, a weekly radio/TV show and podcast on WBAI in New York City.{{Cite web |date=2011-10-01 |title=Economic Update—Richard D. Wolff |url=https://archive.wbai.org/show1.php?showid=econupdate |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111006075126/http://archive.wbai.org/show1.php?showid=econupdate |archive-date=October 6, 2011 |access-date=2025-05-17 |publisher=Pacifica Foundation}}

One of Wolff's students, George Papandreou, served as Prime Minister of Greece from 2009 to 2011. Wolff described Papandreou as a student interested in socialist economics.{{Cite web |last1=Psychari |first1=Eirene |last2=Wolff |first2=Richard D. |date=2011-01-24 |title=Interview in 'To Vima' Newspaper—Greek Publication |url=https://rdwolff.com/content/interview-vima-newspaper-greek-publication |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130315072700/http://rdwolff.com/content/interview-vima-newspaper-greek-publication |archive-date=March 15, 2013 |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=RDWolff.com}} However, CUNY professor Costas Panayotakis noted that Papandreou, despite campaigning against austerity, implemented a criticized austerity program after Greece's debt crisis.{{Cite web |last=Panayotakis |first=Costas |date=2010-12-01 |title=Capitalism, Socialism, and Economic Democracy: Reflections on Today's Crisis and Tomorrow's Possibilities |url=https://postcapitalistproject.org/node/100 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161105000633/http://postcapitalistproject.org/node/100 |archive-date=November 5, 2016 |access-date=2025-05-17 |work=Capitalism Nature Socialism}}

Wolff is a co-founder of Democracy at Work, a non-profit that produces media and live events advocating workplace democracy and critiquing capitalism.{{Cite web |date=2013-01-01 |title=About – Democracy at Work |url=https://www.democracyatwork.info/about |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180617165044/https://www.democracyatwork.info/about |archive-date=June 17, 2018 |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=Democracy at Work}} The organization is based on his 2012 book, Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism. Wolff also hosts the nationally syndicated program Economic Update with Richard D. Wolff, produced by Democracy at Work.{{Cite web |date=2018-08-30 |title=Economic Update with Richard D. Wolff |url=https://economicupdate.libsyn.com/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180831035407/https://economicupdate.libsyn.com/ |archive-date=August 31, 2018 |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=Liberated Syndication}}

In a review of Wolff's book Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism, Hans G. Despain, writing for Marx and Philosophy, argued that the ideas presented in the book "deserve wide support and wide debate to repoliticize the American population and rejuvenate the American workforce and citizens."{{Cite web |date=2013-11-10 |title='Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism' reviewed by Hans G Despain |url=https://marxandphilosophy.org.uk/reviews/7827_democracy-at-work-review-by-hans-g-despain/ |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=Marx and Philosophy}}

In addition to his native English, Wolff is fluent in French and German. Wolff lives in New York City with his wife, Harriet Fraad, a psychotherapist. They have two children.

In an interview on The Jimmy Dore Show in January 2021, Wolff stated that he is a distant relative of the German political activist Wilhelm Wolff, to whom the first volume of Karl Marx's Das Kapital was dedicated.{{Cite interview |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=Capitol Insurrection Caused by Capitalism Failure & Rapacious Donor Class -- Dr. Richard Wolff |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYd2HA-JHGo&t=2040s |access-date=2025-05-17 |work=The Jimmy Dore Show |publisher=YouTube |date=2021-01-13 |at=34:00 |interviewer-last=Dore |interviewer-first=Jimmy |interviewer-link=Jimmy Dore}}

• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=The Economics of Colonialism |publisher=Yale University Press |year=1974 |isbn=0-300-01639-5 |location=New Haven}}
• {{Cite book |last1=Resnick |first1=Stephen A. |title=Rethinking Marxism: Essays for Harry Magdoff and Paul Sweezy |last2=Wolff |first2=Richard D. |publisher=Autonomedia |year=1985 |location=NY}}
• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |url=https://archive.org/details/economicsmarxian00wolf_0 |title=Economics: Marxian versus Neoclassical |last2=Resnick |first2=Stephen A. |publisher=Johns Hopkins Press |year=1987 |isbn=0-8018-3479-1 |location=Baltimore}}
• {{Cite book |last=Resnick |first=Stephen A. |title=Knowledge and Class: A Marxian Critique of Political Economy |last2=Wolff |first2=Richard D. |publisher=University of Chicago Press |year=1987 |isbn=0-226-71021-1 |location=Chicago}}
• {{Cite book |last1=Fraad |first1=Harriet |title=Bringing It All Back Home: Class, Gender and Power in the Modern Household |last2=Wolff |first2=Richard |last3=Resnick |first3=Stephen |publisher=Pluto Press |year=1994 |isbn=0-7453-0707-8}}
• {{Cite book |last1=Wolff |first1=Richard D. |title=Crisis and Transitions: A Critique of the International Economic Order |last2=Resnick |first2=Stephen |last3=Ruccio |first3=David F. |publisher=Westview Press |year=1988 |isbn=0-8133-0757-0}}
• {{Cite book |last1=Gibson-Graham |first1=J.K. |title=Class and Its Others |last2=Resnick |first2=Stephen A. |last3=Wolff |first3=Richard D. |publisher=Minnesota University Press |year=2000 |isbn=0-8166-3618-4 |location=Minneapolis}}
• {{Cite book |last1=Gibson-Graham |first1=J.K. |title=Re/Presenting Class: Essays in Postmodern Marxism |last2=Resnick |first2=Stephen A. |last3=Wolff |first3=Richard D. |publisher=Duke University Press |year=2001 |isbn=0-8223-2709-0 |location=Durham}}
• {{Cite book |last=Resnick |first=Stephen A. |title=Class Theory and History: Capitalism and Communism in the USSR |last2=Wolff |first2=Richard D. |publisher=Routledge |year=2002 |isbn=0-415-93317-X |location=NY}}
• {{Cite book |last=Resnick |first=Stephen A. |title=New Departures in Marxian Theory |last2=Wolff |first2=Richard D. |publisher=Routledge |year=2006 |isbn=0-415-77025-4 |location=NY}}
• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=Capitalism Hits the Fan |publisher=Olive Branch Press |year=2009 |isbn=978-1-56656-784-8}}
• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=Contending Economic Theories: Neoclassical, Keynesian, and Marxian |last2=Resnick |first2=Stephen A. |publisher=MIT Press |year=2012 |isbn=978-0262018005 |location=Cambridge, MA}}
• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism |publisher=Haymarket Books |year=2012 |isbn=978-1608462476 |location=Chicago}}
• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=Capitalism's Crisis Deepens: Essays on the Global Economic Meltdown |publisher=Haymarket Books |year=2016 |isbn=978-1608465958 |location=Chicago}}
• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=Understanding Marxism |publisher=Democracy at Work |year=2019 |isbn=978-0359467020 |location=New York}}
• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=Understanding Socialism |publisher=Democracy at Work |year=2019 |isbn=978-0578227344 |location=New York}}
• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=The Sickness is the System: When Capitalism Fails to Save Us from Pandemics or Itself |publisher=Democracy at Work |year=2020 |location=New York}}
• {{Cite book |last=Wolff |first=Richard D. |title=Understanding Capitalism |publisher=Democracy at Work |year=2024 |isbn=978-1-7356013-6-6 |location=New York}}

• {{Cite video |url=https://capitalismhitsthefan.com |title=Capitalism Hits the Fan |date=2009 |medium=DVD |publisher=Media Education Foundation |isbn=1-932869-30-1 |people=Wolff, Richard}}

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{{reflist|30em}}

{{Commons category|Richard D. Wolff}}{{Wikiquote}}

• {{official website|https://www.rdwolff.com}}
• [https://www.democracyatwork.info Democracy at Work]
• [https://www.umass.edu/resnick-wolff Wolff's UMASS webpage (with Stephen A Resnick)]
• [https://www.newschool.edu/public-engagement/faculty/richard-wolff/ Wolff's faculty profile at The New School]
• [https://www.rethinkingmarxism.org Rethinking Marxism: A Journal of Economics, Culture and Society]
• {{IMDb name|id=2581418}}

{{external media|video1={{YouTube|Vm3HeYRIe8o|Capitalism's Stunning Contradiction}}|width=220px|float=right|video2={{YouTube|kVo0YNZK_oY|Abby Martin & Richard Wolff Discuss Socialism in 2019}}|video3={{YouTube|opYfk9344Vo|Professor Richard Wolff: Does COVID Crash Show Capitalism Has Finally Failed?}}|video4={{YouTube|Co4FES0ehyI|Does Capitalism Actually Reduce Poverty? (with Richard Wolff)}}|video5={{YouTube|o0Bi-q89j5Y|Richard Wolff: Marxism and Communism (Lex Fridman Podcast, 2022)}}}}

• {{Charlie Rose view|7517}}
• [https://www.democracynow.org/2013/3/25/capitalism_in_crisis_richard_wolff_urges Capitalism in Crisis: Richard Wolff Urges End to Austerity, New Jobs Program, Democratizing Work]. Democracy Now! March 25, 2013.
• [https://therealnews.com/stories/amartin0317efep22 The Empire Files: Understanding Marxism and Socialism with Richard Wolff]. The Real News, March 21, 2016.
• [https://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/36662-poverty-has-always-accompanied-capitalism Poverty Has Always Accompanied Capitalism]. Truthout. July 3, 2016.

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