David Charles Colander (November 16, 1947 – December 4, 2023)[1] was an American economist, and the Christian A. Johnson Distinguished Professor of Economics at Middlebury College.
[5] in 2017 he received The John R. Commons Award from Omicron Delta Epsilon, the economics honor society.
[6] In an article entitled "Confessions of an Economic Gadfly", Colander relayed the story of his progression as an economist.
He believes that the MIT approach limits one's intuition and recollects encountering colleagues who refused to discuss economic ideas without formal models.
Despite Colander's aversion to simplified formal models, he began his career working on a mathematical project.