Born in Frankfurt, Salin studied political economy and jurisprudence, completing his PhD at Heidelberg University in 1913 with a thesis on the economic development of Alaska under the supervision of Alfred Weber.
After habilitating at Heidelberg in 1920 with a monograph on the political thought of Plato, Salin taught there and at Kiel before taking up a position as Professor of National Economy at the University of Basel in 1927, which he held until 1962.
[2] Salin's economic theory integrated influences from John Maynard Keynes, Karl Marx, and Friedrich List.
[2] He was a proponent of European integration, and after World War II he became a prominent critic of ordoliberalism, particularly the work of Wilhelm Röpke.
[1] Salin was awarded the Goethe Plaque of the City of Frankfurt in 1962 and the Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1972.