Joel Dean (1906–1979) was an American economist best known for his contributions to corporate finance theory in general, and particularly to the area of capital budgeting.
[6] Discounted Cash Flow approach and Internal Rate of Return rule became popular by the ardent promotion of Joel Dean Associates.
During World War II he was with the Office of Price Administration, and was also a research associate of the Cowles Commission.
[13][14][15] Joel Dean's best known work is Capital Budgeting (New York: Columbia University Press, 1951.
His Statistical Cost Estimation (Indiana University Press, 1976), by contrast, is a forgotten book, perhaps for the reasons outlined above.