Before he established himself at the forefront of the study of Soviet economics, Bergson won acclaim for the “Bergson social welfare function,” according to Paul A. Samuelson, an MIT professor emeritus of economics and Nobel laureate who described Bergson as his “oldest and dearest friend at Harvard.”
Though Bergson’s work probably placed him on many Nobel “short lists,” Samuelson said, a misunderstanding perpetuated in the economics literature may have cost him the prize.
But Samuelson, himself a Nobel Laureate, added that the fact that Bergson never won a Nobel doesn’t mean he was undeserving.
“People who don’t get the Nobel Prize are just as good as the people who do get it,” he said. “There’s a lot of luck in those things.”
Bergson leaves behind his wife, three daughters, a sister and three grandchildren.