Robert L. Heilbroner (1919- ) is the Norman Thomas Professor of Economics at the New School for Social Research.　He has two children and currently resides in New York City.　Heilbroner graduated summa cum laude from Harvard in 1940 with a degree in history, government, and economics, and worked briefly for the Office of Price Administration.　After service in the Army during World War II, he took a job as a business economist with a large commodity-trading house.　However, he soon decided that he liked writing more than office work and took a year's leave.　He never went back to business.

For two decades, thousands of instructors have used The Worldly Philosophers as an introduction to the lives and thoughts of the great economists.　Sales of all editions of this book have been estimated at approximately two million.　The combined sales of all the economics books written by Heilbroner, counting joint authorships, may make him the top-selling economics authors of all time.　In his writing Heilbroner brings an economic point of view to social and political problems.

The final revision of this classic bestseller, the 7th edition defines the common thread linking the world's greatest economic thinkers and explores the philosophies that motivate them. Hailed by Galbraith as a "brilliant achievement", "The Worldly Philosophers" with over 2 million copies sold worldwide, not only enables us to see more deeply into our history, but helps us to better understand our own times. Heilbroner provides the new theme that connects thinkers as different as Adam Smith and Karl Marx: the desire to understand how a capitalist society works. A new chapter conveys a concern that today's increasingly "scientific" economics may overlook fundamental social and political issues that are central to economics.