Peter A. Diamond is an Institute Professor Emeritus at MIT where he taught from 1966 to 2011. He has written on public finance, social insurance, behavioral economics, uncertainty and search theories, and macroeconomics. His books include Saving Social Security: A Balanced Approach (with Peter R. Orszag), Reforming Pensions: Principles and Policy Choices and Pension Reform: A Short Guide (both with Nicholas Barr), and Behavioral Economics and Its Applications (edited with Hannu Vartiainen).

His recent papers include The Mirrlees Review chapter "The Tax Base" (with James Banks), "Capital Income Taxes with Heterogeneous Discount Rates" (with Johannes Spinnewijn, American Economic Journal: Economic Policy), The Case for a Progressive Tax: From Basic Research to Policy Recommendations (with Emmanuel Saez, The Journal of Economic Perspectives) and Unemployment, Vacancies, Wages (the Nobel Lecture in The American Economic Review). His recent report is Pension Reform in China: Issues, Options and Recommendations (with Nicholas Barr). He has been President of the American Economic Association, of the Econometric Society, and of the National Academy of Social Insurance. He was one of the three winners of the 2010 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel.