Piero Sraffa

Piero Sraffa was born on 5 August 1898, in Turin, Italy. His father, Angelo Sraffa, was a professor in commercial law; he later became the dean at the Bocconi University in Milan. His mother, Irma Sraffa (née Tivoli), was also a highly cultured lady from a distinguished family. .

Sraffa spent his childhood in various places. He began his primary education at Parma. Afterwards, he was admitted to Giuseppe Parini Secondary School in Milan. Later, he went to Massimo D’ Azeglio School in Turin and passed out from there in 1915 with very high marks.

In 1916, Sraffa entered the University of Turin to study law. Here, he was greatly influenced by Luigi Einaudi, who at that time was a professor at the same university. However, he had to spend a part of 1917 and 1918 fighting the World War I for Italy.

Towards, the end of the 1918, Sraffa was discharged from his military service and he returned to Turin to finish his education. In spite of the break in his studies he managed to pass his examinations.

In 1919, Sraffa began his graduate work on inflation in Italy since the World War I under the supervision of Luigi Einaudi. In the same year, he became friendly with Antonio Gramsci and joined the editorial team of his journal L’Ordine Nuovo.

After his graduation, Piero Sraffa began working for the Milanese Socialist administration. But before long, he went to England and in 1921 joined London School of Economics as a research scholar.

There he continued with his work on Italian financial problems. His paper revealed his profound knowledge in this subject. It drew the attention of John Maynard Keynes, who asked him to write about the Italian banking crisis for ‘Economic Journal’ and ‘Guardian Supplement’.

The first article, titled 'The Bank Crisis in Italy', was published in the Economic Journal in its June 1922 edition. It was a strongly worded article, in which Sraffa proved with figures how public money was used in attempt to rescue Banca di Sconto, a leading Italian bank which had gone bankrupt in the same year.

In December 1922, his second article on the same topic was published in the Supplement of the Manchester Guardian in four languages. It caught the attention of Mussolini, who asked for immediate retraction. But Sraffa told his father that since his articles were based on figures he would not do so.

Therefore Mussolini, had him banned from England through his contacts at the then Conservative English Government. In 1923, Piero Sraffa went back to Italy and began his career as the Director of the Provincial Labor Department in Milan.

Piero Sraffa is best remembered as the exponent of the neo-Ricardian school of economics. He closely studied David Ricardo and then went on to reinterpret and reconstruct surplus theory, which resulted in a new school of thought, now known as the neo-Ricardianism. His book, ‘Production of Commodities by Means of Commodities’ also played an important part in establishing this school of thought.