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Paul Solman

About Paul

Paul Solman has been a correspondent for the PBS News Hour since 1985, mainly covering business and economics.

While attending Brandeis University, Solman joined the Brandeis newspaper, The Justice, and eventually became its editor. He got his first journalism job in 1970 at the alternative weekly Boston After Dark.

Solman became founding editor of the rival alternative weekly The Real Paper in 1972 and went on to become a feature writer and investigative reporter.

Solman received an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1978.

After a few years of local PBS reporting, he inaugurated the PBS business documentary series, ENTERPRISE with fellow Nieman Fellow Zvi Dor-Ner.

In the 1980s, Solman produced documentaries, returned to local reporting, and joined the Harvard Business School faculty, teaching media, finance and business history in the school's Advanced Management Program. He also co-authored “Life and Death on the Corporate Battlefield” in 1983, which appeared in Japanese, German and Taiwanese editions. He joined the MacNeil/Lehrer Report in 1985.

In the '90s, with sociologist Morrie Schwartz, a teacher of his at Brandeis, Solman helped create -- and wrote the introduction to the book "Morrie: In His Own Words," which preceded "Tuesdays with Morrie.” In 2015, Solman co-authored “Get What's Yours: the Secrets to Maxing Out Your Social Security.”

Solman has lectured on college campuses since the '80s and has written for numerous publications, including the Journal of Economic Education. As a one-time cab driver, kindergarten teacher, crafts store co-owner and management consultant, he was also the author and presenter of "Discovering Economics with Paul Solman," a series of videos to accompany introductory economics textbooks.

In 2007, he joined the faculty at Yale, where he contributed to the university's Grand Strategy course for a decade. In 2011, he was the Richman Distinguished Visiting Professor at his alma mater, Brandeis, where he taught a seminar, "Economic Grand Strategies: From Chimps to Champs? Or Chumps?" He has taught regularly at West Point, the Naval War College and was an adjunct faculty member at Gateway Community College in New Haven, CT, where he created the evening program, “Yale@Gateway.” In 2016, he was a Visiting Fellow at Mansfield College, Oxford University.

Since 2019, Solman has chaired the board of the anti-polarization American Exchange Project, a nonpolitical nonprofit domestic "foreign exchange" program that introduces high school seniors from everywhere in America to each other, sends and embeds them, for free, in communities unlike their own.

Solman took up tennis at 50. His father was the American expressionist artist Joseph Solman. He is married with two children and seven grandchildren.

Full Bio

Paul’s Recent Stories

Economy Jun 14

Are College and Career Skills Really the Same?

The Common Core curriculum standards don't prepare students for the workforce, says Robert Lerman. Still from PBS NewsHour footage. Paul Solman: Centrist economist Robert Lerman of the Urban Institute and American University is back on this page with a timely…

Economy Jun 13

How I Stumbled Into My Encore Career

Retired economics professor Mary Huff Stevenson leads a Zumba Gold ® class at the Brookline Senior Center outside Boston. Photos by Amara Cohen. Professor Emerita of Economics (University of Massachusetts, Boston) Mary Huff Stevenson is an exceptionally astute old friend…

Economy Jun 13

How I Stumbled Into My Encore Career

By Paul Solman Retired economics professor Mary Huff Stevenson leads a Zumba Gold ® class at the Brookline Senior Center outside Boston. Photos by Amara Cohen. Professor Emerita of Economics (University of Massachusetts, Boston) Mary Huff Stevenson is an exceptionally…

Economy Jun 12

Reinventing Old Age: The Good We Do When We Work Forever

// Paul Solman's piece exploring the contributions of older workers airs on The PBS NewsHour Wednesday. We've been reporting on America's aging workforce on the NewsHour over the past several months, covering the factory where the average age is…

Economy Jun 12

Reinventing Old Age: The Good We Do When We Work Forever

By Paul Solman // Paul Solman's piece exploring the contributions of older workers airs on The PBS NewsHour Wednesday. We've been reporting on America's aging workforce on the NewsHour over the past several months, covering the factory where the…

Economy Jun 07

U-7 Up; Black Youth Unemployment Hits 42 Percent

Our U-7 index includes everyone in the government's U-3: everyone who said they wanted a job and had looked for one in the past four weeks. It also adds everyone who said they wanted one, hadn't looked in the past…

Economy Jun 07

U-7 Up; Black Youth Unemployment Hits 42 Percent

By Paul Solman Our U-7 index includes everyone in the government's U-3: everyone who said they wanted a job and had looked for one in the past four weeks. It also adds everyone who said they wanted one, hadn't looked…

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