Belgian-born economist who devised ways to measure wealth with such creations as balance sheets that tracked the flow of capital among various segments of the economy.

After earning a Ph.D. from the University of Berlin (1927), Goldsmith studied at the London School of Economics and Political Science before immigrating to the United States (1934). He worked for several U.S. government agencies, notably the Securities and Exchange Commission (1934–41) and the War Production Board (1942–46), and he was a member of the U.S. government mission on German currency reform (1946). He was an adviser to numerous foreign governments and a professor of economics at Yale University (1960–74). His works include The Changing Structure of American Banking (1933), The National Balance Sheet of the United States, 1953–1980 (1981), and Comparative National Balance Sheets: A Study of 20 Countries, 1688–1978 (1985).