"As an intellectual and economist, there were two Samuelsons. There was the mathematical savant who had learned his trade at the feet of Viner, Leontief, Schumpeter and, above all, Wilson. This work had raised him above most of his contemporaries, enabling him to speak with the authority of one of the leading economists of his generation. However, his more popular work was not just a distillation of his abstract theories; it rested not on complex mathematical arguments but involved careful data analysis and familiarity with the way that economic institutions worked. This was the Samuelson, mentored by Hansen during the Second World War, who wrote Economics and whose views were sought by the press and government."