Category: Michigan

Michigan. Henry Carter Adams’ Plea on Own Behalf, 1887

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2020-12-28

The dirtiest my hands have ever become from archival work was during my exploration of Columbia University’s collection of John Maurice Clark’s papers. Now having the luxury of digital images to scroll through, I can work without forsaking the pleasures of biting my finger nails, rubbing my eyes and scratching my nose. The younger Clark was quite a paper hoarder so it pays to return to my folders with the images of his documents.

This post builds on notes Clark took after a talk given by his colleague Joseph Dorfman on the economist Henry Carter Adams. Clark was struck by a phrase used by Adams, “all power carries responsibility,” that was a recurring theme in Clark’s own “preaching”. Attached to his brief note was a typed copy of a transcribed letter that Henry Carter Adams had written to the President of the University of Michigan to plead the case that he wished to be judged for a professorial appointment for the right reasons, i.e. not for any particular policy positions he might be thought not to hold but for exhibiting high scholarly virtues in his research and teaching.

Adams had earlier managed to attract the ire of a Cornell trustee, businessman Henry Williams Sage, much in the way Paul Samuelson was to attract the ire of the former member of the M.I.T. corporation, Lamott Dupont II, some 60 years later. Clearly not wanting his Cornell history to repeat itself, Henry Carter Adams successfully went pro-active with the University of Michigan in lobbying on his own behalf. He did get the appointment.

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Socialist Tease?

Henry C. Adams along with Richard T. Ely was attacked for “Coquetting with Anarchy” in The Nation (September 9, 1886), pp. 209-210. In that article Adams was incorrectly identified as President [C. K.] Adams of Cornell. The correction was immediately forthcoming in the following issue, September 16, 1886 issue, p. 234. The essay by Henry Carter Adams being attacked was “Principles that Should Control the Interference of the States in Industries” that was read before the “Constitution Club”of New York City.

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Several biographical accounts of Adams

Joseph Dorfman. The Economic Mind in American Civilization, vol. 3. Pp. 164-174.

S. Lawrence Bigelow, I. Leo Sharfman, and R. M. Wenley, “Henry Carter Adams,” The Journal of Political Economy, April 1922, pp. 201-11 (includes a selected bibliography);

“Memorial to Former President Henry C. Adams,” The American Economic Review, September 1922, pp. 401-16.

Mark Perlman’s review of the 1954 publication of Henry Carter Adams’ Relation of the State to Industrial Action (1887) and his American Economic Association Presidential Address (1896) edited by Joseph Dorfman with introductory essay. [Note: this re-publication of two of Adams’ essays includes the letter transcribed from Dorfman’s copy in J. M. Clark’s papers.]

A. W. Coats. Henry Carter Adams: A Case Study in the Emergence of the Social Sciences in the United States, 1850-1900. Journal of American Studies, Vol. 2, No. 2 (October 1968), pp. 177-197.

Nancy Cohen. The Reconstruction of American Liberalism, 1865-1914. University of North Carolina Press, 2002. (Especially Chapter 5 “The American Scholar Revisited”, pp. 154-158, 162-164, 169-174)

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Henry C. Adams, some early publications

The Position of Socialism in the Historical Development of Political Economy. Penn Monthly, April 1870, pp. 285-94.

Outline of Lectures upon Political Economy (Baltimore: privately printed, 1881); (second edition, Ann Arbor: privately printed, 1886).

“The Labor Problem,” Sibley College Lectures.—XI. Scientific American Supplement, August 21, 1886.

Adams’ statement in The Labor Problem, edited by William E. Barns (New York: Harper, 1886), pp. 62-63.

“Principles that Should Control the Interference of the States in Industries” read before the “Constitution Club” of the City of New York. [Fun Fact: Frank Taussig’s copy]

Relation of the State to Industrial Action. Publications of the American Economic Association, 1887. Pp. 471-549.

Public Debts: An Essay in the Science of Finance (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1887).

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Note by John Maurice Clark attached to transcribed copy of Henry Carter Adams’ letter

Letter of Henry Carter Adams (1851-1921)
to President James B. Angell, March 15, 1887.

J.M.C. Nov. 27, 1951, Comment, from memory of Dorfman’s remarks yesterday.

President Angell appointed Adams professor after receipt of this letter, and Thomas Cooley (father of Charles Horton Cooley?) who was on the original Interstate Commerce Commission, got Adams the job of chief statistician of the Commission, where he created the system of control of accounts of railroads aiming at enough uniformity to make financial and operating reports comparable, so totals for the country and comparisons of companies would mean something.

Adams had already commented on Jevon’s “The State in Relation to Labor[”] and Adams’ original paper on this theme was later (later than Mar 15, 1887) worked over and enlarged, and came to be regarded as a classic by economists between Adams’ generation and mine.

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[Clark’s note] This is the letter of a man 36 years old who had earned his academic freedom by a sober and responsible attitude. From my standpoint, it is especially interesting because Adams gives such central importance to the principle that all power carries responsibility (presumably inner responsibility plus subjection to checks and controls where appropriate). This is the principle I’ve been preaching (or announcing factually) as the only alternative to regimentation or chaos.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

COPY

Ithaca, N.Y. March 15, 1887.

Dear Dr. Angell:

I don’t think there is any danger of my misunderstanding your letter or the spirit in which it was written. Last year, your questions came to me with the shock of a complete surprise, but I am coming to be pretty well accustomed to such expressions now.

You ask if I can help you any more so you can see your way clear on my nomination. I don’t see as I can, except it be to suggest that, in my opinion, your point of view in this matter is not the right one. If you make a man’s opinions the basis of his election to a professorship, you do, whether you intend it or not, place bonds upon the free movement of his intellect. It seems to me that a board has two things to hold in view. First, is a man a scholar? Can he teach in a scholarly manner? Is he fair to all parties in the controverted questions which come before him? Second, is he intellectually honest? If these two questions are answered in the affirmative, his influence upon young men cannot be detrimental.

Upon these points, certainly, nothing new can be said. I have served for five years as an apprentice and you have had opportunity to know. Or, with regard to the fairness in which topics are presented in the classroom, you have the outline of (the) lectures. My conscious purpose in teaching is two-fold. To portray social problems to men as they will find them to be when they leave the University and to lead men to recognize that morality is an every day affair.

But all this, you will say, is by the point. You say you do not know what my views are on capital and labor. I am not surprised at that for I have intentionally withheld them. No one knows them and I had madeup my mind to keep them to myself until I had worked through my study of the industrial society. My reason for such a decision was, that, in my study of social questions I had found myself on all sides of the question, I started as an individualist of the most pronounced type. But my advocacy of it led me to perceive its errors, and my criticisms were formulated before I read any literature of socialism. But when, upon coming into contact with socialistic writers I found their criticisms were the same as my own I was for a while carried away by their scheme. But upon further study, I found their plans to be, not only as I though impracticable, but contrary to the fundamental principles of English political philosophy, in which I still believed. You can imagine that was not a pleasant condition for one appreciative of logical symmetry. You said a year ago that my views were not logical, that is, that some of my expressions were contradictory to each other. I don’t doubt that they appeared so, it seems bad logic to admit the purpose of individualism and the criticism of socialists at the same time. You say now in your letter that I have not worked out my ideas into clear and definite shape. That is true, but I am doing it as fast as I can and in my own way. My book upon Pub. Debts is one stage in this direction.

But to go back to the development of this subject in my own mind. The illogical position into which my mind had drifted as the result of the first five years of study, was the occasion of keen intellectual pain: but the sense of the necessity of harmony led me finally to discover a principle, which I thought, and still think, adequate to bridge over the chasm between the purpose of individualism and the criticisms of socialism. This principle is the principle of personal responsibility in the administration of all social power, no matter in what shape that power may exist. This principle has given form to our political society: I wish it to be brought over into industrial relations. Its realization will cure the ills of which socialists complain, without curbing or crushing that which is the highest in the individual. I thought, at first, this principle to be so simple that its statement must gain for it quick recognition. But when I tried to make that statement, and work the theory out, I was at once surprised and chagrined to see what a task lay before me. It is useless to deny that the interests of the privileged classes in our civilization is against responsible administration of industrial power. I worked at it for a year, and then came to the conclusion that I did not yet know enough, nor was I sure enough of my position, to make public the thought which had assumed direction of my studies. It was then that I took up the study of finance and went to work upon Pub. Debts. This is the most simple of any of the topics which must be treated as the subject of constructive economics opened before me: it was also furthest removed from the points likely to cause controversy. I thought I might, perhaps, gain the reputation of a sound thinker so that expressions of views more unusual might attract a candid reading from scholarly men. It has taken a year and a half longer than I had anticipated, and now that it is done seems to have dwarfed in importance.

I do not think this narration will relieve you from embarrassment. I do not see that anything can do that, except a promise on my part to give expression only to orthodox views of social relations. But it has relieved me somewhat and I trust you will consider that an adequate apology. I have of course full confidence in your personal friendship: I only wish you might have equal confidence in my scholarly purposes.

Very truly yours,
H.C. ADAMS.

P.S.

May I add a postscript, for I am sure it is an unjustifiable pride which kept me from inserting it in the body of the letter. I presume the expression(s) of my views which have given you the greatest solicitude are to be found in the Sibley address of last year, and in the syndicate article which I wrote on the Knights of Labor. I do not wish to recall anything said, but I am willing to say that these expressions were as unwise as they were unpremeditated. In justice to myself I should say: that the Sibley address was on Friday afternoon and my invitation was on the Wednesday previous. Professor [R. H.] Thurston said he had been disappointed in his lecturer for the afternoon, that he did not like to postpone the meeting, and that he would like me to open a discussion on the labor problem. He told me, who besides myself would speak, and they were all decidedly opposed to any expression of sympathy with the struggle of the Knights then going on. After my opening address, the man against whom I talked, who, it was said, would reply to me, took his hat and left. Others spoke, among them President [Charles Kendal] Adams, Mr. Smith [sic, perhaps Mr. Frank B. Sanborn?] and Henry [W.] Sage. The President was not dogmatical but did not understand what I tried to say. The others were. My part in the discussion has cost me a professorship, for I do not see how, with the views of Mr. Sage to the functions of a teacher, he can vote for me. It was after the address was made that the talk began, and I thought it then cowardly not to let it be printed, and dishonest to change it. So it went in, as nearly as I could remember as it was given. I think it unfair to judge of my classroom work on this address.

With regard to the syndicate article [“What Do These Strikes Mean?”, a copy attached to Adams’ letter to James B. Angell dated March 25, 1887], I confess myself to have been deceived by the attitude of the Knights of Labor during their strike on the Gould system or I should not have written it. In their articles of complaint, they said certain things which I believed to be true, and I thought the men who drew them up had thought the labor problem through to its end, and had made a stand on a principle in harmony with English Liberties. If so, it was time for men of standing to declare themselves. But it turns out that the Knights hit the mark by a chance shot. They did not know what they were about and got whipped as they deserved. The result of this unfortunate venture is, that I believe more strongly than ever in the necessity of scholarship as one element in the solution of this terrible question that is upon us.

Have you seen “The Ind. Revolution” by Arnold Toynbee? His death is a loss. The scraps of his lectures and letters show him to have had much the same purpose as myself in his studies.

Respectfully
H.C.A.

Source: Columbia University Archives. John M. Clark Collection, Economic Theory and Methodology, Box 28. Folder “Group Power carries moral responsibility”.

Image Source: Johns Hopkins University Sheridan Libraries, graphic and pictorial collection. Henry Carter Adams (Ph.D., Johns Hopkins, 1878). Photograph by Sam B. Revenaugh (1847-1893), Ann Arbor, Mich.

Tags AdamsHC, ClarkJM, Ely

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United States. Courses of Study of Political Economy. 1876 and 1892-93.

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2020-11-22

The first article in the inaugural issue of The Journal of Political Economy, “Courses of Study in Political Economy in the United States in 1876 and in 1892-93,” was written by the founding head of the University of Chicago’s department of political economy, J. Laurence Laughlin. This post provides Laughlin’s appendix that provided information about economics courses taught in 65 colleges/universities in the United States during the last quarter of the 19th century. The bottom line of the table is that “aggregate hours of instruction in 1892-3 [were] more than six times the hours of instruction given in 1876”.

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“How little Political Economy and Finance were taught only fifteen years ago, as compared with the teaching of to-day, must be surprising even to those who have lived and taught in the subject during that period…. At the close of the war courses of economic study had practically no existence in the university curriculum; in short, the studious pursuit of economics in our universities is scarcely twenty years old. These considerations alone might be reasons why economic teaching has not yet been able to color the thinking of our more than sixty millions of people. But about the close of the first century of our national existence it may be said that the study of Political Economy entered upon a new and striking development. This is certainly the marked characteristic of the study of Political Economy in the last fifteen years. How great this has been may be seen from the tables giving the courses of study, respectively, in about 60 institutions in the year 1876 and in 1892-3. (See Appendix I.) The aggregate hours of instruction in 1892-3 are more than six times the hours of instruction given in 1876.” [Laughlin, p. 4]

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Courses of Study in Political Economy in the United States in 1876 and in 1892-93.

Note: Returns could not be obtained from Johns Hopkins University, Amherst College, and some other institutions.

Institution.	Description of Courses.	1876.		1892-3.
		No. hours per week.	No. weeks in year.	No. hours per week.	No. weeks in year.
University of Alabama.	Text Book and Lectures, Senior Year Finance and Taxation	— —	— —	4 2	36 36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		216
Boston University.	Principles of Political Economy	—	—	3	20
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		60
Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine.	Elementary (Required) Advanced (Elective)	5 —	14 —	4 4	12 10
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	70		88
Brown University, Providence, R. I.	Elementary History of Econ. Thought Advanced Course [2^nd] Advanced Course Seminary of History, Pol. Sci., and Pol. Econ.	2½ — — — —	16-17 — — — —	3 3 3 3 2	33-34 11-12 11 11 23
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	40-42½		242-250
University of Chicago, Chicago, Ill.	1. Introductory Political Economy 2. Descriptive Political Economy 3. Advanced Political Economy 4. Industrial and Economic History 5. Scope and Method 6. History of Political Economy 7. Unsettled Problems 8. Socialism 9. Social Economics 10. Practical Economics 11. Statistics 12. Railway Transportation 13. Tariff History of U.S. 14. Financial History of U.S. 15. Taxation 16. Public Debts 17. Seminary	— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —	— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —	5 4 5 4 4 5 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4	12 12 12 24 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		996
Colby University, Waterville, Maine.	Elementary [1^st] Elementary [2^nd] Theoretical Historical	5 — — —	7 — — —	2 2 4 4	13 10 13 10
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	35		138
Columbia College (School of Political Science, New York City.	1. Principles of Political Economy (Element.) 2. Historical Practical Political Economy (Advanced) 3. History of Economic Theory (Advanced) 4. Public Finance (Adv.) 5. Railroad Problems (Adv.) 6. Finan. History of U.S. (Adv.) 7. Tariff History of U.S. (Adv.) 8. Science of Statistics (Adv.) 9. Communism and Socialism (Adv.) 10. Taxation and Distribution (Adv.) 11. Seminarium in Political Economy (Element.) 12. Seminarium in Public Finance and Economy (Adv.) 13. Law of Taxation (Adv.) 3 and 5, 6 and 7, 8 and 9 given in alternate years.	2 — — — — — — — — — — — —	17 — — — — — — — — — — — —	2 3 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2	17 34 34 34 25 34 17 34 34 17 34 34 17
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	34		764
Columbian University, Washington, D.C.	Elements of Political Economy	—	—	5	8
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		40
Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y.	1. Elementary Political Economy 2. Advanced Political Economy 3. Finance 4. Financial History 5. Railroad Problems 6. Currency and Banking 7. Economic History 8. Statistics	2 — — — — — — —	11 — — — — — — —	3 2 2 2 2 2 2 1	34 34 34 13 11 10 34 34
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	22		408
Dartmouth College, Hanover, N.H.	1. Elementary 2. Advanced 3. Advanced Finance and Tariff	6 — —	6 — —	6 6 6	6 2/3 4 1/6 3 1/3
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	36		85
University of Denver, Col.	1. Ely’s Introduction 2. Ingram’s History 3. Gilman’s Profit-Sharing 4. Ely, Labor Movement in America 5. Kirkup’s and Rae’s Socialism 6. Finance and Taxation 7. International Commerce	— — — — — — —	— — — — — — —	2 1 1 2 2 4 2	15 5 5 5 5 5 5
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		90
DePauw University, Greencastle, Ind.	Economics (Elementary) Seminarium (Advanced)	4 —	12 —	4 2	18 36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	48		144
Drury College, Springfield, Mo.	Elementary Course	5	6	5	12
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	30		60
Emory College, Oxford, Ga.	Jevons’ Text, and Lectures.	—	—	5	12
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		60
Franklin and Marshall College.	Political Economy, (Walker’s)	2	15	2	20
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	30		40
Georgetown College, Ky.	1. General Economics 2. Special Topics	5 —	15 —	3 3	20 20
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	75		120
Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass.	1. Introductory 2. Theory (Advanced) 3. Economic History from 1763 4. Railway Transportation 5. Tariff History of U.S. 6. Taxation and Public Debts 7. Financial Hist. of U.S. 8. Condition of Workingmen 9. Economic Hist. to 1763 10. History of Theory to Adam Smith Seminary	3 3 — — — — — — — — —	30 30 — — — — — — — — —	3 3 3 3 2 3 2 3 3 2 2	30 30 30 15 15 30 15 30 30 15 30
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	180		735
Haverford College, Pa.	Economic Theory	—	—	2	40
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		80
Howard University, Washington, D. C.	Elementary	5	10	5	10
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	50		50
Illinois College and Whipple Academy, Jacksonville, Ill.	Newcomb’s Polit. Economy, Seniors	—	—	5	15
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		75
University of Illinois, Champaign, Ill.	Senior Class	5	11	5	11
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	55		55
Iowa College, Grinnell, Iowa.	Political Economy Taxation Railroad Problems Socialism	5 — — —	10 — — —	3 3 3 3	37 14 12 11
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	50		222
State University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa.	Elements of Economics Currency and Banking Industrial Revolutions of 18^thCentury Recent Econ. History and Theory Railroads, Pub. Regulation of Seminary in Polit. Econ.	5 — — — — —	14 — — — — —	5 5 2 2 2 1	14 11 14 11 10 35
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	70		230
Kansas State Agricultural College, Manhattan, Kan.	Elementary, 4^th year	5	8	5	11
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	40		55
Kansas State University, Lawrence, Kansas.	1. Elements of Political Economy 2. Applied Economics 3. Statistics 4. Land Tenures 5. Finance	5 — — — —	19 — — — —	5 3 2 2 2	19 19 19 19 19
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	95		266
Lake Forest University, Lake Forest, Ill.	1. Elementary 2. Advanced	3 —	11 —	3 3	16 13
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	33		87
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston, Mass.	1. Political Economy, Elem., Junior Year 2. Financial Hist. of U.S., Jun. and Sen. Year 3. Taxation, Junior and Senior Year 4. History of Commerce 5. History of Industry, Junior and Senior Year. 6. Socialism, etc. (Option), Jun. and Sen. Year 7. History of Economic Theory (Opt.), Senior 8. Statistics and Graphic Methods, Junior 9. Statistics and Sociology (Option) Senior	2 — — — — — — — —	15 — — — — — — — —	3 3 3 3 — 3 2 2 3	15 15 15 15 — 15 15 15 15
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	30		375
Michigan Agricultural College.	Primary Course	—	—	5	12
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		60
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich.	1. Elements of Political Economy 2. Elements of Political Economy 3. Hist. Devel. of Industr. Society 4. Finance 5. Problems in Pol. Econ 6. Transportation Problem 7. Land Tenure and Agrarian Movements 8. Socialism and Communism 9. Currency and Banking 10. Tariff History of U.S. 11. Indust. and Comm. Develop. of U.S. 12. History of Pol. Econ. 13. Statistics 15. Economic Thought 16. Labor and Monopoly Problems 17. Seminary in Finance 18. Seminary in Economics 20. Social Philosophy with Economic Relations 21. Current Econ. Legislation and Literature	2½ — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —	18 — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —	3 4 3 4 4 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 1 1 1 2 2 1 2	18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18 18
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	45		756
Middlebury College, Middlebury, Vermont.	1. Elementary (Junior Class) 2. Advanced (Senior Class) 3. Finance (Senior Class) 4. Seminary	4 4 — —	10 10 — —	3 2 2 1	35 21 14 21
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	80		196
University of Minnesota.	1. Elementary 2. Advanced 3. Am. Pub. Economy 4. Undergraduate Seminary 5. Graduate Seminary	5 — — — —	13 — — — —	4 4 4 2 1	13 13 10 23 36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	65		226
University of Mississippi, University, Miss.	Advanced	—	—	5	30
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		150
Mt. Holyoke College, South Hadley, Mass.	Polit. Econ. (General) Polit. Econ. Seminary	— —	— —	4 2	12 12
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		72
College of New Jersey at Princeton.	Pol. Econ. (Elem., Elective) Pol. Econ. (Elem., Required) Finance (Elective) Historics—Econ. Semin.	2 — — —	13 — — —	— 2 2 2	— 16 16 15
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	26		94
College of the City of New York.		—	—	—	16
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		48^*
New Hampshire College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts, Hanover, N. H.	Elementary—Perry or Walker	4	10-12	5	10
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	48		50
Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio.	1. Elementary Polit. Econ. 2. Advanced Polit. Econ. 3. Finance 4. History Econ. Thought 5. Economic and Social Problems 6. “Money,” etc.	5 — — — — —	12 — — — — —	5 5 3 3 3 2	11 12 25 13 12 36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	60		337
Ohio State University.	Elementary Advanced Finance Seminary (Indust. History)	— — — —	— — — —	2 2 2 2	38 26 12 38
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		228
Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware, Ohio.		4	12	4	12
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	48		48
Penn. Military Academy, Chester, Penn.	Elementary	—	—	5	13
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		65
University of Pennsylvania, Wharton, School of Finance and Economy, Philadelphia, Penn.	1. Grad. Course in Finance 2. Grad. Course in Theoretical Polit. Econ. 3. Grad. Course in Statistics 4. Elem. Course in Finance 5. Elem. Course in Theoret. Polit. Econ. 6. Elem. Course in Statistics 7. Elem. Course in Practical Polit. Econ. 8. Course in Money 9. Course in Banking 10. Advanced Course in Political Economy 11. Economic History of Europe 12. Grad. Course in Practical Polit. Econ. 13. Econ. and Fin. History of U.S. 14. Grad. Econ. History of the U.S. 15. Grad. English Econ. History from 13^th to 17^th century 16. Modern Econ. History.	— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —	— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —	1 2 3 3 2 2 2 2 1 2 3 2 2 4 3 3	30 30 30 30 30 15 15 15 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		1020
Purdue University, Lafayette, Ind.	Elementary Course	—	—	3	19
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		57
Randolph Macon College, Ashland, Va.	Elementary	2	32	2	32
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	64		64
University of Rochester, Rochester, N.Y.	Elementary Econ. Polit. History U.S.	5 —	14 —	5 1	14 20
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	70		90
Rutger’s College.	Polit. Econ. (Elementary)	3	12	4	22
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	36		88
Smith College, Northampton, Mass.	Elementary Course Adv. Course in Theory Seminarium Practical Studies	3 — — —	12 — — —	3 3 2 2	14 14 10 12
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	36		128
South Carolina College, Columbia, S.C.	Polit. Econ. Senior Class Applied Polit. Econ.	— —	— —	2 2	40 20
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		120
Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, Penn.	Polit. Econ. (Walker) Finance Protection and Free Trade Money and Banking History of Econ. Theories	— — — — —	— — — — —	4 4 4 4 4	20 10 10 10 10
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		240
Syracuse University, Syracuse, N.Y.	Elementary Finance Industrial Development since 1850 Seminary	— — — —	— — — —	3 2 2 2	14 10 12 38
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		162
University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tenn.	Elementary Advanced (Post-Graduate)	— —	— —	3 2	20 Varies
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		100?
University of Texas, Austin, Texas.	General	—	—	3	36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		108
Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut.	Elementary Advanced Finance	4 — —	13 — —	3 4 2	17 17 17
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	52		153
Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee.	Political Economy, Elementary Political Economy, Advanced	3 —	36 —	3 3	36 36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	108		216
Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York.	Principles of Economics Economic History Railroads, Trusts, and Relation of State to Monopolies Labor Problem and Socialism Seminary	— — — — —	— — — — —	3 3 2 2 2	18 18 18 18 18
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		216
University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont.	Elementary Advanced	— —	— —	3 2	20 20
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		100
University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Va.	Theory of Economics Science of Society	3 —	26 —	3 2½	16 16
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	78		88
Washington and Jefferson College, Washington, Pa.	Political Economy	3	11	3	16
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	33		48
Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Va.	Elementary Advanced	— —	— —	3 3	14 26
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		120
Washington University, St. Louis.	Prescribed Course	3	20	3	20
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	60		60
Wellesley College, Wellesley, Mass.	Industrial History Economic Theory Statistics (Seminary) Socialism (Seminary)	— — — —	— — — —	3 3 3 3	18 18 18 18
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		216
Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut.	General Introductory (Sen.) General Introductory (Jun.) Economic Problems	1½ — —	36 — —	2 3 2	36 18 36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	54		198
West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia.	Elementary Pol. Economy Advanced Pol. Economy	— —	— —	2 2	14 36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		100
Williams College, Williamstown, Mass.	Political Economy	6	14	3	15
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	84		45
University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wis.	Econ. Seminary Distribution of Wealth History of Pol. Econ. Money Public Finance Statistics Recent Econ. Theories Synoptical Lectures Outlines of Economics	— — — — — — — — —	— — — — — — — — —	2 5 5 5 3 3 3 1 4	37 14½ 12 10½ 37 12 14½ 15 37
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	—		612½
Yale University, New Haven, Conn.	Pol. Econ.**—Elem. (2) Pol. Econ.—Adv. (3) Economic History (2) Finance, Public (2) Finance, Corporate (2) Mathematical Theory (1) Seminary Instruction (2)	3 2 — — — —	36 36 36 — — — —	4 3 4 2 3 1 1	36 36 36 36 36 36 36
	[Total hours of instruction per year]	180		648

_{* [College of the City of New York] A few hours additional are given in the work of the Department of Philosophy; the whole number amounting to some 52 or 53.}

_{** [Yale University] Figures in brackets represent numbers of courses under each head.}

Source: Appendix I to “The Study of Political Economy in the United States” by J. Laurence Laughlin, The Journal of Political Economy, vol. 1, no. 1 (December, 1892), pp. 143-151.

Image Source: J. Laurence Laughlin drawn in the University of Chicago yearbook Cap and Gown (1907), p. 208.

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Economists Exam Questions Harvard Michigan Suggested Reading Syllabus

Harvard. Syllabus, reading assignments, final exam for “Economies of Tropical Africa”. Berg, 1961

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2020-07-06

Today’s post provides material from a regional economics course on economic development in “tropical Africa” by the newly minted Harvard Ph.D., Elliot Joseph Berg, from the Spring term of the 1960-61 academic year. Biographical and career information is provided, followed by the transcription of the course syllabus and final examination.

According to a story about African Studies in the Harvard Crimson (“Harvard Expands Africa Studies with Courses in History, Anthropology”, October 3, 1961),

“Last year [1960-61] the University offered its first two courses on Africa–one in Government, the other in Economics.”

__________________________

Elliot Joseph Berg’s best known publication:

Report of the African Strategy Review Group coordinated by Elliot Berg. Accelerated Development in Sub-Saharan Africa: An Agenda for Action. The World Bank, 1981.

Finding aid to Elliot Berg Papers on African Development. (MSS 308 large) Michigan State University Libraries.

__________________________

Life and Career

Elliot Joseph Berg
(b. 20 May 1927 in New York City;
d. 21 November 2002 in Alexandria, VA).

Education:

B.A., New York University, 1949
M.A., Columbia University, 1955
Ph.D., Harvard University, 1960.

Teaching Fellow, Assistant Professor of Economics, Harvard University 1959-1964.

Project Director, Harvard Advisory Group, Liberia, 1964-1966.

Awarded Grand Commander Order Star of Africa by the Government of Liberia, 1965.

Professor of Economics, Director of the Center Economic Development, University of Michigan, 1966-1983

1982-1991: President, Elliot Berg Associates. Alexandria, VI.

Adjunct Professor, Universite de l’Auvergne, Clermont, France, 1982-2000

Vice President, Development Alternatives Incorporated, Bethesda, MD, 1990-1995.

Source: Prabook webpage for Elliot Joseph Berg.

__________________________

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 118. The Economy of Tropical Africa. Dr. E.J. Berg. Half course. (S)

Total 37: 3 Graduates, 13 Seniors, 6 Juniors, 10 Sophomores, 2 Radcliffe, 3 Other Graduates.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1960-1961, p. 76.

__________________________

Syllabus and Readings

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics

Outline
Economics 118
THE ECONOMIES OF TROPICAL AFRICA

The Pattern of Development
1. The Pre-Colonial Background
2. Peoples and Cultures: The Colonial Ideology
3. The expansion of the Money Economy: Measures of Rates of Growth
4. Types of Economic Growth: The Mining and Settler Economies and the Peasant-Producer Economies
5. Development of a Labor Force
6. The Role of the Non-African: Patterns of Conflict and Cooperation
Structural Characteristics of African Economies
1. Population Patterns
2. The Extent of the Money Economy and the Concept of Dualism
3. African National Accounts
4. Export-Orientation and the Terms of Trade
5. Goods Markets and Price Determination
6. Labor Markets and Wage Determination
Problems of Economic Policy and the Strategy of Development
1. The Expansion of Agricultural Output
2. Internal Trade Policies and Marketing Boards
3. Transportation and Development
4. The High-Level Manpower Problem and the Economics of Education
5. Wage and Labor Policy
6. Monetary Policy
7. Tax Policy and Problems of Public Finance
8. Accelerated Industrialization
9. Development Planning
10. The Role of the State: The Socialist Solution in Africa
The Economics of Independence
1. Economic Viability, Economic Development and the Size of States
2. Uneven Growth and the Economic of Federalism
3. External Economic Assistance
4. Africa and the European Common Market
5. Problems of African Economic Integration
6. The Economic Prospects for Africa

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

*Indicates substitutable readings

The Pattern of Development

*Pim, Sir Alan, The Financial and Economic History of the African Tropical Territories. (Oxford, 1940).

*Knowles, L., The Economic Development of the Overseas Empire, (London, 1924), Vol. I, pp. 113-301; 485-508.

Stamp, L.D., Africa—A Study in Tropical Development (New York, 1953) Ch. 2.

Kimble, G. H. T., Tropical Africa (New York, 1960), Ch. 1.

Hancock, W. K., Survey of British Commonwealth Affairs, Vol. II, Problems of Economic Policy, 1918-1939, Part 2 (London, 1942).

Buell, R. L., The Native Problem in Africa (New York, 1928), Ch. 21, 29, 82, 83, 87, 89.

Myint, H., “The Classical Theory of International Trade and the Underdeveloped Countries,” Economic Journal, June 1958, pp. 317-337.

Singer, H., “The Distribution of Gains Between Investing and Borrowing Countries,” American Economic Review, May 1950, Papers and Proceedings, pp. 473-485.

United Nations, Bureau of Economic Affairs, Enlargement of the Exchange Economy in Tropical Africa (New York, 1954).

Hailey, Lord, An African Survey (London, 1957), pp. 1263-1306.

Bauer, P. T., Economic Analysis and Policy in Underdeveloped Countries, Ch. 2.

Structural Characteristics of African Economics
1. General

United Nations, Department of Economic Affairs, Review of Economic Conditions in Africa. Supplement to World Economic Report, 1949-50 (New York, 1951). Ch. 1.

United Nations, Department of Economic Affairs, Scope and Structure of Money Economies in Tropical Africa. (New York, 1955).

1. The Dual Economy and the Supply of Effort

United Nations, Department of Economic Affairs, Enlargement of the Exchange Economy in Tropical Africa.

B. Higgins, Economic Development (New York, 1959), Ch. 12, pp. 274-293.

A. I. Richards, Land, Labour and Diet in Northern Rhodesia (OUP, 1939), pp. 201-227.

P. T. Bauer and B. Yamey, The Economics of Underdeveloped Countries (Cambridge, 1957), Ch. VII.

W. O Jones, “Economic Man in Africa,” Food Research Institute Studies (Stanford), Vol. I, #2, May 1960, pp. 107-134.

1. Population Patterns

G. T. Kimble, Tropical Africa, Vol. I, Ch. 3, pp. 81-124.

A. Hirschman, The Strategy of Economic Development (New Haven, 1958) pp. 176-182.

East Africa Royal Commission (1953-1955) Report (London, H.M.S.O., 1956. Cmd 9475), Ch. 3, pp. 30-40; Appendix VII, pp. 462-473.

1. National Income

D. Seers, “The Role of National Income Estimates in the Statistical Policy of an Underdeveloped Area,” in Review of Economic Studies, Vol. XX (1952-3), pp..159-68.

A. R. Prest, The Investigation of National Income in British Tropical Dependencies. University of London, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, Commonwealth Papers, No. IV., (London, 1957).

Phyllis Deane, Colonial Social Accounting (Cambridge, 1953) pp. 223-229.

1. Export-Orientation and the Terms of Trade

Singer, “The Distribution of Gains…(article cited in Part I.)

Higgins, Economic Development, Ch. 15 (omit pp. 374-382).

United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Economic Survey of Africa Since 1950, Ch. 3.

G. Haberler, International Trade and Economic Development (Cairo, 1959), pp. 1-24.

1. Consumer Goods Markets, Price Determination and the Mechanics of Inflation

Gold Coast, Ministry of Finance, A Survey of Some Economic Matters (Accra, 1952), pp. 12-17.

D. Seers and C. R. Ross, Report on Financial and Physical Problems of Development in the Gold Coast(Accra, 1952), pp. 1-72.

P. T. Bauer, West African Trade (Cambridge, 1954), pp. 7-64; 104-144; 156-171; 379-392.

F. Bezy, Problemes Structurels de l’Economie Congolaise (Louvain, 1957), pp. 86-94.

East Africa Royal Commission Report, pp. 64-76.

M. Perham, (ed.), Mining, Commerce & Finance in Nigeria, (London, 1948), pp. 195-202; 218-224 (“Balance of Payments and the Three Sectional Price Levels”).

F. C. Wright, African Consumers in Nyasaland and Tanganyika. An Enquiry into the Distribution and Consumption of Commodities Among Africans Carried Out in 1952-1953. Colonial Research Studies #17 (London, 1955).

W. V. Berelsford, Copperbelt Markets. A Social and Economic Study (Lusaka, 1947), pp. 7-12; 21-41.

M. Capet, Les Economies de l’AOF (Paris, 1958), pp. [no pages given]

1. Labor Markets, The Migrant Labor System and Wage Determination

International Labour Office, African Labour Survey (Geneva, 1959), pp. 106-120; 127-169; 259-294.

Bezy, Problemes Structurels de l’Economie Congolaise, pp. 101-197.

Sheila Van der Horst, Native Labour in South Africa (London, 1942) pp. [no pages given]

E. A. Royal Commission Report, pp. 146-172.

E. Berg, “French West Africa,” in W. Galenson, ed., Labor and Economic Development (New York, 1959), pp. 193-204.

J. C. Mitchell, “The Causes of Labour Migration,” in Bulletin of the Inter-African Labour Institute, Jan. 1959, pp. 12-45.

W. Elkan, “Migrant Labor in Africa: An Economist’s Approach,” in American Economic Review, Papers and Proceedings, Vol. XLIX, #2, (May 1959), pp. 188-197.

B. Gussman, “Industrial Efficiency and the Urban African: A Study of Conditions in Southern Rhodesia,” in Africa, Vol. XXIII, #2 (April 1953), pp. 135-144.

W. Watson, Tribal Cohesion in a Money Economy: A Study of the Mambwe People of Northern Rhodesia(Manchester, 1958), Ch. 3-5.

& IV. The Strategy of Development and the Economics of Independence
1. The Expansion of Agriculture

Food and Agricultural Organization, The State of Food and Agriculture, 1958 (Rome, 1959), Part III, pp. 90-162.

S. H. Frankel, “The Kongwa Experiment: Lessons of the East African Groundnut Scheme,” in The Economic Impact on Under-Developed Societies, (Cambridge, Mass., 1953), pp. 141-153.

K.D.S. Baldwin, The Niger Agricultural Project (Oxford, 1957) pp. 1-7, 81-125; 172-197.

Kimble, Tropical Africa, Vol. I, Ch. 5, pp. 163-193.

E. Africa Royal Commission Report, Part V.

1. Marketing Boards

P. T. Bauer, West African Trade, pp. 263-343.

1. Wage and Labor Policy

International Labour Office, African Labour Survey (Geneva, 1958), pp. 259-294.

Inter-African Labour Institute, Commission for Technical Co-operation in Africa South of the Sahara, The Human Factors of Productivity in Africa: A Preliminary Survey, pp. 1-55; 103-106.

Federation of Nigeria, Report of the Fact-Finding Committee on the Minimum Wage Question, (Lagos, 1955), mimeo’d, pp. 10-25.

E. A. Royal Commission Report, pp. 146-162.

E. Berg, “French West Africa,” in W. Galenson (ed.), Labor and Economic Development, pp. 223-241.

1. High Level Manpower and the Economics of Education

Federal Ministry of Education, Nigeria. Investment in education; The Report of the Commission on Post-School Certificate and Higher Education in Nigeria. (The Ashby Report.) (Lagos, 1960).

1. Industrialization

United Nations, Economic Survey of Africa Since 1950, pp. 134-140.

W. A. Lewis, Report on Industrialization and the Gold Coast (Accra, 1952).

1. Development Plans and Finance

W.A. Lewis, “On Assessing a Development Plan.”

United Nations, Economic Survey of Africa Since 1950, pp. 135-47.

“The Finance of Development in Tropical Africa,” in United Africa Company, Statistical and Economic Review, #20 (September 1957), and #21 (March 1958).

1. Integration and the Economics of Federalism

E. Berg, “The Economic Basis of Political Choice in French West Africa,” in American Political Science Review, Vol. LIV, #2 (June, 1960), pp. 391-405.

East Africa, Report of the Fiscal Commission (The Raisman Report).

C. Legum, A New Deal in Central Africa. (“The Economic Argument”).

[No additional reading assignment was given for the Reading Period]

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003. Box 7, Folder “Economics 1960-61, (1 of 2)”.

__________________________

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics

Economics 118
FINAL EXAMINATION
May 29, 1961

Dr. Elliot Berg

INSTRUCTIONS: Answer both questions in Part I, and any three questions in Part II. Organize your answers and write clearly.

Part I. Answer both Questions

(45 minutes). An African economist recently made the following statement:
“The pattern of economic development imposed by the European powers in Africa has been a disaster for Africa. What benefits have we drawn from the European presence? Our people have been exploited, our raw materials drained, our economies tied to specialized products which face a dismal future on world markets. The economic benefits of the colonial experience have accrued to the metropolitan countries.”
Do you agree? Discuss.
(45 minutes). You are an eminent economist, deputized by a committee of African governments to make recommendations regarding the re-grouping of existing African states into the most “rational” conceivable economic units. If economic considerations alone were decisive, how would you re-draw the African map?
In your answer you may focus on any one region (i.e., West Africa, East Africa, etc.) or you may discuss the problem more generally. Make clear the theoretical considerations, on which you base your recommendations—e.g., if you think larger states are more conducive to economic growth than smaller ones, give the analysis supporting your position.

Part II. Answer any three questions

(30 minutes)

“In the development planning of most African countries, agricultural expansion should receive first attention, for agriculture is the essential springboard on which all economic growth depends.”
Do you agree? Discuss, giving some attention to the problems of agricultural development, and to alternative methods of agricultural development in Africa.

(30 minutes)

Some economics argue that because of the migrant labor system in Africa wage levels for unskilled African labor are higher than they would otherwise be. On the other hand, Adam Smith wrote, in The Wealth of Nations: “When a person derives his subsistence from one employment, which does not occupy the greater part of his time, in the intervals of leisure he is often willing to work for another for less wages than would otherwise suit the nature of the employment.”
Are these arguments incompatible? Analyze the effects of labor migration on the level of wages of unskilled African labor.

(30 minutes)

Discuss the major problems of national income accounting in African countries.

(30 minutes)

African economies are commonly described as “fragile.” In what sense, and to what extent, is this an accurate description? Do you believe that African economies are more susceptible to domestic inflation than are advanced industrial economies?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Bound volume: Social Sciences, Final Examinations. June, 1961. (HUC 7000.28, vol. 134). Papers Printed for Final Examinations [in] History, History of Religions, … , Economics, … , Naval Science, Air Science.

Image Source: Screen shot of Elliot Berg, President of Elliot Berg Associates, Inc. from C-SPAN, International Conference on Privatization hosted by the Sequoia Institute(February 17, 1986).

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Amherst Barnard Berkeley Brown Chicago Colorado Columbia Cornell Dartmouth Duke Harvard Illinois Indiana Iowa Johns Hopkins Kansas M.I.T. Michigan Michigan State Minnesota Missouri Nebraska North Carolina Northwestern NYU Ohio State Pennsylvania Princeton Radcliffe Rochester Stanford Swarthmore Texas Tufts UCLA Vassar Virginia Washington University Wellesley Williams Wisconsin Yale

U.S. Bureau of Education. Contributions to American Educational History, Herbert B. Adams (ed.), 1887-1903

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2020-02-22

I stumbled across this series while I was preparing the previous post on the political economy questions for the Harvard Examination for Women (1874). I figured it would be handy for me to keep a list of links to the monographs on the history of higher education in 35 of the United States at the end of the nineteenth century. Maybe this collection will help you too.

Contributions to American Educational History, edited by Herbert B. Adams

The College of William and Mary. Herbert B. Adams (1887)
Thomas Jefferson and the University of Virginia. Herbert B. Adams (1888)
History of Education in North Carolina. Charles L. Smith (1888)
History of Higher Education in South Carolina. C. Meriwether (1889)
Education in Georgia. Charles Edgeworth Jones (1889)
Education in Florida. George Gary Bush (1889)
Higher Education in Wisconsin. William F. Allen and David E. Spencer (1889)
History of Education in Alabama. Willis G. Clark (1890).
History of Federal and State Aid to Higher Education. Frank W. Blackmar (1890)
Higher Education in Indiana. James Albert Woodburn (1891).
Higher Education in Michigan. Andrew C. McLaughlin. (1891)
History of Higher Education in Ohio. George W. Knight and John R. Commons (1891)
History of Higher Education in Massachusetts. George Gary Bush (1891)
The History of Education in Connecticut. Bernard C. Steiner (1893)
The History of Education in Delaware. Lyman P. Powell (1893)
Higher Education in Tennessee. Lucius Salisbury Merriam (1893)
Higher Education in Iowa. Leonard F. Parker (1893)
History of Higher Education in Rhode Island. William Howe Tolman (1894)
History of Education in Maryland. Bernard C. Steiner (1894).
History of Education in Lousiana. Edwin Whitfield Fay (1898).
Higher Education in Missouri. Marshall S. Snow (1898)
History of Education in New Hampshire. George Gary Bush (1898)
History of Education in New Jersey. David Murray (1899).
History of Education in Mississippi. Edward Mayes (1899)
History of Higher Education in Kentucky. Alvin Fayette Lewis (1899)
History of Education in Arkansas. Josiah H. Shinn (1900)
Higher Education in Kansas. Frank W. Blackmar (1900)
The University of the State of New York. History of Higher Education in the State of New York. Sidney Sherwood (1900)
History of Education in Vermont. George Gary Bush (1900)
History of Education in West Virginia. A. R. Whitehill (1902)
The History of Education in Minnesota. John N. Greer (1902)
Education in Nebraska. Howard W. Caldwell (1902)
A History of Higher Education in Pennsylvania. Charles H. Haskins and William I. Hull (1902)
History of Higher Education in Colorado. James Edward Le Rossignol (1903)
History of Higher Education in Texas. J. J. Lane (1903)
History of Higher Education in Maine. Edward W. Hall (1903)

Image Source: Cropped from portrait of Herbert Baxter Adams ca. 1890s. Johns Hopkins University graphic and pictorial collection.

Cal Tech Columbia Fields M.I.T. Michigan Princeton Stanford

Columbia. Memo advocating the establishment of an Industrial Relations Section. Wolman, 1944

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2019-11-18

The following brief memo written by Leo Wolman was commissioned in 1943 by an informal committee to provide a case for establishing an Industrial Relations Institute at Columbia. Besides identifying the existing centers of industrial relations research and teaching in the U.S. and Canada, Wolman also points to the key role played by “C. J. Hicks, the dean of American industrial relations men, adviser to the Rockefellers on policies and problems in this field and, until his retirement some 15 years ago, the director of labor relations for the Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey.”

_____________________

Leo Wolman, Biographical Note

1890, Feb. 24. Born, Baltimore, Md.
1914. Ph.D. in political economy, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md.
1916. Published The Boycott in American Trade Unions. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press
1918. Appointed head of section on production statistics, War Industries Board
1919. Attached to American peace mission, Paris, France
1919-1928. Member, faculty, New School for Social Research, New York, N.Y.
1920-1931. Director of research, Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union
1920-1934. Editor, Journal of American Statistics Association
circa 1925. Became freelance researcher for the National Bureau of Economic Research, formally joining the staff in 1931 and later becoming director-at-large for research. NBER publications by Leo Wolman.
1931-1958. Professor of economics, Columbia University, New York, N.Y.
1933. Appointed to staff of National Recovery Administration
1936. Published Ebb and Flow in American Trade Unionism. New York: National Bureau of Economic Research
1961, Oct. 2. Died, New York, N.Y.

Source: Library of Congress. Leo Wolman Papers. Biographical Note.

_____________________

COPY TO DR. FACKENTHAL

October 23, 1944

Dean George B. Pegram,
201 Low Memorial Library.

Dear Dean Pegram:

I enclose a copy of a statement prepared by Professor Wolman on “Industrial Relations Sections or Departments in American Universities”. This was prepared in compliance with the recommendation made by the informal committee that met last year to consider the possibility of our setting up an Industrial Relations Institute at Columbia. I have had some two dozen copies of this statement mimeographed. These will be available for distribution if you plan to call another meeting to explore this matter further.

Faithfully yours,

_____________________

Industrial Relations Sections or Departments

During the past 15 years, a number of American universities, and one Canadian, have organized sections or departments of industrial relations. The earliest of these was the Industrial Relations Section of Princeton University. Since 1930, similar sections have been established at the University of Michigan, Stanford, California Institute of Technology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Queens University, Canada. These sections are integral parts of the graduate departments of the several institutions. The moving spirit in initiating and finding financial resources for the sections, already established, was C. J. Hicks, the dean of American industrial relations men, adviser to the Rockefellers on policies and problems in this field and, until his retirement some 15 years ago, the director of labor relations for the Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey.

The purposes of this departure were several—to keep members of the faculty and students abreast of the very rapid developments in this important area of private and public policy, to make available to employers, managers, labor, and public officials comparative data as to practices, rules, procedures and policies, to enable students desiring to specialize in labor, labor relations and related subjects to observe and study the practical workings of industrial relations, to push forward the boundaries of knowledge through research, and to establish a closer relation between the scientific activities of universities and the problems of industry, labor, government, and the public. In carrying out these purposes, the various sections have built up libraries of current materials, have published studies dealing with current developments, such as the reemployment of veterans, or of historical importance, such as labor banking in the United States, have trained graduate students, and have held conferences, annual as a rule, for persons working in labor relations.

Depending on their location, age, and industrial environment, the sections now in operation have emphasized different practices. California Technology, operating in a region where large-scale industry is relatively new and personnel men are scarce, has devoted much of its time and resources to bringing to bear the knowledge and experience of other parts of the country on the problems and needs of Southern California. The Massachusetts Institute, operating in an area concerned with unemployment and industrial contraction, has concentrated on research in wages, labor mobility, unemployment, and the like. But all of the sections study, teach, and write about the large issues of private and public policy.

The funds for these enterprises come largely from business, usually in the form of annual contributions pledged for periods of 3 or 5 years. Occasionally a specific piece of research is financed by one of the Foundations but this source of funds has not been counted on for current expenses. Contributions by labor unions have been only a small fraction of total income, though they generally participate in the conferences, and make use of available materials.

There can be little question that the establishment of an industrial relations section at Columbia (associated with the faculties of Political Science and Business) would confer many benefits upon the University. It would make available to students in this field facilities, publications, and contacts with labor and industry which they now lack. It would open up for graduate students new opportunities for employment. It would make available to the university facilities and funds for research. It would create for interested numbers of the faculty, working in the related areas of labor economics, theory, public law, sociology, and labor law, the occasions for using the materials, experience, and problems of industry, labor, and government, not now available to them. It would enable the University to enlarge the range of its public service by serving some of the needs of the enormous and variegated industry, located in this city and the surrounding industrial area of New Jersey, Connecticut, and New York State.

The funds for such an undertaking are probably available in industry. At any rate the other universities had no difficulty raising money. What is needed at Columbia is endorsement of the idea by the faculty, administration, and trustees and the appointment of a small committee instructed to make the plans, raise the funds and find the man capable of directing a section of industrial relations at Columbia.

Leo Wolman

Source: Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Columbiana. Department of Economics Collection. Faculty. Box 2, Folder “Department of Economics—Faculty. Beginning Jan. 1, 1944”.

Image Source: Detail from a faculty group picture (early 1930’s). Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Columbiana. Department of Economics Collection. Box 9, Folder “Photos”.

Tags HicksCJ, Wolman

Berkeley Chicago Faculty Regulations Harvard Johns Hopkins M.I.T. Michigan Rochester Stanford Uncategorized Yale

Harvard. Report on the General Examination for an Economics PhD, 1970

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2019-09-25

What makes this report on the general examination in the economics PhD program at Harvard particularly valuable is its brief survey of the practice at eight other universities: Yale, MIT, Johns Hopkins, Rochester, Stanford, Berkeley, Michigan, and Chicago.

_____________________

DRAFT

This draft is distributed in Professor Chenery’s absence to permit discussion at the next Department meeting, January 27, 1970.
Professor Chenery or other members of The Committee might wish to record further comments in preparation [of] a final report.

* * * * * * * *

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

Cambridge, Massachusetts 02135
January 16, 1970

To: The Department of Economics
From: Committee on Graduate Instruction

REPORT ON THE GENERAL EXAMINATION FOR THE PH.D.

In response to a number of requests from students and faculty, the Committee has reexamined at considerable length the requirements for the General Examination. This report summarizes our general assessment in section I and makes specific recommendations for changes in section II. Some related issues needing further consideration are listed in section III.

Although for the past several years graduate students have criticized various aspects of the generals, the main source of dissatisfaction seems to be with the rigidity of “the system” rather than with any particular aspect of it. We have taken advantage of the fact that the Committee now has three student members to try to understand some of the effects of our present procedures on students’ choices and incentives. We have also tried to strike a better balance between preparation for the general examination and other aspects of a student’s training in his first two years.

As a background for our discussion, the secretary of the Committee compiled a useful summary of the regulations in effect at other leading universities, which is attached.

ROLE OF THE GENERAL EXAMINATION

The primary functions [sic] of the General Examination is to evaluate the student’s formal preparation in economics before he proceeds to more advanced phases of teaching and thesis preparation. It also serves as a screening device to weed out weak candidates, as a basis for subsequent recommendations for employers, and as an indirect way of organizing the student’s course work in his first two years. These multiple functions produce much of the debate over requirements at Harvard and elsewhere, since a system that is ideal for one purpose has weaknesses for another.

One of the main criticisms of the existing Harvard system is its psychological impact on the student. The need to satisfy the requirements in all fields within a period of several months inhibits most students from exploring non-required topics until after they have passed the generals. On balance, we are impressed with the desirability of adopting a more flexible timing that will encourage the student to get most of his tool requirements out of the way in the first year and use the second year to explore the fields of his special interest and get some taste of actual research. We have tried to maintain the undoubted benefits of an overall examination, however, as compared to a set of course requirements.

Our survey of other departments shows a significant trend toward breaking down the requirements into separate parts and focusing less on the culminating oral examination. Most departments use the qualifying examination in theory as a device for screening first year students, which also reduces the burden of preparing all fields in the second year. In most departments the minimum proficiency in quantitative techniques and economic history is demonstrated by a satisfactory course grade rather than by inclusions in the general examination. Although we have made our own judgements on these questions, we recommend movement in these directions.

Another consideration which makes greater flexibility desirable is the growing proportion of students who are already well prepared in one or more required fields. For many students, the present system therefore encourages too much review of material they have already covered. We feel that those who are adequately prepared on one of the required fields (theory, quantitative method, history) should have an opportunity to satisfy this requirement in their first year in order to make better use of their time thereafter.

Our recommendations are directed toward achieving greater flexibility in the timing of courses and examinations to allow the student to make more effective use of his time. This should enable many students to get started earlier on their optional fields and to make a better choice of their field of specialization. We do not envision any reduction in the total work done in the first two years or any lowering of standards of performance.

SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS

General Principles

The general examination should be separated into four component parts—theory, quantitative method, economic history, and special fields—each of which would be graded separately.
The minimum requirement in quantitative method and economic history should be regarded as a “tool requirement” or “literacy test” as has become the practice in the quantitative field. Students wishing to specialize in these fields may offer them at a higher level as one of their special fields.
The term “general examination” would apply to the oral examination on the special fields. (The question of a general grade on all parts as at present was left open.)
There should be no prescribed timing of the four components, other than the stipulation that the required fields be either completed (or write-off courses in progress) at the time of the oral examination on the special fields. Qualified students would be encouraged to complete one or more requirements in the first year.
Two write-offs should be allowed rather than one.
A subcommittee would be set up for economic history (and retained in theory and quantitative method). The standards and ways of satisfying them in the three required fields should be proposed by the three subcommittees and ratified by the GIC and the Department.

The Theory Requirement

The present coverage (roughly 201a, 201b, 202a) should be retained. The examination would continue to be written.
The examination should be offered two or three times a year. (A straw vote by students showed a preference for June, September and January and a margin for September over January.) Most students would take the examination at the end of their first year—in June or September.

The Quantitative Requirement

The present de facto standard of the written examination should be accepted as the “literacy test”.
The requirement can be met either by the present type of written examination (given twice a year) or by a grade of B+ in 221b or 224a. (It is estimated that roughly 75% would be able to qualify by course examination.)

The Economic History Requirement

The history requirement be made parallel to the quantitative requirement in that:
1. It can be satisfied by course or special departmental examination.
2. It can either be offered at a minimum level or at a higher level as a special field.
The minimum requirement would be satisfied by a course grade that would allow a similar proportion to qualify in this way (B+ or A- pending further information).
Alternatives to the present 233 sequence (if any) to be established by the history subcommittee.
Minimum standards in both history and quantitative method could be demonstrated by course examination.

The Requirement in Special Fields

Two special fields would be required as the basis for the oral examination, which would also cover general analytical ability.
Advanced theory, econometrics and economic history would be eligible as special fields, but the first two could not both be included. (In the majority view, one applied field apart from history would be required in order to eliminate the possibility of a candidate offering only the three required fields.)
The candidate would be encouraged (or required?) to submit a research paper to be made part of the subject matter and record of the general examination (He is now “expected” to have presented a paper to a working seminar by the end of his second year.)
The general oral examination would normally be taken at the end of the second year, but could not be taken before the qualifying exams in theory, quantitative and history have been passed (or prospective write-offs are in progress.)

QUESTIONS OF GRADING

Should all examinations be either pass-fail or on a more limited grading scale than at present?
Should the passing standard for the course option in both quantitative methods and history be B+?
Should the four requirements be graded separately or combined (as at present) into an overall grade on the General Examination? (The committee favors first the alternative, but would also require “distinguished” performance in at least one area.)

* * * * * * * *

Examination Requirements at Other Places

Below I summarize examination requirements at eight other places, including Yale, MIT, Hopkins, Rochester, Stanford, Berkeley, Michigan and Chicago. The main findings of the survey are:

It appears that the massive type of “generals” (where all fields and theory are combined in one session) has almost disappeared. With the exception of Hopkins, all of the above schools seem to settle the theory examination at the end of the first year, with special fields examined at the end of the second year.
Among the schools surveyed, only Yale has a written examination in history. Hopkins, Stanford, Chicago and Berkeley require a course, with “satisfactory” grade. MIT and Rochester have no requirement.
Only Yale gives a written in quantitative aspect of the generals. All the other schools have course requirements (satisfactory grade) only.
Practices vary with regard to number of special fields and type of examination. MIT and Hopkins require three, the others two special fields. Examinations at Yale are oral, at the other places written, in some cases both written and oral. In most places the special field examinations must be taken together, but in some (Rochester, Chicago) they can be separated. Throughout, these special examinations seem to be given by the department, and not merely as course examination.
Some provisions of special interest:
1. Chicago and Rochester’s second year research paper as part of general examination
2. Stanford’s requirement for distinction in at least one field.

I. Yale

Comprehensive Examination

Written examination in theory and econometrics, usually August or September after first year.
Written examination on economic history; usually late spring of second year.
Oral examination in two applied fields, chosen from six and in general analytical ability; late spring of second year. Given by four examiners. Student excused from general examination in special field courses at end of second year. Oral examination in theory, history, quantitative or field outside economics may be substituted for one of the applied fields if candidate has done year’s course work in applied field “with sufficient distinction”.

History and Quantitative

History—written, end of second year, and option to substitute for one special field.
Quantitative—written, end of first year, and option to substitute for one special field.

Other requirements

Has apparently been dropped.
One course credit of explicit research training, second year.
Dissertation to be completed in fourth year.

II. MIT

General examination

General examination in theory consists of two written papers—micro and macro, given in final exam period of first year. May be substituted for final examinations in theory courses.
General examination normally at end of second year. Consists of:
1. written examinations on three of 12 special fields. These may include advanced theory, econometrics or economic history.
2. oral examination in the three fields after written.
3. a fourth field is required but may be written off by B grade in full year course.

History and Quantitative

History—no requirement. May be a special field.
Quantitative—no generals examination. May be a special field.

Other requirements

Two languages

III. Johns Hopkins

First Year Oral Examination

A first year oral examination is given in the spring of the first year, covering the fields in which the student has worked during that year.

Comprehensive Examination

Normally taken in spring of second year. Consists of:

Two written examinations in theory, micro and macro.
Three written examinations in special fields, one of which may be outside economics.
Oral examination: Covers theory, special fields, statistics.

History and Quantitative

History—satisfactory work in course.
Statistics—satisfactory work in course.

Other Requirements

One language.
In addition to the departmental special examination, an examination is given by the graduate board, which includes members of other departments.

IV. Rochester

Qualifying Examination

Theory and econometrics courses are required but are not part of Qualifying Examination.
Qualifying Examination taken in May of second year. Consists of
1. Written examination in two fields. These may include mathematical economics and econometrics. Need not be taken simultaneously.
2. A second year research paper which is to be presented to a departmental seminar at the end of second year.
3. After (a) and (b) are met, an oral examination in the special fields.

History and Quantitative

Econometrics and mathematical economics requirements (courses), extent depending on fields.
No history requirement.

Other Requirements

Certain distribution requirement.
Language and mathematics.

V. Stanford

Comprehensive Examination

Written in micro and macro theory at end of first year. Cover course materials.
Selection of special fields under two plans:
1. If no minor subject is taken, student chooses four out of ten fields. These may include history, econometrics, mathematical economics. One field may be outside economics.
2. Student may choose a minor subject (in another department) and choose only one out of the ten special economics fields.

Comprehensive written examinations for each field scheduled annually, usually at close of course sequence. Must show distinction in at least one field.

History and Quantitative

History—Include at least two courses from offerings in economic history, history of thought, comparative economics, development.
Quantitative—Econometrics course required.

Other Requirements

Language or particular quantitative skills.
Two seminars and research papers.

VI. Berkeley

Departmental Examination in Theory

Must be passed by end of first year. Students with strong background take it in November of first term, others in June (end of first year).
Written qualifying examinations given in two out of thirteen special fields at end of second year. Examinations given twice a year, must be taken together.
Within one year after written qualifying examinations are completed, student presents himself for oral, based on prospectus (and interim results) of his thesis. General assessment of competence.

History and Quantitative

Course in economic history at 210 level.
Course in statistics at 240 level.

Other Requirements

No language.

VII. Michigan

Preliminary Examination

At end of theory courses in micro and macro, an “augmented examination” is given which serves as preliminary examination in theory.
Two fields of specialization are required. One field is satisfied by satisfactory grades in two courses. For the other field a written preliminary examination is required.
After this, oral examination on research topic and surrounding area.

Economic History and Quantitative

No history requirement.
Course requirement in statistics and econometrics.

Other Requirements

No general language requirement.

VIII. Chicago

Preliminary Examination

A “course [sic, “core” probably intended] examination” covering micro and macro theory is given twice a year (separate from course examinations) and is usually taken at end of first or middle of second year.
Two special fields are chosen. Written examinations in these fields, separate from course examinations. Need not be taken together.
Student presents a thesis prospectus before thesis seminar, usually in third year. Must pass on this for candidacy.

History and Quantitative

History course required as part of distribution requirements.
Course work in statistics required.

Other Requirements

Math, no languages.

Source: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library. John Kenneth Galbraith Papers. Series 5. Harvard University File, 1949-1990. Box 526. Folder “Harvard University Department of Economics: General Correspondence, 1967-1974 (2 of 3)”.

Image Source: Harvard Class Album, 1946.

Tags Chenery

Dartmouth Economists Germany Michigan Princeton Suggested Reading Syllabus

Princeton. Course readings for “Government and Business”. Frank Haigh Dixon, 1924-25

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2019-09-23

According to the Princeton catalogue for 1922/23, the undergraduate course Economics 407 “Corporations: Finance and Regulation” was taught by Professor Frank Haigh Dixon. The course was designated as a senior course that graduate students could attend with supplementary work and a weekly conference. Frank W. Fetter took Economics 407 (that appears to have had the title “Government and Business” during the first semester of the academic year 1924-25. In his papers at the Economists’ Papers Archive at Duke University, one finds 47 pages of lecture notes for this course taken by Fetter (in which clear references to Dixon as the lecturer are found) plus about 40 pages of notes he took on his reading assignments.

This post is limited to providing links to the texts and the weekly reading assignments of Dixon’s course. The course outline is followed by a memorial faculty minute for Professor Frank Haigh Dixon that provides career and biographical information.

__________________

Princeton University, 1924-1925

Government and Business
Economics 407

Links to Course Texts

Gerstenberg, Charles W. Financial Organization and Management. New York: Prentice-Hall, 1924. [Revised in 1923, Second revised edition 1939, Fourth Revised Edition, 1959]

Jones, Eliot. The Trust Problem in the United States. New York: Macmillan, 1921.

Ripley, William Z. (ed.). Trusts, Pools and Corporations, rev. ed. Boston: Ginn and Company, 1916. [1905 edition]

Morgan, Charles Stillman. Regulation and the Management of Public Utilities. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, Riverside Press Cambridge, 1923. [Awarded second prize in Class A of the Hart, Schaffner & Marx competition]

Assignments

Sept. 26	Gerstenberg	Ch. 4-7
Sept. 30	Gerstenberg	Ch. 8-12
Oct. 6	Gerstenberg	Ch. 13, 18, 19, 22
Oct. 13	Gerstenberg	Ch. 27, 28, 29
Oct. 20	Gerstenberg	Ch. 30, 31, 32
Oct. 27	Gerstenberg	Finish book
Nov. 3	Jones Ripley	Ch. 1, 2, 3, 4, 19 old ed. pp. 244-249 rev. ed. pp. 465-470
Nov. 10	Jones Ripley	Ch. 13, 14 Ch. 1 and 2
Nov. 17	Jones Ripley	Ch. 5, 7 Ch 4 (rev.) or 5 (old) 8 (rev. only)
Nov. 24	Jones	Ch. 6, 9, 10.
Dec. 1	Jones	Ch. 17 & 18
Dec. 8	Jones Ripley	Ch. 8 Ch 18 (rev ed.) & pp. 545-549 (rev. ed)
Dec. 15	Jones Ripley Morgan	Ch. 15 Ch 19 (rev. ed.) Ch. 1 & 2
Jan. 12	Morgan	Ch. 3, 5
Jan. 19	Morgan	Ch. 6, 7

Source: Duke University. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Economists’ Papers Archive. Frank Whitson Fetter Papers, Box: 49, Folder: “Student Papers, Graduate Courses (Princeton University) EC 407 Government and Business Notes 1924-1925”.

__________________

Faculty Minute adopted March 6, 1944

FRANK HAIGH DIXON

The death, on January 27, 1944, of Frank Haigh Dixon, professor of economics, emeritus, closed a scholarly career of national distinction in his special field of transportation and public utilities. Professor Dixon was born in Winona, Minn., on October 8, 1869, the son of Alfred C. and Caroline A. D. Dixon. He pursued his collegiate studies at the University of Michigan until his attainment of the doctorate in 1895. This was followed by a year of study at the University of Berlin. Returning to Michigan, he served one year as an instructor in history before becoming an assistant professor of economics. At the University of Michigan he had the good fortune to have as his teacher and later as colleague that able economist and remarkable man, Henry Carter Adams, who at that time was organizing the uniform accountancy system of all the American railroads under the jurisdiction of the Interstate Commerce Commission. As a young economist Dixon was thus attracted to the subject of transportation, in which he wrote his doctoral thesis. Declining an invitation to go to Cornell University, he in 1898 accepted a call to an assistant professorship at Dartmouth College.

Professor Dixon’s record of academic and public services is outstanding. Following a visit to England in 1900 to get information, he largely prepared the plans for the establishment at Dartmouth of a graduate school of commerce and business, the Amos Tuck School of Administration and Finance, of which he became the first director. In 1903 he attained full professorial rank. Giving up the Tuck School position, he retained the chairmanship of the department of economics and at the time of his resignation to come to Princeton was recognized as one of the most influential leaders in the Dartmouth faculty.

Professor Dixon came to Princeton in 1919 with ripe scholarship, broad experience and outstanding ability as a lecturer and teacher of college classes, as was further evidenced at once by the large enrollments in his Princeton courses. His coming put Princeton in the first rank of American universities for the distinction of its graduate work in this field. His Alma Mater, Michigan, tried in vain to lure him away from us. His services as chairman of the department of economics and social institutions from 1922 to 1927, on various faculty committees, and particularly in the building up of the Pliny Fisk Collection of research material in the fields of railroad and corporation finance, were marked by clear vision, practical judgment, and unwavering loyalty to the best interests of the University as a whole. In 1938, having reached the age for retirement, he became professor emeritus.

From the first of his career Professor Dixon was very active professionally outside the classroom. In 1907-1908 he served as a consulting expert for the Interstate Commerce Commission and in the following year in a similar capacity for the National Waterways Commission. During the first world war he was a special expert for the U.S. Shipping Board and he was a member of the executive board of the New Hampshire Commission on Public Safety. From 1910 to 1918, without giving up his college work, he was chief statistician of the Bureau of Railway Economics at Washington. For a full half century he was a member of the American Economic Association, serving repeatedly on its executive committee, and in 1927 he was vice-president of the Association. His writings, which with few exceptions were on transportation, are too numerous to be listed here. One of the most notable items in his bibliography was his authoritative text published after his coming to Princeton, “Railroads and Government: their Relations in the United States, 1910-1921.”

In 1900 Professor Dixon married Alice L. Tucker, daughter of the Rev. William J. Tucker, then president of Dartmouth College. In coming to Princeton Professor and Mrs. Dixon left in Hanover many close professional and personal friends. In turn they quickly won in Princeton many others whose number and regard have grown with the passing years. We rejoice that Mrs. Dixon is keeping the family residence among us. To her and to her three children, William Tucker, Roger Colt, and Caroline Moorhouse Dixon, the faculty of Princeton University wishes to express its deep sympathy as well as the high appreciation of the large contributions which Frank Haigh Dixon made to this University community.

Frank A. Fetter
William S. Carpenter
Stanley E. Howard, Chairman

Source: Princeton Alumni Weekly, Vol. 44 (April 28, 1922), p. 25.

Image Source: Frank Haigh Dixon faculty portrait Tuck School, Dartmouth College. Rauner Special Collections Library.

Tags AdamsHC, Carpenter, Dixon, FetterFA, FetterFW, Howard

Berkeley Dartmouth Funny Business Illinois Michigan

Three Ballads on price theory, macroeconomics, and political economy by Bruce W. Knight, Kenneth Boulding, and David Felix

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2019-06-12

I stumbled across the following three ballads by accident. My search began with an obituary search for Frank Knight’s elder brother Melvin Moses Knight and his younger brother Bruce Winton Knight, both of whom were professors of economics, at Berkeley and Dartmouth, respectively. I came across a few lines quoted from the first of the three ballads below (on price theory) and was able to locate a copy of what turned out to be a pair of ballads, the second (on macroeconomics) by Kenneth Boulding. One damn thing led to another and I next discovered a third ballad (on political economy more generally) explicitly inspired by the first two. The least well known of the three balladeers was David Felix, a Berkeley economics Ph.D. and later professor at the University of Washington in St. Louis. I include his university obituary in this post.

Incidentally, the University of Michigan undergraduate textbook that is referred throughout to was written by Fred Manville Taylor, e.g., Principles of Economics. 8th edition, 1921. In a nice essay about the life of Fred M. Taylor written by Z. Clark Dickinson and published in 1952 (Quarterly Review: A Journal of University Perspectives, Autumn, pp. 48-61), I discovered that Bruce Knight’s contribution (The Ballad of “Right Price”) was written in the early 1920s when he was a graduate-student quizmaster for Taylor’s course at the University of Michigan.

__________________

Obituary:
Felix, professor emeritus of economics, 91
By Melody Walker August 12, 2009

David Felix, Ph.D., professor emeritus of development economics and economic history in the Department of Economics in Arts & Sciences, died June 13, 2009, in Bangor, Maine. He was 91.

Born in New York City, Felix graduated magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1942 before enlisting in the U.S. Navy. He served as a lieutenant in the Pacific during World War II.

After the war, he returned to Berkeley, where he earned a master’s degree in history and a doctorate in economics. Before joining the faculty at Washington University in 1964, he was an economics professor at Wayne State University from 1954-1964.

Felix retired from Washington University in 1988. His research interests included economic development, history and international trade and finance.

Felix served as an economic consultant to the United Nations and the International Monetary Fund. He had research appointments at Harvard University, the University of Sussex, England, and the London School of Economics. He received fellowships from the Fulbright, Rockefeller, Ford and other foundations for research in Latin America.

Steve Fazzari, Ph.D., professor of economics and a member of the department since 1982, has fond memories of Felix.

“I respected him for his intellectual integrity,” Fazzari said. “I admired him for his strong work ethic and professional accomplishments. And I will miss him as a teacher, colleague and friend.”

Felix is survived by his wife of 63 years, Gretchen (Schafer) Felix of Orono, Maine; two daughters; and two grandsons.

Donations may be made to the ACLU, 125 Broad St., 18th Floor, New York, NY 10004 and to The Chamber Music Society, University of Maine, 5746 Collins Center for the Arts, Orono, ME 04469.

Source: Washington University in St. Louis. theSource website, August 2o09.

__________________

Economics in Two Lessons

I. The Ballad of “Right Price” [early 1920s]

by Bruce Knight
Professor of Economics,
Dartmouth College

Great Whoopla, King of Hoomhomho,
In Privy Council deeply swore,
Some nineteen hundred years ago,
That Profiteering made him sore.
“Egad, it gets my goat,” he said:
“Two bits is too darn much for bread!

“Not only that my Kingdom cracks
Beneath these Robber Barons’ tolls:
The Lord perceives their heartless tax
And marks for Doom their greedy souls.
What think ye, Gents of High Renown —
Shall we revise this tariff down?”

The Council thought: “To buck a king
At best were misdirected gall:
Those prone to such a silly thing
Were never Councilmen at all.”
Their verdict was unanimous:
“What, ho! that sounds like sense to us.”

East and West and North and South
The heralds rode throughout the land,
With simple speech and ample mouth,
That Profiteers might understand:
“Hear ye!” they roared, with voice intense:
“The Price of Bread is Thirteen Cents!

“His Royal Nibs doth eke proclaim
That whoso charges more for Bread,
To brand his economic shame
Shall lose his ears from off his head:
Beware the Most Imperial Shears —
Charge Thirteen Cents, and keep your ears!”

The bakers, just a bit abashed,
So hearing, reasoned somewhat thus:
“Though wheat is scarce, and we’ll be dashed
If this won’t mean a loss to us,
We loathe to run the risk of Hell
And jeopardize our ears as well.”

The price was Thus in every town;
And South and North and West and East
The proletariat swarmed down
Like locusts to th’ Egyptian Feast:
The price of wheat dropped half a plunk,
And farmers would not plant the junk.

The days took flight, and fortnights sped:
Vox Populi exclaimed, “Immense!”
“Sic semper Profiteers!” they said,
And praised their Monarch’s Common Sense.
One dinner-time, along with roast
Whoop ordered up his usual Toast.

The Waiter blushed a crimson hue
Quite unbecoming such a lout,
And stammered forth: “Would Crackers do?
The Bread Supply has plumb run out!”
Roared Whoop: “Hast tried the nearest store?”
“Yea,” wept the knave: “There ain’t no more!”

Then waxed the King exceeding wroth,
As hungry kings are wont to do,
And, swearing by his doubtful Troth,
Ordered his land searched through and through.
This was the net result that night:
The stock of Bread had vanished quite.

Quick summoned Whoopla to his side
His meek Comptroller of Supplies:
“WHEAT! and AT ONCE!” the Monarch cried;
The wretch rejoined, with gusty sighs:
“There ain’t no wheat! And, worse, I fear,
There’s none been planted for next year.”

Last, to his Minister of State,
Sage Laran Gitis, Whoopla flew:
“Larry, thy brain, at least, hath weight:
What in the Heck are we to do?”
The latter, ex cathedra, spoke:
“Give heed, thou thick and regal Bloke:

“Next time your Cabinet and You
Contemplate fixing price, please look
At Sub-Head Three, page Fifty-two
Of Freddy Taylor’s well-known book:
You got yourselves in all this fix
By being Economic Hicks.

“Why, any college Soph would know,
Who took Ec One, and pulled a “D,”
That prices, if you let them go,
Will guide our conduct prop-er-lee —
Increase supply, curtail demand
When Wheat is scanty — understand?

“When every Jehu stocks his shelf
With Bread that’s cheap, but should be dear,
Important Persons, like Yourself,
May go without it, do you hear?
And Competition, don’t forget,
Will fix a Price that’s Right— you bet!

“Then, — there’s the Farmer — don’t you see?
The only Wheat that he will grow
Will be what he can eat; and he
Acts sensibly in doing so.
The Long Run, Whoopla — there’s the rub!
And, Broadly Speaking, you’re a dub.”

And thus and thus, and so and so
Into the regal ears was dinned,
Till Whoopla rose at length to go,
Quite vanquished by superior wind.
The chances are, when he withdrew,
He knew as much as Soph’mores do.

At any rate, he styled himself
A Proselyte of Lay-Say Fare.
Forthwith, his Empire, as to Pelf,
Beheld no equal anywhere.
And this became his proudest boast:
“I never fail to get my Toast!”

MORAL:— (Heh, heh!)

If you would see your land wax fat,
Don’t Meddle with the Thermostat!

II. The Busted Thermostat [early 1950s]

Kenneth Boulding
Professor of Economics,
University of Michigan

Protected by the hidden hand
Of moderate laissez-faire
King Whoopla’s happy little land
Lay prospering many a year,
As prices, neither low nor high,
Equate demand with its supply,

And Butcher, Baker, Soldier, Sailor,
Rich Man, Poor Man, Beggerman, Thief,
Rejoiced in Truth as taught by Taylor,
And no misfortune brought them grief,
(Knowing that evils only come
From price disequilibrium).

But now alas a cloud arose
As you will often find,
For lo! although production grows,
Consumption lags behind:
The consequent Accumulation,
Producing signs of sharp deflation.

So while King Whoopla takes his ease,
(The crops are good, the weather fine)
As smitten by a strange disease
Down creeps the trend-of-business line,
And round the factory corners lurk
Long lines of people wanting work.

At first the monarch flat denied
That anything could be amiss,
For was not laissez-faire the guide
To every economic bliss?
No need to call the system busted —
It’s just a little maladjusted!

But as distress and trouble grew
The king called in his learned sages
(Those dignified professors who
Transmit the wisdom of the ages)
And asked them all to diagnose
These quite unprecedented woes.

They talked of costs, they talked of prices,
Of disproportions and of lags,
And various economic vices
That make for turns and dips and sags,
But all agree, the answers come
In Long-Run Equilibrium.

But then a rash youth spoke — Who gains
From this poor status quo upholding?
I learned my¹Ec from Maynard Keynes,
Interpreted by Kenneth Boulding.
Silence more eloquent than words
Fell on those shocked and learned birds.

Mistaking silence for consent
(As intellectuals often do)
As if on self-destruction bent
The youth went on to air his view,
Maintaining, with an unbowed head,
That in the long run all are dead!

With pert remark and airy stance
He then proceeded to expound
The charms of deficit finance
In words more flippant than profound,
In Daniel Webster’s words professing
How Public Debt is Private Blessing.

It’s wrong to save too much, he said,
(Turning the theme in all its facets)
Income is from expenses bred
And public debt is private assets
And so (I hope you catch the drift)
Extravagance is really thrift!

Said Whoopla — if I feel the urges
To spend as freely as I like,
“Then²my extravagance, or splurges,
Will other money incomes hike?
Why! said the youth — Great ball of fire,
You Understand the Multiplier!

Fine, said the king, start public works,
Build me a large expensive palace!
In such extravagance there lurks
No hint of wickedness or malice,
For from my tendency to sin comes
A rise in other people’s incomes!

On every side the buildings reared,
Harems sprang up throughout the nation;
Soon unemployment disappeared,
Succeeded by a wild inflation,
And pretty soon our poor King Whoop
Was in a different kind of soup.

People of every rank and sort
Complain about the rising prices;
The country finds its dollars short
And has an economic crisis,
And through the miserable nation
Rises the talk of abdication!

A brief revolt among the scholars,
Forced the unhappy king to flee;
He, having kept his funds in dollars,
Became a prosperous refugee,
Enjoying the succeeding era
In basking on the Riviera.

The moral of this sorry tale
Is much too obvious to mention
Don’t trim your craft to every gale
Of intellectual invention,
And think, no matter what you try
In every ointment there’s a fly.

____________

¹”by” in original, corrected by hand to “my” in University of Michigan library copy.
²”That” in original, corrected by hand to “Then” in University of Michigan library copy.

Source: Economics in Two Lessons, Michigan Business Review, Vol. IV, No. 6 (November 1952), pp. 24-26.

__________________

[III.] The Ballad of the Sad Economist, or
Who’s the Fairest Model of Them All? [1952]

David Felix
Lecturer, School of Business Administration
University of California, Berkeley

A Regency Council was quickly appointed,
With praise from the propertied classes anointed,
To govern the hapless country pro tem,
Unrest and inflation to ruthlessly stem.
“Right men and right thoughts,” the Regency vowed,
“Will guide back Hoomhomho to normalcy proud.”

But what is this normalcy, if one may ask?
And how will the Council proceed with its task?
With Keynesian cries hushed in prison captivity,
Committed for Un-Hoomhomhonian activity,
Along with yet more Un-Hoomhoms of the trade,
The answer would have to be Taylor-made.

“Balance the Budget! Turn off the Pumps!
All must be willing to absorb their lumps.
Out with the Parities! The Wage-price Ratchets!
Tariffs, Pork Barrels, and similar gadgets!
Up with the Bank Rate! With will there are ways.
Come all aboard for the Happy Old Days!”

“But hold!” cried the Farm Bloc, “You’re going too far!
Surely Ag Parities are not on a par
With unwarranted aids and the dishonest pleas
Of Gold-grasping Business Monopolies!
And what of our low supply elasticity?
And industrial prices with scanty plasticity?”

But Business replied, “Such Populist impudence!
When National Unity most needs forbearance,
And an end to such rabble-rousin’ and scorchin’.
Have ye not even glanced at Life, Time, and Fortune?
The Invisible Hand in its moribund hour
Has passed on the torch to Countervailing Power.”

Then a chorus of voices was heard through the land.
“You fellows can laugh, but if over our strand
Passed foreigner’s goods un-tariff blockaded,
We’d never survive such a contest unaided.”
From the Tower, “The long-run adjustment . . .” “Absurd!
In the long run we’re dead. Or hadn’t you heard?”

From the depths of the Dungeon a thin voice arose,
“Let planning and subsidies cushion the blows.”
The voice died away . . . the impersonal force
Of the Price Mechanism rolled over the source.
But then from the Workers the querulous phrase,
“What’s all this talk of the Happy Old Days?”

And a crisp, booming voice was heard to sound off,
“Our appropriations are barely enough.
We could hardly survive any budget incisions,
And still keep intact a full hundred Divisions.
With no might in sight, oh, dismal our plight!
In our fight ‘gainst the Doctrine that Might Makes the Right.”

Approbational noises applauded these facts,
Most loudly from those with Armed Forces contracts,
And from those who remembered the lack of enjoyment
In the bitter old days of Mass Unemployment.
So for various reasons ’twas widely agreed
A Defense Budget cut could scarce be decreed.

“But what shall we do?” the Council now shouted.
“All our specifics are brutally flouted.
Tell us, oh, Taylor, what means to be had?
Or is there no balm in all Gilead?
If citizens dare not to forego their coddling,
It’s no help at all to show them your modeling.”

Then Taylorites answered, “Gaze ye at the World.
The Price Mechanism lies rusted and spurled.
There stalks o’er the earth a Great Disequilibrium
That keeps us from reaching our Mobile Millenium.
Check it! Or else all our plans are disasters,
And buried the rules of our Laissez-Faire Masters.”

”We’ll call a world meet,” the Council orated.
“Immutable Laws we will get reinstated.
Call Statesmen, Advisers, and Academicians.
We’ll get to the roots of our present conditions.”
“Normalcy’s indivisible,” said Taylorites, beaming.
“How true,” said the Council, and pondered its meaning.

So from East and from West the Experts all came,
From countries too numerous to mention by name.
All ideas were free to be talked of in forum,
Provided they met current rules of decorum —
Ricardo’s, and Smith’s, and the elder John Clark’s,
Though one had to be careful in making his Marx.

As befitted the host of this glittering Cabal,
The Hoomhomhos played with their Free Market Model.
But to their surprise this gambit was spurned
By others with backgrounds equally learned.
“Technical errors,” “too static,” “unreal,”
“Class bias,” “unstable,” “no sex appeal.”

“The problem is structural,” said Abdul Al Mism.
“We’ve starved long enough with your Price Mechanism.
Send us more funds and we might try your scheme.”
“But that will just make our inflation extreme,”
Was the Taylored reply, “Attempt first our scheme.”
Said Abdul, “That’d just make our poorness extreme.”

“What I cannot swallow,” said Viscount D’Abords,
Up from the Dockers to Chamber of Lords,
“Is bread at this twenty-five pennies a loaf,
Merely to nourish some kingly old oaf.
That’s scarcely fair shares and, dash it, not cricket!
This unequal right to a bread ration ticket.”

“But come now, M’Lord, you forget the supply.
You won’t get the wheat.” “In the pig’s eye!”
Retorted the Lord, “With proper control,
The supply will come forth, I’ll wager my soul!
Haven’t you heard that most income is rent?
It’s not hard to keep the supply curve unbent.”

“But Walras has shown the result’s a delight
When unknowns and equations total up right.”
Then forth came the haughty Econometricians,
“You fail to consider stability conditions.
Equational counting is hardly enough.
In dynamic relations things can get rough.

Inflation is only a manifestation
Of some inconsistent structuralization.”
Spake Senor Garbanzo of southernmost Chile,
“To bow to the world market forces is silly.
What our countries need is Diversification,
Or else we continue as low-income nations.

Political Strength means Industrialization
To cushion the impact of Boom and Deflation.”
The Historian spake, “You Laissez-Faire Boys
Are much too enchanted with outmoded toys.
Your model concerns but a brief passing phase,
Of which, by the way, it just points up the glaze.”

And so they continued in whisper and scream,
Shifting assumptions in the midst of the stream,
Till a Child, the one who with infantile crudity
Had shown up the emperor stark in his nudity,
Piped up with “But all your polemical flair
Conceals not the fact that you’re knowledge-wise bare.

Your Curves and Equations, your scholarly canting,
Do not give the Council the answers they’re wanting.”
Then all rose indignant at this Child’s presumption.
As one they rejected the youngster’s assumption. ”
Of course we have knowledge, profound and pervasive.
There’s really no reason to be so derisive.

But to say what it is, if that’s your suggestion,
Is in general form a nonsensical question.”
But now some declared that Truth’s praxiologic,
And were quickly denounced for illogic hodge-podgic.
And so Unity broke with a suddenness tragical
On serious issues and points methodological.

Despairing, the Council cried, “Give us a policy!
How do we wend our way back unto normalcy?”
With patience one uses for children sub-normal,
The theorists explained that their knowledge was formal.
“Give us your goals, arranged in a scale,
And we’ll give you the points toward which you must sail.

And if you can tell what it is that you’ll find,
That is different from that which you’re leaving behind,
We can give you the rules couched in language most terse
For finding out which is the better or worse.”
With this, all adjourned — it was getting much later,
And each went his own way to gather more data.

Said the Child to the Councilmen, still in a coma,
Having been overcome by the learned aroma,
“The Truth is an elephant; they each hold a part,
But to piece all together is still quite an art.”
Then up woke the Council and looked round the hall,
“But that doesn’t solve our dilemma at all!”

Said the Child, “When I’m older and go off to college,
I’ll explore sociologic roots of our knowledge,
And political aspects of modern economy,
And what is the source of society’s anomy.”
Soft from up high in the empty hall’s rafters
Sounded the echo of something like laughter.

Moral

Graduate students and hair-splitting profs
Can expound the moral to credulous sophs.
It carries at least the following sting:
A little model is a dangerous thing.

Source: Current Economic Comment, University of Illinois, Bureau of Economic and Business Research, 1952, pp. 51-54.

Image Sources: From left to right…
Bruce W. Knight in Eleven Professors to Retire. Dartmouth Alumni Magazine, June 1960, p. 19.
Kenneth Boulding at the University of Michigan Faculty History Project.
David Felix from Tourist Card for Brazil, dated 17 December 1962, copy at the ancestry.com website.

Tags Boulding, Felix, KnightMM

Economists Germany Harvard Johns Hopkins Michigan Princeton Swarthmore

Harvard. Economics Ph.D. alumnus, Richard Abel-Musgrave, 1937

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2019-05-07
4 Comments on Harvard. Economics Ph.D. alumnus, Richard Abel-Musgrave, 1937

The German-born economist Richard Abel-Musgrave was one of many German/Austrian educated economists who came to the United States in the 1930s, much to the enrichment of economics. He was one of the many truly outstanding economists to have left Harvard in the 1930s with an economics Ph.D. Richard Musgrave wrote a principal textbook for the field of public finance. More biographical information can be found in Hans-Werner Sinn’s lecture “Please Bring Me the New York Times: On the European Roots of Richard Abel Musgrave” (2007).

A Musgrave-artifact posted earlier at Economics in the Rear-view Mirror:

External examination questions for honors A.B. at Swarthmore College, 1946.

_____________________

Harvard Ph.D.

RICHARD ABEL-Musgrave, DIPLOM-VOLKSWIRT (Univ. of Heidelberg, Germany) 1933, A.M. (Harvard Univ.) 1935.

Subject, Economics. Special Field, Public Finance. Thesis, “The Theory of Public Finance and the Concept of ‘Burden of Taxation.’” Instructor in Economics and Tutor in the Division of History, Government, and Economics.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1937-38, p. 155.

_____________________

Short Bio from Harvard Law School Yearbook

Richard Musgrave
H. N. Burbank Professor of Political Economy

Born: Königstein, Germany, 1910; Education: Diplom Volkswirt (Economics) U. of Heidelberg 1930, M.A. (Economics) Harvard 1936, Ph.D. (Economics) Harvard 1937; Subsequent Experience; 1941-8 Economist on the Federal Reserve Board, 1948-58 Professor of Economics at the University of Michigan, 1958-62 Professor of Economics at Johns Hopkins, 1962-5 Professor of Economics at Princeton; Married: 1964 to the former Peggy Brewer, one child; Joined the Faculty; 1965; Subjects: Federal Tax Policy, Economics for Lawyers, Taxation and Economic Development; Publications: Fiscal Systems (1969), The Theory of Public Finance (1958), Public Finance in Theory and Practice (1974); Extra-legal Activites: Consultant to the U.S. Treasury, the Council of Economic Advisers, and Foreign Missions; President, Tax Reform Commission for Columbia (1969), director, Fiscal Reform Project, Bolivia; Editor Quarterly Journal of Economics. (1968-75), President, International Seminar in Public Economics.

Source: Harvard Law School Yearbook 1979, p. 63.

_____________________

Obituary from UC Santa Cruz

Musgrave, renowned pioneer of public finance, dies at 96

January 16, 2007
By Jennifer McNulty, Staff Writer

SANTA CRUZ, CA–Richard A. Musgrave, widely regarded as the founder of modern public finance and an adviser on fiscal policy and taxation to governments from Washington to Bogota to Tokyo, died Monday, Jan. 15.

Musgrave, 96, was an adjunct professor of economics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and professor emeritus of economics at Harvard University. His wife, Peggy Boswell [sic, “Brewer” was her maiden name] Musgrave, said Musgrave died of natural causes.

A staunch believer that government can play a positive and constructive role in society, Musgrave also believed deeply that economists can contribute to making government work well, thereby contributing to a better society. His work on public finance has been described as his “attempt to marry the theory and practice of good government.”

“Richard Musgrave transformed economics in the 1950s and 1960s from a descriptive and institutional subject to one that used the tools of microeconomics and Keynesian macroeconomics to understand the effects of taxes,” says Martin Feldstein, George F. Baker Professor of Economics at Harvard and president of the National Bureau of Economic Research.

“Richard Musgrave was a giant – a towering figure who transformed the field of public economics,” adds David M. Cutler, Otto Eckstein Professor of Applied Economics and dean for the social sciences in Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences.

An academic economist for the last 60 years, Musgrave mixed his university work with a wide range of public service and consultation. Starting in the 1940s, he advised governments in Colombia, Chile, Myanmar, Japan, Puerto Rico, South Korea, and Taiwan on taxation and fiscal policy, and led tax reform commissions in Colombia and Bolivia.

Similarly, domestic agencies and congressional committees repeatedly sought Musgrave’s advice on public finance policy questions. He worked with or as a consultant to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, the U.S. Treasury, the President’s Council of Economic Advisers, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the World Bank.

Musgrave described the setting of tax policy as a delicate orchestration of factors including employment, inflation, economic growth, and the fair distribution of the tax burden – with the latter generally assigned outsize importance, in Musgrave’s view.

“Clearly, tax policy is not simply a matter of raising revenue in an equitable fashion,” he and his wife, then an economist at the University of California, Berkeley, wrote in the Boston Globe in 1978. “The entire performance of the economy must be allowed for as well, though this should be done with least damage to the fairness of the tax system.”

Two of Musgrave’s books became classics in their field: The Theory of Public Finance: A Study in Public Economy (1958) and Public Finance in Theory and Practice, coauthored with Peggy Musgrave (1973).

“Intelligent conduct of government is at the heart of democracy,” Musgrave wrote in the introduction to The Theory of Public Finance. “It requires an understanding of the economic relations involved; and the economist, by aiding in this understanding, may hope to contribute to a better society. This is why the field of public finance has seemed of particular interest to me; and this is why my interest in the field has been motivated by a search for the good society, no less than by scientific curiosity.”

The Theory of Public Finance transformed the study of public finance to a discipline in which questions are analyzed in general equilibrium terms, where changes in tax policy take into account the resulting changes in the economy. Musgrave’s many intellectual contributions included studies on tax incidence, tax progressivity, public goods, fiscal federalism, the effects of taxation on risk taking, and the role of fiscal policy in stabilizing the economy.

Musgrave’s influence endured throughout his lengthy career. In 1998, he was invited by the University of Munich to join his “archrival” in the study of political economy, James M. Buchanan, in a five-day debate. The results were published in 1999 as Public Finance and Public Choice: Two Contrasting Visions of the State. [At the CESifo Mediathek one can find videos from this five day conference. Search “Two visions” or “Buchanan” or “Musgrave”]

“Two towering pillars of 20th-century public economics examine the deep foundations of their own thought and their common subject,” economist Robert M. Solow of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology wrote of the work. “Who could resist the chance to eavesdrop on their reflections? Certainly not anyone who cares about the role of government in modern society.”

Born Dec. 14, 1910, in Koenigstein, Germany, Richard Abel Musgrave studied at the University of Munich, Exeter College, and the University of Heidelberg, where he received his Diplom Volkswirt (the equivalent of a bachelor’s degree) in 1933. He continued his studies at the University of Rochester and at Harvard, where he received an A.M. degree in 1936 and a Ph.D. in 1937.

Musgrave was an instructor in economics at Harvard until 1941, when he became an economist at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, a position he held until 1947. He taught economics at Swarthmore College from 1947 to 1948, following which he was an economics professor at the University of Michigan from 1948 to 1958; at Johns Hopkins University from 1958 to 1961; and at Princeton University from 1962 to 1965.

In 1965 Musgrave joined Harvard as professor of economics in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and at Harvard Law School. He was named H. H. Burbank Professor of Economics in 1969, when he also became chair of Harvard’s standing committee on Afro-American studies. In 1981 he was named professor emeritus at Harvard and became an adjunct professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz, remaining affiliated with that campus through 2004.

Among his numerous awards and honors, Musgrave was a Fulbright professor in Germany in 1956 and held a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1959. He was named honorary president of the International Institute of Public Finance in 1978, the same year he was elected a Distinguished Fellow of the American Economics Association. He received the Frank E. Seidman Distinguished Award in Political Economy in 1981. In 1983, 50 years to the day after he received his Diplom Volkswirt, Musgrave was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Heidelberg, his alma mater. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1986, and in 1994, he received the Daniel M. Holland Medal from the National Tax Association.

Musgrave is survived by his wife, Peggy Boswell [sic, “Brewer” was her maiden name] Musgrave, and three stepchildren: Pamela Clyne of New Jersey, Roger Richmond [sic, “Richman” is correct] of California, and Thomas Richmond [sic, “Richman” is correct] of Colorado. He is also survived by numerous nephews and nieces, including Harry Krause, the Max L. Rowe Professor Emeritus at the University of Illinois College of Law. Details regarding a memorial service have not been finalized.

Source: UC Santa Cruz. University News. January 16, 2007.

_____________________

Harvard Crimson Obituary

Renowned Economist Musgrave Dead at 96
Former professor ‘transformed’ public sector economics

By Tina Wang, Crimson Staff Writer
January 19, 2007

During the lifetimes of most Harvard undergraduates, Richard A. Musgrave—a founder of modern public sector economics—was in retirement.

Musgrave, who died Monday at age 96, also came from an era preceding current economics faculty. But his ideas about the state’s role in the economy left a lasting impact felt by Harvard faculty and alums today.

Having taught public finance at Harvard for about two decades, Musgrave had been an emeritus professor since 1981.

“The training I received well after he had retired was different because he was around,” said Dean for the Social Sciences David M. Cutler ’87.

Concerned with the government’s equitable and efficient distribution and redistribution of resources through taxation and spending, “he transformed the whole way people thought about public economics,” said one of Musgrave’s former students, James M. Poterba ’80, who now chairs the economics department at MIT.

Born in 1910 in Germany, Musgrave, who received a Ph.D in political economy from Harvard, taught here from 1937 until 1941, when he left for a post at the Federal Reserve.

After various teaching stints, including at Princeton, Musgrave returned to Harvard in 1965 with tenured appointments in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and at Harvard Law School.

He also took prominent economic advising roles in Washington, as well as with foreign governments, from Colombia to South Korea.

Musgrave died in Santa Cruz, Calif., where he and his wife had moved to teach at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

‘THE MUSGRAVE TRICHOTOMY’

In his senior year of college—and the last year Musgrave taught at Harvard—Poterba audited Musgrave’s graduate course, co-taught with Baker Professor of Economics Martin S. Feldstein ’61.

“He didn’t just study the tax system or government policies in an abstract classroom, or in a theoretical way. He studied these questions because he believed they were incredibly important in making the lives of individual citizens better,” Poterba said.

The ground-breaking “Musgrave trichotomy” identified three separate roles of government—redistributing income, allocating resources, and stabilizing the macroeconomy, Cutler and Poterba said.

“Everything that’s taught in public economics now is completely different than what was taught from before,” said Cutler, who co-teaches Economics 1410, “Public Sector Economics.” “You look at textbooks before him and you wouldn’t even recognize them.”

Cutler said that when he teaches his students to think about questions of efficiency and redistribution in public sector economics separately, “all of that comes from Musgrave.”

“Generations of students who used his textbook [The Theory of Public Finance] think about the world very differently,” Cutler said.

Musgrave strove for much of his life to find ways for the state to play a positive role in the economy, which entailed understanding the trade-offs between allowing the government to provide some goods versus allowing the private sector to provide them.

As a student who came to Harvard in the mid-1930s during the Great Depression, when Keynesian views about the benefits of government intervention in the economy were starting to enter economic discourse, “Musgrave was always very deeply of the view that the government could make things better,” Poterba said.

ECONOMIC OUTLIER

Musgrave’s economic principles, particularly with their focus on social equity, did not always square perfectly with mainstream thinking in his field.

“He was probably a little bit frustrated that the profession has moved as far as it has toward the efficiency direction,” said Cutler. “Although I think it would’ve moved even farther had he not been around.”

An emphasis on equity may have eroded in conventional economics discourse, partially because “it’s really hard to say how equitable should things be,” Cutler said. “You’re saying, ‘gee, what’s the right distribution of income.’”

Contrary to trends in his field, Musgrave “probably moved a bit in the direction of thinking there was an activist role of government,” Poterba said.

The German school of thought— “thinking about the whole community almost as though it was one actor”—was another influence that Musgrave brought to bear on U.S. economic thinking, Poterba said.

“That was a perspective that was somewhat different from what most U.S. economists were using,” Poterba said.

Concerned with questions of how to set up an equitable tax system, Musgrave was a vocal critic of President Reagan’s conservative economic program.

In 1982, Musgrave, with 33 other economists, sent a letter to the White House criticizing Reagan’s economic policy as “extremely regressive in its impact on our society, redistributing wealth and power from the middle-class and poor to the rich,” The Crimson reported.

“One never knows if this will have any effect on the President, but we felt it was important to speak out,” Musgrave told The Crimson at the time.

‘DEEPLY COMMITTED’

Cutler said he first met Musgrave in the early 1990s when Musgrave was on the East Coast and had contacted him, saying he had heard Cutler had joined the Harvard faculty and wanted to meet him.

They met about every other year through much of the 1990s to chat about economics research and the goings-on of the department, according to Cutler, who joined the Harvard economics faculty in 1991.

“Every time after meeting him, I would think, ‘I hope I’m in as good a shape at 40 as he is at 80,’ ” Cutler said.

“Even though Musgrave was in his 80s and 90s at the time, he kept very well up-to-date…not very many people will do that,” he said.

He was still “very interested in the world of economics and how it could be used in policy areas,” he said.

Poterba has fond memories of Musgrave’s energy as well.

In Musgrave’s class, “even at that stage, one of his last years at Harvard, he was incredibly energetic and enthusiastic about the whole study of government and taxation, deeply committed to training students, and maintained long connections and ties to students,” Poterba said.

A stone in Mt. Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge will bear Musgrave’s name, his wife, Peggy Brewer Musgrave, told The Boston Globe.

Source: Tina Wang. Renowned Economist Musgrave Dead at 96. Harvard Crimson(January 19, 2007).

Image Source: Harvard Law School Yearbook 1970, p. 31.

Tags Musgrave

Economists Gender Harvard Johns Hopkins Michigan

Michigan, Johns Hopkins and Harvard. Three Generations of Economics PhDs. Orcutt-Nakamura(s)

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2019-04-13

In an earlier post we met the Ruggles Family Dynasty, three generations of economists with Harvard economics Ph.Ds. Silly me that I thought that this might have been a unique constellation, but in the meantime I have “discovered” a second observation. Meet the Orcutt-Nakamura dynasty of economists! Painstaking empirical analysis reveals that both dynasties display a greater frequency of women economists (including the spouses), than the frequency for the entire population of economists.

Thus, with all the power vested in me from this second observation, I hereby declare Collier’s conjecture on economist-dynasties: the economist-gene is carried on the X chromosome.

__________________

1st Generation: Guy Henderson Orcutt
(Ph.D. from Michigan, 1944)

Guy Henderson Orcutt (b. 5 July 1917 in Wyandotte, Michigan; d. 5 March 2006 in Bowie, Prince Georges, Maryland)

B.S. with honors, Physics (1939)
M.A. Economics (1940)
Ph.D. (1944) University of Michigan

Dissertation Title: Statistical Methods and Tools for Finding Natural Laws in the Field of Economics

Taught or affiliated with MIT, Cambridge, Harvard, Wisconsin, and Yale, IMF, World Bank and The Urban Institute.

Guy Orcutt material transcribed for Economics in the Rear-view Mirror:

Economics 110. Introduction to Econometrics. Harvard, Spring Semester 1950.
A Bibliography of Books and Articles on the Scientific Method

Economics 110a. Empirical Economics. Harvard, Fall Semester 1950.
Course Readings

Autobiographical/Biographical material

Guy Orcutt, “From engineering to microsimulation: An autobiographical reflection” In Special issue “Orcutt Festschrift” Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization. Vol. 14, No. 1 (September 1990), pp. 5-27.

Harold W. Watts. An Appreciation of Guy Orcutt, Distinguished Fellow of the American Economic Association. Journal of Economic Perspectives Vol. 5, No. 1 (Winter 1991) pp. 171-179.

Guy Henderson Orcutt page at the Prabook website.

Image source: Ugo Colombino’s lecture Microsimulation and Microeonometrics: Survey, Interpretation and Perspectives. (Università degli studi di Torino, Campus Luigi Einaudi) April 1, 2015. Slide #3.

2nd Generation: Alice Orcutt Nakamura
(Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins, 1972)

Alice O. Nakamura (b. Boston, Mass., 1945)

B.S. in Economics (Political Science minor), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1968
Ph.D. in Political Economy with a minor in Sociology, Johns Hopkins University, 1973

Dissertation Title: State and Local Police Expenditures: An Empirical Investigation.

Professor of Finance and Management Science at University of Alberta

Biographical/Professional Information

Apr. 4, 2019 archived webpage of Alice Orcutt Nakamura.

Alice O. Nakamura’s c.v. (June 2017)

Alice O. Nakamura’s Short Biography
March 31, 2019 archived

Alice Nakamura is a Professor of Finance and Management Science at the University of Alberta. She holds a Ph.D in Economics from John Hopkins University and a B.S. from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. She is a Fellow of the Canadian Economics Associations. In 1994-95, she served as President of the Canadian Economics Association. She has received numerous honors, including begin an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Western Ontario, the Kaplan Award for Excellence in Research, and the McCalla Research Professorship. She has also held numerous public policy and advisory roles, including being a member of the Axworthy Social Security Reform Task Force, the Statistics Canada Price Measurement Advisory Committee and the Co-chair of the Canadian Employment Research Forum (CERF). Her publications are in the areas of labour economics, econometrics, price and productivity measurement, social policy, and genomic statistics among other topics. She has numerous publications in the most prestigious journals in economics and statistics, including the American Economic Review, Econometrica, the Journal of Econometrics, the Journal of the American Statistical Association, the Review of Economics and Statistics and the Canadian Journal of Economics.

Image Source: Alice Nakamura’s webpage.

Alice Nakamura is married to Masao Nakamura

B.S., Keio University (Tokyo), 1967 in Administration Engineering
M.S. Keio University (Tokyo), 1969 in Administration Engineering
Johns Hopkins University Ph.D. 1972 in Operations Research/ Industrial Engineering

Title of Dissertation: Mathematical analysis and optimization of health services systems.
Dissertation Adviser: Rodger Parker

Professor of Commerce & Business Administration (Emeritus)
Strategy & Business Economics Division, Sauder School of Business
University of British Columbia

Masao Nakamura’s c.v. (April 2016)

Masao Nakamura’s Personal webpage (Nov. 30, 2018)

2nd Generation: Harriet L. Orcutt Duleep

Harriet L. Orcutt born 1953.

B.A., Oberlin Conservatory/College, 1973
B.A., in Economics, University of Michigan, 1976
Ph.D. in Economics, M.I.T., 1986

Title of Dissertation: Poverty and Inequality of Mortality.
Advisers: Jerry Hausman and Lester Thurow.

Research Professor of Public Policy, College of William and Mary since 2007.

Harriet Orcutt Duleep’s c.v.

3rd generation: Emi Nakamura
(Harvard Ph.D., 2007)

Emi Nakamura (b. 1980)

A.B. (summa cum laude) Princeton University, 2001
A.M. Economics, Harvard University, 2004.
Ph.D. Economics, Harvard University, 2007.

Dissertation Title: Price Adjustment, Pass-through and Monetary Policy
Advisers: Robert Barro and Ariel Pakes

Emi Nakamura is Chancellor’s Professor of Economics, University of California, Berkeley since 2018.

Emi Nakamura’s c.v. (January 2019)

Image source: Emi Nakamura’s home page.

From an Interview with Emi Nakamura

Can you tell us something about growing up in an academic family of economists?

My parents love their work and really wanted to give me a sense of what they did. That’s easy when your parents are firemen or policemen, but harder when your parents spend all their time sitting at a desk reading books and running regressions. How do you explain to a kid what it means to do research? So my mom brought me to a number of economics conferences when I was a child. Of course, I didn’t understand much, but I did get some sense of what it meant to be an academic economist. It also led to some funny conversations when I grew up and met colleagues like Kevin Lang, who I’d first met as a child. Because of my parents, I also got to take a bunch of economics classes at the University of British Columbia when I was in high school and over the summer when I was home from college in Vancouver, including a number of classes on economic measurement from Erwin Diewert. Measurement is a really understudied topic in economics today and you don’t learn much about it even in grad school, so that was a unique opportunity. I have since written several papers on measurement issues where this experience was very useful.

Source: CSWEP News. 2015 Issue 2. From “An Interview with Emi Nakamura” by Serena Ng.

HUGE UPDATE: John Bates Clark Medal 2019 awarded to Emi Nakamura!

Emi Nakamura is married to:

Jón Steinsson also Chancellor’s Professor of Economics at UC Berkeley.

Jan. 2019 c.v. of Jón Steinsson.

Note: Emi Nakamura and Jón Steinsson have two children…[to be continued?]

Image: Guy Orcutt, Alice Nakamura, Emi Nakamura.

Tags Diewert, LangK, NakamuraA, NakamuraE, NakamuraM, Orcutt, Steinsson

Socialist Tease?

Several biographical accounts of Adams

Henry C. Adams, some early publications

Note by John Maurice Clark attached to transcribed copy of Henry Carter Adams’ letter

Letter of Henry Carter Adams (1851-1921) to President James B. Angell, March 15, 1887.

J.M.C. Nov. 27, 1951, Comment, from memory of Dorfman’s remarks yesterday.

COPY

Courses of Study in Political Economy in the United States in 1876 and in 1892-93.

Life and Career

Elliot Joseph Berg (b. 20 May 1927 in New York City; d. 21 November 2002 in Alexandria, VA).

Course Enrollment

Syllabus and Readings

HARVARD UNIVERSITY Department of Economics

Outline Economics 118 THE ECONOMIES OF TROPICAL AFRICA

HARVARD UNIVERSITY Department of Economics

Economics 118 FINAL EXAMINATION May 29, 1961

Contributions to American Educational History, edited by Herbert B. Adams

Leo Wolman, Biographical Note

COPY TO DR. FACKENTHAL

Industrial Relations Sections or Departments

DRAFT

HARVARD UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

REPORT ON THE GENERAL EXAMINATION FOR THE PH.D.

ROLE OF THE GENERAL EXAMINATION

SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS

General Principles

The Theory Requirement

The Quantitative Requirement

The Economic History Requirement

The Requirement in Special Fields

QUESTIONS OF GRADING

Examination Requirements at Other Places

I. Yale

Comprehensive Examination

History and Quantitative

Other requirements

II. MIT

General examination

History and Quantitative

Other requirements

III. Johns Hopkins

First Year Oral Examination

Comprehensive Examination

History and Quantitative

Other Requirements

IV. Rochester

Qualifying Examination

History and Quantitative

Other Requirements

V. Stanford

Comprehensive Examination

History and Quantitative

Other Requirements

VI. Berkeley

Departmental Examination in Theory

History and Quantitative

Other Requirements

VII. Michigan

Preliminary Examination

Economic History and Quantitative

Other Requirements

VIII. Chicago

Preliminary Examination

History and Quantitative

Other Requirements

Princeton University, 1924-1925

Government and Business Economics 407

Links to Course Texts

Assignments

Faculty Minute adopted March 6, 1944

FRANK HAIGH DIXON

Obituary: Felix, professor emeritus of economics, 91 By Melody Walker August 12, 2009

Economics in Two Lessons

I. The Ballad of “Right Price” [early 1920s]

II. The Busted Thermostat [early 1950s]

[III.] The Ballad of the Sad Economist, or Who’s the Fairest Model of Them All? [1952]

Harvard Ph.D.

Short Bio from Harvard Law School Yearbook

Richard Musgrave H. N. Burbank Professor of Political Economy

Obituary from UC Santa Cruz

Letter of Henry Carter Adams (1851-1921)
to President James B. Angell, March 15, 1887.

Elliot Joseph Berg
(b. 20 May 1927 in New York City;
d. 21 November 2002 in Alexandria, VA).

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics

Outline
Economics 118
THE ECONOMIES OF TROPICAL AFRICA

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics

Economics 118
FINAL EXAMINATION
May 29, 1961

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

Government and Business
Economics 407

Obituary:
Felix, professor emeritus of economics, 91
By Melody Walker August 12, 2009

[III.] The Ballad of the Sad Economist, or
Who’s the Fairest Model of Them All? [1952]

Richard Musgrave
H. N. Burbank Professor of Political Economy

January 16, 2007
By Jennifer McNulty, Staff Writer

Renowned Economist Musgrave Dead at 96
Former professor ‘transformed’ public sector economics

By Tina Wang, Crimson Staff Writer
January 19, 2007

1st Generation: Guy Henderson Orcutt
(Ph.D. from Michigan, 1944)

2nd Generation: Alice Orcutt Nakamura
(Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins, 1972)

3rd generation: Emi Nakamura
(Harvard Ph.D., 2007)