Tag: Galbraith

Harvard or MIT. Economics graduate student skit, ca. 1963.

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2017-12-18

Because of the reference to Jaroslav Vanek’s leaving Harvard, we are able to date the following script to 1962-63 since Vanek left Harvard to work at the State Department in 1963. Almost everything about this script would lead me to conclude that it was used in a Harvard graduate student skit that somehow wound up in the folder for the Graduate Student Association at the Department of Economics of M.I.T. The folder is otherwise filled with clearly M.I.T. skit material from the 1960s. One of the students is identified as “David” another “Bob” and the third looks like “Les”.

Lester Thurow did get his Ph.D. from Harvard in 1964 and came to M.I.T. in 1968 so it is not inconceivable that the following transcription is indeed based upon his personal typed script copy with original pencil stage directions that made its way into the folder.

One thing that I find rather surprising about the text is just how many Harvard professors’ names have been misspelled.

__________________________

D—This is a review with a message—a message no economist can afford to ignore. The year is 2000 A.D. 16 years have now passed since 1984, that Armageddon of the economics profession when Professor Wassily Leontief finally established that the world really was homogeneous of degree one. The then President of the United States, Mr. Norman Mailer, immediately issued the great Marginal Product Proclamation. Everyone was to receive their marginal product.

B— But there was nothing left over for the economists. Economists became the hand-loom weavers of the 20^th. century.

L—Arthur Schlesinger Jr. vividly described their position in a 17-volume work entitled “The Coming of the Raw Deal.” Economists everywhere, after the first shock, set out upon new careers. Tonight we shall discover what happened to some of those whom we know and love.

D—Several of them went into the movie industry and we will now let you hear the soundtrack of the preview of one of their movies.

(Epic Music—Bruckner?)

[Insert: Stand]

L—Ladies and Gentlemen, 21^st Century Fox are proud to present Arthur Smithies and Joan Robinson in….The Big Push, the story of the unbalanced growth of an economist….

B—Production by Karl [sic] Kaysen

D—Copyright by Edward Hastings Chamberlain [sic]

L—All labor disputes on location and with Elizabeth Taylor arbitrated by John Dunlop.

B—Continuity by Simon Kuznets

L—Editing by Seymour Harris, of course.

D—Costumes by Robert Dorfman.

B—This is the story of Ragnar Maynard von Eckstein (his parents had always wanted him to be an economist). After many struggles at last he got to Harvard Graduate School.

L—It is a tale of ^|horror. See him now at a seminar on the economics of Medical Care…..

D—This after-noon I am going to discuss the economics of Blood-banking. One of the crucial problems in this field is what proportion to maintain of liquid assets. In this category we have blood [Insert: L. What about near blood] near-blood. We also have non-liquid assets—bonds in the form of pounds of flesh. Another problem is the current shortage of tellers, for we can only employ vampires with a strong liquidity preference. If we cannot get more it will clot up the flow of funds and reduce the velocity of circulation.

L—It is a tale of ^|ambition…..

B—Coming from a family whose marginal product was zero, Ragnar Maynard realized that to get on quickly he must publish something. But what? He had not written anything. But our resourceful hero saw a way out: he would publish his first book before it was written. It was called First Draft, a revised tentative, preliminary, provisional text. It was based on Photostat copies of his blackboard notes.

L—It is a tale of ^|love….

D—Ragnar Manyrd fell passionately in love with a beautiful capital theorist, played in the movie by ravishing Joan Robinson. His demand for her love was infinitely elastic; her supply could not meet him—at least not at his price. The price was to join him in his exhausting search over peaks and through troughs for the elusive U-shaped cost curve.

L—It is a tale of^|excitement

B—See Ragnar Maynard trying to free himself from the dreaded liquidity trap.

Insert: D—It’s true, it really is thicker than water

L—All this and more you can see in this movie—The Big Push is a take-off point in the development of the motion-picture.

B—See the exciting attempt on Professor Leontief’s life (with a 202 rifle) to try to prevent him revealing his startling discovery of a constant returns world.

D—See the world’s largest input-output table which proved it—drawn by the Economic Research project in the sand of the New Mexican desert.

L—You cannot afford to miss this motion picture. Filmed in wonderful new—Solocolor. An introducing revolutionary—Rostowscope.

(concluding epic music)

[Insert: Sit]

D—But the movies could not accommodate everybody…

[Insert: Bob in middle]

[Insert: one illegible word]

L—Professor Leontief, having escaped with his life, and using his input-output table from Scientific American as a testimonial, got into the business of designing bathroom tiles.

B—Professor Duesenbery [sic] was well qualified to go into the demonstration business. He drove Cadillacs around low-income districts to stimulate demand. And changed his name to Jones so that it would be him that everyone was keeping up with.

D—In England many economists went to work for the government where they produced a remarkable effect. Before 1984 political speeches had sounded something like this.

B—Good evening; I’m the Prime Minister. My name is….. [insert: ad lib] etc.

D—But now all this has changed…

B—Good evening…[insert: ad lib] etc.

L—Professor Tom Schelling took up a career in Madison avenue. It was he who was responsible for some of the following products…

D—Ladies, now you can wear the most powerful and alluring perfume in the world—First Strike—the only perfume with complete credibility. It also contains the only deodorant with overkill.

B—Now at last there is a product to take away the smell of deodorant—it is called Counterforce. Only Counterforce gives you 24-hour protection against odorlessness. [Insert: 5120 or S120]

[Insert: STAND]

L—For years girls have been searching for a perfume which will attract the men and yet prevent them from taking liberties—now they have it in the form of Deterrence—the perfume which is effective [Insert: only] if you don’t use it.

D—He also introduced a city wide deodorant campaign under the title of Civil defence.

L—And the only really safe method of birth control—Early Warning.

B—Meanwhile Professor Dunlop had become a truck driver and a shop steward for Jimmy Hoffa.

D—And Professor Kuznets took to selling abacuses.

[Insert: Some economists, not from Harvard opened a cafeteria.]

[Insert: Bob-Les—come forward]

L—Professor Galbraith first thought of becoming a rice farmer. But he soon saw that since there was no more need for economists he could now come into his own. After a coup d’etat he took over the Littauer building and changed it into the department of Affluent Studies. The idea was the ultra-popularization of economics; the main qualification for admission was to be a good phrase-monger. The new department published books like…

B—The Economics of Sex, with an appendix on the second derivatives of Jayne Mansfield. A geometric interpretation with diagrams.

D—The department became identified with a new theory of economic decline, published as a non-Rostovian manifesto. All countries, it said, tend to decline, and their speed of decline is determined by their relative degree of economic advancement. Its five stages of decline started with the age of mass consumption, through the age of preconditions for decline, coming then to the crucial landing stage.

B—Other books appeared like ‘The Naked Truth about Public Squalor, and so on.

[Insert: Pause—back to audience]

L—Only one of the redundant economists took the highest calling of all. Let us now eavesdrop on a sermon by [Insert: his eminence] Archbishop Gerschenkron…

[Insert: seated]

B—You know, when I was an economist one of my graduate students wrote a very good paper for my course. Matthew, [Insert: I said] why don’t you publish this paper, no, really why don’t you publish. But you know youll have to change the title. What journal is going to publish a paper called ‘the First Gospel’? But you know it really was a very good paper. There was a lot of interesting material about the farm problem in Egypt and about the almost miraculous elasticity of supply of loaves and small fishes in Gallillee [sic]. Then there was a very good section about Christ throwing the money-changers from the temple. Well, you see, the rate of interest was very high then. Don’t you think that the real reason why Christ did this was to reduce the rate of interest and to stimulate investment. You see, I wanted Matthew to rewrite his paper for the Quarterly Journal and call it ‘Christ as a proto-Keynsian’ [sic] But no, he was a very strong-willed boy and he brought it out in a syposium [sic] edited by Seymour Harris, called the Bible, essays in honor of God. But, you know, it was still required reading for my course.

D—Professor Harberler [sic] took to song writing, and here is a sample…

[Insert: stand behind table]

(tune: God bless America)

[Insert: All:] God bless free enterprise,
[Insert: MOC or HOC or NOC] System divine,
Stand beside her and guide her,
Just as long as the profits are mine.
[Insert: Salute]
Corporations may they prosper
Big business, may it grow!
[Insert: MOC or HOC or NOC] God bless Free Enterprise,
The Status quo!

L—Well, David, I guess that’s it. Do you think they’ll throw us out?

D—I dont know. But I dont suppose we’ll ever be allowed to pass generals. There are still some jobs you can get without a Ph.D.

B—No chance at all is there? I mean about generals….

D—Well they were all in it weren’t they—all the generals board.

L—What about Professor Vanek? He emerged unscathed.

D—That’s true but he’s leaving.

B—That’s fair, of course.

L—Yes, he hasn’t done much since he’s been here really.

D—Half a dozen good articles…

B—4 books, or is it 5?

L—He’s become an acknowledged expert on at least two major fields of economics…

D—A clear and stimulating teacher…
And a nice guy…

L—Not much really. [Insert: Clearly not a Harvard type]

B—Not surprised they’re letting him go

D—Well, that’s it then.

B—One more thing actually…The perpetrators of this entertainment would like it to be known that any resemblance of characters in this review to any person or persons living or half-dead is purely intentional.

L—So be it.

All—In the name of the Holy Trinity:

D—Dorfman,

L—Samuelson,

B—and Solow.

All—Amen

Source: MIT Archives. Department of Economics Records, Box 2, Folder “GEA 1961-67”.

Tags Chamberlin, Duesenberry, Dunlop, Eckstein, Galbraith, Gerschenkron, Haberler, Harris, Kuznets, Leontief, Smithies, Thurow

Harvard Suggested Reading Syllabus

Harvard. Undergraduate microeconomics reading list. Marglin, 1969-70

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2017-12-10

In the year after being granted tenure at Harvard, Stephen A. Marglin taught an undergraduate microeconomics course to which he invited Professors Galbraith, Arrow, Gintis and Dorfman for a discussion with his students. He included a copy of his reading list in his invitation to Galbraith which are both transcribed below.

Marglin’s biography was featured in a few Harvard Crimson articles over the years (the common theme to these articles is “What’s a nice radical economist like you doing in a place like this?”): May 12, 1975; March 12, 1980 ; May 21, 1982 ; June 1, 2009.

____________________________________

Invitation from Marglin to Galbraith to participate in a discussion with his microeconomics students in January 1970

HARVARD UNIVERSITY

Stephen A. Marglin
Professor of Economics

1737 Cambridge Street, Room 410
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138
(617) 868-7600 Ext. 3759

December 19, 1969

Professor J. Kenneth Galbraith
Littauer Center 207
Harvard University
Cambridge, Mass. 02138

Dear Ken:

The “confrontation” you kindly agreed to participate in for the benefit of Ec 20 and Ec 21 students has been fixed for Friday January 9, 1970 2-4 PM, in Emerson 105. In addition to yourself Ken Arrow and Herb Gintis have agreed to participate. Bob Dorfman, who teaches Ec 21, has agreed to help guide the discussion.

The meeting will rely heavily on students’ questions, but not completely. To get the ball rolling, I am working with my section-men to prepare questions that they will ask in the beginning. These will hopefully elicit from each of your short statements on the issues we believe to be most important. I expect these questions and your answers will occupy the first 45 minutes or so of the meeting, with the rest of the time for the students.

I am enclosing a copy of the reading list to give you an idea of the scope and depth of the course. I appreciate very much your willingness to participate in this meeting. I expect it will be extremely worthwhile for my students, the teaching fellows, and for me personally.

Yours sincerely,
[Signed: “Steve”]
Stephen A. Marglin

cc: Robert Dorfman
SM:lw
(enclosure)

____________________________________

Harvard University
Economics 20a
Microeconomic Theory

Fall 1969-70
Professor Marglin

Reading List I

Consumption
1. Scitovsky, Welfare and Competition, pp. 29-50
2. Baumol, Economic Theory and Operations Analysis, (2^nd edition), pp. 169-202
Production
1. Dorfman, The Price System, pp. 14-42
2. Scitovsky, Welfare and Competition, pp. 109-147
3. Dorfman, “Mathematical or ‘Linear’ Programing: A Nonmathematical Exposition,” reprinted in Kamerschen, Readings in Microeconomics, (abbreviated DRK henceforth), pp. 547-576
4. Coase, “The Nature of the Firm,” reprinted in Boulding and Spivey, AEA Readings in Price Theory, (henceforth abbreviated AEA), pp. 331-351
Competitive Markets
1. Dorfman, The Price System, pp. 76-88
2. Viner, “Cost Curves and Supply Curves,” reprinted in DRK, pp. 197-228, and in AEA, pp. 198-232
Restricted Competition
1. Sraffa, “The Laws of Returns Under Competitive Conditions,” reprinted in AEA, pp. 180-197
2. Scitovsky, Welfare and Competition, pp. 319-337, 373-396
3. Dorfman, The Price System, pp. 89-104
4. Modigliani, “New Developments on the Oligopoly Front,” DRK, pp. 355-378
Capital and Interest
1. Fisher, The Theory of Interest, pp. 61-287
2. Scitovsky, Welfare and Competition, pp. 189-216
3. Duesenberry, Business Cycles and Economic Growth, pp. 49-133
General Equilibrium
1. Dorfman, The Price System, pp. 105-125
2. Lange and Taylor, On the Economic Theory of Socialism, pp. 59-129
Welfare
1. Dorfman, The Price System, pp. 126-146
2. Scitovsky, Welfare and Competition, pp. 338-370
3. Bator, “The Simple Analytics of Welfare Economics,” reprinted in DRK, pp. 503-544
Income Distribution
1. Budd (editor), Inequality and Poverty, Introduction
2. Locke, Second Treatise of Government, ch. 5 (“Of Property”)
3. Clark, J.B., The Distribution of Wealth, ch. 1
4. Budd (editor), Inequality and Poverty, Part 1, pp. 1-49
Criticisms of Conventional Theory
1. Veblen, The Theory of the Leisure Class, ch. 2, 4, and 5
2. Galbraith, The Affluent Society, ch. 10 and 11.
3. Berle and Means, The Modern Corporation and Private Property, Skim Book 1; read Book IV more carefully.
4. Nordquist, “The Break up of the Maximization Principle,” reprinted in DRK pp. 278-295
5. Veblen, “The Limitations of Marginal Utility,” reprinted in Mitchell (editor), What Veblen Taught, pp. 151-175
6. Cohen and Cyert, Theory of the Firm, pp. 329-351
7. Simon,” A Behavioral Model of Economic Choice,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, 1955 (omit appendix). Reprinted in Simon, Models of Man, pp. 241-256
8. Friedman, Capitalism and Freedom, pp. 1-36, 108-160
9. Schumpeter, Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy, Part II, pp. 61-163
10. Galbraith, The New Industrial State
11. Baran and Sweezy, Monopoly Capital
12. Rawls, “Distributive Justice”, pp. 58-72, 79-82

Source: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library. John Kenneth Galbraith Personal 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: Stephen A. Marglin from Harvard Crimson June 1, 2009.

Tags Arrow, DorfmanR, Galbraith, Gintis, Marglin

Berkeley Columbia

Columbia Economics Ph.D. Alumnus (1931) and Berkeley professor, Leo Rogin

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2017-10-24

Today we get a glimpse of the life of Russian-born economist Leo Rogin who died at age 54 after having taught twenty years at UC Berkeley.

A additional brief biographical paper of Leo Rogin that highlights his influence on John Kenneth Galbraith:

Robert W. Dimand and Robert H. Koehn. Galbraith’s Heterodox Teacher: Leo Rogin’s Historical Approach to the Meaning and Validity of Economic Theory. Journal of Economic Issues, Vol. 42, No. 2 (June, 2008) pp. 561-568.

________________

Leo Rogin, Economics: Berkeley
1893-1947

by Robert A. Brady, Ralph W. Chaney, and Malcolm M. Davisson

The greatest tribute to Leo Rogin’s intellectual qualities was the response of his students. They invariably reported his classes to be extraordinarily challenging and exhilarating. Few teachers paid so little lip service to the conventional canons of pedagogy, yet few were able to stir up such animated and continuous reëxamination of fundamental propositions which underlie social theory in general and economic theory in particular. Former students are scattered all over the country who, years after, remember his classes as the outstanding intellectual experience of their entire college career.

Part of this experience was derived by contact with his charming personal qualities: an infectious enthusiasm, a wonderful sense of humor, a never failing delight in new ideas, and a great tolerance in outlook and interpretation. Some of these qualities may trace back to a life of rich and varied personal experience. He was born in Mohilev, Russia, on April 18, 1893. His father, manager of a large Russian estate, moved with his family to the United States in 1902, where in due time they became American citizens. Leo Rogin’s early interest was quite naturally devoted to agricultural subjects. He received the B.S. degree in Agriculture from Rutgers College in 1916 and the Ph.D. degree in Economics from Columbia University in 1931. He began teaching as Instructor in Economics and Sociology at Grinnell College in 1921. The following year he became Associate Professor of Economics and Sociology at North Carolina College for Women. In 1926 he was Assistant Professor of Economics at Lawrence College, Wisconsin. He came to the University of California in 1927, where he was Lecturer (1927-1938), Associate Professor (1938-1946), and Professor (1946-1947).

Interspersed with his teaching were other professional assignments. In 1925-1926 he served as Economist on the staff of the Guarantee Trust Company. In 1934-1935 he was Chief of Staff of the Labor Advisory Board of the NRA. In 1937-1938 he was Director of an extensive Survey of Destitution in Wyoming.

An understanding of the contribution of Leo Rogin must begin with the realization that he held that neither theory nor practice in the social sciences could be adequately analyzed or creatively expanded or refined outside of a frame of reference which was coextensive with the dual role of citizen and scholar. From this it followed that the differentia specifica which separates the social sciences from the natural sciences inheres in the structure, character, and functioning of social relations as such; that there is no escape from the acceptance of the historicity of social science theory, however formal and abstract; and that no aspect of social sciences–economics, political science, sociology–can be looked upon as more than a specific angle of an approach to an examination of the social sciences as a whole.

It is no accident, accordingly, that Leo Rogin felt, as an economist, that this view required that he become unusually well versed in philosophy and history. That this implied a stronger, rather than a weaker, imperative for rigor in his thinking processes is indicated by his systematic and long drawn-out self-education in logic and mathematics. But this very same emphasis also led him to feel that since the significant reality of the social sciences was an ever-changing and perpetually fluid manifold of social relations, it was highly necessary to cultivate a sense for the vagaries of theory by active participation in the social life of his time. Thus his personal as well as his scholarly life represented a quite unusual wedding of theory and practice. He maintained an acute and vivid interest in people, events, and a whole range of current social problems while at the same time constantly pursuing a heavy schedule of detailed and exacting research. This research had just begun to yield its most important results at the time of his sudden death in the summer of 1947. A major work, tentatively titled The Meaning and Validity of Economic Theory, representing some ten years of intensive work, is to be published in 1948. This study, dealing with the major figures in the evolution of economic thought from the time of the Physiocrats and the founding of the Classical School to J. M. Keynes, was prefatory to two other projected works. One was to be a detailed study of Keynes, whom Rogin regarded as one of the great transitional figures of contemporary times. The other was to be a constructive examination of the theory of economic planning.

Thus his work was cut off at the very time when it bore promise of yielding a significant reëxamination of economic theory as a whole. His earlier critical writings reflected a very carefully outlined plan of work and were notable for their penetration and originality. Particularly noteworthy was a series of articles and reviews on the writings of Karl Marx and Werner Sombart. An earlier study, The Introduction of Farm Machinery in its Relation to the Productivity of Labor in the Agriculture of the United States During the 19th Century, published by the University of California Press in 1931, reflects his intense interest in the practical side of economic investigation and forecasts his later concern over techniques and methodology. E. A. J. Johnson said of this study that, “It is at once a set of findings and a method… his methodological contributions are indispensable to economic historians.” His later work would have amplified this statement to cover the significant problems of contemporary theory and policy formation.

In 1923 Leo Rogin married Winifred Ellsworth. His widow, three daughters, and a son survive him.

Source: University of California. In Memoriam, 1947.

Image Source: Blue and Gold, 1922.

Tags Galbraith, Rogin

Curriculum Harvard Uncategorized Undergraduate

Harvard. Undergrad economics program described in The Harvard Crimson, 1953

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2017-10-10

The Harvard Crimson has a really useful search function that can get you a student’s perspective on undergraduate economics education in Harvard’s ivy-covered (well, sometimes) lecture halls. I added links to courses and professors for a bit of value-added. Otherwise the article speaks for itself.

_______________________

The Harvard Crimson
April 22, 1953

Economics
Number of Concentrators: 331.
1952 Commencement Honors: cum, 17; magna, 20; summa, 1; 2 cums in General Studies.

The fact that Economics can boast one of the top faculties in the country, and probably has more nationally known professors than any other department in the College, is one of the main drawbacks to the concentrator. For few undergraduates are able to claim having really studied under any of them.

Most of the courses are conducted under the lecture system which does allows the undergraduate little contact with the men who divide their time between Washington and Cambridge.

The mistake should not be made that a concentrator in Economics will be trained in how to make his first million, no illusions should be developed that Economics is just another term for business administration. What the Department of Economics attempts to do is quite simple: the development of the economic background to present day social and political issues.

Tutorial

Economics I, required of every concentrator, is designed to introduce the student to the field. Its main criticism is that it is too general. But in the past it has been quite efficient in preparing students for the more advanced courses.

In an attempt to introduce some personal contact, the Department has now extended tutorial to all sophomores and juniors. According to Departmental chairman Arthur Smithies, its purpose is threefold: 1) to make specific things brought up in classes more concrete, 2) to tie the various fields of economics together, 3) to bring out the close relationship between economics and the other social sciences.

Tutorial in the junior year, usually limited to honors candidates, is now open to non-honors candidates also. Called “presumptive honors tutorial,” it meets in sessions conducted along honors tutorial lines. The program was opened last year with the hope of inducing more concentrators to apply for honors in their senior year. According to Ayers Brinser ’31, Head tutor of Economics, a great majority of the juniors who enter the junior tutorial with no intention of being an honors-candidates, change their minds during the junior year. By offering the presumptive tutorial, the department enables students who did not sign for honors to change in their senior year.

Basic Courses

Requirements for concentration do not impose too great a restriction on the concentrator’s program. Four Economic courses including Economics I are a must for non-honors men, while honors candidates are held for five. Three of the courses must be chosen from the basic courses: Economics 101, Economic Theory and Policy; Economics 141, Money, Banking and Economics Fluctuations; Economics 151. Public Finance; Economics 161, Business Organization and Public Regulation; Economics 171, Economics of Agriculture; and Economics 181a and b, Trade Unionism and Collective Bargaining, Public Policy and Labor.

Honors candidates may elect to take tutorial for credit for one semester of their senior year, while they work on their 40,000 word theses. Currently, more than a third of the concentrators are honors candidates.

The department also requires all concentrators to take full courses in Government, History, Social Relations or the second group Social Science courses.

Most popular of the advanced courses last year was Economics 161. Professors Kaysen and Galbraith divided last year’s schedule. The course deals with the structure and character of business and their markets; the attitude of the public toward combination and regulation, including the transportation industry and the public utilities; and the problems of resource conservation and industrial mobilization.

Labelled by most concentrators as the most difficult of the basic courses, Economics 141 crams a great deal into its program. Most concentrators prefer to get this one out of the way in their sophomore or junior year, since it is a good foundation for other courses in the field.

Labor Economics

One of the most popular professors teaching an undergraduate courses, John Dunlop will be back to give the two semesters of Labor Economics. Different from the other basic courses in that it emphasizes more human aspects, Economics 181 combines human and legal aspects of the labor movement as well of the economic foundation.

Economics 101, the basic theory course for undergraduates, is restricted to honors candidates in their last year of study.

Source: The Harvard Crimson, April 22, 1953.

Tags Dunlop, Galbraith, Kaysen, Smithies

Exam Questions Harvard Suggested Reading Syllabus

Harvard. Galbraith’s Business Organization and Control. Syllabus and Exams. 1949-50

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2017-09-28

Materials for the undergraduate course “Business Organization and Control” taught by Sidney Alexander in 1948-49 has been transcribed and posted earlier. The course was taught the following year by John Kenneth Galbraith and others. Below you will find enrollment data followed by transcriptions of the syllabi for both semesters along with the mid-year and final examinations for the course.

_______________________

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 161 (formerly Economics 61a and 62b). Business Organization and Control. (Full Co.) Dr. Galbraith

(F) Total 179: 2 Graduates, 61 Seniors, 75 Juniors, 32 Sophomores, 1 Freshman, 8 Radcliffe.
(Sp) Total 160: 2 Graduates, 56 Seniors, 70 Juniors, 24 Sophomores, 7 Radcliffe, 1 Other.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College and Reports of the Departments for 1949-59, p. 73.

_______________________

[Fall Term, 1949-50]

Economics 161
Business Organization and Control
Dr. Galbraith

Date	Topic	Lecturer	Reading
Sept. 28	Preview	Galbraith	Bain, Ch. 1,2 (omitting pp. 26-41), 4, 5, 6, 8. TNEC No. 21, pp. 20-48, 113-121.
Sept. 30	Applied Theory of Markets	Galbraith
Oct. 3	“	Galbraith
Oct. 5	“	Galbraith
Oct. 7	Section
Oct. 10	Section
Oct. 12	HOLIDAY
Oct. 14	Forms of Business Enterprise	Gordon	Guthmann & Dougall, Chapter 2
Oct. 17 24	The Corporation: Origin and Legal Characteristics	Gordon	Buchanan, Ch. 3; Berle & Means, Book II, Ch. 1; Dewing, Book I, Ch. 1-2.
Oct. 19 26	“	Gordon
Oct. 21 28	Section
Oct. 24 31	Concentration & Market Organization: The Role and peration of the Large Corporation	Galbraith	Gordon, Chapters 2, 4, 5. Berle and Means, Book I, Ch. 1; Book IV, Chapters 1-4.
Oct. 26 Nov. 2	“	Galbraith
Oct. 28 Nov. 4	Section
Oct. 31 Nov. 7	Concentration & Market Organization: Holding companies and interest groups	Galbraith	Purdy, Chapter 7. Structure of the American Economy, Part I, Appendix 13
Nov. 2 Nov. 9	Concentration & Market Organization: Trade Associations	Gordon	TNEC No. 18, pp. 45-67 TNEC No. 21, pp. 234-258
Nov. 4 Nov. 11	Section

Bain, Joe S., Pricing, Distribution, and Employment, 1948.

U.S., Temporary National Economic Committee Monographs:

No. 18, Trade Association Survey;
No. 21, Competition & Monopoly in American Industry.

Guthmann, H. G., & Dougall, H. E., Corporate Financial Policy, 1948.

Buchanan, N. S., The Economics of Corporate Enterprise.

Berle, A. A., & Means, G. C., The Modern Corporation and Private Property, 1932.

Dewing, A. S., Financial Policy of Corporations, 1941, 2-volume edition.

Gordon, R. A., Business Leadership in the Large Corporation, 1945.

Purdy, H. L., Lindahl, M.L., and Carter, W. A., Corporate Concentration & Public Policy, 1942.

U.S., National Resources Committee, Structure of the American Economy, Part I, “Basic Characteristics.

_______________________

[Fall Term (cont.), 1949-50]

Economics 161
Business Organization and Control
Messrs. Galbraith and Gordon

	Topic	Lecturer	Reading
November 14	Price Leadership and Market Sharing	Gordon	Burns, Ch. III (ex. pp. 118-140), and Ch. IV.
November 16	Patents and Trademarks	Gordon	T.N.E.C. Monograph No. 21, pp. 158-165; Edwards, pp. 216-248.
November 18	Section
November 21	Advertising	Galbraith	Burns, Ch. VIII
November 23	Price Discrimination	Gordon	Boulding, pp. 533-43
November 25	Section		Boulding, pp. 533-43
November 28	Basing Point System—Exposition	Galbraith	Machlup, Ch. 1 (ex. Appendix) and Ch. 3; Kaysen, “Basing Point Pricing and Public Policy”
November 30	Basing Point System—Consequences	Kaysen
December 2	Section
December 5	Economic Norms of Public Policy	Duesenberry	Hansen, Fiscal Policy and Business Cycles, Ch. XV
December 7	“	Duesenberry	Hansen, Fiscal Policy and Business Cycles, Ch. XV
December 9	Section		Galbraith, Essay on Monopoly and Concentration of Economic Power in Ellis, Review of Contemporary Economics
December 12	Economic Norms of Public Policy	Duesenberry
December 14	Promoting Competition: The Anti Trust Laws	Gordon	Purdy et al., Chs. 16, 17, 18 (omitting pp. 354-360), 20 (omitting pp. 393-401), 28; Adelman, “Effective Competition and the Anti Trust Laws”; Mason, “The Current Status of the Monopoly Problem in the United States
December 16	Section
December 19	Promoting Competition: The Anti Trust laws
December 22	“

Adelman, M. A., “Effective Competition and the Anti Trust Laws,” M.I.T., Publications in the Social Sciences, Series No. 1, Reprint from Harvard Law Review, Sept. 1948.

Boulding, Kenneth, Economic Analysis, Revised Edition.

Burns, A. F., The Decline of Competition, 1936.

Edwards, Corwin, Maintaining Competition, 1949.

Kaysen, Carl, “Basing Point Pricing and Public Policy,” Q.J.E., August, 1949, pp. 289-314.

Machlup, Fritz, The Basing Point System, 1949.

Mason, Edward S., “The Current Status of the Monopoly Problem in the U.S.,” Harvard Law Review, June, 1949, pp. 1265-1285.

Purdy, H. L., Lindahl, M. L., and Carter, W. A., Corporate Concentration & Public Policy, 1942.

U.S., T.N.E.C. Monograph No. 21, Competition and Monopoly in American Industry, 1940.

Hansen, Alvin, Fiscal Policy and Business Cycles, 1941, First Edition.

Ellis, Howard, Review of Contemporary Economics, 1948.

_______________________

Final Examination, Fall Term 1949-50

1949-50
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 161

I.
(one hour)

Required

A book published a couple of years ago entitled The American Individual Enterprise System, has the following to say about “the meaning of competition”;

“How a seller chooses to exercise his freedom, as long as he is independent, does not furnish a test of competition. The only true test, and the basic distinguishing feature of competition, is whether there are at least two suppliers of a market who make independent decisions on the prices and conditions at which they will offer their goods and services.”

Using the word “competition” in this sense, the book’s authors stat that “competition serves the public in the following ways”:

“It tends to assure that goods and services will be produced and distributed at the lowest possible cost.
“It tends to assure that profits will be held to the minimum.
“It tends to assure that the energy and raw materials and productive capacity of the nation will be used for providing those goods and services which the public wants, and in proportion to the relative demands of the public.
“It assures freedom of opportunity. Anyone at any time, if he has the necessary capital, can enter any line of business he desires.”

Questions:

(a) Do you concur in this definition of competition? Why or why not?

(b) Would an economic system which is “competitive” in the sense of the above quotation necessarily produce the results which the authors mention? Consider in turn each of the “results” mentioned above. Be specific, and make certain that you explain each step in your reasoning.

II.
(Seventy-five minutes)

Answer any three of the five.

Give a concise, clear explanation of the mechanics of a multiple-basing point pricing using graphs if you wish.
Under what circumstances and why are business firms likely to prefer non-price to price competition? Define your terms precisely.
In what ways may it be argued that the American patent system is a stimulus and in what ways a deterrent, to invention and to realized technical progress in American industry?
What is price discrimination? Outline a set of conditions under which discriminatory pricing operates to the advantage of buyers.
State definitely but concisely the way in which each of the following cases affected the development of antitrust law.

C. Knight Case
Standard Oil Case
U. S. Steel Case
Aluminum Case

III.
(Forty-five minutes)

Required.

Schumpeter and Clark appear to agree in advocating (or condoning) certain restraints on competition. Develop fully and discuss the lines of argument by which they arrive at their respective conclusions.

Mid-Year. January 1950.

_______________________

[Spring Term, 1949-50]

Economics 161
Business Organization and Control
Professor Galbraith and Mr. Gordon

	Subject	Lecturer	Reading
Feb. 8	Promoting Competition: Cartel Policy	Gordon	Mason, Controlling World Trade, Ch. 1, 2.
Feb. 10	Promoting Competition: The Recent Antitrust Cases	Gordon	Oppenheim, Cases on Federal Antitrust Laws, Ch. 5. Nicholls, “The Tobacco Case of 1946,” American Economic Review, May 1949, pp. 284-96.
Feb. 13	Regulating Competition: Retail Trade and Regulation	Galbraith	TNEC Monograph 35, pp. 5-14, 145-160. Adelman, “The A & P Case,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, May 1949.
Feb. 15	Regulating Competition: Retail Trade and Regulation	Galbraith
Feb. 17	Section
Feb. 20	Limiting Competition: Agriculture	Galbraith	Black, Parity, Parity, Parity, Ch. 5, 20, 21. Schultz, Production and Welfare of Agriculture, Ch. 4, 5, 8, 9, 12, 13, 15.
Feb. 22	HOLIDAY
Feb. 24	Limiting Competition: Agriculture	Galbraith
Feb. 27	Limiting Competition: Agriculture	Galbraith
Mar. 1	Regulated Monopoly: The Public Utility Concept	Gordon	Lyon, Abramson et al, Government and Economic Life, Vol. II, Ch. 21.
Mar. 3	Section
Mar. 6	Regulated Monopoly: Power and Transport	Gordon
Mar. 8	Regulated Monopoly: Power and Transport	Gordon	Locklin, Economics of Transportation, Ch. VIII, XV, XVI.
Mar. 10	Section
Mar. 13	Regulated Monopoly: Power and Transport	Gordon
Mar. 15	Corporate Financial Structure	Gordon	Dewing, Financial Policy of Corporations, Bk. I, Ch. 4 to p. 83, Ch. 7, 8, 9 to p. 218, and pp. 230-42; Bk. III, Ch. 1, 2. Merrill, Lynch, How to Read a Financial Report (entire pamphlet)
Mar. 17	Section
Mar. 20	Corporate Financial Structure	Gordon
Mar. 22	Corporate Financial Structure	Gordon
Mar. 24	Section
Mar. 27	Regulation of Securities and Markets	Gordon	Stein, Government and the Investor, Ch. 2, 3, 4, 6.
Mar. 29	Regulation of Securities and Markets	Gordon	Stein, Government and the Investor, Ch. 2, 3, 4, 6.
Mar. 31	Section
Recess from April 2 through 9
Apr. 10	Conservation: Forest Products	Nixon	Jensen, Lumber and Labor, Ch. 1,2.
Apr. 12	Conservation: Oil and Gas	Manne	Rostow, A National Policy for the Oil Industry, Ch. 1-9, 13-15.
Apr. 14	Section
Apr. 17	Conservation: Oil and Gas	Manne
Apr. 19	HOLIDAY
Apr. 21	Public Development: Housing	Galbraith	Fortune Magazine: The Industry Capitalism Forgot, August 1947, & Editorial, September 1947. TNEC Monograph #8, Towards More Housing, Ch. IV, V, IX.
Apr. 24	Public Development: Housing	Galbraith
Apr. 26	Economic Mobilization	Galbraith	Galbraith, “The Disequilibrium System,” American Economic Review, 1947. Johnson, G. G., Economic Stabilization Program.
Apr. 28	Section
May 1	Economic Mobilization	Galbraith
May 3	Reconciliation of Policy	Galbraith
May 5	Summary	Galbraith
Reading Period begins May 8

Mason, Edward S., Controlling World Trade, 1946.

Oppenehim, S. C., Cases on Federal Antitrust Laws.

Nicholls, W. H., “The Tobacco Case of 1946” in American Economic Review, May 1949, pp. 284-96.

Lyon, Abramson, et al, Government and Economic Life 1940.

Dewing, Arthur S., Financial Policy of Corporations, 1941, 2-volume edition.

Merrill, Lynch, Pierce, Fenner, and Beane, How to Read a Financial Report (pamphlet).

Stein, Emanuel, Government and the Investor.

Locklin, D. Philip, Economics of Transportation, 1947.

TNEC Monograph #8, Toward More Housing.

TNEC Monograph #35, Large-Scale Organization in the Food Industries.

Adelman, M. A., “The A & P Case. A Study in Applied Economic Theory,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. LXIII, No. 2, May 1949.

Schultz, T. W., Production and Welfare of Agriculture, 1949.

Black, J. D., Parity, Parity, Parity, 1942.

Jensen, Vernon, Lumber and Labor.

Rostow, Eugene V., A National Policy for the Oil Industry, 1947.

Galbraith, J. K., “The Disequilibrium System,” American Economic Review, Vol. XXXVII, #3, June 1947.

Fortune Magazine, “The Industry Capitalism Forgot,” August 1947, “Editorial,” September 1947.

Johnson, G. G., Suggestions for the Development of an Economic Stabilization Program for a War Emergency, National Security Resources Board, Document 47.

_______________________

Economics 161
[Midterm] Examination
April, 1950

Retailing and agriculture are both industries composed of many small firms. What are the similarities in government policy toward these industries? What are the important differences?
What were the principal provisions of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934? Discuss briefly in light of the abuses they were designed to remedy.

_______________________

Spring Term, Final Examination

1949-50
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 161

I.
(Forty-five minutes)

Required

The special appeals court, which heard the Alcoa case in 1945, said that Congress, in passing the federal antitrust laws, “was not necessarily actuated by economic motives alone.” “It is possible,” the court said, “because of its indirect social or moral effect, to prefer a system of small producers, each dependent for his success upon his own skill and character, to one in which the great mass of those engaged must accept the direction of a few.”

Does this point of view seem to you to provide a persuasive argument for the fair trade laws, Robinson-Patman Act and the position of the government in the A & P cases? Explain.

II.
(Ninety minutes)

Answer three out of four.

Explain the importance of the following in relation to public regulation of the petroleum industry:
1. The rule of capture.
2. The Connally “Hot Oil” Act.
3. The Interstate Compact.
4. Marginal well Acts.
5. Compulsory unit operation.
What are the Acts of Congress administered by the Securities and Exchange Commission? Outline the principal provisions of any three of them and the ends they were designed to achieve.
Under what circumstances do you believe a certificate of convenience and necessity should be required for entry into a business? What industries would you add (or delete) from a list where such certificates are required and why?
“The pricing system is not an appropriate means for stabilizing income from farming over time. To place this burden on the pricing system, as has been done in recent years can only reduce greatly its capacity [for allocating resources between alternative employments in agriculture and between agricultural and non-agricultural enterprise].”

What is the general character of the legislation “of recent years” to which Professor Schultz refers? Do you agree that it has inhibited resource allocation? Does the same objection hold for the Brannan Plan?

III.
(Forty-five minutes)

Required.

Before signing or vetoing important legislation, the President customarily requests the Bureau of the Budget—or occasionally some other Executive department or agency—to prepare a confidential memorandum setting forth the main features of the proposed legislation, the principal groups favoring and opposing it together with their arguments and motives, a careful statement of the economic consequences of the legislation; and the recommendation to the President, properly defended, as to whether he should accept or veto the legislation.
Would you prepare such a memorandum on the amendments to the Natural Gas Act of 1938 (the Kerr Bill), as passed by the Eighty-first Congress and keeping in mind the following:
1. That you are asked to pass only on the economic questions posed by the legislation. You are at liberty to ignore any purely legal issues that may have been involved.
2. That your concern is solely with the public welfare. You may ignore any political problems which the legislation poses for the President or his party.
3. That the President is a busy man and should not be burdened with an unnecessarily long-winded discourse.

(The quality of your memorandum and its economic analysis and argument, not the particular recommendation you make, will be the guiding factor in marking your paper.)

Final. May 1950.

Source: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Papers of John Kenneth Galbraith. Box 519, Folder “Economics 161, 1949-50.”

Image: John Kenneth Galbraith in Harvard Class Album 1952.

Tags Galbraith

Economics Programs Harvard

Harvard. Gerschenkron moves to abolish language requirement, 1959

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2017-05-23

In this 1960 memo to the executive committee of Harvard’s economics department, the polyglot economic historian, Alexander Gerschenkron, provided his written blessing for, indeed he initiated, the abolishment of a foreign language requirement for the graduate study of economics. Since the copy of the mimeographed memo was found in John Kenneth Galbraith’s papers, it is fitting to add his brief assent together with his comment on Gerschenkron’s obiter dicta with respect to math requirements.

______________________________

Memo to the Executive Committee
from Alexander Gerschenkron
(March 19, 1959)

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics

Littauer Center
Cambridge 38, Mass.

CONFIDENTIAL

March 19, 1959

TO: Members of the Executive Committee

I should like to give you an advance warning of my intention to propose, at the next regular meeting of the department, a radical change in our language requirements.

I have administered our language examinations for about ten years. You may recall that in the first year of operation I proposed, and the department accepted, a considerable reform of the way in which language examinations were given. The duration of the examination was extended from one hour to two hours, and the length of the material to be translated was more than doubled. At the same time much more difficult passages began to be selected; and finally, the examination was graded much more rigorously than it had been before. At that time I had the hope that it would be possible to stimulate through the language examination an increased interest in, and a fuller mastery of, foreign languages. It is perfectly clear to me now that this hope has not materialized. It is true that the students had to work harder in order to pass the examination, but it is equally true that whatever knowledge was acquired was allowed to fall into disrepair following the examination. The long run effect, which after all is the only thing that matters, has been zero point zero.

At the same time it is perfectly clear that the opportunity cost of preparing for the language examination is extremely high. Our students are a hard-working lot and we keep them very busy. I wonder very seriously whether it can be justified to force our students to cut out of a working day of some 10 or 11 hours and hour or two in order to master a language which in all likelihood will never be used by the student in his professional career. To some extent our language requirements are in the nature of an anachronism and we might do well to admit the fact frankly. At the turn of the century reading knowledge of French and German may have been the necessary prerequisite of any well rounded economics education. This is certainly not so now. The center of gravity shifted and at the same time the interest in the history of doctrines has greatly diminished. I am fully aware of the general benefit inherent in the study of languages. But I believe that we have to think in terms of professional proficiency. I doubt that the foreign language requirement could be justified under any circumstances, least of all if one consider how negligible its effect has been.

I plan therefore to make the following motion: All foreign language requirements for Ph.D. as well as for M.A. are abolished beginning with the class entering in September 1959. An examination in mathematics becomes an absolute requirement from which there is no dispensation and to which accordingly every candidate is subject. The Chairman should appoint a committee to discuss in which way, if any, the standards for the examination in mathematics should be improved.

Sincerely yours,

[signed]

Alexander Gerschenkron
Chairman, Language Requirements

AG/jw

______________________________

John Kenneth Galbraith’s Reply to the Memo

March 23, 1959

Professor Alexander Gerschenkron
Littauer M-7

Dear Alex:

I approve your proposal on languages with some reservations about the mathematics examination. I do not question your goal. But would it not be better — and better for secondary and college preparation — to put the mathematics requirement firmly in the requirements for admission?

Yours faithfully,

J.K. Galbraith

Source: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library. Papers of John Kenneth Galbraith. Series 5. Harvard University File, 1949-1990. Box 526, Folder “Department of Economics, Executive Committee 5/22/56-11/29/60”.

Image Source: Alexander Gerschenkron in the Harvard Class Album, 1952.

Tags Galbraith, Gerschenkron

Agricultural Economics Economists Harvard

Harvard. Memorial Minute for Agricultural Economist, J. D. Black, 1960

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2017-05-09

John Kenneth Galbraith was the chairman of a committee commissioned to write a faculty minute in honor of John D. Black (1883-1960) who taught courses in the economics of agriculture at Harvard from 1927 through 1959. Anyone familiar with Galbraithian prose can see that this minute was overwhelmingly, if not exclusively, the work of Galbraith. I do not think it an exaggeration to see in Galbraith’s praise of this or that aspect of Black’s career and scholarly style a projection of Galbraith’s own creed for academic life. Admiration, gratitude (Black pushed hard to get Galbraith promoted to a full professorship at Harvard), and affection all shine through this memorial minute, a genuine positive outlier in the art of the obituary.

Willard W. Cochrane wrote a profile “Remembering John D. Black” that was published in Choices (Magazine published by the Agricultural & Applied Economics Association in the 1st Quarter 1989 issue) pp. 31-32.

______________________

FACULTY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

At a meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences on October 18, 1960, the following minutes were placed upon the records.

JOHN DONALD BLACK

John D. Black, Henry Lee Professor of Economics, was the nation’s leading student of the economics of agriculture, and, to a greater extent than any other man, he gave the modern dimension and form to this branch of economics. His books, monographs, and papers were more widely and attentively read than those of any other scholar in the field; he was a premier source of ideas and a leader in research; his students have held and still hold a large proportion of the professorships in this subject; they have been equally influential in the United States Department of Agriculture and influential also in the colleges and departments of agriculture in foreign countries; and Black himself had a marked influence on the agricultural legislation passed in 1933 and thereafter. The price paid for milk in this community is set in accordance with a complex formula devised by Black. Not the least of his achievements was to make Harvard, an institution with no very intimate ties to farming, a major center during his lifetime of agricultural research and instruction.

Black’s first interest in life was as a teacher of advanced students — students who would find their career in one or another branches of his subject. His teaching had little style; preparation was at best an afterthought. But his students soon came to realize that they were, incomparably, the most important people in his life. They could count, literally, on his unlimited time and his impersonal but equally unlimited affection. And they discovered that beneath his formless lecturing were solid theoretical premises, a strong scientific attitude, and a profound contempt for anything suggestive of cant or pretense. He was immensely tolerant of students of average ability and was content if they became, in his hands, a little better than average. But he rejoiced in his good students and saw in all their achievements his own. Black’s students were his students for life. He knew them all by name; he expected to be consulted when they changed jobs; and he liked to be informed on their personal life. He was deeply concerned with the quality of instruction in agricultural economics not alone at Harvard but throughout the country. High level instruction he identified, not inaccurately, with this own students. So for many years he carried with him a small black book containing a list of former students and in his mind a list of college and university departments where he felt his influence could be enhanced. A vacancy in any of these institutions led promptly to a recommendation of a man who could be counted upon to extend what he did not hesitate to call “the Black point of view.”

Though subordinate in its claim on his time (during his nearly thirty years at Harvard his door was always open to students from nine until five) Black’s research and writing was of first importance and was prodigious in volume. His Production Economics, published in 1926, though unfinished in some respects, was a landmark in the development of the production function and in the theory of the competitive firm. It led Black to develop an entirely new approach to farm management research and instruction, one that reflected far more adequately the conceptual character of the farm firm and which in time largely supplanted the older methods based on comparative accounting data. Marketing, agricultural co-operation land tenure, land economics, price analysis, forestry, population theory, food and nutrition, farm labor, and national policy were among the subjects which engaged his attention at one period or another. A selection from his writings published last year by the Harvard University Press was from nearly three hundred books, papers, pamphlets, congressional submissions, reports, and manuscripts. Black had little patience with refinement in economic theory or method; he made no effort to conceal his opinion that much discussion of finer points was pretentious nonsense. He spoke often of the need to “open up a subject”—to initiate investigation and to offer the preliminary findings. This repeatedly he did. The results were never well formed or polished. But they were always supremely relevant, and they usually paved the way for the more detailed efforts of less original men.

Throughout his life Black was a trusted adviser on a wide range of matters concerning agricultural policy. He could not be readily typed either as a liberal or as a conservative. But he was sympathetic and pragmatic. He mistrusted the men who resolved matters on general theoretical grounds, and he was profoundly interested in results. Thus during the thirties, when many economists opposed the farm legislation of the period as an improper interference with the free market, Black was concerned only with how it might be made to work. Similarly on other matters. As a result, he was called on constantly by a succession of Secretaries of Agriculture, by agricultural officials, farm leaders, congressional committees and, especially in recent years, by foreign governments.

John Donald Black was born in 1883 in the log house on the original family homestead in Cambridge, Wisconsin. He was fourth in a family of talented children — one that include three teachers, a distinguished chemist, and a leading businessman. Black made his way through normal school, became a high school teacher of algebra, botany, and physical geography and the coach of the high school athletic teams. With earnings from teaching, he proceeded to the University of Wisconsin and to a degree in English. He taught English first at Western Reserve University and then for four years at the Michigan College of Mines (as it then was) on the upper Michigan peninsula. This latter college was in a raw and bitter community; in the neighboring copper mines bitterness and strife were endemic. He became impressed, especially after a long strike in 1915, with the urgency of the social problems. It seems likely, also, that he had become increasingly less impressed by the urgency or even the feasibility of teaching English grammar to these engineers for, in any case, he had begun to smuggle economics into his courses in the form of assignments in English composition. But on returning to study labor economics at a University of Wisconsin summer school, his attention was caught by the fledgling work in farm economics of Henry C. Taylor. He turned to this subject and took his Ph.D. degree with a thesis on land tenure in Wisconsin. On completion of his degree in 1918, he went to the University of Minnesota. His academic progress there may well serve as a model for the ambitious young scholar. He was assistant professor for six months, associate professor for two years, and the head of his department from the beginning.

In the ensuing ten years, the University of Minnesota became by far the most interesting center for research and discussion of the social problems of agriculture in the United States. A brilliant group of scholars gathered to work with Black. From them came a striking series of pamphlets and monographs — those on empirical methods and the nature of market supply responses were especially noteworthy. Before long, Black had a disproportionate share of both graduate students and budget — a development which he never found it in his heart to deplore.

By the late twenties his work was widely known and, at the behest of Thomas Nixon Carver, he was invited to visit Harvard for a term. This he did in 1927, and the visit was soon followed by an offer of a professorship. Now the students came to Cambridge instead of St. Paul. Few of them had funds to afford Harvard tuition, and by an incredible exercise of energy and resourcefulness Black found them money with which to study and do research. In 1929 and the years following the Social Science Research Council awarded one hundred twenty scholarships to improve the level of teaching and research in agricultural economics and rural sociology. Of the recipients, no fewer than forty-five came to Harvard to work with Black. In some subsequent years as many as a quarter of all the students in economics belonged to what came to be called “the Black Empire.”

In 1917 Black married Nina Van Steenberg, a woman of serene good humor and keen intelligence who, with their three children — Guy, Margaret, and Alan — survives him. The Black house in Belmont was for hundreds of graduate students nearly as much a part of Harvard as were his rooms in Widener or (later on) in Littauer. Black, to the wonder of all who knew him, worked prodigiously, imperturbably, and without evident strain. The serenity, charm, and quiet good humor of his household is surely a part of the explanation.

In his relations to colleagues and university, Black was the epitome of the inner-directed man. His view of what he needed and wanted was extremely clear. Since, in the end, it invariably prevailed, the Department eventually adopted the wise course of acceding to his wishes at the outset. Where he found university rules inconvenient, he unhesitantly ignored them. The rule that members of the faculty, though sound in body and mind, should retire at some specified age, struck him as especially absurd. He continued to teach until last December when he was seventy-six. He had a certain quiet pride in the devices by which he accomplished this defeat of authority, and it was his belief that no one in the modern history of the university had approached his record.

Black was an early President of the American Farm Economic Association and one of the life Fellows of that organization. He had a founding role in the organization of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations, and in 1955 he was President of the American Economic Association.

Last January he was stricken by the first of a series of severe heart attack. He died on April 12.

Edward S. Mason
Arthur Smithies
John Kenneth Galbraith, Chairman.

Source: Harvard University Gazette, Vol. LVI, No. 7 (October 29, 1960), p. 36-8. Copy in the Papers of John Kenneth Galbraith (Box 527), John F. Kennedy Presidential Library.

Image Source: Harvard University. Class Album 1945.

Tags BlackJD, Galbraith, Mason, Smithies

Harvard Regulations

Harvard. M.A. and Ph.D. requirements in Economics, 1958

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2017-03-12

Some economists keep more extensive files from their departmental lives than others. John Kenneth Galbraith not only wrote faster than most folks read, but routine departmental business is laced with his wit (when he writes) and fortified with other people’s memos and supplements that have been filed with as great a care as successive drafts of Galbraith’s own writings and correspondence.

For new visitors to Economics in the Rear-view Mirror, I should mention that my principal focus is the history of the organization and content of economics graduate education. Today we have an addition to the collection of “rules and regulations” governing the degree requirements for economists. It is only coincidental that this artifact has been recovered from the Galbraith papers.

_____________________

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics, Littauer M-8

September 18, 1958

Dear Sir:

Enclosed is a copy of the latest departmental supplement. It includes all the latest revisions. Note especially the new requirement of the written General Examination, pp. 3-4.

Seymour E. Harris
Chairman

_____________________

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

Supplement to the General Announcement*

[*To be read in conjunction with the Excerpts from the General Announcement and/or the General Announcement.]

Higher Degrees under the Department of Economics

The graduate program of the Department of Economics is designed both to provide students with a general graduate education in economics and to train them to undertake research in particular fields. While the Department has always stressed the importance of economic theory, history and statistics, its interest in abstract economics has always been tempered by its realization of the need to apply economics to the resolution of practical issues; it offers work also in mathematical economics and econometrics. As part of its empirical work, the Department, in cooperation with other branches of the University, operates and advanced statistical laboratory with the latest types of computational machines.

Students in economics are eligible for the regular Graduate School scholarships (see Excerpts from the General Announcement). The Henry Lee Memorial Scholarship is reserved specifically for students in Political Economy. At present, there are available ten to twenty scholarships yielding from $800 to $3,000. In addition, the Department hires annually about ten teaching fellows with stipends ranging from $880 to a maximum of $2,640. Ordinarily these appointments are available on a competitive basis to able student who have completed two years of graduate study in this Department.

The David A. Wells Prize is awarded annually for the best thesis on a subject which lies within the field of economics and is acceptable to the Department of Economics. Further details are available in the Department Office.

The Economics Club organized by graduate students meets regularly to hear speakers and to discuss problems of common interest.

HIGHER DEGREES IN ECONOMICS
Master of Arts (A.M.)

Prerequisites for Admission—Normally a distinguished undergraduate record and competence in a foreign language. Concentration in economics is not demanded, however, and persons with honor grades in their undergraduate work are welcomed. All applicants are urged to take the Aptitude Test of the Graduate Record Examination.

Residence—A minimum of two years: see General Announcement. The Department may waive up to one year of this requirement if a student has done graduate work elsewhere.

Program of Study—Four fields selected as follows from the fields listed below. Two fields, including Economic Theory, must be selected from Group A, and two must be chosen from Groups A, B and C (not more than one from group C).

GROUP A

(1) Economic Theory and Its History, with special reference to the Development of Economic Thought since 1776.
(2) Economic History since 1750, or some other approved field in Economic History.
(3) Statistical Method and Its Application.

GROUP B

(4) Money and Banking
(5) Economic Fluctuations and Forecasting.
(6) Transportation.
(7) Business Organization and Control.
(8) Public Finance.
(9) International Trade and Tariff Policies.
(10) Economics of Agriculture or Land Economics.
(11) Labor Problems.
(12) Socialism and Social Reform.
(13) Economic History before 1750.
(14) Consumption, Distribution, and Prices.
(15) Economics of Public Utilities.
(16) Social Security.
(17) Location and Regional Economics.
(18) Economics of Underdeveloped Areas.
(19) Forestry Economics.
(20) Any of the historical fields defined under requirements for the Ph.D. in History.
(21) Certain fields in Political Science listed under requirements for the Ph.D. in Political Science.

GROUP C

(22) Jurisprudence (selected topics).
(23) Anthropology.
(24) Philosophy (selected topics).
(25) History of Political Theory.
(26) International Law.
(27) Certain fields in Sociology defined under the requirements for the Ph.D. in Sociology.

Each student is required to submit for Departmental approval a plan showing four fields. The plan must be filed at the beginning of the third term of study on an official departmental form. Students may present for consideration of the Department reasonable substitutes for any of the fields named in the several groups.

Generally, students will take six courses, including one or two seminars, and two reading courses. During their first year of graduate study, students will normally take formal courses in theory, history, and statistics; but during their second year they are encouraged to take reading courses. These may consist of work under the direction of a member of the Faculty, or of independent work; in the latter case, the student must secure the approval of the Chairman of the Department.

Languages—A fluent reading knowledge, to be tested by a rigorous two-hour written examination, of advanced economic texts in one of the following languages: French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, a Scandinavian language, or Russian.

A student may substitute mathematics for this requirement, in which case he must take an examination to show his capacity to read and understand the more elementary mathematics used in economics. This includes knowledge of analytic geometry and differential and integral calculus.

Examinations are given by the Department in the first week of November and March. This requirement should be fulfilled during the first term of residence, and must be fulfilled before the General Written Examination. A student who has twice failed a language or mathematics examination must present to the Department proof of further study before he can take the examination a third time.

General Examinations—Each student will take a General Written and a General Oral Examination, normally during his fourth term of residence.

The General Written Examination precedes the General Oral Examination and will consist of a four-hour comprehensive test in Economic Theory and its History. This examination will be given in March. A student whose graduate record at Harvard does not average at least B will not be allowed to take the General Written Examination.

The General Oral Examination is a two-hour examination in four fields selected in accordance with the rules stated under Program of Study. In his preparation for the examination, the student’s main purpose should be to provide himself with tools of analysis, to be aware of the contributions that theory, history, and statistics can make to the solution of economic problems, and to appreciate the relation of economics to other disciplines. A student who has not passed the General Written Examination cannot present himself for the General Oral Examination.

The General Oral Examinations are held throughout the academic year. The student should consult the Secretary of the Department six weeks in advance of the date upon which he proposes to be examined.

Thesis—None required.

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

Prerequisites for Admission—In general, same as for the A.M.

Residence—Minimum of two years; see General Announcement.

Program of Study—Same as for the A.M., except that five fields are required, to be selected as follows. The three subjects in Group A are required, and two subjects from Groups B and C (not more than one from Group C). The student should include as one of his five fields the subject within which his thesis falls.

Languages—Two foreign languages selected from those listed under the requirements for the A.M. A test in one language must be passed before taking the General Written Examination and the other passed at least six months before the Special Examination. All candidates must offer French or German.

Mathematics may be substituted for the second language. For such substitution refer to rules for the A.M.

A student whose native language is not English may petition the Department to be excused from examination in the second language. He will then normally be examined in either French or German before taking his General Written Examination. In considering such petitions, account is taken of the amount of original economic literature in the student’s native language as well as of his general academic standing.

General Examinations—Same as for the A.M. except that the General Oral Examination will cover five fields. The requirement of the fifth field is usually fulfilled by completing a full-year graduate course, other than Theory, in the Department of Economics at Harvard with the grade of B+ or higher. Seminars offered by the Graduate School of Public Administration are not acceptable for such “write-off” purposes. One half-course must have been completed in the write-off field with a grade of B+ or higher before the General Oral Examination. If the requirement for the write-off is not met prior to the General Oral Examination, all five fields must be offered.

Ordinarily students who have completed three terms of residence at Harvard are excused from the final examination in courses included in the fields presented for the General Oral Examination, provided it is passed after December 1 in the fall term, or after April 1 in the spring term, and before final course examinations are held, and provided it is passed with at least a grade of “Good”.

Thesis—The thesis should be written in one of the fields offered in the General Oral Examination and must show an original treatment of the subject and give evidence of independent research. The candidate must obtain written consent for his proposed topic from the faculty member who has agreed to supervise his thesis and must submit it to the Chairman within six months after passing the General Oral Examination. A student must make a report of progress on his thesis to the Department once a year until the thesis is submitted for approval. The thesis in final form together with a brief summary (4-10pp.) must be submitted within five years from the date of the General Oral Examination. Two bound copies of the thesis (the original and first copy) must be in the hands of the Department by December 1 for a degree at Mid-year and March 1 for a degree at Commencement.

Special Examination—After approval of the thesis, the candidate must pass an oral examination of one and one-half hours, not less than one-half hour to be devoted to intensive examination in the special field without primary reference to the thesis. No examinations are held during the summer.

Ph.D. IN BUSINESS ECONOMICS

The purpose of this degree is to combine the more general training in Economics with the technical training in business courses and to prepare students to teach in schools of business administration.

Prerequisites for Admission—Same as for the Ph.D. in Economics.

Residence—Same as for the Ph.D. in Economics.

Program of Study—The student should prepare himself in five fields chosen from the groups given below. Only two fields, including Economic Theory and its History, may ordinarily be chosen from Group A. In all cases the program of study must be approved by the Chairman of the Department of Economics. For advice on courses relating to business subjects, students should see Professor John Lintner of the Business School.

GROUP A

(1) Economic Theory and Its History, with special reference to the Development of the History of Economic Thought since 1776.
(2) Economic History since 1750.
(3) Public Finance and Taxation.
(4) Economics of Agriculture.

GROUP B

(5) Accounting.
(6) Marketing.
(7) Foreign Trade.
(8) Production.
(9) Money and Banking.
(10) Business Organization and Control.
(11) Transportation.
(12) Insurance.
(13) Statistical Method and Its Application.
(14) Economics of Public Utilities.
(15) Labor.

Languages—Same as for the Ph.D. in Economics.

General Examinations—Same as for the Ph.D. in Economics.

Thesis—Same as for the Ph.D. in Economics.

Special Examination—Same as for the Ph.D. in Economics.

Further information regarding courses and programs of study in Economics may be obtained by writing directly to the Chairman, Department of Economics, M-8 Littauer Center, Cambridge 38, Massachusetts. Inquiries concerning admission and scholarships should be addressed to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, 24 Quincy Street, Cambridge 38, Massachusetts.

Source: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. John Kenneth Galbraith Papers, Series 5 Harvard University File, 1949-1990, Box 525, Folder “Harvard Dept of Econ: [Departmental Documents]”.

Tags Galbraith, Harris

Economists Harvard

Harvard. Haberler Argues Against Galbraith And On Behalf of Samuelson, 1948

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2017-01-26

Gottfried Haberler was apparently unable to attend an Executive Committee meeting of the Department of Economics at which it must have been decided to recommend John Kenneth Galbraith as the successor to Harvard’s agricultural economist J. D. Black. Haberler was so unhappy with this decision that he went behind the backs of his colleagues in a letter to the Dean. Apparently one of his former graduate students and his later Harvard colleague, Abram Bergson, must have heard about the letter some three decades later and asked Haberler about it. It certainly looks like Haberler had to ask the Dean’s Office in 1981 to have a copy of that 1948 letter sent to him. At least as important as learning about Haberler’s opinion of Galbraith, we are also treated to a full-throated praise of Paul Samuelson’s virtues. We also get a glimpse of a coalition of School of Public Administration economists wanting to hire a policy-oriented economist with some one or other(s) of the stock of senior economic theorists protecting their turf from Samuelson at his Wunderkind-best.

___________________________________

1981 Letter from Haberler’s AEI Secretary to Abram Bergson

American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
1150 Seventeenth Street, N. W. Washington, D. C. 20036

(202) 862-5800

August 17, 1981

Professor Abram Bergson
Department of Economics
Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138

Dear Professor Bergson:

When Professor Haberler called his office from abroad today, he asked that the attached copy of a letter he wrote to Professor Buck in 1948 be sent to you. He also asked that you be told that although he “was ashamed his memory failed him and he did not remember writing it, he was not ashamed of the letter.”

I am certain that on his return to the office around September 8^th Professor Haberler will be in touch with you.

Sincerely yours,

Secretary to
Professor Haberler

Encl.

___________________________________

1981 Cover Note from Dean Rosovsky to Gottfried Haberler

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Faculty of Arts and Sciences

Office of the Dean

5 University Hall
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138

For Professor Haberler from Dean Rosovsky

[handwritten note: 8/11/81, cc to Sils, Envelopes#2]

___________________________________

1948 Letter from Gottfried Haberler to Provost Paul H. Buck

Harvard University
Graduate School of Public Administration

International Economic Relations Seminar

Littauer Center
Cambridge 38, Massachusetts

November 27, 1948

Provost Paul H. Buck
University Hall
Harvard University
Cambridge 38, Mass.

Dear Mr. Buck:

I had to go to Paris, London, Oxford and Cambridge for a brief visit in connection with the creation of an International Association of Economists and was therefore prevented from attending the meetings of the Executive Committee of the Department of Economics on November 17 and 24.

Let me inform you by letter that in my opinion the recommendation to appoint J. K. Galbraith to the remaining vacant professorship is a great mistake and calculated to reduce the level and reputation of our Department. I am rather hesitant to put it so bluntly, because I am on the best of terms with Galbraith. (For that reason I would be obliged if you would treat this letter as confidential.) But I think it is my duty to state my views clearly in such an important matter.

In my opinion, Galbraith is not a first-rate man. As you have said to me on one or two occasions, he has shot his bolt and there is no new evidence, it seems to me, which would warrant a change of that judgment. Galbraith is good average, not more. Moreover, he is not an agricultural economist. For years, not only during the time he served in Washington, he has written on subjects like monopoly and competition, international economic relations, full employment policies and the like. This shows a wide range of interests, but in none of these fields is he regarded as an outstanding expert. Yet he is now to be appointed as successor to John D. Black.

I am afraid the Department is on its way to fill all vacancies with respectable mediocrities. This is the more astonishing and inexcusable, because we could have a man who is almost universally regarded as one, if not the, most outstanding economist, namely P. A. Samuelson. As you know, Samuelson was awarded the Walker medal [sic, “Clark medal” is correct] by the American Economic Association which is to be given to the most outstanding economist under forty. He has had offers from first-rate universities, Chicago among others. He has without doubt the most brilliant record of all living economists under forty. He is an excellent teacher and would fit ideally into the Department from the point of view of our age distribution, a factor which has been, in my opinion very rightly, stressed by the Administration of the University. (Galbraith, on the other hand, falls more or less within the age group which is most strongly represented.)

It is, I think, a scandal (which is recognized and commented on everywhere) that the appointment of Samuelson has been prevented again and again. I have been repeatedly asked, more or less discretely, by leading economists at home and abroad, why a man like Samuelson is not at Harvard. Several of my colleagues admit that they have had the same experience. Samuelson has a tremendous reputation abroad. In London, Cambridge and Oxford where I visited last week, everyone was impressed by him and by the lectures he gave there recently.

I know, of course, the arguments which are used against his appointment. Mason, for example, while admitting that he is the most brilliant scholar in the field, says that Galbraith is more useful for the School for Public Administration. But Smithies has just been appointed to the School. If we look at the University as an institution which is primarily interested in extending the limits of scientific knowledge, rather than as a training school for Government officials, the choice between the two men should not be difficult.

Some members of the Department are afraid that Samuelson would enter the crowded field of theory. It is, of course, unavoidable that a brilliant young man would step on the toes of some older men in the Department. That is the nature of progress. But I would say that our Department is large enough and the students numerous enough to absorb a new man without undue hardship on vested interests. With Schumpeter near retiring age, it is time to look for a successor in the field of theory. Moreover, Samuelson could, and I think would, give instruction in the important field of advanced statistics, where we have an embarrassing void at the present time.

I am under no illusion that it will be possible to change the minds of the majority of the Department, although I know that several members who voted for the recommendation of Galbraith feel about it as I do. But the fact that you have prevented the Department on several occasions from making a fool of itself, gives me hope that it may not be too late. Moreover, I wanted to relieve my own conscience.

Very sincerely yours,

[signed]

G. Haberler

H:B

Source: Hoover Institution Archives. Gottfried Haberler Paper, Box 12, Folder “J. Kenneth Galbraith”.

Image Source: Harvard Class Album 1950.

Tags Bergson, BlackJD, Galbraith, Haberler, Mason, Samuelson, Smithies

Courses Economists Harvard Suggested Reading

Harvard. Economics and Public Policy for Public Administration, Smithies. 1949-50

Post author By Irwin Collier
Post date 2016-10-06

Following the brief obituary for Arthur Smithies from the Harvard Crimson, course enrollment statistics and the course reading list for his public administration course “Economic Analysis and Public Policy” at mid-century are included in today’s post.

The mid-year and course final examinations have been transcribed and posted now as well.

________________________________

Economist and K-House Master Arthur Smithies Dies at Age 73

The Harvard Crimson
September 14, 1981

Arthur Smithies, Ropes Professor of Political Economy Emeritus and a former master of Kirkland House, died of a heart attack at the Cambridge Boat Club last Wednesday after rowing on the Charles River. He was 73 years old.

Smithies, an authority on the Federal budget and the fiscal policies of developing countries, served as chairman of the Economics department from 1950 to 1955 and from 1959 to 1961. “Smithies did a lot for Harvard,” Otto Eckstein, Warburg Professor of Economics and one of Smithies’ students, said yesterday. “He really started the modern era of the Economics department here.”

An early advocate of Keynesian economics, Smithies wrote extensively on the Federal budget, fiscal policy and full employment. His “The Federal Budget and Fiscal Policy,” published in 1948, was regarded as the standard work in the field for two decades.

By the 1960s, however, his interests had changed to the economic problems of developing countries. In the 1970s, Smithies helped develop and implement policies aimed at preventing the South Vietnamese government from collapsing economically in the face of high military expenditures.

“Unlike many economists, Smithies correctly believed that the difference between a good economist and an inferior one is his sense of history,” John Kenneth Galbraith, Warburg Professor of Economics Emeritus, said Friday. Smithies was “one of the most popular and engaging members of the Harvard Economics department,” Galbraith added.

As master of Kirkland House from 1965 to 1974, Smithies was known for his affection for students, his ability to stimulate debate, and his love of athletics, former students and associates said last week. He was also known for his annual renditions of “Waltzing Matilda” at the Kirkland House Christmas party. A native of Tasmania, Smithies had “a terrible singing voice, which the students always induced him to use,” Warren Wacker, master of South House and a close friend of Smithies, said yesterday.

________________________________

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 206. (formerly Economics 106a and 106b). Economic Analysis and Public Policy. (Full Co.) Professor Smithies.

(F) Total 59: 6 Graduates, 1 Senior, 39 Public Administration, 7 Business School, 5 Radcliffe, 1 Other.

(S) Total 58 (sic): 6 Graduates, 1 Senior, 36 Public Administration, 9 Business School, 4 Radcliffe, 1 Other.

Source: Harvard University, Report of the President of Harvard College and Reports of the Departments 1949-50, p. 74.

________________________________

ECONOMICS 206

Reading List 1949-50

American Economic Association, (ed. Howard Ellis) Survey of Contemporary Economics, “Federal Budgeting and Fiscal Policy,” by Arthur Smithies, Blakiston, 1948.

American Political Science Review, “Federal Executive Reorganization Re-examined,” A Symposium edited by Fritz Marx, February 1947, pp. 48-84.

Appleby, Paul H., Big Democracy, Alfred Knopf, New York, 1945.

Beveridge, Sir William [*], Full Employment in a Free Society, Norton, New York, 1945.

Economic Reports of the President [*], all issues, particularly Midyear Economic Report, July 1949.

Federal Expenditures and Revenue Policies, Hearings before the U.S. Joint Committee on Economic Report, 81^st Congress, September 1949.

Franks, Sir Oliver (Essays) Central Planning and Control in War and Peace, Harvard University Press, 1947.

Hansen, Alvin H., Fiscal Policy and Business Cycles, Norton, 1941.

Hayek, Friedrich, Road to Serfdom, University of Chicago Press, 1945.

Income, Employment and Public Policy: Essays in Honor of Alvin H. Hansen, Norton, 1948, New York. Article: “Income-Consumption Relations and Their Implications” by James S. Duesenberry.

Keynes, J. M. General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, Harcourt Brace & Co., New York 1936.

Lange, Oskar, On the Economic Theory of Socialism, University of Minnesota, 1948.

Mills and Long, National Bureau of Economic Research, Statistical Agencies of the Federal Government, New York, 1949.

Mises, Von, Ludwig, Economic Planning, Dynamic America, New York, 1945.

Nathan, Robert, A National Wage Policy for 1947, Washington, 1947.

Samuelson, Paul A. [*], Economics: An Introductory Analysis, McGraw-Hill, 1948.

Schumpeter, Joseph [*], Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy, Harpers and Brothers, New York, 1947.

Smithies, Arthur, Business Cycle Analysis and Public Policy, Paper submitted to Business Cycle Conference, New York, November 26, 1949.

Spence Bill, Economic Stability Act of 1949, H. R. 2756.

United Nations, Secretariat, Department of Economic Affairs, Maintenance of Full Employment, 1949 (especially United Kingdom), 1949.

Reading Period Assignment

Meade, J., Planning and the Price System, Allen & Unwin, London, 1948.

Sweezy, Paul, Socialism, Economic Handbook Series (Harris, ed.), McGraw-Hill, New York, 1949.

[*] Indicates that book is authorized for purchase by veterans.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003. Box 5, Folder “Economics, 1949-50 (3 of 3)”.

Image Source: Harvard Album 1952.

Tags Eckstein, Galbraith, Smithies

Invitation from Marglin to Galbraith to participate in a discussion with his microeconomics students in January 1970

HARVARD UNIVERSITY

Harvard University Economics 20a Microeconomic Theory

Fall 1969-70 Professor Marglin

Reading List I

Leo Rogin, Economics: Berkeley 1893-1947

by Robert A. Brady, Ralph W. Chaney, and Malcolm M. Davisson

The Harvard Crimson April 22, 1953

Course Enrollment

[Fall Term, 1949-50]

Economics 161 Business Organization and Control Dr. Galbraith

[Fall Term (cont.), 1949-50]

Economics 161 Business Organization and Control Messrs. Galbraith and Gordon

Final Examination, Fall Term 1949-50

1949-50 HARVARD UNIVERSITY ECONOMICS 161

[Spring Term, 1949-50]

Economics 161 Business Organization and Control Professor Galbraith and Mr. Gordon

Economics 161 [Midterm] Examination April, 1950

Spring Term, Final Examination

1949-50 HARVARD UNIVERSITY ECONOMICS 161

I. (Forty-five minutes)

II. (Ninety minutes)

III. (Forty-five minutes)

Memo to the Executive Committee from Alexander Gerschenkron (March 19, 1959)

HARVARD UNIVERSITY Department of Economics

John Kenneth Galbraith’s Reply to the Memo

FACULTY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

JOHN DONALD BLACK

HARVARD UNIVERSITY Department of Economics, Littauer M-8

HARVARD UNIVERSITY THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

Supplement to the General Announcement*

Higher Degrees under the Department of Economics

HIGHER DEGREES IN ECONOMICS Master of Arts (A.M.)

GROUP A

GROUP B

GROUP C

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

Ph.D. IN BUSINESS ECONOMICS

GROUP A

GROUP B

1981 Letter from Haberler’s AEI Secretary to Abram Bergson

1981 Cover Note from Dean Rosovsky to Gottfried Haberler

1948 Letter from Gottfried Haberler to Provost Paul H. Buck

Economist and K-House Master Arthur Smithies Dies at Age 73

The Harvard Crimson September 14, 1981

Course Enrollment

ECONOMICS 206

Reading List 1949-50

Reading Period Assignment

Harvard University
Economics 20a
Microeconomic Theory

Fall 1969-70
Professor Marglin

Leo Rogin, Economics: Berkeley
1893-1947

The Harvard Crimson
April 22, 1953

Economics 161
Business Organization and Control
Dr. Galbraith

Economics 161
Business Organization and Control
Messrs. Galbraith and Gordon

1949-50
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 161

Economics 161
Business Organization and Control
Professor Galbraith and Mr. Gordon

Economics 161
[Midterm] Examination
April, 1950

1949-50
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 161

I.
(Forty-five minutes)

II.
(Ninety minutes)

III.
(Forty-five minutes)

Memo to the Executive Committee
from Alexander Gerschenkron
(March 19, 1959)

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics, Littauer M-8

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

HIGHER DEGREES IN ECONOMICS
Master of Arts (A.M.)

The Harvard Crimson
September 14, 1981