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.
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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.
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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.
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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, 81st 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.