Author: Irwin Collier

Categories
M.I.T. Regulations

M.I.T. No general foreign language requirement in MIT Economics PhD program, 1969

 

While the general foreign language requirement for an economics PhD was officially abolished at M.I.T. in 1969, at least Charles Kindleberger (European Economic History) and Evsey Domar (Communist Economies) were free to require their thesis writers to demonstrate competency in a foreign language as needed for research.

________________

Carbon copy of letter from E. Cary Brown to William F. Bottiglia

May 14, 1969

Professor William F. Bottiglia
Head of Department
Modern Language
14N-207

Dear Bill:

The following statement describes our new language requirement. As you see, we hope that your Department will police it when it is needed.

*   *  *   *   *  *   *   *

“The Department has no general foreign language requirements. When a foreign language is essential for full access to the literature in the field of the student’s major interest (e.g., European Economic History, Communist Economies) or to his thesis research, a language requirement will be imposed by the Department upon the recommendation of the Thesis Superviosr or the Graduate Registration Officer. Such a requirement will be administered by the Department of Foreign Literatures and Linguistics, and can be met by satisfactory course work at M.I.T., at other schools, or by examination.”

Sincerely yours,

E. Cary Brown, Head
Professor of Economics

ECB/mr

Source:  M.I.T. Archives. Department of Economics Records, Box 2, Folder “Grad Curriculum”.

Image Source: Technology Review, February 1914.

Categories
Economists Gender Harvard Radcliffe

Harvard-Radcliffe. Economics Ph.D. alumna, Eleanor Dulles, c.v. early 1960s

 

This morning I stumbled across a c.v. for the Radcliffe M.A. and Ph.D. alumna, Eleanor Lansing Dulles,  that I found earlier in the papers of Herbert Fürth (Gottfried Haberler’s brother-in-law and Federal Reserve Board economist) at the Hoover Institution archives. While there is no date on the c.v., it would appear that it could have been prepared around 1961, though one item (International Board for construction in Berlin) is listed as running through 1964.

Her obituary in the New York Times (November 4, 1996). Best quote:

”[The State Department] is a real man’s world if ever there was one,” she said in 1958. ”It’s riddled with prejudices. If you are a woman in Government service you just have to work 10 times as hard — and even then it takes much skill to paddle around the various taboos. But it is fun to see how far you can get in spite of being a woman.”

Worth viewing are the few minutes taken from the National Portrait Gallery’s video interview of Eleanor Dulles (at age 93) conducted by Marc Pachter on November 28, 1988. She was 101 years old at the time of her death.

The major collection of her papers are at George Washington University. Papers are also to be found at the Eisenhower Presidential Library and at Princeton University.

__________________

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
Radcliffe College

Eleanor Lansing Dulles, A.M.
Subject: Economics.
Special Field: International Finance.
Dissertation: “TheFrench Franc Since the War.”

Source: Radcliffe College, Report of the Dean 1925-26, p. 25.

__________________

ELEANOR LANSING DULLES

Employment Record
(See also studies)
1917-1919 Refugee relief work—France
1920-1921 Employment Management—Steel Mill, etc.
1921-1922 London School of Economics—Investigation of English Industrial methods in 75 firms
1924-1936 Teaching 8 years

Simmons College
Bryn Mawr
University of Pennsylvania
Research 1925-26, 1928-1932
Study of Unemployment Insurance in England (for President Hoover) 1931
Economic advisor to investment counselor
New York City, 1932
Government
1936 Social Security Board

Director of Financial Research
(Tax, income, and investment studies)

Represented U.S. Government at Geneva Conference on Investment of Social Security Funds, 1938
1942-1961 Department of State

Postwar planning Germany, Austria, UNRRA, British balance of payments, etc.

Bretton Woods Banks (attended conference)

Vienna, Austria (1945-49) Financial Attaché

Berlin reconstruction, investment, (1952-1960)

Underdeveloped countries
(Studies of 60 Asian, African and Latin American countries, travelled in 42)
Detailed to National Production Board 1951-52

Representative on Petroleum Committee for Defense
Originator of Benjamin Franklin Foundation

International Board for construction in Berlin 1956-1964
Personal Rank of Minister—1960
Awards and Degrees
1934 Phi Beta Kappa, University of Pennsylvania
1950 LL.D., Wilson College
1955 Distinguished Service Medal, Radcliffe
1957 Dr. h. c. rerum, Political & Econ. Science, Free University of Berlin
1957 LL.D., Western College for Women, Oxford, Ohio
1957 Carl Schurz-Steuben Plaque for Distinguished Service in furthering German-American cultural relations, presented at Berlin
1959 Ernst Reuter Medallion for Service to Berlin
1960 Citation for Distinguished Service, Bryn Mawr College
Studies and Fellowships
1914-17 A.B. Bryn Mawr College
(First New England scholarship, 1914)
1919-20 M.A. Bryn Mawr College
(Fellow labor & industrial economics)
1921-22 London School of Economics
1922-26 M.A., Ph.D. Radcliffe and Harvard College
1925-27 Faculté de Droit, University of Paris
Other courses: Bonn, Germany; Geneva, Switzerland

Languages: French, German, Spanish
Public Relations
For many years I have been on the roster for public speaking for the Department of State.

I have given some 100 or more speeches mainly in this country and have appeared on television and radio.
Publications
The French Franc, 1914-1928.
MacMillan, New York, 1929, pp. 570

A study of inflation, public finance, speculation, and changing international financial relationships with consideration of political and economic factors.
The Bank for International Settlements at Work.
Macmillan, New York, 1932, pp. 631

The origins and early operations of the BIS, the hopes for a world bank, plans for international investment and clearance mechanism, bank policy in relation to the central banks of various nations.
The Dollar, the Franc, and Inflation.
MacMillan, New York, 1933, pp. 100

A short discussion of recurrent characteristics of inflation, the dangers to special groups, and to the economy as a whole.
Depression and Reconstruction—A Study of Causes and Controls.
University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 1936, pp. 340

A review of alleged causes of the depression of 1929 and subsequent years, an appraisal of major national and international maladjustments and areas of disturbance and relationships changing in the development of a dynamic policy.
Financing the Social Security Act, 1936

Basic study of the tax and benefit laws and formuli.
Fiscal Capacity of States

Planned (1938) and supervised a five year study in Social Security Board of the income and capacity to pay taxes of the states & localities.

Among the several hundred articles published are for instance:
The Evolution of Reparation Ideas
The French Franc, 1928-1934
The Export-Import Bank—The First Ten Years, 1943
War and Investment Opportunity
Inflation
The Impact of the United States on Europe
The Arithmetic (financial) of Postwar Occupation
Africa—Hopes and Contradictions

Source:  Hoover Institution Archives, Papers of J. Herbert Furth, Box 4.

Image Source:. World Bank webpage: The Bretton Woods Institutions turn 60/Breaking the Mold.

Categories
Columbia

Columbia. Alvin S. Johnson recounts exams with Franklin Giddings, 1951

 

Perhaps I lived a blessed student life. I never felt that I had been particularly ill-treated in an examination, though I should add that I have fortunately been spared the trauma of an oral examination, except for matters involving my dental health. I once spoke with Kenneth Arrow, on the day before his 90th birthday, and was surprised to hear just how salient a memory was of an injustice that had been inflicted upon him by John Maurice Clark in an oral examination some seven decades earlier. Apparently Alvin Johnson nursed an analogous decades-long grudge as a result of his oral exam at the hands of the sociologist Franklin Giddings. In his letter to Joseph Dorfman transcribed in this post, we see that he was later able to leverage a poor exam performance of a Giddings’ student into a sweet payback of sorts. 

____________________

Letter from Alvin Johnson to Joseph Dorfman

THE NEW SCHOOL
66 West 12th St. New York 11
[Tel.] Oregon 5-2700

August 21, 1951

Dear Joe:

You haven’t answered my query as to whether it wouldn’t suit your purpose better to substitute for the piece I sent you on the School of Political Science my experience of the economics department proper.

I think my second minor was in Constitutional History under Burgess. At my doctor’s exam Burgess asked me three questions, but to be fair he elaborated them so much that he answered them himself, and I had only to nod assent.

Not so with Giddings. He was having a feud with Seligman and set about taking it out of my hide. I had attended a course with him on the English Poor Laws, a course that bored Giddings stiff. He came to my exam with a sheet of details he couldn’t have remembered himself.

“What was the Statute of Laborers? What year of what reign?
“What law was enacted in the third year of Edward VI?
“What was the ‘Speenhamland Act?’ What year of what reign?”

            About forty such questions. After I had retired for the Faculty to vote[,] Giddings, who after all was my friend, came out first, slapped me on the back and said:

“Well you passed. But by God, I made you sweat.”
“I’d have made you sweat yourself if I had had the written sheet and you hadn’t loaded up for me.”
“You bet.”

            I had my revenge a few months later, when one of Giddings’ protégés came up with a thesis on Puerto Rico. He was a theologue [sic], savagely Protestant, who ascribed all the woes of Puerto Rico to the Catholic Church. His book was full of fishy figures, the worst on the food situation. The Puerto Ricans were starved; they produced practically no food but lived on imported rice, the figures for which the thesis gave. I used my arithmetic and found that the figures gave fifty pounds of rice daily per capita.

“And you say they are underfed,” I added, not very humanely.

            When the candidate had retired Goodnow moved, first that the candidate be flunked; second that Giddings be censured for bringing such a fool before the Faculty; third that I be censured for making a Faculty member laugh right out in meeting. All three votes carried.

Sincerely,
[signed]
Alvin Johnson

Dr. Joseph Dorfman
Columbia University
Faculty of Political Science
New York 27, N.Y.

aj:ar

 

Source:  Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Joseph Dorfman Collection, Box 13, Folder “C.U. Dept.al history”.

Image Source: From the cover of Alvin S. Johnson’s 1952 autobiography.

Categories
Columbia Economists Harvard

Harvard. Career of A.M. in economics alumnus, Arthur Morgan Day (1867-1942)

 

This post began as a simple transcription of two typed pages that Alvin S. Johnson sent to Joseph Dorfman, who at the time was collecting material on the history of economics at Columbia University. The Columbia economics instructor who was the subject of Johnson’s letter, Arthur Morgan Day, was new to me, and I presume something of an unknown even to Joseph Dorfman. My curiosity sparked a chase through a variety of genealogical sources accessible at Ancestry.com, then a search through yearbooks of Barnard College and Columbia University catalogues at archive.org, and eventually a discovery of the reports of the Harvard Class of 1892 (available at hathitrust.org) that taken together provide us a fairly good account of Day’s life and career through age 55.

I have located only a single source that gives the year of his death: “Arthur Morgan Day (1867-1942)” in the National Cyclopaedia of American Biography. Vol. 31. New York: James T. White & Co., 1944.

_______________

Alvin Johnson’s recollection of Arthur Morgan Day at Columbia College

THE NEW SCHOOL
66 West 12th St. New York 11
[Tel.] Oregon 5-2700

July 17, 1951

Dear Joe Dorfman:

This is the best I can do on Day. If you don’t like it, throw it into the waste-basket.

Sincerely,
[signed]
Alvin Johnson

encl.

Dr. Joseph Dorfman
Faculty of Political Science
Columbia University
New York 27, N.Y.

[Handwritten addition by Johnson]

I’m trying to write
something on the
Faculty
AJ

* *  *  * *

Alvin Johnson’s attachment to his letter to Joseph Dorfman of July 17, 1951

When I presented myself to Dean Burgess for registration in November 1898 and announced that I wished to study economics, the Dean advised me to register for the Marshall course by Mayo-Smith, the course on History of Economics by E. R. A. Seligman, the course on theory by John Bates Clark. I confessed that my training had been in classics; that I had never attended a course, nor even a single lecture in economics. I asked whether I ought not to take the course in elementary economics, under an instructor, Arthur Morgan Day. No, said Dean Burgess, that course was only for undergraduate cubs, who had no desire to know economics. The Committee on College Requirements had seen fit to make a required course out of it; but a mature man would be wasting his time under Day.

I did not register for Day’s course. I’m sorry I did not. For Day was a true representative of the old, solid economics of Adam Smith and Malthus and Ricardo, of Senior and Cairnes and John Stuart Mill. He made shift to comprehend the marginal utilitarianism of Marshall, but it gave him no inspiration. He saw no advance in Clark’s theory and he regarded Seligman’s Historismus as merely a change of venue in economic reasoning.

Day detested me, for my ardent devotion to J. B. Clark, for my eager acceptance of Seligman’s wide explorations in all literatures. He pitied me for my destiny of going forth into the world equipped only with fluff and froth, with no sense of the grand old economists who looked facts in the face and wrote in language that the most unlicked cub of a business man could understand. When I was awarded a fellowship Day proposed that I should have the privilege of reading and grading all his examination papers, a privilege I was too immature to appreciate. The President of the University vetoed the proposal. I had my year of complete freedom, to follow my teachers, Clark and Seligman, with uncrippled ardor.

Yet I came to realize that Day was a better economist than we then assumed. It was not possible for him to follow the marginal utility calculus into a field of abstractions divorced from the comprehension of the ordinary citizen. Any man, however sodden in business thinking, could follow John Stuart Mill, agreeing, or most likely disagreeing. Only the intellectual elite could follow Menger and Wieser and Böhm[-]Bawerk, Marshall and Clark, Fisher and Fetter.

If Day were living he would find justification for his repugnance to the marginal utility theories. Keynes, an adept in marginal theory, shifted the emphasis from value to price.

Said Chesterfield, “In mixed company I always talk bawdy, for that is something in which all men can join.” Keynes always talked price. Day, prematurely, talked price, believed in talking price. There was no place for him in the marginal utility universe of talk, of those days. But I surmise, Day was a good deal of a man.

[signed]
Alvin Johnson

 

Source:  Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Joseph Dorfman Collection, Box 13, Folder “C.U. Dept.al history”.

_______________

From the Columbia College Catalogue, 1898-99

Economics A—Outlines of Economics—Recitations, lectures, and essays. 3 hours, second half-year. Professor Mayo-Smith and Mr. Day. [Economics A was required of juniors in the College, and open to sophomores who have taken economics I.]

Economics 1—Economic history of England America—Selected textbooks, recitations, essays, and lectures. 3 hours, first half-year. Professor Seligman and Mr. Day. [Economics I was open to juniors and qualified sophomores in the College.]

[Note: p. 11 under officers of instruction, Assistants. Address given as 128 West 103d Street.]

Source:  Columbia University in the City of New York. Catalogue 1898-99, p. 74.

_______________

1900 U.S. Census

Name: Arthur M Day
Age:    33
Birth Date:     Apr 1867
Birthplace:      Connecticut
Home in 1900:           Danbury, Fairfield, Connecticut
Ward of City: 2
Street: Westoria Avenue
House Number:          28
Race:   White
Gender:           Male
Relation to Head of House:   Son
Marital Status:           Single
Father’s name:            Josiah L Day
Father’s Birthplace:    New York
Mother’s name:          Ellen L Day
Mother’s Birthplace:  Connecticut
Occupation:    College Instructor
Months not employed:         0
Can Read:       Yes
Can Write:      Yes
Can Speak English:    Yes
Household Members:

Josiah L Day  60
Ellen L Day    58
Arthur M Day           33

_______________

From Mortarboard 1902
[Barnard College Yearbook]

Leisure Hours of Great Men
or
Intimate Glimpses of the World’s Workers at Play

Arthur Morgan Day

It is certainly pathetic
How he smothers the aesthetic
Under money, banking, trusts and corporations,
But he soothes his longing heart,
Studying dramatic art,
And high tragedy completes his aspirations.

Source: 1902 Mortarboard , p. 71.

_______________

From the Columbia Daily Spectator, 1902

Mr. Day Resigns

Mr. A. M. Day, Instructor in Economics, has resigned his position at Columbia to take a position on the new Tenement House Commission of New York City. He is to serve as one of two men to take charge of registration and compilation of statistics of tenement houses in the boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn. Mr. Henry Raymond Mussey, Fellow in the Department, has taken Mr. Day’s position as instructor in Economics for the time being. Mr. Mussey has already acquired much popularity and confidence among the students in his classes.

*  *  *  *  *

Congratulations for Mr. Day.

The members of the Course Economics I have sent the following message of congratulation to their instructor, upon his appointment as chief of the Bureau of Statistics of the New York City Tenement House Commission. “We the undersigned members of the course, Economics I, of the current University year, having heard with pleasure of the great honor which has been conferred upon our former instructor Mr. Arthur Morgan Day, desire to extend to him our sincere congratulations and to assure him of our best wishes for a successful career in his new office.

 

Source:  Columbia Daily Spectator, Volume XLV, Number 42, 21 March 1902, page 1.

_______________

From Harvard College Class of 1892 Reports

Arthur Morgan Day (1892)

[Joined the Harvard Class of 1892 in the junior year, received A.B. together with the degree of A.M.]
Honorable Mention: English Composition; Political Economy; History.

 

Source:  Secretary’s Report Harvard College Class of 1892, Number I, (1893), pp. 6, 27, 29.

 

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1896)

“1892-93, graduate student in History and Economics, H.U.; 1893-94, graduate student in History and Economics and assistant in History, H.U.; 1894-95, assistant in Economics, School of Political Science, Columbia College; 1895-96, assistant and lecturer in Economics, School of Political Science, Columbia College, and lecturer in Economics, Barnard College.”

Published “Syllabus of six lectures on ‘Money’ for Extension Department of Rutgers College, 1895.”

Delivered “six lectures on ‘Money,’ Univ. Ex. course, New Brunswick, N.J., December-January, 1894-95; two lectures on ‘Monetary Literature in U.S.’ in course of ‘Free Lectures to the People,’ under direction of Board of Education, N.Y.”

Source:  Secretary’s Report Harvard College Class of 1892, Number II, (1896), pp. 30-31.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1902)

From 1892 to 1894 was graduate student in History and Economics at Harvard; 1893-4, was assistant in History at Harvard; 1894-1902, was successively assistant lecturer, and instructor in Economics at Columbia and Barnard Colleges, and also assistant editor of “Political Science Quarterly” and “Columbia University Quarterly “; in March, 1902, resigned from Columbia to become Registrar of the Tenement House Department of New York City for Brooklyn, Queens, and Richmond.

Has given numerous courses of lectures for the New York Board of Education; has lectured also in extension department of Rutgers College and in the Educational Alliance. Has published syllabi of lectures on “Money” and “Economic History”, signed reviews in the “Political Science Quarterly” and elsewhere, and editorials in a New York daily. Assisted in the preparation of Seligman’s “Essays in Taxation” and “Incidence of Taxation”, Giddings’ “Democracy and Empire “, Clark’s “Distribution of Wealth,” and the second edition (rewritten) of White’s “Money and Banking.”

Source:  Harvard College, Record of the Class of 1892. Secretary’s Report No. III for the Tenth Anniversary (1902),  pp. 46-47.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1907)

Son of Josiah Lyon Day and Ellen Louisa (Baldwin) Day. Born at Danbury, Connecticut, April 12, 1867. Prepared for college at the Danbury High School.

Received A.M. in 1892. From 1892 to 1894 was a graduate student in History and Economics at Harvard; 1893-94, was Assistant in History at Harvard; 1894-1902, was successively Assistant, Lecturer, and Instructor in Economics at Columbia and Barnard Colleges; also Assistant Editor of Political Science Quarterly and Columbia University Quarterly; in March, 1902, resigned from Columbia to become Registrar of the Tenement House Department of New York City for Brooklyn, Queens, and Richmond. In May, 1902, resigned Registrarship to become Assistant to President of Manhattan Trust Co.; in July, 1903, was made Secretary and Treasurer of Casualty Company of America; in January, 1905, entered publicity business. Has published syllabi of lectures on “Money” and “Economic History,” signed reviews in the Political Science Quarterly and elsewhere, and editorials in a New York daily. Assisted in the preparation of Seligman’s “Essays in Taxation” and ” Incidence of Taxation,” Giddings’ “Democracy and Empire,” Clark’s “Distribution of Wealth,” and the second edition (rewritten) of White’s “Money and Banking.” Belongs to Harvard Club of New York.

Source:  Secretary’s Report for the Fifteenth Anniversary. Harvard College Class of 1892, Number IV, (1907), p.48.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1912)

Son of Josiah Lyon Day and Ellen Louisa (Baldwin) Day. Born at Danbury, Connecticut, April 12, 1867. Prepared for college at the Danbury High School.

Attended Harvard 1888-92, A.B. and A.M.; Graduate School 1892-94.

1892 to 1894, graduate student in history and economics at Harvard; 1893-94, assistant in history at Harvard; 1894-1902, successively assistant, lecturer, and instructor in economics at Columbia and Barnard colleges; also assistant editor of Political Science Quarterly and Columbia University Quarterly; in March, 1902, resigned from Columbia to become registrar of the Tenement House Department of New York City for Brooklyn, Queens, and Richmond. In May, 1902, resigned registrarship to become assistant to president of Manhattan Trust Company; in July, 1903, was made secretary and treasurer of Casualty Company of America; in January, 1905, entered publicity business; in June, 1906, employed by United Gas Improvement Company of Philadelphia; in August, 1906, serious attack of typhoid caused long absence from business; in June, 1908, with Blair & Co., bankers, New York; in April, 1910, began independent work as financial agent for various clients; in January, 1912, entered bond department of Prudential Insurance Company at Newark. Has published syllabi of lectures on “Money” and “Economic History,” signed reviews in the Political Science Quarterly and elsewhere, and editorials in a New York daily. Assisted in the preparation of Seligman’s “Essays in Taxation” and “Incidence of Taxation,” Giddings’ “Democracy and Empire,” Clark’s “Distribution of Wealth,” and the second edition (rewritten) of White’s “Money and Banking.” Belongs to Harvard Club of New York.

Source:  Secretary’s Report for the Twentieth Anniversary. Harvard College Class of 1892, [Number V, (1912)], p.54.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1917)

Born at Danbury, Conn., April 12, 1867. Son of Josiah Lyon and Ellen Louisa (Baldwin) Day. Prepared for College at Danbury High School, Danbury, Conn.

Attended Harvard:  1888-92; Graduate School, 1892-94.

Degrees: A.B. and A.M. 1892.

Occupation: Investments.

Address: (home) 28 Westville Ave., Danbury, Conn.; (business) 37 Wall St., New York, N.Y

FROM 1892 to 1894 I was a graduate student in history and economics at Harvard, and during 1893-94 I was assistant in history at Harvard. From 1894 to 1902 I was successively assistant, lecturer, and instructor in economics at Columbia and Barnard colleges; also assistant editor of the Political Science Quarterly and the Columbia University Quarterly. In March, 1902, I resigned from Columbia to become registrar of the Tenement House Department of New York City for Brooklyn, Queens, and Richmond. I held this position until May, 1903, when I resigned to become assistant to the president of the Manhattan Trust Company. In July, 1903, I was made secretary and treasurer of the Casualty Company of America; and in January, 1905, I entered publicity business. I was employed by the United Gas Improvement Company of Philadelphia in June, 1906, but a serious attack of typhoid fever in August of that year caused a long absence from business. In June, 1908, I was with Blair & Co., bankers, in New York, and in April, 1910, I began independent work as financial agent for various clients. In January, 1912, I entered the bond department of the Prudential Insurance Company at Newark, and since December 1, 1915, I have been with Wood, Struthers & Co., bankers, 37 Wall St., N. Y.

Publications: Syllabi of lectures on “Money” and “Economic History,” signed reviews in the Political Science Quarterly and elsewhere, and editorials in a New York daily. Assisted in the preparation of Seligman’s “Essays in Taxation” and “Incidence of Taxation,” Giddings’ “Democracy and Empire,” Clark’s “Distribution of Wealth,” and the second edition (rewritten) of White’s “Money and Banking.”

Clubs and Societies: Harvard Club of New York.

Source:  Secretary’s Report for the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary. Harvard College Class of 1892, Number VI, (1917), pp. 68-69. Includes Graduation picture.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1922)

Born at Danbury, Conn., April 12, 1867. Son of Josiah Lyon and Ellen Louisa (Baldwin) Day. Prepared for College at Danbury High School, Danbury, Conn.

Attended Harvard: 1888-92; Graduate School, 1892-94.
Degrees: A.B. and A.M. 1892.

Occupation: Investments.
Address: (home) 152 Deer Hill Ave., Danbury, Conn.; (business) 5 Nassau St., New York, N.Y.

Since December 1, 1915, I have been with Wood, Struthers & Co., bankers, 5 Nassau Street, New York.

Clubs and Societies: Harvard Club of New York.

Source:  Harvard College Class of 1892, Thirtieth Anniversary Report, Number VIII, (1922), p. 70.
[note: Number IX, June 19-22, 1922 is the Supplementary Report of the Thirtieth Anniversary Celebration]

_______________

From the State of Connecticut, Military Census of 1917

State of Connecticut

By direction of an act of the Legislature of Connecticut, approved February 7th, 1917, I am required to procure certain information relative to the resources of the state. I therefore call upon you to answer the following questions.

MARCUS H. HOLCOMB, Governor.

TOWN or CITY: Danbury
DATE: March 4, 1917
POST OFFICE ADDRESS: 28 Westville Ave.

  1. What is your present Trade, Occupation or Profession ? Banking and Brokerage
  2. Have you experience in any other Trade, Occupation or Profession? College Professor
  3. What is your Age? 49
    Height? 5 ft 8 in
    Weight? 165
  4. Are your Married? Single? or Widower? Single
  5. How many persons are dependent on you for support? None wholly
  6. Are you a citizen of the United States? Yes
  7. If not a citizen of the United States have you taken out your first papers? [not applicable]
  8. If not a citizen of the United States, what is your nationality? [not applicable]
  9. Have you ever done any Military or Naval Service in this or any other Country? No
    Where? [not applicable]
    How Long? [not applicable]
    What Branch? [not applicable]
    Rank? [not applicable]
  10. Have you any serious physical disability? Yes
    If so, name it. Near sighted
  11. Can you do any of the following:
    Ride a horse? [No]
    Handle a team? [No]
    Drive an automobile? [No]
    Ride a motorcycle? [No]
    Understand telegraphy? [No]
    Operate a wireless? [No]
    Any experience with a steam engine? [No]
    Any experience with electrical machinery? [No]
    Handle a boat, power or sail? [No]
    Any experience in simple coastwise navigation? [No]
    Any experience with High Speed Marine Gasoline Engines? ? [No]
    Are you a good swimmer? [Yes]

I hereby certify that I have personally interviewed the above mentioned person and that the answers to the questions enumerated are as he gave them to me.

[signed]
Chas A Stallock[?]
Military Census Agent

Source: Connecticut Military Census of 1917. Hartford, Connecticut: Connecticut State Library. [available as database on-line at Ancestry.com]

 

Image Source: Class portrait and current portrait (ca 1917) of Arthur Morgan Day from Secretary’s Report for the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary. Harvard College Class of 1892, Number VI, (1917), pp. 68-69.

 

Categories
Columbia Syllabus

Columbia. Course outline, Railroad Problems. Seligman, 1898-1904

 

The following course outline was found in the papers of the historian of American economic thought, Joseph Dorfman. It has neither date nor instructor listed but from the Columbia University catalogues and the Bulletins of the Faculty of Political Science we can conclusively determine that the second semester course with this name and number was taught by E.R.A. Seligman every other academic year beginning 1897-98 going through 1903-04. He also taught the course in earlier years (course number VIII) and later years (course number 108).

___________________

Course Description

Economics 7 — Railroad Problems; Economic, Social and Legal. — These lectures treat of railroads in the fourfold aspect of their relation to the investors, the employees, the public and the state respectively. A history of railways and railway policy in America and Europe forms the preliminary part of the course. The chief problems of railway management, so far as they are of economic importance, come up for discussion.

Among the subjects treated are: Financial methods, railway construction, speculation, profits, failures, accounts and reports, expenses, tariffs, principles of rates, classification and discrimination, competition and pooling, accidents, and employers’ liability. Especial attention is paid to the methods of regulation and legislation in the United States as compared with European methods, and the course closes with a general discussion of state versus private management. — Two hours a week, second half-year (1899-1900): Prof. [Edwin R. A.] Seligman.

Source: Columbia University, School of Political Science, Announcement, 1898-99, pp. 29-40.

___________________

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 7

OUTLINE OF LECTURES
ON
RAILROAD PROBLEMS:
ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND LEGAL

  1. The problems stated.
  2. Literature of the subject.

BOOK I. HISTORY OF RAILWAYS AND RAILWAY POLICY.

Chapter I. England.

  1. Turnpikes and canals.
  2. Genesis of the railway system and development to the investigation of 1844.
  3. Development to Cardwell’s Act of 1854.
  4. Development to Railway Commission of 1873.
  5. Commission of 1881-1882.
  6. Railway and Canal Traffic Act of 1888.
  7. Present conditions and outlook.

Chapter II. United States.

  1. Highroads and internal improvements.
  2. The Erie Canal and Mississippi River.
  3. Genesis and development of the railway system.
  4. The early charters.
  5. Railway consolidation.
  6. Sleeping car and express companies.
  7. Fast freight lines, co-operative and joint-stock.
  8. Pools and traffic associations to 1877.
    1. Chicago-Omaha Pool.
    2. Southern Railway and Steamship Association.
    3. Southwestern Rate Association.
  9. Trunk Line combinations to 1877.
    1. Saratoga Conference.
    2. Railway wars of 1874-1876.
    3. Live stock pool and evening system.
    4. Standard oil contract and petroleum pool.
    5. Anthracite coal pool.
  10. Trunk line pools 1877-1887.
    1. West bound pool.
    2. East bound pool
    3. Joint Executive Committee of 1879.
    4. Railway wars and Trunk Line organization of 1885.
  11. Railway co-operation 1887-1898.
    1. The Inter-state Commerce Act of 1887.
    2. The Anti-Trust Law of 1890.
  12. Present outlook

Chapter 3. Other Countries.

  1. Belgium. The mixed system.
  2. France. Division of the field.
    1. Development to the law of 1842.
    2. Development to the law of 1859.
    3. Development to the law of 1884.
    4. Present outlook.
  3. Germany. Government ownership.
  4. Italy. System of leases.
    1. The law of 1865.
    2. The agreements of 1885.
  5. Holland, Austria and other European countries.
  6. Australia and the British colonies.
  7. Comparison with the rest of the world.

BOOK II. THE RAILWAYS AND THE INVESTORS.

  1. The railway as a corporation.
  2. Financial methods.
    1. The financing of a railway.
    2. Conflict of interests between directors, stockholder and bondholders.
  3. Railway Construction.
    1. Cost of railways in America and Europe.
    2. Construction companies.
    3. Other subordinate corporations.
    4. Parallel roads.
  4. Railway speculation.
    1. Stock exchange speculation.
    2. Railways and commercial crises.
  5. Railway profits.
    1. Stock watering.
    2. Limitation of dividends.
  6. Railway failures and receiverships.
  7. Railway accounts and reports.

BOOK III. THE RAILWAYS AND THE PUBLIC

  1. Railway competition.
    1. The law of competition.
    2. Competition and combination.
    3. Competition for the field.
    4. Competition with waterways.
    5. Competition of carriers on the line.
    6. Separation between motor and carrier.
    7. Running powers or working arrangements.
  2. Railway expenses.
    —Fixed charges and operating expenses.
  1. Railway tariffs.
    1. Principle of railway rates.
    2. Cost of service principle.
    3. Value of service principle or charging what the traffic will bear.
    4. Relation between the two principles.
  2. Classification of Rates.
    1. Theory of classification.
    2. History and practice of classification in Europe and America.
  3. Personal discriminations.
    1. Allowance for quantity.
    2. Rebates and special rates.
  4. Local discriminations.
    1. History and practice of local discriminations.
    2. Just and unjust discriminations.
    3. Principle of profits vs. principle of tolls.
    4. Sliding scale or zone system.
    5. Pro-rata or equal mileage, and short-haul rates.
      —Other projected reforms.
    6. Differentials between cities and export trade.
  5. Pools.
    —Money pools vs. traffic pools.
  1. Extortion and reduction in rates.
    —Comparison of European and American rates.
  1. Passenger rates.
    —The Zone system in Austria-Hungary.
  1. Accidents.

BOOK IV. THE RAILWAYS AND THE EMPLOYEES

  1. Employers’ liability for accidents.
    —Comparison of European and American legislation.
  2. Railway strikes. Especially strikes of 1877 and 1886.
  3. Profit sharing and other schemes.
  4. Relief associations. Compulsory and private insurance.
    1. Insurance against sickness.
    2. Insurance against accidents.
    3. Insurance against dishonesty. Guarantee funds.

BOOK V. THE RAILWAYS AND THE STATE.

  1. Early State legislation.
  2. The Granger movement and its results.
  3. Maximum and minimum laws.
  4. Pro-rataand short-haul laws.
  5. Laws requiring improved facilities.
  6. General railroad acts.
  7. State and national aid to railroads. Land grants, etc.
  8. Railway taxation.
    1. Basis—Taxation of franchise, property, gross earnings, net income, etc.
    2. Double taxation. Inter-state complications.
  9. State railroad commissions.
    1. Compulsory commissions.
    2. Advisory commissions.
  10. National Legislation.
    1. Early attempts.
    2. The Reagan and Cullom bills.
    3. The Inter-state Commerce Law of 1887.
  11. The Inter-state Commerce Commission.
    1. Character of decisions.
    2. Powers and duties.
    3. Comparison with English commission.
    4. Projected amendments.
  12. Present outlook and prospects.
  13. General conclusion as to State vs. private ownership and management.
    1. Financial arguments.
    2. Political arguments.
    3. Socio-economic arguments.

 

Source:  Columbia University Libraries. Manuscript Collections. Joseph Dorfman Collection.Box 13. Folder “Economics History Project”.

Categories
Economists M.I.T.

Italy. Terror victim, economics professor Ezio Tarantelli (1941-1985)

 

While skimming the oral history interview of Berkeley economist Lloyd Ulman (Harvard PhD, 1950), I learned that he was in Rome the day that his Italian colleague, Professor Ezio Tarantelli, was assassinated by two members of the Red Brigades in a parking lot outside of the building where he had just lectured. 

I met Ezio during my first year of graduate school at M.I.T. in 1974-75 through my classmate Francesco Giavazzi. While I probably had discussed economics and politics with him only a few times and probably less than for a couple of hours, he impressed me with a combination of intelligence, warmth, and humility that I was to discover to be relatively rare, and not just in a university setting. 

When I read the news that this mild-mannered professor of political economy in Rome had been murdered by political terrorists, I was utterly dumbfounded. Clearly having a name and a face for the victim of an act of senseless political violence made all the difference. Today I decided to add this post, a minor tribute to the memory of a most decent man and fellow economist.

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About Ezio Tarantelli

Red Brigades Kill Rome Economics Professor,  by Sari Gilbert. Washington Post, March 28, 1985.

Chapter 2, “Ezio Tarantelli: Sketches of an Intellectual Biography” in Giovanni Michelangoli, Ezio Tarantelli—Economic Theory and Industrial Relations. Springer, 2012.

Italian Documentary by Monica Repetto:  Ezio Tarantelli, La forza delle idee.

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Excerpt from Oral History Interview with Lloyd Ullman

Uhlman: …I became heavily involved with Bob Flanagan and David Soskice, whom I had met in Oxford, on a Brookings project which ultimately materialized in Wage Restraint: A Study of Incomes Policies in Western Europe (1983). While working on this project, David Soskice and I were invited to give back-to-back talks to Ezio Tarantelli’s class in labor economics in Rome. My topic was the role played by collective bargaining as a second-best choice when employers were confronted by an existential threat to the capitalist order. It just so happened that Italy was experiencing considerable unrest and inflation at the time. Furthermore, Tarantelli, our host, was attracting a good deal of attention as an advocate of moderating the Scala Mobile, the national system of wage escalation which was regarded at the time by many as an important generator of inflation. Which made him a prime target of the Red Brigade on the far left.

Koya: Was the Scala Mobile between the laborers or employers or was the state also involved?

Uhlman: Laborers and employers.

Koya: No state intervention here in Italy?

Uhlman: More of a neo-corporatist arrangement.
Ezio Tarantelli was a very accomplished and very intelligent, imaginative fellow. So he invited David and me to give twin seminars in a single meeting of his class one day. I spoke about the threat of radicalism as an employer inducement to bargain collectively. He regarded it as very provocative, as he put it. That evening he took Lassie and me out to dinner. David had something else to do. And so in the usual Italian style, we ate at about ten o’clock. The restaurant was quite empty. There was a couple across the room and Lassie noticed they were looking at us all the time. Later, Tarantelli said, “Look,” he said, “when I was a student, I was a guide, a tour guide, and I’m now going to drive you through Rome in the moonlight.” It was an enchanted, lovely ride. We said goodnight and spoke about getting together soon again.
The next morning I had a meeting with the head of the non-communist labor federation at the time, the CISL [Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Lavoratori or Italian Confederation of Workers’ Trade Unions]. Someone broke into our discussion and then left. The CISL head said, “Excuse me, but a friend of mine has just died and I have to see some television people.” Then we learned that Tarantelli had been killed by members of the Red Brigade[s]. That morning when he came to class, somebody shouted, “Professor Tarantelli!” He turned around, and they shot him. That was the most horrendous episode in my life, I can say.

Koya: So the provocation?

Uhlman: What? The provocation was that he was on the wrong side. That’s the provocation. That evening a small group of us had a meeting. David’s friends in the academic community met at the home of Ida Regalia, a well-known labor economist. We all brought over some bottles of wine and we sat around talking all evening and that was that.
Everything has a comic side to it, I guess. The next morning I had to get a haircut. My previous barber was an Oxford product, of course. The Italian barber took a look at me, walked all around me, my head, and said, “Atsa a bad haircut.” Later I walked back and Lassie and I met with David. I said, “David, sit down. I must tell you something.” I told him the story. It was just a horrible thing.

 

Source: Lloyd Ulman: An Oral History. Riyad Koya interviewer (Audio File 16, Interview October 20, 2011) pp. 233-234. University of California, Berkeley. Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library.

Image Source: Screen shot from Monica Repetto’s  Ezio Tarantelli, La forza delle idee.

 

Categories
Economic History Exam Questions Harvard Suggested Reading Syllabus

Harvard. Readings and Examination Questions for Economic History Since 1860. Cole, 1936-37

 

The economic historian, Arthur Harrison Cole, is best known as having been the Librarian of the Business School’s Baker Library and also the executive director of the Research Center in Entrepreneurial History at the Business School. This post provides the reading list and examination questions for the undergraduate economic history course he taught at Harvard in the first semester of the 1936-37 academic year. The post begins with the biographical note provided at the Harvard Business School Archives where Arthur H. Cole’s papers are located.

Arthur Harrison Cole’s doctoral examination fields can be found at this post. His dissertation is included in this list of Harvard economics Ph.D.’s through 1926.

His obituary in the Harvard President’s annual report has also been previously posted.

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Arthur Harrison Cole (1889-1974)
Biographical Note

Arthur Harrison Cole was born November 21, 1889 in Haverhill, MA. He attended Governor Dummer Academy (1904-1907) and graduated from Bowdin College with a BA (1911). He received his MA (1913) and PhD (1916) in economics from Harvard University. After completing his dissertation, Cole tutored and taught economics at Harvard. He rose from instructor (1916-1917, 1920-1923) to assistant professor (1923-1928) to associate professor (1928-1933). In addition to his academic work, Professor Cole worked in the War Department and the U. S. Tariff Commission from 1917-1920. In 1933, he became Professor of Business Economics at Harvard Business School.

In 1929, Arthur Cole was appointed financial supervisor of the International Scientific Committee on Price History. Funded by the Rockefeller Foundation, which supported the study of social and economic problems, the Committee researched commodity prices of leading European countries and the United States prior to 1861. The Rockefeller Foundation eventually spent $325,000 for this study and allowed Cole the administrative freedom to dispense the funds to Committee members.

Under the presidency of Sir [later Lord] William Beveridge, the Committee reached a consensus on methodology in 1931 after meeting in London (1930), Frankfort (1930), and Amsterdam (1931). Thereafter, economists on the Committee from England, Germany, France, Austria, Poland, Spain, and the United States proceeded to investigate prices in their respective countries. Meetings in Aix-en-Provence (1932), Vienna (1932) and Locarno (1933) allowed the members to gather periodically to discuss various problems of investigation and methods.

In addition to serving in an administrative capacity for the International Scientific Committee on Price History, Arthur Cole wrote one of the volumes of price history for the United States, Wholesale Commodity Prices in the United States, 1700-1860 (1938). The other two volumes of price history for the United States were Prices in Colonial Pennsylvania by Bezanson, Gray and Hussey (1935) and Wholesale Prices for 213 Years, 1720-1932 by Warren, Pearson and Stoker (1932). Publication of the price histories were suspended during World War II, but resumed after the end of hostilities.

Arthur Cole assumed the dual role of economic historian and library administrator throughout his long professional career. As Administrative Curator of Baker Library (1929-1932) and later, Librarian of Baker Library (1932-1956), Cole’s pioneering efforts in collecting and preserving historically significant business records led to the accumulation of one of the finest collections on the subject in the world. In addition, his influence as an economic historian continued long after he left the classroom. Cole remained an integral part of the scholarly community as Managing Editor of the Review of Economic Statistics (1935-1937), Chairman of Inter-University Research Commission on Economic History (1941-1958), Associate Editor of the Journal of Economic History (1943-1946), and Executive Director, Research Center in Entrepreneurial History (1948-1958). He retired to emeritus status from Harvard Business School in 1956.

Arthur Cole married the former Anne Steckel of Pennsylvania on August 5, 1913 and they had two children: Barbara and Jonathan. He died November 10, 1974.

 

Source: Arthur Harrison Cole Papers. Harvard Business School Archives. Baker Library Historical Collections. Harvard Business School. Accessed July 22, 2018.

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Course Enrollment

34 1hf. (formerly 2a). Professor A. H. Cole.—Economic History Since 1860.

Total, 20: 7  Seniors, 5 Juniors, 7 Sophomores, 1 Other.

 

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1936-37, p. 92.

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ECONOMICS 34
Reading Assignments—1936-37

Industrial Development

  1. Usher, A. P., Industrial History of England, pp. 1-23, 247-366.
  2. Clark, V. C., History of Manufactures in the United States, pp. 233-314, 335-63.
  3. Roe, J. W., English and American Tool Builders, pp. 109-72.

Transportation Improvement

  1. Kirkaldy, A. W., British Shipping: its History, Organization, and Importance, pp. 3-92, 151-73, 307-47.
  2. (a)

Usher, A. P., Industrial History of England, pp. 431-67.
Clapham, J. H., Economic History of Modern Britain, I, pp. 75-97, 381-412.
Clapham, J. H., Economic Development of France and Germany, pp. 104-13, 140-55, 339-54.

or

  1. (b)

Kirkland, E. C., History of American Economic Life, pp. 257-301, 370-419.
Schmidt, L. B. and E. D. Ross, Readings in the Economic History of American Agriculture, pp. 127-30, 173-270.

Commercial Policy

  1. (a)

Barnes, D. G., History of the English Corn Laws, pp. 239-84.
Ashley, P., Modern Tariff History, pp. 3-63, 323-87.

or

  1. (b)

Hill, W., First Stages of the Tariff Policy of the United States, pp. 38-93.
Taussig, F. W., Tariff History of the United States, pp. 68-154.

Banking and Credit

  1. (a)

Andreades, A., History of the Bank of England, pp. 248-94.
King, W.T.C., History of the London Discount Market, pp. 1-169.
Bagehot, W., Lombard Street, Chaps. VII and IX. (1910 ed., pp. 162-209, 283-302.)

or

  1. (b)

Conant, C. A., History of Modern Banks of Issue, pp. 334-95.
Myers, M.G., The New York Money Market, pp. 3-9, 43-209.

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Department of Economics, Correspondence & Papers 1902-1950, Box 23, Folder “Course Outlines 1935-37-38-42”.

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Reading Period (January 4-20, 1937) Assignment
Economics 34:

Read 200 pages in one of the following books:

Ernle, Lord, English Farming, Past and Present, Chs. 7-19 (inclusive).

Levy, H., Monopolies, Cartels, and Trusts in British Industry, Chs. 5-8, 9.

Webb, S. and B., History of Trade Unionism.

Phillips, U. B., American Negro Slavery, Chs. 8-19 (inclusive).

Hibbard, B. H., History of the Public Land Policies.

Seager, H. R., and Gulick, C. A., Jr., Trust and Corporation Problems, Chs. 5, 7-16, 24-26.

Sprague, O. M. W., Crises under the National Banking System.

Commons, J. R., and associates, History of Labour in the United States.

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003(HUC 8522.2.1), Box 2, Folder “Economics, 1936-1937”.

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FINAL EXAMINATION, 1936-37
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 341

I
(About one hour)

  1. Write an essay upon some subject suggested by your reading-period assignment, or upon the changes in ocean shipping, 1760-1870.

 

II.
(About two hours)

Answer four questions

  1. “Those who would set apart certain decades in the economic development of a country as the period of that country’s ‘industrial revolution’ and who conceive the changes therein contained in terms of inventions, commit two grievous errors. The setting-apart of these periods is spurious, while, in so far as there were developments of note, those in industrial technique were not the decisive ones for segregation.” Do you agree? If so, why? If not, why not?
  2. Take one of the following:

(a) Trace the course of tariff change in England in the period 1815-60. What forces were chiefly responsible for the reformation of the tariff accomplished in these decades?

(b) Trace briefly the development of protectionist thought in the United States in the pre-Civil-War period.

  1. What phases of railroad development on the continent of Europe before 1880 contrast most sharply with the roughly contemporaneous experiences of England and the United States in the same field? Illustrate your points.
  2. What were the outstanding characteristics of the London or New York money market at approximately 1860? How do you account for the emergence of this city as the financial center of England or the United States? (Consider one country only.)
  3. Identify and indicate the significance in economic history of five of the following: (a) Eli Whitney; (b) Brunel; (c) Chevalier; (d) Friedrich List; (e) the Scholfields; (f) Sir Henry Bessemer; (g) Nicholas Biddle.
  4. “Economic independence did not accompany political independence for the United States. The one unifying thread in American economic history for the greater part of the nineteenth century—in commerce, finance, opening the continent, etc.—is action relative to Europe, especially England, and dependence upon these foreign areas.” Do you agree? Why or why not? If on the whole you agree, you should support your views by enlargement of the above contentions (though you may also indicate limitations to the validity of these statements, if you care to); while if on the whole you disagree, you may develop another “unifying thread”—although that course is not essential.

Final. 1937.

 

Source:Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Examination Papers, Finals (HUC 700028, vol. 79). Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Papers Printed for Final Examinations. History, History of Religions, …, Economics,…Military Science, Naval Science. January—June, 1937.

Image Source: Harvard Business School Yearbook 1930-1931, p. 39.

 

 

 

Categories
Agricultural Economics Gender Harvard

Harvard-Radcliffe. Economics Ph.D. alumna Barbara Benton Reagan, 1952

 

This post is another in the series “Meet an Economics Ph.D.” It offers several items about the life and career of Harvard economics Ph.D. (1952), Barbara Benton Reagan. A few years before she died, she was interviewed about the history of the economics department at Southern Methodist University. A link to the video is provided as the first item. A note in the University of Texas alumni magazine from 1966 is then followed by her 2002 obituary. Links (to jstor.org) for her work on women in economics are included at the end of the post.

Barbara Reagan was a founding member of the Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession.

Fun Fact:  Barbara Reagan’s daughter, Patricia, received a Ph.D. in economics from M.I.T. (1980) and went on to join the Department of Economics at Ohio State University. This is only the second mother-daughter  economist pair thus far at Economics in the Rear-view Mirror (the first was Nancy and Patricia Ruggles).

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Oral history of Southern Methodist University’s department of economics

Betty Maynard  interviews Barbara Reagan, Professor Emerita of Economics, on October 27, 2000. (57 minute interview)

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From the University of Texas Alumni Magazine

Lady home-farm economist

            The only woman on the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Advisory Committee is Dr. Barbara Benton Reagan, BS in HE ’41 with honors, a professor at Texas Women’s University, Denton.
Dr. Reagan is also the only woman member of the advisory committee to the Agriculture Policy Institute, chairman of the research committee of the Texas Association of College Teachers, a member of the T.W.U. Graduate Council, and the author of many published analyses and studies.
The committee concerned with economic research is composed of 11 men and R. Reagan, and they recently reviewed more than $12,000,000 worth of research. The results of their surveys are used by nutritionists, marketing experts and others.
At T.W.U., she is professor of home management and family economics, as well as director of Ph.D. and M.A. theses programs.
A onetime Ferguson Fellow at Harvard, Dr. Reagan is a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and is listed in Who’s Who of American Women, and the forthcoming Who’s Who in American Education.
Her husband, Dr. Sidney Reagan, BBA ’37 with honors, LL.B. ’41, is chairman of S.M.U.’s department of general business and has charge of the university’s real-estate program. They live in Dallas.

Source:  The Alcade (University of Texas Alumni Magazine), April, 1966, p. 37.

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Obituary for Barbara Benton Reagan

[31 May 1920 San Antonio TX—9 Dec 2002 Dallas TX]

REAGAN, BARBARA BENTON, was born May 31, 1920, in San Antonio to Colonel William Benton and Cora Martin Benton. She was reared by her beloved aunt, Phoebe Benton Ulrich, after the death of her mother during the 1928 polio epidemic. She received her early schooling through high school in San Antonio and won a scholarship to Mary Baldwin College 1937. The following year she transferred to the University of Texas in Austin, where she served as President of the campus YWCA and was a member of the Kappa Alpha Theta sorority. She met her husband, Sydney Reagan, at a YWCA Retreat in New Braunfels in 1939 when he was President of the Student Body. She received her BS degree with honors in 1941. Barbara and Sydney Reagan were married September 1, 1941, in Indianapolis. They moved to Washington, D.C., where she earned an MA in Statistics from American University in 1947. They both attended Harvard University, where she earned a PhD in Economics in 1952. Her dissertation advisor was the eminent agricultural economist John D. Black. During her years at Harvard, she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. She was a noted scholar specializing in employment and labor market discrimination. Barbara and Sydney returned to Washington, where they both served as economists in the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Their daughter, Patricia, was born in 1954. Their son, Sydney, was born in 1955. The family moved to Dallas in 1955, when Sydney took as a position as Professor of Economics at Southern Methodist University. Barbara returned to work in 1959 as a Professor of Home Economics at Texas Woman’s University. She was named Professor of Economics at Southern Methodist University in 1967, where she remained until her retirement in 1990. She served as Department Chair 1984-1990. During her tenure at SMU, she served as Assistant to the President for Student Academic Services with line responsibility for the Office of Admissions, Registrar, and Financial Aid (1975-76). She was President of the Faculty Senate 1981-1982. Barbara published numerous articles in academic journals, including the American Economic Review and Journal of Economic Literature. She published several books, including one prepared for The National Academy Press. She was a founding member of the Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession, an influential organization within the American Economics Association. She served as President of the Southwestern Social Sciences Association, 1978-79. An active and respected member of the Dallas community, Barbara was a member of the Dallas Economists Club and Town and Gown since 1975. She was a Director of the Federal Home Loan Bank, Region IX, 1981-85. She served on the Board of Directors of American Savings Bank 1990-97. She was also on the Board of Directors of The Texas Guaranteed Student Loan Corporation from 1991-97, serving as Chair 1994-95. Barbara was very active in the women’s rights movement, serving as Founder and Board Member of Women for Change, Dallas, and the Women’s Center of Dallas Advisory Board, where she was President in both 1981 and 1994. Barbara received numerous awards, including the M Award for Service to SMU in 1972, Outstanding Teacher SMU 1972, and the Willis M. Tate for Outstanding Faculty Member 1982. She received the Dallas Outstanding Women-Helping-Women Award in 1980, and the American Association of University Women Laurel Award 1983. She is listed in Who’s Who in Economics, American Men and Women of Science, Who’s Who of American Women, Who’s Who in American Education, Outstanding Educators in America, and Who’s Who in America. Barbara is a third-generation member of PEO active since 1941. She is a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution as a descendant of Isaac Parker. Barbara is survived by her husband Sydney C. Reagan of Dallas, her son Sydney, daughter Patricia, and four grandchildren. Services with no viewing will be held at 11:00 A.M. Tuesday, December17, 2002 at Northhaven Methodist Church in Dallas. In lieu of flowers, contributions can be made to Northhaven United Methodist Church, 11211 Preston Road, Dallas, Texas 75230. These funds will be used in Barbara’s name to promote education among women….

Source: Dallas Morning News, December 14, 2002.

 

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Selected papers

Reagan, Barbara B., and Betty J. Maynard. “Sex Discrimination in Universities: An Approach through Internal Labor Market Analysis.” AAUP Bulletin 60, no. 1 (1974): 13-21.

Reagan, Barbara B. “Two Supply Curves for Economists? Implications of Mobility and Career Attachment of Women.” The American Economic Review 65, no. 2 (1975): 100-07.

Martha Blaxall; Barbara Benton Reagan (1976). Women and the Workplace: The Implications of Occupational Segregation. University of Chicago Press.

Blaxall, Martha, and Barbara B. Reagan. “Preface.” Signs 1, no. 3 (1976): Viii-Ix.

Reagan, Barbara B., and Martha Blaxall. “Introduction: Occupational Segregation in International Women’s Year.” Signs 1, no. 3 (1976): 1-5.

Strober, Myra H., and Barbara B. Reagan. “Sex Differences in Economists’ Fields of Specialization.” Signs 1, no. 3 (1976): 303-17.

Reagan, Barbara B. “Stocks and Flows of Academic Economists.” The American Economic Review 69, no. 2 (1979): 143-47.

 

Image Source:  Southern Methodist University yearbook, The Rotunda 1976, p. 80.

 

Categories
Exam Questions Johns Hopkins

Johns Hopkins. Exams for graduate course on business cycles. Domar, 1951-54

 

Below are three final exams for the Johns Hopkins University graduate course on business cycles taught by Evsey Domar. The examination for 1948-49 has been posted earlier, we see that a few of those questions were recycled below.

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Economics 617
BUSINESS CYCLES

Three hours —January 25, 1951—E.D. Domar

  1. How does the U.S. Department of Commerce treat the following items in the computation of gross national product, national income and consumers disposable income:
    1. Interest on the Federal debt paid to consumers.
    2. Dividends received by American consumers from abroad.
    3. Personal income taxes.
    4. Sales taxes.
    5. Social security payments made by the government to individuals.
    6. Undistributed profits of corporations. If you disagree with the Commerce Department methods, present and justify the methods you would recommend.
  2. Set up a simple model of the Keynesian system including its interest theory and explain its essential differences from the so-called classical system.
  1. 1. Construct a model according to the following conditions:

a) Consumption of a given period is a linear function of the income of the same period.
b) Investment of a given period is a linear function of the difference between incomes of two immediately preceding periods.
c) Income is the sum of consumption, investment and an export balance (constant), all of the same period.

  1. Derive the equation describing the movement of income over time.
  2. Analyze this equation for convergence, divergence and fluctuations and derive the critical values of the parameters.
  3. Make a graph of your results.Give a careful explanation of each step.
  1. Now that we are entering an inflationary period, increased production is suggested as an excellent anti-inflation measure. But larger production means larger incomes which intensify inflation. What then is the actual effect of increased production on inflation?
    Indicate clearly each step in your reasoning.

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ECONOMICS 618
BUSINESS CYCLES

E. D. Domar—Three Hours—May 21, 1952

Answer any four questions. They carry equal weights. Your reasoning is more important than your answers.

I.

“So far as capitalism is concerned we are undoubtedly justified in calling underconsumption a disease of old age.” (Paul Sweezy, The Theory of Capitalist Development,” p. 189.)
Comment.

II.

“Technological progress is alleged to create new investment opportunities by making existing capital assets obsolete. But to the extent that such obsolescence was foreseen, the assets were depreciated over a shorter period and thus gave rise to larger gross savings. Therefore expectedtechnological progress fails to stimulate the economy.”

III.

Hansen emphasizes the positive effect of the growth of population on investment, national income and employment. Yet during the depression many countries suffering from unemployment tried to reduce immigration.
Can you explain this contradiction?

IV.

About 1945 or 1946 when a large loan to Britain was discussed in Washington, the New York Times tried to justify it on the grounds that the British were sure to spend all this money in the United States. On the other hand, the Russians (who also might have asked for a loan) could not be so trusted.
Comment on this and develop your answer into an essay.

V.

Write an essay on any subject related to the course but not covered in your term papers. Take something interesting if possible.

_______________

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
E. D. Domar              May 21, 1954

ECONOMICS 617-618
(Business Cycles)

Three Hours

Answer all questions. They carry equal weights.

I.

Present and analyze some (respectable) business cycle theory not discussed in your own term paper.

II.

The following statement appeared in the National City Bank Monthly Letter (Jan. 1944) regarding government spending as a means of raising the level of income and employment:

“Government spending tends to be like a drug, in that it takes larger and larger doses to get results, and all the time debt and taxes get higher and higher.”

Comment. What could be said regarding private investment directed to the same purpose?

III.

“In spite of his claim to the contrary, Keynes did not succeed in proving the possibility of underemployment equilibrium if wages and prices were assumed to be flexible. That a long period of unemployment could persist as a result of wage and price rigidity we had known long before Keynes.”

Comment on this statement and show what effects flexible prices and wages would have on elimination of unemployment (in a depression) and a bottleneck (during inflation). Indicate clearly every step in your analysis. What practical recommendations follow from your discussion?

IV.

The following comment was made by Mr. Ayzenshtadt, a Soviet economist, in 1947:

“Even the greatest admirers of Keynes and of his theory that loan capital is the main propeller of the industrial cycle, do not see anything new in it…Keynes himself thinks that the ‘novelty’ of his system lies in the equilibrium formula of the economic process, in which the independent and dependent variables are arranged as follows:

Independent variables:

1. Propensity to consume
2. Marginal efficiency of capital
3.Rate of interest
4. Liquidity preference.

Dependent variables:

1. Saving
2. Investment
3. Level of employment.”

Comment. Be specific.

Source:  Duke University. David M. Rubenstein Library of Rare Books and Manuscripts. Economists’ Papers Archives. The Evsey D. Domar Papers, Box 16, Folder “Final Examination, Business Cycles”.

Image source: Domar, Evsey D.“” Webpage at the MIT Museum Website.

Categories
Funny Business M.I.T.

MIT. The Wizard of E52-383C. Grad Student Skit, 1976

 

Today’s addition to the skits written and performed by my cohort of M.I.T. economics graduate students (we joined the program in 1974-75)  was performed in early 1976.  It is a parody of the classic Judy Garland movie The Wizard of Oz.  As coincidence would have it, the faculty’s own contribution to the skit party was a Wizard of Oz parody too. There are so many obscure references in the script that I’ll perhaps prepare an annotated version later. Not to brag, but Paul Samuelson was reported to have said after seeing my performance as the cowardly lion words to the effect “I think that guy might be in the wrong business.”

A parody of Alice in Wonderland set in the Wonderland Institute of Technology in 1975 was written and performed in 1975. In addition to the script I posted a list of my classmates with links to some biographical information where I was able to find something. 

In 1978 many of same people were involved in Casablank, a parody of the movie Casablanca. That script has likewise been transcribed and posted here at Economics in the Rear-view Mirror.

_________________

Cast of characters [corresponding Professor]
in order of appearance with actor’s name when known

Wizard of Mit [Paul Samuelson] played by Paul Krugman
Dorothy [Representative graduate student] played by Margaret Feiger (neé Agnew)
Mailman
Del [Del Tapley, Department Administrator]
Munchkin Labor Force Kid [Robert Hall]
Munchkin Mayor [Evsey Domar] played by William Krasker
Munchkin Adelman [Morris Adelman]
Wicked Witch of the East 
Scarecrow [Robert Solow] played by Jay Helms
Tin Man [Franco Modigliani] played by Dick Startz
Oil Can [Stanley Fischer] played by Jeffrey Frankel
Lion [Jerry Hausman] played by Bud Collier
Narrator
Housewife

_________________

THE WIZARD OF E52-383C

by Messrs. B. Collier, J. Frankel, J. Helms, R. Hill, P. Krugman, D. Startz.

 

Act I
Scene I

Wizard (offstage) Good Evening, Ladies and Gentlemen. I am the Great and Powerful Wizard of Mit. Tonight the Second year class presents a tale of the supernatural—The Wizard of E52-383C. Any resemblance between faculty members and characters in this skit is purely coincidental. Pay no attention to the identifying initials worn by the actors! Our action begins in Kansas where Dorothy, a college senior, has received a series of troubling letters.

 

Dorothy: (picking up and reading letters): I don’t understand it. I’ve been rejected by every grad school I applied to. Chicago…Stanford…Slippery Rock State Teacher’s College…University of Southern North Dakota…Southwestern Virginia College for Small Women…What did I do wrong? I wonder if I should have mentioned on my applications that I have an NSF fellowship?

(FANFARE)

enter Mailman (running): Special delivery! I have a piece of registered mail for Occupant.

Dorothy: That’s me! (opens letter) Why, it’s a letter from MIT. (begins reading)

Mailman (to audience): Dorothy’s letter says: “Dear Sir, Madam, or otherwise: We hear you have received an NSF and are delighted to admit you to our graduate economics program. This acceptance is, of course, based solely on our evaluation of your academic promise and be sure to fill out and return the enclosed financial form immediately.”

Dorothy: Hey, how do you know what it says? Did you get the same letter?

Mailman: Why not? Nobody said that it had to be a one-to-one correspondence.

Dorothy: Well, I guess I’d better go to MIT. But I don’t know how to get there. Excuse me, sir, (turning to Mailman), but can you tell me how I can get to MIT?

Mailman: (solemnly) Study!

 

Scene II

Dorothy: Somehow, I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.

Del: Hi! What witch are you?

Dorothy: Which what? Who? Huh? Oh! Why, I’m not a witch at all. As a matter of fact, I’ve never even seen a witch, I went to a state university.

Munchkins: Hee hee.

Dorothy: What’s that?

Del: They’re laughing because I am a witch. I’m Del, the good witch of the North.

Dorothy: Oh, I beg your pardon. But who are they?

Del: Those are Munchkins, the little people who live in this land. And you are their national heroine, for you have killed the Wicked Witch of the East Campus. Come out, every one, it’s safe now!

Dorothy: Hello!

Del: Munchkin Hall, from the second floor, would like to give you a present.

Hall (singing and dancing on one foot):

I represent the Labor Force Kids
The Labor Force Kids, The Labor Force Kids,
And on behalf of the Labor Force Kids
I wish to welcome you to Munchkin Land

The Labor Force Kids are honored to present you with a copy of my latest Brookings paper on the Phillips curve (holding paper upside down)

Dorothy: Aren’t you holding that journal upside down?

Hall: Well, most people think it slopes the opposite way, but they’re wrong, as you can tell by looking at the 454 model, which is empirically fitted on one observation.

Dorothy: But are you sure your paper is right?

Hall: Well, there are actually a few—actually, I—uh –as a matter of fact, I’d better warn you that some of the things I told you last term aren’t quite true. But here (taking another BPEA) is my latest Brookings paper on inflation, and I promise that this is my absolute last word on the subject…until next Fall.

enter Domar: On behalf of all the Munchkins, I, the Mayor of the Munchkins, welcome you to our land.

Dorothy: I’m pleased to meet you. But, please, sir, what exactly is a Munchkin?

Domar: Oh, a Munchkin is a sort of peasant. Actually, some Munchkins are workers, but most are peasants. I am the Mayor because I love to talk about peasants.

Dorothy: Why do the Munchkins need a Mayor? Is it hard to keep law and order?

Domar: Oh no, it’s no trouble at all. Munchkins are a friendly, peaceful folk who live in harmony and concord, except for a few who live in Lincoln. The only reason they need a mayor is because Munchkinland is a Mayoritocracy. Why, all the Munchkin laws are in this little book (hands Dorothy a book)

Dorothy: It’s awfully heavy for such a little book.

Hall: That’s because they’re all iron laws.

A Munchkin: Now let us all rejoice and tell happy stories!

Hall: 14.454!

(laughter)

Adelman: 14.124!

(laughter)

Dorothy: I don’t get it.

Domar: Oh, around here all you have to do is mention some course numbers and everyone thinks it’s funny.

Dorothy: Can I try it?

Domar: Be my guest.

Dorothy: 14.383

(everyone starts crying)

Domar: Why did you tell such a sad story? You’ve upset everyone!

(shrieks, rumbles)

Wicked Witch: Who killed my sister?

Dorothy: I thought you said she was dead!

Del: This is her sister, the Wicked Witch of the West.

Dorothy: You have two wicked witches?

Hall: O yes, you wouldn’t believe the trouble we’ve had around here because of doubles witching!

Wicked Witch: Who killed my sister? Was it you?

Dorothy: But I didn’t mean to.

Wicked Witch: I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little dog too!

Dorothy: What little dog?

Wicked Witch: You’re supposed to have a little dog!

Dorothy: Well you can’t expect us to reproduce the movie in Toto!

Del: You are in great danger, my dear, and you had better go and seek out help.

Dorothy: Who can help me?

Del: Perhaps the great Wizard of Mit can.

Dorothy: Can he pull a rabbit out of a hat?

Del: Well, he’s no Hal Varian, he can only do half a rabbit at a time.

Dorothy: Sounds like hare-splitting to me. But how do I find him?

Hall: It’s easy: just follow the gray cement.

Dorothy: (looking at ground) Follow the gray cement…follow the gray cement…(bumps into wall) Hey! Your were wrong, this path doesn’t lead anywhere.

Hall: Yes, I realized it wasn’t true as soon as I said it, but I decided not to tell you.

Adelman: Before you go, I, as the chief Munchkin expert on the oil industry, will make a prophecy: you will go safely to Mit and he will return you to Kansas.

Dorothy: Why does being an oil expert mean that you can see the future?

Adelman: Everyone knows there’s lots of prophets in the oil industry.

Dorothy: I sure hope this turns out better than some of your other predictions.

Del: Now my dear, you’d better start on your way to Mit.

Dorothy: How do I get there? And no funny business this time!

Del: Let’s see. I know I have it written down here somewhere (rummaging on table; picks up envelope, looks on back) Oh yes, here it is. All you must do is follow the yellow brick road…to Government center, change for the Green Line to Park Street, then take the Red Line to Kendall.

Dorothy: Follow the yellow brick road…follow the yellow brick road…

All: (singing)

Follow the yellow brick road
Follow the yellow brick road
Follow the, follow the, follow the, follow the,
Follow the yellow brick road

You’re off to see the Wizard,
The Wonderful Wizard of Mit
We hear he is a wonderful WizThough most of his stuff is—ahem!

If ever oh ever a Wiz there was
The Wizard of Mit is one because,
Because, because, because, because….

(everyone looks around in confusion, shrugs shoulders, and walks off stage).

 

ACT II
Dorothy Meets the Scarecrow

(Scarecrow is standing as if held up by a pole, his arms stretched out. Enter Dorothy)

Dorothy: Follow the yellow brick road…follow the yellow brick road…? But there’s a fork in the road! Where do I go now?

Scarecrow: You could go down the golden rule path. (He points left.)

Dorothy: (startled) What was that? There’s no one here but a scarecrow!

Scarecrow:  Or, you could go down the turnpike. (He points right.)

Dorothy: (to the audience) Wasn’t he pointing the other way?

Scarecrow: Of course, some people just can’t differentiate between the two. (He points both ways.)

Dorothy: You did say something, didn’t you? (Scarecrow looks silly pointing both ways:) Are you doing that on purpose or can’t you make up your mind?

Scarecrow: That’s just the trouble—I can’t make up my mind—I haven’t got a brain…only straw. (He says sadly.)

Dorothy: How can you talk if you haven’t got a brain?

Scarecrow:  I don’t know (thoughtful pause). But you’ll find there’re lots of people around here without brains who do an awful lot of talking.

Dorothy: What do you mean by that?

Scarecrow:  I may not have a brain, but I have enough sense not to answer that question. Besides, it’d be tasteless, and we’re leaving that sort of stuff to Perloff and the fourth year class.

Dorothy: But won’t they get into big trouble for that?

Scarecrow: Maybe so, but at least they can run away—I’m stuck here on this pole.

Dorothy: Oh, that must be very uncomfortable—what do you do up there all day?

Scarecrow: Well, everything I see reminds me of sex, but I’m trying to keep it out of this skit.

Dorothy: Here. (She walks over to him.) Maybe I can help you (Scarecrow acquires a lecherous grin.)…get down, that is.

Scarecrow: If you could bend the nail down I might fall off. (She does so, and the scarecrow falls down and flops around a bit.) Oh, thank you! Thank you! You really know how to knock down a straw man—you’ll do fine here. But I’m still a failure because I haven’t got a brain.

Dorothy: What would you do with a brain if you had one?

Scarecrow: (aside) I think that’s a cue for a song.

Dorothy: But you can’t sing—I heard you in rehearsal.

Scarecrow: You’re not kidding! But neither can anyone else in this skit, so people had better just get used to it. Besides, the audience seems pretty juiced up anyway.

I could wile away the hours
Reading Robert Clower
Or even J. M. Keynes

It would be no enigma
When things grew at rate sigma
If I only had a brain.

I could put down Milton neatly
And Franco quite discreetly
They’d suffer boundless pain

I could do a lot of thinkin’
I could be like Don Patinkin
If I only had a brain.

Oh I
Could tell you why
Growth theory’s such a bore
And what god made grad students for (?)
And then I’d sit
And think some more.

I could solve for optimality
With primal and duality
And never feel the strain

I could normalize the vector
That describes the public sector
If I only had a brain.

Dorothy: (running off) …oh my god…

Scarecrow: Wait! (shouting, running after her) You didn’t even introduce yourself!

Dorothy: Oh, yes …I’m Alice…I mean Dorothy.

Scarecrow: What are you doing here?

Dorothy: I’m going to see the Wonderful Wizard of Mit to ask him to help me get home.

Scarecrow: Where’s your home?

Dorothy: It’s one of those places where ivy doesn’t grow—you’ve probably never heard of it.

Scarecrow: (slowly, with tone of contempt) Oh, yes… but how did you ever get here from there ?…Well, no matter…Hey, do you think this Wizard of yours could help me get a brain?

Dorothy: Probably not. No one around here seems to have nearly enough brains for himself—much less enough to give away.

Scarecrow: But isn’t it worth a try? Hey, look—maybe he has one but he’s just not using it very much—then he’d never miss it if he gave it to me.

Dorothy: You’re right! (excitement builds!) Come along then!

Scarecrow: Hooray! We’re off to see the Wizard!

(Dorothy and Scarecrow exit, skipping and singing, “We’re off to see the Wizard….)

 

ACT III
Tin Woodsman Scene

(Tin man on stage, Dorothy & Scare crow walk in

Tin Man: (with mouth closed) Oil can.

Dorothy: What was that?

Tin Man: (more clearly) Oil can.

Scarecrow: I think he said “oil can”.

Dorothy: Where would we find an oil can in the middle of the forest?

(Oil can hops in: harmonica fanfare)

Dorothy: What a coincidence!

Oil Can: Not really, I was out in Chicago waiting for this to happen. You see, we left the Tin Man in a seminar room all by himself…

Dorothy: …and he was so lonely he cried and rusted shut?

Oil Can: He kept right on talking and was bored stiff.

(Oil Can and Dorothy loosen up the Tin Man)

Tin Man: …yes by the way it works in my model…

Dorothy: (interrupts) I have a question.

Tin Man: Yes?

Dorothy: You look very peculiar for a Tin Man. Everyone else in the room uses at least two axes and you don’t even have one.

Tin Man: Well the reason I can do that is I find an axe isn’t so good. No, a two man saw is much more efficient.

Oil Can: The truth is he can’t cut down a tree without a co-author.

Dorothy: (to Oil Can) You have a very interesting accent. You sound just like someone I know but I can’t quite place it. Hmmm…I know who it is! You sound just like Jeremy Bulow.

Tin Man: I promise from now on I’m going to be witty and entertaining and I will try to maintain a high rate of interest.

Scarecrow: That doesn’t tell us much. You promising to set a high rate of interest is like the young man who swears to lead a virtuous life. You still don’t know what he’s going to do with his hands.

Tin Man: I’d like to tell you a few more characteristics of my life’s story, but I see it’s five o’clock and we’re out of time.

Oil Can: That’s ok, this skit goes until 5:30.

Dorothy: You do that one more time and we’re sending you back to Chicago.

Tin Man: The reason I keep talking about my model is because I haven’t got a heart.

Dorothy: Do you mean that when the tinsmith made you he left out a heart? How sad.

Tin Man: Oh no, I had one originally. But you see I thought Milton needed one a lot more than I did, so I gave it to him. Then he sold it to the University of Chicago Art Gallery.

Dorothy: Huh?

Oil Can: Both the gallery and Uncle Milton have always wanted to hang a Modigliani.

Dorothy: Why do you keep on talking about your model when you should show a little restraint?

(into song sung by Tin Man except where indicated)

There’s a money demand equation
a free reserve relation
difficult it ain’t.

Class attention I’d be keepin’
And there’d be nobody sleepin’
If I only showed restraint.

I do model simulation
of disintermediation
the notion’s really quaint.

I could talk to Kenneth Arrow
or even Robert Barro
If I only showed restraint.

Riddle me
economy
above a voice cries low

(Dorothy) Wherefore art thou, Franco?

I estimate!
(thump, thump)

(Scarecrow) I integrate!

I’d forget about consumption
study peasants like the Munchkin
be quiet as a saint.

(Oil Can) I’d have time to teach you theory
Students wouldn’t get so weary
If I only showed restraint.

Dorothy: Are you always around to take care of the Tin Man?

Oil Can: What do you take me for, a one night Stan?

Dorothy: Which way to Mit?

Tin Man: (In Italian) I think it’s that way. (point)

Scarecrow: Sheer madness.

Dorothy: Yes, that way would be better.

Scarecrow: Sheer madness and a Talmudic argument.

Dorothy: Well then, how about that way?

Scarecrow: Sheer madness, a Talmudic argument, and if God had intended us to go that way. She would have put up a sign post.

Oil Can: Never mind, Mit lies that way.

Dorothy: How can you be so sure that road will converge to Mit?

Oil Can: Elementary, it’s the perfect foresight path.

 

ACT IV
Cowardly Lion Scene

Dorothy: Oh my, the path leads us into this forest. Do you think that there are any wild animals there?

Scarecrow: Maybe a lion or two, nothin’ to get worried about.

Dorothy: Lions! Do you think we’ll meet any?

Tin Man: Don’t worry Dorothy, we’ll protect you.

Scarecrow:  (to Tin Man) But who will protect us?

Tin Man: Shhh. Besides, the only lion that lives around here is the economist’s best friend—the regression lion.

Dorothy:  A regression lion? I’ve never heard of one of those before. Are you sure they won’t attack us?

Scarecrow: I don’t know for sure but there’s a pretty harmless one called OLS, it’s BLUE.

Tin Man: That’s a lion of a different color.

Scarecrow: Of course, there is always the GLS…, it’s ferocious.

Dorothy:  What color is GLS?

Scarecrow: Blue.

Dorothy:  So how will we be able to tell them apart?

Scarecrow: Sometimes they’re the same thing.

Tin Man: But the meanest and baddest lions in the forest are (pause, then whisper) FIML.

Dorothy: OLS?

Scarecrow: (nodding his head) GLS.

Tin Man: FIML.

Dorothy: Oh my!

All: OLS, GLS, FIML…

Dorothy: Oh my!

All: OLS, GLS, FIML…

Dorothy: Oh my!

(Repeat the above chant with Dorothy’s ‘Oh my!’ several times, faster and faster. Go around in circles so that the three are facing the entrance/exit and they are heading towards the entrance when out pops the lion roaring, Dorothy screams.)

Lion: RRRRRROOOAR!!! (to Tin Man) Hah, so you’re trying to hold the money workshop in the forest without inviting me.

Tin Man: But, but….

Lion: Just don’t let it happen again, hey Tin Man who’s the chick with the clown?

Dorothy: (scared) I’m not a chick, and he’s not a clown, he’s a scarecrow. And he’s smart too, so you’d better be careful.

Lion: So ya think you’re smart do ya’? (Scarecrow shakes his head “no”.) Oh yeah, well put ‘em up, wanna see who can prove that three stage least squares is asymptotically efficient? (Scarecrow is shaking and on his knees, begging, and shaking his head) See, he’s scared. Hah! Com on ya dummy, I’ll let you prove it in thirty lines, I’ll do it in less than ten. Ah, come on scarecrow, I’ll let ya use my colored chalk, I’ll use white chalk, I’ll even erase the board for myself. (Scarecrow is on the ground paralyzed with fear. To Dorothy…) See, he ain’t so smart.

Tin Man: You really shouldn’t act this way…

Lion: Don’t criticize my acting. Will you shut up or do I have to turn you into a sculpture for the East Campus? I wonder what you would look like with your head put on backwards?

Dorothy: (running behind and pulling his tail) Don’t hurt Tin Man, he just can’t restrain himself, it’s not his fault. You shouldn’t make fun of Scarecrow’s scarcity of wit either. Do you think you’re perfect?

Lion: (starts crying) Ah why’d you have to go and pull my tail, I wasn’t trying to hurt nobody. I was just having my own sick, perverted, disgusting fun (bawls some more).

Dorothy: My goodness, what a fuss you’re making. You’re nothing but a big coward.

Lion: You’re right, I am a coward. Just look at the circles under my eyes, I haven’t slept in weeks.

Tin Man: Why don’t you try reading Patinkin?

Lion: I can’t, I’m afraid the suspense would kill me.

Scarecrow: Maybe the Wizard could help you. He’s going to give me a brain and him restraint and he’ll help get Dorothy out of here.

Lion: (To Dorothy) You think he could do it?

Dorothy: He’s a Wizard isn’t he? Oh, do come with us, it’s worth a try, come on.

Lion. OK, it would really be terrific if the Wizard could give me courage (he lapses into song….)

“IF I ONLY HAD MORE NERVE”

When I’d speak I wouldn’t mumble,
I would seem so meek and humble.
All that you would observe.
And I’d answer all your queries
When I’d lecture on time series,
If I only had more nerve.

I’m afraid there’s no denyin’
that this regression lion
Can’t even draw a curve.
But I know that this kitty
Could give lectures truly witty,
If he only had more nerve.

Oh I…..’d be King of Mit,
My realm the whole third floor,
Editor of Econometrica,
And then I would teach
Three-eighty-four!

I would humbly beg your pardon
If I’d seem to come too hard on,
Decorum I’d observe.
And I’d be just like your brother,
No longer a mean mother-…
If I only had more nerve.

Dorothy: I wouldn’t worry if I were you, it took a lot of nerve to sing that song.

Scarecrow: Shall we go to see the Wizard?

Tin Man: Let’s go!

All: (Arm in arm, they go off singing)  We’re off to see the Wizard….

 

(break for commercial)

Narrator: We will return to the Wizard of Mit after station identification.

Housewife: Mothers! You may have compared guns to butter, but are you uncertain what brand of butter to choose? Try new Scotch brand mean-preserving spread. Scotch brand sticks to your bread. Just a wee bit removes the uncertainty as to which side your bread is buttered on. In 9 out of 10 families, it produces a higher level of margarine utility. And, as part of a budget-constrained diet, Scotch brand mean-preserving spread can help preserve your means.

Narrator: Preserve my means of what?

Housewife: Your means of payment.

Narrator:(Snorts) I don’t know what means of payment! I don’t have any bread.

Housewife: So remember mothers, all brands of butter are not indifferent. Next time you are at the supermarket, try Scotch brand mean-preserving spread. You can differentiate it by the little Scotch on the rooks. (Pointing to package.)

Narrator: And speaking of Scots, don’t forget to get your tickets for the Adam Smith Roast, April 12, commemorating the 200thanniversary of the publication of the Wealth of Nations. Join us for an Eve with Adam.
We now return to the Wizard of Mit, already in progress.

 

ACT V
“Waiting for the Wizard”

Scene 1.

Man at door: (Wizard with a Groucho Marx disguise of glasses, nose, and moustache) I’m sorry, but the Wizard is busy, you’ll have to wait here.

Lion: If I had more nerve, I’d tell him a thing or two. He wouldn’t dare talk to the King of Mit like that.

Dorothy: Your majesty, if you were king, you wouldn’t be afraid of anybody?

Lion: Not nobody, not nohow, nuthin’.

Scarecrow: What of non-linear estimation?

Lion: I’d do it on my vacation.

Tin Man: How ‘bout a grad student with a question?

Lion: Wouldn’t even affect my digestion.

Dorothy: Not even errors in variables?

Lion: That wouldn’t be so terriable.

Scarecrow: But what of a fixed-point theorem?

Lion: I wouldn’t even fear ‘em.

(Dorothy, Scarecrow, and Tinman look at each other confused and together say)

All (but Lion): How?

Lion: How?…..Courage.

What makes Jim Tobin cool in inflation?
Courage.
What makes Ken Galbraith so ready to ration?
Courage.
What makes Frank Fisher insulting
Though he’s never here and always consulting?
Courage.
What makes Scarf so easily able
To prove his equilibr’um stable?
What makes Diamond’s neoclassical fable?
Courage.
What makes Domar so concerned with the serf?
Courage.
What lets Lance Taylor know wheat from the turf?
Courage.
What gives Eckaus the decision on money?
What gives Bob Bishop the right to be funny?
Courage.
What makes Hatanka hot?
What puts the “P” in Hall’s P-dot?
What do they got that I ain’t got?

Others: (loud) Tenure!

Lion: You can say that again.

(Out pops Wizard’s head in disguise again)

Man in disguise: You may come in, but please don’t make so much noise.

 

Scene 2.

(Dorothy, Scarecrow, Lion, Tin Man, and Oil Can meet the Wizard

Scarecrow: There’s the wizard!

Dorothy: Oh Wizard can you help us? Can you send me home?

Scarecrow: Can you give me brains?

Lion: Can you give me courage?

Tin Man: Can you give me restraint?

Wizard: (In deep voice) I am the great Wizard of Mit. Of course I can grant your requests for I am faster than hyperinflation, more powerful than an explosive cycle and able to leap tall nonnegativity constraints in a single Cramer-Rao bound.
But first you, Dorothy, must capture a set of the bluest coefficients from the Wicked Witch of the West—and you, Scarecrow, Lion, and Tin Man, must help her.

(Dorothy, Scarecrow, Lion, Tin Man, Oil Can exit, talking with one another about what they are to do)

 

ACT VI
The Castle of the Wicked Witch

(Dorothy, Tinman, Scarecrow, Lion, Oil Can on stage)

Tin Man: This is Harvard, so the Wicked Witch’s castle must be around here somewhere.

Scarecrow: But we haven’t seen any building named Bronwyn Hall.

Dorothy: Oh, this is terrible. We’ll never be able to get those coefficients, and I’ll never be able to go home. (sobs)

Lion: Wait a minute! There’s a computer. I’m sure it will be more than happy to solve our problem for us.

Dorothy: Yes, but how can we use it without an account? Oh, if only someone would give me some computer money! (pause) I said: Oh, if only someone would give me some computer money!

enter Del: Hi! Did I hear you calling for something?

Dorothy: Please, can I have some computer money?

Del: How much do you want?

Dorothy: Twenty-five should be enough.

Del: Oh, that’s alright then. If you want more you’ll have to go see Professor Eckaus. Here you are (opens change purse and gives Dorothy a quarter) (leaves)

Tin Man: Well, now you can run the equation, although I must admit I am rather skeptical about your getting any results. In the last 17 papers I have co-authored on this subject I have failed to find any significant influence of…

Dorothy: (interrupting) Don’t you think we’d better get this over with?

Lion: Now Dorothy, it’s not nice to interrupt someone like that.

Oil Can: You know, Dorothy, if the Regression Lion has to give you lessons in tact, you’re in real trouble.

Dorothy: Well, anyway, let me see what comes out. (Puts quarter in machine, rips off sheet of paper.) Hey this is gibberish! That’s very peculiar.

Lion: Oh, I don’t think it’s peculiar. It fact, it’s quite normal.

Scarecrow: Why is it normal?

Lion: Because I’ve seen it happen lots of times, and anything becomes approximately normal after about 25 observations.

Dorothy: All that it says on this printout is “Error 1039”. Does anyone know what that means?

Lion: No, but we can look it up in the version 2.7 manual.

Dorothy: Well, you do that. I’ll go see if I can find Bill Dellafar (starts to walk offstage, shrieks, is yanked off)

Scarecrow: Error 1039, error 1039, let’s see: it says, “I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little dog too.”

(all look around)

Tin Man: The Wicked Witch must have taken Dorothy!

Scarecrow: But where?

Wicked Witch: Ha ha ha! You know I’m here somewhere, but you’ll never find enough restrictions to identify me!

Lion: Now what are we going to do?

Tin Man: If I knew you were going to ask that question, I would have put it in my model, which I have to believe in, because if I don’t, who will?

Scarecrow: Now look, I don’t have any brains, so I don’t know any econometrics, and I wouldn’t believe it if I did. But I have an idea. What we have here is an identification problem. Now what does that make you think of?

Oil Can: Money!

Scarecrow: Everything you hear makes you think of money. Everything I hear makes me think of sex, but I’m still trying to keep it out of the skit.

Dorothy: (offstage) you’re not trying had enough!

Scarecrow: I mean Frank Fisher.

Lion: But we can’t afford him. He charges 100,000 bucks to testify against witches.

Scarecrow: Yes, but the second year students have never had Fisher, and don’t know him from Irving. If you (pointing to Lion) go around humiliating students and saying incomprehensible things, nobody will know the difference.

Lion: All right, I’ll do it. I’m gonna go in and set the system of equations (1) in the normalized form (4) after deleting the columns corresponding to the a priori known elements of beta and gamma, which will allow us to use equation (14) to derive the Fiml estimator delta-hat in instrumental variable form. And there’s only one thing I want you guys to do.

All: What is it?

Lion: Talk me out of it!

Scarecrow: Okay, let’s go!

(Dorothy comes running out)

Tin Man: Come on Dorothy!

Wicked Witch: You won’t escape me!

(Dorothy trips over wire)

Wicked Witch: What have you done? You’ve pulled my plug! I’m going down, I’m going down…

Tin Man: The Wicked Witch is dead; but now how are we going to get the coefficients?

Scarecrow: Well, since I don’t have a brain, I always cars this HP 55 with me, since it’s the next best thing. Maybe we can calculate them on this.

Dorothy: But will it do everything we need?

Scarecrow: Not by itself, but we have all sorts of special accessories. (While this happens, computer begins moving into audience, saying “Mommy”, “Where’s Browyn Hall?”, etc.)

Lion: For example, we can test for cereal correlation with this (pulls out a box of cereal)

Oil Can: And correct for it using the special CORC attachment! (pulls cork out of bottle, passes bottle around)

Tin Man: We can take t-statistics with these (tea bags)

Lion: And we can perform Chow tests with this! (dog food)

Scarecrow: We can use Almon Lags (almonds), and it will be no problem to scramble the variables (eggs).

Dorothy: Stop! We’ll never get them unscrambled! But can we get a variance?

Oil Can: You’ll have to go to the zoning board for that.

Scarecrow: And this will be only too glad to do hill-climbing for us (climbing gear)

Dorothy: It sure looks like a lot of work.

Scarecrow: That’s true, but it may be what God made graduate students for. Presumably she had somethingin mind.

(computer now speaks to Bronwyn Hall)

Computer: Good evening, Mrs. Hall. Here’s something you thought you’d never see: the very last bug from TSP (gives her bug).

 

ACT VII
Dorothy, Scarecrow, Lion and Tin Man return to the Wizard

 

Dorothy: (places coefficients before Wiz) Are they blue enough? Will they get me back home?

Wizard: That depends on whether the Lerner-Lewis-Leontief-Lousy operator meets the Bishop-Bowley-Bentham-Bogus condition on top of the Samuelson-Savage-Slutsky-Silly contour integrals.

Lion: But the coefficients—will they give me courage?

Wizard: (absent-mindedly) This reminds me of what Cournot said to Bernoulli when they were ruining gamblers in St. Petersburg…

Scarecrow: Please Wizard! Tell us if the coefficients are good enough to give me a brain!

Wizard: Or am I thinking of the time Edgeworth trampled on Pareto’s bordered Hessian and Villy came after him swinging a Markoff chain?

Tin Man: (knocking over poster of wizard to expose man reading Newsweek) Hey, this is no wizard—he’s a fake!

Wizard: Yes I admit—I get all my economics from Newsweek—I don’t understand those things I say any more than anyone else does.

Dorothy: You mean you don’t know what Shephard’s lemma is?

Wizard: I’ve never even seen a sheep.

Lion: You don’t understand the Wong-Viner envelope?

Wizard: I’ve never even been in a Chinese stationery store.

Dorothy: Then you can’t get me back home!

Lion: You can’t give me courage!

Scarecrow: Or me a brain!

Tin Man: Or me restraint!

Dorothy: I can’t believe that all the Munchkins have been saying how great you are when you’re a complete phony.

Wizard: I’m sorry, my dear, but it’s true. I’m an exact, pure humbug with or without the social contrivance of Munchkins. Now, Scarecrow, Lion, and Tin Man. Don’t get excited. There’s one thing that will help you all—when you have it the lack of brains, courage, and restraint doesn’t matter at all.

Scarecrow, Lion, Tin Man: (together) What is it?

Wizard: (sings)

I’m a dullard and a coward
and my math’s not so high-powered
my column’s not so wise.
Though I made a lot of money
No one thought my jokes were funny
‘Til I won the Nobel prize.

Though my thought is quite as narrow
as that of Kenneth Arrow
my ego’s twice his size.
Though I make a silly blunder
No one ever seems to wonder
How I won the Nobel prize.

refrain:

Koopmans, Kantorovich, Frisch
Tinbergen—I’m better than them all.
Next to me they scarcely count at all
I love me so
And you should know…

If you want a commendation
Just give me a small donation.
I’ll tell all sorts of lies.
So you see you can be winners
even though you’re just beginners
When you win your Nobel prize.

Scarecrow, Lion, Tin Man: (together) Oh, thank you Wizard!

Wizard: It was nothing. But Dorothy, how are we going to get you back to Kansas?

Dorothy: Kansas? What’s all this about Kansas—I want to go back to Australia.

THE END

Source: Personal copy of the script of Irwin Collier.

Image: Left to right: Paul Krugman as the Wizard of Mit, Jeffrey Frankel as Oil Can, Margaret (Feiger) Agnew as Dorothy, Irwin Collier as Lion, Dick Startz as Tin Man.  From Irwin Collier files (photographer unknown).