Tag: Kaysen

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Economists Harvard

Harvard. Annual report on the department of economics. Dunlop, 1961-1962

John T. Dunlop

An overview of the annual comings and goings of a department are typically chronicled in a report prepared by the department chair. Such low circulation documents are sometimes targeted to a specific readership, e.g. a visiting committee, a dean, the alumni, but the report transcribed in this post for the Harvard economics department in 1961-62 does not appear to have had a particular audience in mind.

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About  Chairman John T. Dunlop
(Harvard Album, 1960)

Sallying forth from an office in the farther reaches of Littauer to Washington, D.C., JOHN THOMAS DUNLOP, Professor of Economics and faculty member in the Graduate School of Public Administration, is certainly one of the university’s most travelled professors. Dunlop, a labor expert, teaches an undergraduate course on unionism and public policy applying to labor relations and problems; in the grad school he conducts two seminars, in one of which he had worked closely with the late Professor Slichter. But in addition to his teaching, Professor Dunlop is one of the country’s leading strike arbitrators, and he figures that he travels in the vicinity of 150,000 miles a year on this outside work. The occasion for a weekly trip to the nation’s capital is his post as the impartial chairman of a joint committee in the construction industry, comprising representatives of the eighteen major unions and contracting firms. In this position Professor Dunlop must mediate disputes between the union and management. He is also a permanent umpire for the women’s garment industry and in the past has served in similar capacities for the brass companies of Connecticut and the bituminous coal producers. The dispute in 1955 involving the complexities of the ratio of required conductors to the length of a freight train called him back to the role of mediator, following a long term with the Atomic Energy Labor panel. At present he edits the Wertheim series on the histories of various big corporations and unions, and he also administers a Ford Foundation grant to study the functionings of labor and management in the underdeveloped countries of Asia.

Professor Dunlop was born in the Forty-Niner gold region and graduated from the University of California in 1935. He has been with Harvard since 1938, when he joined the faculty as an instructor. He gets back to California at least once a year, and the last time he returned he did so by travelling eastward via Indonesia. Professor Dunlop lives in Belmont, and, when not compiling mileage, he devotes his time to his wife and three children, and concentrates on his tennis game.

Source: The Harvard Album, 1960, p. 29.

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Previously posted departmental reports

Department Reports to the Dean (1932-41)
Department Reports to the Dean (1942-1946)
Department Reports to the Dean (1947-1950)
Department Report to the Dean (1955-56)
Department Newsletter (June 1960)

___________________________

June 26, 1962

Report
Department of Economics, 1961-1962

1. Staff

Professor Gerschenkron was Taussig Research Professor for the year, and Professor Albert J. Meyer, lecturer in the Department, was also on leave. Professor Galbraith and Kaysen continued on leave in government appointments. During the spring term Professor Harris was on sabbatical leave; Professor Bergson held a Ford Faculty Research Fellowship, and Professor Leontief was Visiting Professor at the College du France, Paris. Assistant Professors Gill and Vanek were also on leave throughout the year.

As a consequence of the number of senior members on leave, the Department included this year a relatively large number of visiting professors and lecturers. Professor Jesse Markham of Princeton University taught the courses in industrial organization; Dr. Frank Spooner was in charge of economic history; Professor William H. Nicholls of Vanderbilt instructed in agriculture and economic development. Professor Jacob Viner was Taussig Research Professor, and while he taught no courses, we were delighted to have him with us for the year. Professor Schmookler of Minnesota was associated with the science and public policy seminar of the Littauer School, and was a visiting lecturer in the Department. In addition, Professor Domar of M.I.T. taught a course in the Soviet economy in the spring term. Mr. Langley gave courses ordinarily taught by Professor A.J. Meyer, and Professor Caleb Smith of Brown University continued to teach the accounting course.

2. New Appointments

       The Executive Committee unanimously recommended the appointment of Professor Richard Caves as a permanent addition to the Department. Following the established procedures, the governing boards on May 14, 1962 voted his appointment as Professor of Economics effective July 1, 1962. Professor Caves completed his Ph.D. degree in the Department in 1958 and has been on the staff at the University of California (Berkeley) since 1957. He has been vice-chairman of the Berkeley Department. The appointment of Professor Caves will materially strengthen the Harvard Department, particularly in the fields of international trade and industrial organization. Moreover, he is regarded as an excellent undergraduate teacher.

       The Department unanimously recommended and the President and governing boards approved the appointment of four new assistant professors starting July 1, 1962: Clopper Almon, Jr., Elliot Berg, Phoebus Dhrymes, and Thomas Wilson. It is planned that these assistant professors in the Department will devote part time to research and be paid in part from research budgets. Such arrangements, combined with the higher salary scales starting July 1, 1962, should facilitate the recruitment of first rate assistant professors; it has often been difficult in the past to fill this rank in this Department.

       In approving these four appointments on March 5, 1962, President Pusey stated:

“It is my understanding that these four new Assistant Professors will devote part of their five-year tenure to special research projects and that an appropriate fraction of their salaries during these periods will be charged against the project budgets. I approve in principle the idea of experimenting in this way with charging portions of the salaries of assistant professors to grants or contracts, provided these grants or contracts are of sufficient duration to avoid the danger of funds running out when there are still large salary commitments in excess of our normal academic salary budget. Thus I feel that we should move with caution in this direction, treating the above appointments as experimental, and waiting for the results to become apparent before venturing further along this road.”

3. Chair in Modern China Studies and Economics

       The primary responsibility for filling this chair has now been placed in the Department of Economics. After a series of conferences with the East Asia Research Center of Harvard University, President Pusey approved the arrangements under which the Department will seek a permanent appointment competent in Economics and with a command of the Chinese language. In the meanwhile, the Department is to be responsible for providing some instruction on term appointments in the field and is to have the use of the income of the endowment for such instruction and to develop promising scholars in this field.

       Professor Kuznets is to be Chairman of the Committee of the Department to seek appropriate appointments. It is expected that Mr. Dwight Perkins, a graduate student in the Department, will provide a half course of instruction on the Economy of China in the spring term, 1963.

4. Undergraduate Program

       The enrollment in the undergraduate courses in the Department has grown in the last several years. The aggregate enrollment in undergraduate courses was 926 in the fall of 1959 and 1375 in the fall of 1961; the aggregate enrollment was 1080 in the spring term of 1960 and 1281 in the spring of 1962. These figures include the enrollment in Economics 1 which averaged 540 in 1959 and 628 in 1962. It is thought that these increases in part reflect the reorganization of the undergraduate program placed into effect in the fall of 1960 following several years of work on the part of the committee on undergraduate instruction. The division of full year courses into half year courses, the arrangement of courses into four groups according to prerequisites and level of difficulty, the lectures in Economics 1 and the addition to the curriculum of a few new courses is thought to have stimulated enrollment.

       Despite the increases in enrollment in undergraduate courses, the Department faces a serious continuing problem to maintain and to increase the number of concentrators in the field. The percentage of all concentrators who elect the field of Economics has declined from 7.7 percent in 1956-57 to 6.0 percent in 1960-61. The low concentration in Economics at Radcliffe is of particular concern to the Department, and conferences seeking to increase interest among the students have been held with President Bunting and other members of the Radcliffe staff.

       In order to improve the quality of our instruction, Economics 98 (junior tutorial) is to be reorganized. The adoption of the Gill plan by the Faculty materially increased the number of students in Economics 98 from 40 or 50 to more than 80. The instruction in economic theory by lectures has proven to be inappropriate with the larger group. Next year, 1962-63, it is planned to divide the group into three or four seminars, each of approximately 20 students; each seminar is to be under the direction of a senior member of the Department or an assistant professor. In addition, tutorial groups of four or five students will meet with individual tutors. Professor Caves has been given overall responsibility for this important part of the undergraduate program.

5. Graduate Instruction

       There was a total of 48 first year graduate students in the Department this year including 5 women and 3 enrolled through Littauer. There were 88 continuing graduate students including 6 women, 6 from Littauer, and 2 in joint degrees, for a total of 136 graduate students; in addition, the Department had 10 special students and 10 special auditors. A total of 21 Ph.D. degrees were awarded to students in the Department of Economics.

       The competition for places in the graduate schools for work in the Department of Economics has grown more severe in recent years. From the more than 260 applications for admission to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences received in the spring of 1962, there will only be about 45 new graduate students in the fall of 1962. Almost half of these students will be from outside the United States and Canada. For the fall of 1962 we have been able to obtain the admission of 8 out of the first 10 on our list, a considerably higher fraction than in recent years.

       The Department faces strong conflicting pressures in making decisions on the number of new graduate students to be admitted. On the one hand, the Department is anxious to provide individual instruction particularly after the first year of graduate study for the highest quality students. A greater enrollment would also complicate materially the teaching of the required graduate courses in economic history, statistics and theory, and after a point would require further manpower so that two senior members of the Department might give parallel courses or sections. On the other hand, the Department is anxious to make its contribution to the increased demands for economists particularly for developing countries. Moreover the quality of a number of the students rejected for admission (perhaps as many as 15 to 20) appears to be very good. In the selection of students from abroad it is particularly difficult to know whether one has made the best selections. When students are admitted whose records turn out to be poor, there are often many complications for both the student and the University. The Department has spent considerable energy in reviewing the records of students admitted during the past decade; a careful statistical study was made under the direction of Professor Houthakker. The Department is continuing to seek to improve admission procedures.

         Financial resources available to the Department for its own use for scholarships and fellowships is a serious problem since the money made available by the generous gift of Mr. Roger Kyes has now been exhausted.

6. Organization of the Department

The Department now performs much of its routine business through committees. The two major committees are on Undergraduate Instruction under Professor Eckstein and on Graduate Instruction under Professor Dorfman.

7. Research

         A very large amount of research activity is carried out by members of the Department of Economics. In addition to individual research by senior members, an increasing number of research projects which employ a number of graduate students and junior staff are being conducted under the direction of senior members. These research projects often provide opportunities for training of graduate students in research methods and afford topics and financing for Ph.D. dissertations.

         Among these research projects with financial support are the following:

Professor Leontief Harvard Economic Research Project which has recently been refinanced for a period of years.
Professor Mason The relations of government and business in economic development.
Professor Mason and Dr. Papanek Overseas operations and training
(Center for International Affairs)
Professor Kuznets Economic growth
Professor Eckstein Economics of public expenditures
Professor Houthakker Forecasting consumers’ expenditures
Professor Harris Education and Public Policy
Professor Schelling Defense studies and Experimental Study of Bargaining
Professor Dunlop Labor-Management History and Economics of Medical Care
Professor Duesenberry Capital Markets
Professor Meyer Business Decisions
Professor Bergson Soviet Economics
Professor Gerschenkron Economic History Workshop

8. Public and Professional Activities

         A number of members of the Department were engaged in a wide variety of professional activities and public service during the year. A few instances may be of interest; no attempt is made for a complete listing.

         The president of the American Economic Association comes from this Department two years in a row. Professor Mason is president for 1962, and Professor Haberler is president-elect.

         Professor Leontief was chairman of the International Conference on Input-Output Techniques held in Geneva, Switzerland in September 1961 and sponsored by the Harvard Economic Research Project in association with the U.S.[sic] Secretariat. He was also a member of the Commission of Experts for the United Nations which reported on the Social and Economic Consequences of Disarmament.

         Professor Dorfman served as a member of the President’s Scientific Advisory Committee team on Waterlogging and Salinity in West Pakistan. He is also a member of the President’s Committee to Appraise Employment and Unemployment Statistics.

         Professor Harris is serving as Economic Advisor to the Secretary of the Treasury and is a member of the Public Advisory Board of the Area Redevelopment Program.

         Professor John R. Meyer served as a consultant in connection with the President’s message on Transportation Policy.

         Professor Kuznets is Chairman of the Committee on the Economy of China of the Social Science Research Council.

         Professor Bergson is a member of this same Committee and chairman of the Joint Committee of Slavic Studies of the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies. His study, The Real National Income of Soviet Russia Since 1928, was published in 1961 by the Harvard University Press.

         Professor Mason is Chairman, Advisory Committee, A.I.D.

         Professors Duesenberry, Eckstein and Smithies have been consultants to the Council of Economic Advisors. Professor Duesenberry was on the staff of the Commission on Money and Credit and was chairman of the Joint Economic Committee’s Inventory Study Committee.

         Professor Schelling has been a consultant to the Department of Defense and to the Scientific Advisory Board of the Air Force. His study Strategy of Arms Control (with Morton J. Halperin), was published by the Twentieth Century Fund in 1961.

         Professor Houthakker has worked on revenue forecasting problems for the Department of the Treasury.

         Professor Dunlop was a member of the Presidential Railroad Commission (1960-1962), and is a member of the President’s Missile Sites Labor Commission. He was Chairman of the International Conference on Labor Productivity under the auspices of the International Economic Association held August-September 1961.

9. Visiting Committee

         A series of meetings this year with the Chairman of the Visiting Committee, and others of its members, have improved the relations between the Visiting Committee and the Department of Economics. I believe these new attitudes are reflected in the annual report of the Committee. There is a genuine desire on the part of both the Department and the Committee for a constructive relationship.

___________________
John T. Dunlop
Chairman

Source: Duke University. Economists’ Papers Archive. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Edward H. Chamberlin Papers, Box 17, Folder “Economics Department 1960-62”.

Image Source: The Harvard Class Album 1960, p. 29.

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Economists Harvard Teaching Undergraduate

Harvard. Annual Economics Newsletter. 1 June 1960

This three page departmental newsletter for Harvard economics from the end of the academic year 1959-60 is found in Edward H. Chamberlin papers curated at the Economists’ Papers Archive at Duke University. Among other things we learn from this newsletter is that a year’s course “Mathematics for Economists” was able to satisfy the foreign language requirement, or expressed differently, the punishment for receiving a grade less than B in the first semester of the math course was being required to pass a rigorous foreign language examination. 

Of course, finding this I wonder where I can find the first four issues of the Harvard Economics Newsletter.

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ECONOMICS NEWSLETTER
Fifth Annual Issue, June 1, 1960

UNDERGRADUATE INSTRUCTION:

The Department has been engaged in a study of its undergraduate curriculum over the past year and has now adopted a substantial series of changes in concentration requirements and, more particularly, in the undergraduate course offerings. The basic principles underlying the revisions were set out in a report of the Committee on Undergraduate Instruction under the chairmanship of Professor John Dunlop. These principles, briefly, were that the undergraduate program is “part of a liberal education” and, except in very special cases, is “not designed as professional training in Economics”; that the undergraduate program should be “clearly differentiated” from the graduate program; that the undergraduate should have as much flexibility as possible in choosing courses of interest to him; that close attention should be given to the teaching of Economics courses and to the balance of analytic and institutional material in each.

These principles clearly indicate a concern on the part of the Department that the undergraduate program may tend to become subordinate to the graduate program unless specific attention is paid to the particular interests and objectives of the younger student. The revisions, therefore, are in the direction of making a greater number of courses (particularly half-courses) open to undergraduates; breaking the traditional parallelism between graduate and undergraduate courses; and emphasizing historical, institutional and policy questions which will be of interest not only to the Economics concentrator but to able concentrators in other fields. To make certain that this greater freedom of choice does not lead to a lack of coherence, a certain “progression” has been introduced in the course offering and Honors candidates are required to take at least one “advanced” course in the area of their choice.

The sum total of these changes gives us a field of concentration which we believe will better serve the purposes of a liberal arts college. So far as undergraduate reaction is concerned, it will not be until the changes have gone into effect next year that we will be able to judge the response effectively. It is of interest, however, that the Crimson, not an altogether silent critic in the past, has called the new program a “model” which other departments might wisely study.

MATHEMATICS- LANGUAGE REQUIREMENT:

Realizing that mathematical competence is growing more important in most branches of economic work than linguistic ability, the Department has revised the language requirement in the following manner:

A full course entitled “Mathematics for Economists” has been established. All graduate students are now required to take and pass the first half of this course or pass an equivalent mathematics examination. Those who pass with at least a B may take the second half of the course, and no language will be required.

Those students who desire fluency in a foreign language or who receive a grade less than B in the first half of the mathematics course must complete the mathematics-language requirement by passing a rigorous language examination.

THE ECONOMICS OF HIGHER EDUCATION:

Professor Seymour E. Harris has been on leave this year on a Ford Fellowship, to complete the study of the Economics of Higher Education. He has visited more than 100 colleges and universities, and has submitted the following report for inclusion in this year’s Newsletter:

There were three resultant manuscripts:

  1. More Resources for Education (John Dewey Lecture), Harpers, 1960
  2. Economics and Educational Value. Edited volume based on seminar in 1958-59 for College Administrators. (Assisted by Richard Cooper and Reginald Green). Harvard University Press, 1960.
  3. Economics of Higher Education, McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1961.

A questionnaire sent to about 200 economists revealed attitudes towards higher education.  A considerable sentiment for:

    1. Higher tuition if accompanied by improved financing methods. But fear expressed of resultant excessive gains of enrollment for public institutions, increased recourse to colleges near home, a tendency to favor high income groups and endanger the position of many vulnerable private institutions.
    2. General agreement that much greater recourse to loans is practical. But some economists expressed dissatisfaction with the idea that young men and women should be encouraged to borrow. Furthermore, they are unaccustomed to seeking large credits.
    3. Economists generally envisaged the possibility of substantial economies — better use of plant, reduced number of courses, etc. But it was hoped that small discussion groups would not be eliminated.
PERSONNEL:

Professor Simon KUZNETS, now at Johns Hopkins, and Professor Hendrik HOUTHAKKER, now at Stanford, will join our staff next year.

Professor Otto ECKSTEIN has recently been promoted to Associate Professor of Economics. This fall he was in Washington, where he was Technical Director for the Douglas Committee investigating prices, wages, productivity, etc. Now he is in Europe working for the O.E.E.C. Professor GALBRAITH has been on leave in Switzerland for the spring term, working on a new book on corporation organization. Professor KAYSEN been working for Doxiadis Associates in Athens this year, making a study of Greek economy.

Professor James McKIE from Vanderbilt and Professor Henri THEIL from the Econometric Institute in the Netherlands have been visiting members of our staff this year.

Professor DUNLOP is President of the Industrial Relations Research Association for 1960. He has also been appointed to the President’s Committee investigating non-operating unions on the railroads.

Professor MASON has edited a book, Corporation and Modern Society. Professor DUESENBERRY has been working on his Capital Markets Project, supported by a grant from the Merrill Foundation to the Business School. Professor GERSCHENKRON’s Economic History Workshop, under a grant from the Ford Foundation, began operation in the fall of 1959.

Professor LEONTIEF gave three public lectures as Hitchcock Professor at the University of California in November 1959. Now he is in Argentina at the invitation of the University of Buenos Aires, where he is giving some lectures. He has been sent by ICA and will be there about two weeks. On the way back he will be stopping in Rio de Janeiro to give a lecture at the invitation of the Getulio Vergas Foundation.

Professor DORFMAN will be on leave next year, when he will be at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences in Stanford, California.

The Department was saddened by the deaths of Professor SLICHTER in September 1959 and of Mrs. John H. WILLIAMS and Professor BLACK in April 1960.

Source: Economists’ Papers Archive, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Edward H. Chamberlin Papers, Box 17, Folder “Economics Department 1960-62”.

Image Source: “Overhead of empty Harvard Sq.” (1961) Cambridge Historical Commission, Cambridge Photo Morgue Collection. Digital Commonwealth, Massachusetts Collections Online.

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Fields Harvard

Harvard. Report on Long-range Plans for the Department of Economics. 1948

The following transcribed report of a special committee regarding the future of the Harvard economics department looking forward from 1948 is fascinating. Eight senior professors would be retiring over the coming decade and there was a serious discussion of the economists needed to replace them. For my money the most interesting comparison is the one made between Arthur Smithies and Paul Samuelson. I’ll let you or your AI of choice fish that out of the report. But there is much more to be found.

_____________________________

The Provost is not amused
[No letterhead, unsigned.
Apparently a copy.]

December 22, 1947

Dear Mr. Burbank:

I am not at all happy with the recommendation sent me by the Department of Economics and the School of Public Administration for the appointment at professorial rank of a man to serve jointly in the Department and in the School. As you realize, the five votes taken by the group reveal a confused picture in which no clear preference is indicated. Nor have I been successful in clarifying the situation by requesting from each member of the group a letter addressed to me in which he explained fully his vote. Hence I believe it necessary to suggest a different procedure from that which has been followed.

One source of the difficulty, it occurs to me, is that the recommendation for the joint appointment has not been studied sufficiently in relation to the other vacancies which are to be filled within the next year or two. As you know, the Department has, in addition to the joint professorship, a vacancy in the rank of full professorship created by the resignation of Professor Crum, and one in the rank of associate professorship. It also has due it in 1950-51 a second vacancy as associate professor. Hence it appears that within a short span, the Department has four major appointments to make. It goes without saying that those appointments will influence in great measure the future of economics at Harvard for many years to come. The importance of making wise selections cannot be lost sight of.

It seems to me that we must consider all these appointments as a related problem. Consequently I shall take no action on the recommendation for the joint appointment until the Department has thought through its entire slate. No evidence has been given me yet which suggests that the Department has worked out a consistent plan or program into which all these appointments can be fitted and which meets, within the resources available, the demands which the Faculty as a whole may properly make upon the Department of Economics.

I have no desire to lecture the Department as to its obligations, but I do have certain responsibilities to discharge as Dean of the Faculty. Hence I venture to suggest that there are certain questions which may reasonably and properly be directed to the Department for an answer. Among those questions are the following:

  1. What is your concept of teaching and research within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences?
  2. What fields will you cover, within the resources at your command, in carrying out the answer to the first question?
  3. Are you properly discharging your obligations to your sister departments of the Faculty and to the programs which the Faculty has legislated as common ventures?
  4. Do your specific recommendations harmonize with a general plan and program?

I understand fully that these are no easy questions to answer and that the difficulty of finding an answer is a prime factor in creating the present state of confusion. But I suspect that more preliminary efforts to answer the questions might have reduced the degree of confusion. Certainly so long as the basic issues are not clarified, the discussion of individuals to be appointed breaks down into fragmentary views.

I am also distressed by the fact that many of the professors in the Department have informed me that they do not consider themselves either willing or competent to serve as Chairman of the Department when your term expires in June. One conclusion which might be drawn from this situation is that the Department as now constituted needs some recruitment from men competent and willing to think of economics in general, and of the relation of economics to the faculty at large and to the world outside the university.

I must also report a sense of uneasiness among members of the Faculty in other Departments, that the Department of Economics is showing a tendency not to give due weight in the filling of its vacancies to common programs. If there is cause for this apprehension, I should be quite dismayed. At a time when the Faculty as a whole gives indication of the need in teaching and research for ever greater cooperation between disciplines of learning, it would be regrettable if the Department of Economics adhered to narrow and vertical procedures. To make the point quite specific, I might inquire what the Department of Economics plans to do in regard to Economic History and to the Area Program in Russian.

I also wonder whether in your immediate desire to fill the vacancies with men now available, you have given proper consideration to the range of younger men coming to maturity in your field. I have, for example, observed two young economists now in the Society of Fellows who seem to me to have ultimate promise of achievement greater than that of at least some of the men now available. There must be many other such men in the University and elsewhere. It would seen wise in any general approach to the problem to give assurance that proper consideration had been made in our appointment schedule for the generation of economists now coming to maturity.

These are some of the matters I have in mind, both general and particular, which incline me to the decision that we should follow an approach in handling these appointments different from the one followed to date. I fear that the approach followed so far is leading into an impasse from which the only escape will be the making of something less than the wisest appointments. Hence I suggest a change of procedure and ask first that the Department present me, in advance of any specific recommendation, with a statement which deals with the questions raised earlier in this letter. Recommendations may accompany this document, but they will not be accepted without it and unless they are shown to have meaning in relation to it.

Finally, the time has come, I believe, when I must personally associate myself with the development of this program. I am therefore arranging a dinner and evening meeting in the rooms of the Society of Fellows on January 21 at 6:30 p.m. to which I shall invite each member of the Executive Committee (all Professors and Associate Professors) of the Department. I shall preside at this meeting, and we shall begin then discussion of the issues outlined in this letter. Needless to say that because of the urgency of the matter, I shall expect a full attendance of the Executive Committee at the dinner.

I am sending a copy of this letter to each Professor and Associate Professor of the Department.

Sincerely yours,
[Unsigned by Paul H. Buck]
Provost

Professor H. H. Burbank
Littauer Center

_____________________________

C O N F I D E N T I A L

REPORT ON LONG-RANGE PLANS
FOR THE
DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS
(REVISED EDITION)

February 25, 1948
  1. The Task of the Committee

In his letter of December 22, 1947, to the Chairman of the Department of Economics [Professor Harold H. Burbank], the Provost [Professor Paul H. Buck] raised a series of questions concerning the long-run plans for the growth and development of the Department. Any future appointments clearly ought to be related to a comprehensive study of the needs and objectives of the Department.

The questions posed by the Provost were as follows:

    1. What is your concept of teaching and research within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences?
    2. What fields will you cover, within the resources at your command, in carrying out the answer to the first question?
    3. Are you properly discharging your obligations to sister departments of the Faculty and to the programs which the Faculty has legislated as common ventures?
    4. Do your specific recommendations harmonize with a general plan and program?

Following an evening meeting on January 21, 1948, with the Executive Committee of the Department, the Provost appointed a committee of five to consider the above questions and to prepare a report on long-run plans for the Department. The Committee was also directed to recommend appointments for existing vacancies in the light of such a comprehensive survey of long-range problems. Four appointments are under consideration at this time: (1) a full professor replacement for Professor Crum, (2) a full professor to be appointed jointly in the Department and in the Littauer School of Public Administration, (3) an associate professor available July 1, 1948, and (4) an associate professor normally not available until July 1, 1951, but who might be appointed at an earlier date.

  1. The Prospective Situation in the Department

The growth of the Department in recent years is indicated in the following tabulation of the number of permanent positions and the number of undergraduate and graduate students for selected years since 1925.

Year

 Permanent Positions Undergraduate Concentrators

Graduate Students*

1925-26

10

 324

75

1930-31

14

 397

82

1935-36

13

 376

47

1940-41

 16 321

102

1947-48

 17 726

264

* Prior to 1940, graduate students with Corporation appointments were not required to register in the Graduate School. The graduate figures for 1940-41 and 1947-48 include Joint Degree and Littauer School candidates who take most of their work in Economics.
Radcliffe students are included in the figures only for 1947-48.

The Department of Economics may reasonably anticipate the retirement of one-half of its present permanent members by June 30, 1958. On the normal assumption that retirement takes place at age sixty-six, eight of the sixteen present permanent members may be expected to become emeritus during the next ten years. The members of the Department who are, and are not, expected to retire before 1958 are indicated in the following lists. (The dates of birth are given after each name.)

Expected Retirement by 1958

 Active Status Expected, Fall 1958
A.P. Usher January 13, 1883 E. Frickey

August 20, 1893

J.A. Schumpeter

 February 8, 1883 S.E. Harris September 8, 1897
J.D. Black June 6, 1883 O.H. Taylor

December 11, 1897

A.E. Monroe

 August 2, 1885 E.S. Mason February 22, 1899
J.H. Williams June 21, 1887 E.H. Chamberlin

May 18, 1899

H.H. Burbank

 July 3, 1887 G. Haberler July 20, 1900
A.H. Hansen August 23, 1887 W.W. Leontief

August 5, 1905

S.H. Slichter

 January 8, 1892 J.T. Dunlop

July 5, 1914

The Department can look forward, under the existing rules of the University, to a total of six new permanent appointments, including the four now under consideration during this ten-year period. The Department can also expect the appointment of an economist to the Lamont University Professorship upon the retirement of Professor Slichter. Accordingly, the Department can expect to retain a total of fifteen permanent appointments in the academic year 1958-59 in comparison with the seventeen permanent members during the current academic year (the above list plus Professor Crum). (The number of permanent members of the staff may at any given time be larger than retirement dates would indicate by reason of extension of normal term of service.)

These expected changes in the personnel of the Department over the next ten-year period indicate clearly the decisive nature of the appointments now under deliberation. Four of the six expected appointments are under study. The distinction and reputation of the Department for many years to come is at stake. It is imperative that every effort be made to appraise the needs and opportunities of the Department during the next decade and to canvass with insight all possible candidates.

  1. The Place of the Department in the Faculty

The first question posed by the Provost in his letter of December 22, 1947, was: “What is your concept of teaching and research within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences?” The Committee makes the following points in a re-examination of the role of the Department.

(a) The Faculty of Arts and Sciences has embarked on programs of General Education and Area Studies [e.g., Russian Studies]. The Department of Economics has a substantial and distinctive contribution to make to each of these experiments: the development of a common core of a liberal education and the integration of different disciplines around the problems of a significant geographical area.

 (b) The past twenty years have witnessed an unprecedented expansion in the need for economists in a variety of positions outside the academic world — government service, business concerns, research organizations, labor and farm groups, consulting practice and economic reporting. The Department of Economics needs to develop a more flexible graduate program to meet this more diversified demand in cooperation with other Departments in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and with various Graduate Schools in the University. The recognition of these broader objectives will supplement rather than detract from the training of economists for academic posts.

(c) The balance between graduate and undergraduate instruction in Economics is always a delicate adjustment. Indeed, the Provost has recently indicated that the strength and prestige of Harvard College lies in the fact that we are truly a “University College.” The Committee has analyzed the relative proportion of the time of its permanent members devoted to graduate and undergraduate course instruction for selected years since 1925. The permanent staff of the Department gave more courses for undergraduates in 1947-48 than in 1925-26. The proportion of all course time devoted to undergraduate instruction, however, has been reduced in this same period from a half to little more than a third. In other words, the increased permanent manpower of the Department over this period (permanent positions increased from ten to seventeen) has been devoted largely to graduate instruction.

The following table compares the number of courses “taught” or “supervised” by permanent members of the Department for undergraduates with the offering of courses for graduate students for selected dates. Comparative figures are also presented for the History and Government Departments.

Courses of Instruction by Permanent Staff
Economics History

Government
Dates Undergrad. Grad. Undergrad. Grad. Undergrad. Grad.

1925-26

8 ½

 8 ½ 14 12 6 ½

8

1930-31

 9 11 ¾ 14 22 ¾ 5

9 ½

1935-36

 8 ¾ 12 15 ¼ 31 5 ¼

10 ¼
1940-41 9 ¾ 19 ½ 14 13 ½ 7 ¼

19 ¾

1947-48

 12 ½ 22 15 10 ½ 9

9

These figures would appear to indicate that graduate course instruction has expanded in Economics relatively to undergraduate course instruction and also relative to the experience of graduate instruction in other departments. It should be noted, however, that the large increase in graduate courses after 1935/36 was associated with the establishment of the Graduate School of Public Administration which affected both the Department of Economics and the Department of Government.

These data on course offering need to be interpreted in terms of graduate enrollment and undergraduate concentration. The following table presents this information. The figures indicate the incidence of the postwar expansion in University enrolment upon the burden of instruction in Economics and allied departments.

Undergraduate Concentrators and Graduate Students

Economics History Government
Dates Undergrad. Grad. Undergrad. Grad. Undergrad.

Grad.

1925-26

 324 75 190 — 113 45
1930-31 397 82 254 138 130

56

1935-36

 376 47 283 104 292 38
1940-41 321 102 272 146 314

76

1947-48

 726 264 321 207 763

129

The Committee believes that undergraduate instruction in Economics in the past two years has suffered materially by the suspension of the tutorial system. The assistant professor rank in which there is normally considerable contact with undergraduates has not been fully manned in recent years. The Committee believes that undergraduate instruction needs to receive more attention in the Department, not so much by more courses given by permanent members but by rebuilding a strong group of younger teachers in the assistant professor and annual instructor rank.

Assuming the number of the permanent staff at present contemplated to be fixed, the size of the graduate student body in Economics must be reduced from its present size of more than 260 if members of the Department are to fulfill their total obligations to the University and if a more diversified graduate student body is to receive adequate instruction and supervision. The Committee suggests a figure of 200 graduate students — twice the pre-war level — as a normal standard for the period under review. The rate of admission planned for the Fall term, 1948, will eventually yield a student body close to this figure. It is impossible at this time to foresee whether the numbers of qualified graduate students seeking economic instruction at Harvard will substantially exceed 200 after the special circumstances accounting for the present large numbers have been eliminated. If, as may well happen, the demand on the part of first-rate men and women for graduate instruction in economics exceeds the capacity of the staff as at present planned, it may indicate a need for revision of plans of instruction in economics.

(d) There is imperative need for more systematic development of research plans in Economics and for financial arrangements whereby permanent members may be relieved of all duties for periods of a term to pursue research on a full-time basis. Research grants should be used in part to secure substitute instruction. Several research projects which provide a practicable model for the expansion of research have recently been undertaken by members of the Department. Individual members of the Department should be encouraged to organize specific research projects and solicit support, in cooperation with the University administration. These projects should make provision for full-time leave for a term whenever possible. Such projects, moreover, may well become a training center for the most advanced students.

(e) The Department of Economics should expect a continuation of the distinguished tradition of participation by many of its members in wider forms of service to the community — government service, consultation to business and industry, private arbitration, private research organizations, etc. A danger exists, however, that these activities may consume too large a proportion of the time and energy of members of the staff. A devotion to productive scholarship should be an indispensable requirement of every appointee.

In making appointments the Department must be concerned to choose men with the energy and capacity for developing these outside interests and contacts. The Department has not only an obligation to the world of scholarship but also a unique responsibility for leadership at the many points where Economics has a contribution to make to the world of affairs.

  1. The Urgent Needs of the Department

The second question posed by the Provost in his letter of December 22, 1947, asked: “What fields will you cover, within the resources at your command, in carrying out the answer to the first question?” When the objectives for the Department outlined in the preceding section are considered in conjunction with the present personnel and the retirement pattern outlined in Section 2 above, the following needs of the Department appear to be the most urgent. (The listing of these requirements at this point does not imply any particular hierarchy of urgency.)

(a) Economic History. This field has been a required part of the graduate program in Economics for many years. Moreover, for over half a century instruction in this area has been located in the Economics Department. The retirement of Professor Usher requires that provision be made for this field in any comprehensive plan for the Department.

(b) Agriculture and Marketing. Professor Black has developed work in two fields: (1) The Economics of Agriculture and Land Use Planning, and (2) Marketing and Distribution. Ideally two men would be required to carry on this work.

(1) Agriculture. The Committee is of the opinion that work in the Economics of Agriculture and Land Use Planning is indispensable. Research and training in this field have constituted a major contribution of the Department. Moreover, the agricultural field is of particular concern in the School of Public Administration.

(2) Marketing. The Committee reluctantly concludes that, under present prospects and despite the importance of work in marketing and distribution, it is unlikely that one of the few appointments available can be allocated in this field. It may be that the field of Business Organization can be reorganized to permit the inclusion of some portion of the work in the present field of Marketing and Distribution.

(c) General Education and the Area Program. It is imperative that the Department take an active part in the formulation and development of these new programs. The availability of half-time appointments from the General Education and Area budgets would permit the Department of Economics to make two appointments (of half-time each) for one budget vacancy. That is, the appointment of two men, a half time of one in an Area and of the other in General Education, might fill one of the vacancies in the Economics Department.

(d) Business Organization. The resignation of Professor Crum and the administrative responsibilities of Professor Mason make an appointment in this area urgent. Moreover, the field constitutes one of the largest areas of undergraduate and graduate concentration.

(e) Public Policy. The systematic development of the field of the Economic Aspects of Public Policy is essential to the growth of the Graduate School of Public Administration. One of the appointments available at this time has been explicitly earmarked for this purpose.

(f) Public Finance. The retirement of Professor Burbank in the period indicates the necessity for providing for work in this area. The field is indispensable both to the Economics Department and the Graduate School of Public Administration.

(g) Statistics. The burden of instruction in the field of Statistics is heavier than one man should be asked to assume. In addition to undergraduate and graduate courses, this required field involves participation in virtually all general examinations. Ideally instruction should be provided in the field of national income and mathematical statistics. If an additional appointment is not devoted exclusively to this field, consideration should be given to the recruitment of men able to develop such statistical instruction as a part of their program.

(h) Department Chairman. The Department is required to give serious weight in making appointments to qualities which make for a successful Chairman. The Department is so large as to place very heavy administrative responsibilities on its Chairman. The Department should have in its ranks a number of persons qualified to perform the duties of Chairman so that the burden on one individual over the years is not unreasonable.

The Committee believes that the Department should examine its internal operations to determine whether an administrative reorganization might not facilitate the effectiveness of the work of the Department. A systematic survey could be made of such duties as: counselling graduate students, placement, recruitment of superior students, and the supervision of Economics A and the junior teaching staff. Careful study should be given to the possibility of delegating more responsibility to standing committees of the Department.

While the Committee has emphasized, and it believes properly, certain specific needs of the Department, the overriding need, which should take precedence in all appointments, is for able men. If a first-rate man cannot be found in a specific field, it is better either to neglect the field or to divert the attention of existing personnel to this field than to fill the vacancy with second-rate material.

The Committee believes that the answer to the Provost’s third question, “Are you properly discharging your obligations to sister departments of the Faculty and to the programs which the Faculty has legislated as common ventures?”, must, at present, be “no.” It considers, however, that the addition of the personnel suggested below will, together with some reallocation of the time of present officers, enable the Department to meet these obligations.

A consideration of the Provost’s fourth question, “Do your specific recommendations harmonize with a general plan and program?” leads directly to a discussion of the proposed appointments.

  1. Recommendations

(a) The Committee recommends that one appointment at the associate professorship level be utilized in the following manner: that Alexander Gerschenkron be invited on the understanding that the Department assume the responsibility for half his salary, the Russian area assuming responsibility for the other half; that John Sawyer, now a Junior Fellow, be appointed to an assistant professorship at the end of 1948-49, on the understanding that the responsibility for half his salary be assumed either by General Education or the Department of History.

Gerschenkron is one of the two best economists in the country now working on Russian problems, the other being Abram Bergson of Columbia University. Gerschenkron has the advantage of being an economic historian. Consequently, his appointment would enable the Department to take care not only of instruction and research in Russian economics but also to replace Professor Usher’s work in European economic history on his retirement.

Sawyer is an historian of an intellectual ability fully equal to that of our own Junior Fellows, Tobin and Kaysen. He has evinced an interest in cultivating the field of American economic history and also of working in General Education. Since Sawyer’s prospects in the History Department are extremely good, it would be necessary to assure him, on appointment as an assistant professor, that a clear road to advancement exists in the Department, if he shows the competence the Department expects of him.

These two appointments, which would fill one vacancy, would go far towards meeting the Department’s obligations toward the Russian area and toward General Education as well as taking care of economic history.

(b) The Committee feels that the vacancy left by the resignation of Professor Crum must be filled and that the best candidate available is Sidney Alexander, now an assistant professor. Although Alexander’s publication to date does not justify promotion, he has an impressive series of contributions due for publication during the next year which will make him an eminently qualified candidate for promotion by the end of the academic year 1948-49. The Committee therefore believes that one of the vacancies at the associate professorship level should be reserved for the advancement of Professor Alexander.

(c) In many ways the most serious and difficult problem confronting the Committee concerns the replacement of the work now carried on by Professor Black. The research and training program in agricultural economics and land use is an asset of great worth both to the Department of Economics and to the Graduate School of Public Administration.

The Committee understands that before the date set for Professor Black’s retirement the Administration will request him to continue his services to the University for a number of years. It therefore believes that some four to five years are available in which to select a man fully capable of carrying on Professor Black’s work. The Committee believes that there are a number of able young men in the field of agricultural economics who might be secured at the assistant professorship level. The Committee therefore recommends that one or more of these candidates be brought to Harvard and that the next two or three years be utilized to survey the field, including such men as are brought here at lower than permanent rank, to assure the selection of the best possible man.

(d) If one position is filled by Gerschenkron and Sawyer, and another is reserved for Alexander, there remain two positions at the professorial level. These positions might be treated in any one of the following ways:

(1) Both positions could be filled at once;

(2) One position could be filled now and the other held vacant for Professor Black’s successor;

(3)  One position could be filled, the other held vacant pending the appearance of a suitable candidate not necessarily in the field of agricultural economics. In this case it must be assumed that the vacancy caused by Professor Black’s retirement would be filled from the appointment accruing to the Department in 1954, which appointment might be advanced in time. It should also be recognized that this appointment might have to be at the professorial level which would involve a departure from present University policy.

In considering the possibility of filling both vacancies now, the Committee was heavily influenced by the desirability of maintaining balance in the Department not only as among various fields of interest but as among types of mind and of methodological approaches to economic problems. In this connection the Committee considered carefully the qualifications of both Smithies and Samuelson. While of the opinion that each of these men might individually be considered intellectually superior to the rest of the field, the Committee feels strongly that the addition of both would give a particular stamp to the Department that should, if possible, be avoided. Both of these men are, in a sense, system builders, concerned with the logical and mathematical interrelations of the elements of their systems. Neither has done much empirical work. Smithies has shown recently a concern for, and an interest in, institutional developments and public policy. Moreover, he has had extensive experience in government service. The Committee believes that while each of these men is pre-eminent in his type of work the two together do not make a satisfactory combination.

The problem then narrows down to the question of Samuelson or Smithies and someone else. The Committee considers that the interests and type of mind represented either by Richard Bissel or Colin Clark would effectively supplement the Smithies-Samuelson characteristics. No effective way of communicating with Clark suggested itself to the Committee, and there is certain evidence to support the view that he would not be available. It appears that Bissel may not be available at this time. If his views change in the near future, the Committee considers him its first choice.

Of other possibilities the Committee discussed at length the qualifications of Galbraith, Yntema, David Wright, Albert Hart, Donald Wallace, and others. For various reasons, too lengthy here to enumerate, none of these candidates seemed first-rate possibilities.

The Committee therefore recommends that one of the professorial positions be held vacant for the time being pending the appearance of a satisfactory candidate. As to the relative merits of Smithies and Samuelson, the Committee, after deliberating at length, favors Smithies. While recognizing that Samuelson has in his field of activity a better record than anyone near his age in any field, the Committee was heavily influenced by the probability that Smithies’ contribution to the needs of the Department would be substantially greater. He appears to be an ideal man to develop the work in the School of Public Administration on Economic Analysis and Public Policy; he appears to be an eminently satisfactory man to take over the work in Public Finance on Professor Burbank’s retirement; he is clearly a man who would make an able Departmental Chairman. In addition he is competent to develop work in advanced statistics should the Department consider this desirable. For these reasons, and others, the Committee recommends the appointment of Smithies.

Paul H. Buck, Chairman
John T. Dunlop
Wassily Leontief
Edward S. Mason
John H. Williams

Source: Duke University, Economists’ Papers Archive, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Edward H. Chamberlin Papers. Box 17, Folder “Economics Department Faculty, 1944-47.”

Image Source:  Harvard Seal detail from the cover of the Harvard Law School Yearbook 1949.

Categories
Economics Programs Graduate Student Support Harvard Undergraduate

Harvard. Economics Chairman’s Report to the Dean. Harris, 1956

 

The previous post provided transcriptions of the annual reports to the Dean by the chairman of the economics department from 1932 through 1941. This post skips ahead to the middle of the 1950s to give us a glimpse of the post-war Harvard economics department. Seymour Harris’ big take-aways from his 45 year survey of undergraduate and graduate economics courses taught by Harvard economics faculty: (i) “the proportion of undergraduate courses given by full professors has fallen from 75 to 35 percent” and (ii) “graduate courses are relatively 5 times as numerous as they were in 1909-10.” (from July 3, 1956 cover letter to Dean McGeorge Bundy that accompanied the report transcribed below).

It is also interesting to note that the economics department’s continues to plead for more funds to compensate it for “…about one half the teaching burden of the G.S.P.A. and students in the G.S.P.A. account[ing] for about one third of all the graduate students in economics (on a full-time basis)…”. Harris wrote this report two decades after the Graduate School of Public Administration had opened for business.

____________________________

CONFIDENTIAL

June 30, 1956

Report to the Dean of the Faculty for the Academic Year 1955-56
by Seymour E. Harris, Chairman of the Department of Economics

Contents

Undergraduate Instruction

  1. More Mature Staff for Economics 1.
  2. Contents of Economics 1.
  3. Staff Meetings of Economics 1.
  4. Lectures in Economics 1.
  5. Economics Tutorial.
  6. High Honors Concentrators.
  7. Seminars for Honors Graduates.

Allocation of Resources

  1. Enrollment of Undergraduates in Graduate Courses and Vice Versa.
  2. Increase in the Number of Undergraduate Courses, 1909-10 to 1955-56.
  3. Increase in the Number of Graduate Courses, 1909-10 to 1955-56.
  4. Table 1 – Distribution of Courses by Academic Rank, 1909-10 to 1955-56.
  5. Table 2 – Courses Given by Faculty, 1909-10 to 1955-56, by Rank.
  6. Table 3 – Percentage of Courses, Undergraduate and Graduate.
  7. The Increased Importance of Graduate Instruction.
  8. Reduced Undergraduate Instruction by Higher Ranking Members of Faculty.
  9. Ibid., Statistical Summary.
  10. Number of Faculty by Rank.

Relations with G.S.P.A.

  1. Teaching Responsibilities of Economics Department in G.S.P.A.
  2. Contributions of G.S.P.A. to Economics Department.
  3. Overall Consideration of Number of G.S.P.A. Seminars.

Library Problems

  1. Library Problems.

Fellowships

  1. Inadequate Fellowships.
  2. Campaign for Additional Money.
  3. Outside Fellowships.

Research and Personnel Problems

  1. Competition of Research Fellowships for Potential Teachers.
  2. Research Projects.
  3. Financing of Pay of Director of Research Projects.
  4. Small Research Grants.
  5. Secretarial Help.
  6. Personnel Changes.
  7. Honors, etc.

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

Undergraduate Instruction

The Department is especially concerned with the problem of undergraduate instruction. Confronted with a trend away from economics the country over (see my Memo to the Alumni of the Harvard Graduate School in Economics, May, 1956, p. 4) and the competition of an unusually able corps of undergraduate teachers in competing fields at Harvard and notably in history and government we are paying increased attention to our undergraduate instruction. In the last year we have taken the following steps:

  1. More Mature Staff for Economics 1. We are using a larger proportion of instructors and assistant professors in Economics 1. We expect that half the Economics 1 staff will consist of instructors and assistant professors in 1956-57 as compared with 20 per cent in 1955-56.
  2. Contents of Economics 1. We are revising Economics 1 for 1956-57. Economics 1 has become too technical. One advantage of increasing the average age of the staff is that the older men are less inclined to teach the highly technical economics they get in graduate courses. Probably less than 20 per cent of those enrolled in Economics 1 are, or are likely to become, concentrators in economics; and no more than 1-2 per cent will become economists. Our major responsibility is to give the student in Economics 1 relatively simple economic theory and relate it to the major issues of public policy. We intend to devote more time to integrating our economics with history and political science. Macroeconomics will continue to receive a major part of our attention, but less time will be given to the economics of the firm.
  3. Staff Meetings of Economics 1. The Chairman now meets with the Economics 1 staff for 1½ hours every 2 weeks and in every possible way is trying to make the teaching fellow and other junior members, who contribute so much time and enthusiasm to our teaching program, feel as though they are an important part of our department staff.
  4. Lectures in Economics 1. This year we doubled our lectures in Economics 1 — a lecture every other week. In these lectures we try to go over ground not covered in the readings and also incidentally to give the undergraduate an opportunity to listen to some of the top economists in the country. We are now not disposed to increase the number of lectures further but we shall continue the experiment. Of this I am convinced — lectures are not likely to be as important in Economics 1 as in the elementary course in government and history (Social Science). The undergraduate probably gets much more from discussions of economics in small sections than from lectures.
  1. Economics Tutorial. Tutorial in economics is not as good as it ought to be. We are wrestling with this problem. We intend to have more meetings of tutors and to impress upon them the importance of tutorial. At one of our Executive Committee meetings, we had a frank discussion with the seven masters and several senior tutors concerning our tutorial work. Our Junior tests, tied to house tutorial, seem to be working well. This year we prepared an extensive reading list for Sophomore tutorial; and next year we intend to integrate tutorial and Economics 1 more than in the past. We hope that tutorial in the second half of the Sophomore year will deal with some of the theoretical problems that will be excluded from Economics 1.
  1. High Honors Concentrators. This year we had periodic meetings with all first and second group men in economics. At these meetings (one evening every two weeks) we try to encourage discussions of important problems in the seminar manner.
  1. Seminars for Honor Graduates. Economics 100 and 102 are two new courses (to be introduced in 1956-57 and 1957-58) to be open to Junior and Senior honors students. They will be run on a seminar basis, limited in enrollment, and will be integrated with tutorial. The student will get an opportunity to deal with theoretical problems and their empirical counterpart.

Allocation of Resources

  1. Enrollment of Undergraduates in Graduate Courses and Vice Versa. Here are some tables which throw some light on the allocation of resources between undergraduate and graduate courses. Generally courses for undergraduates and graduates are taken primarily by undergraduates, and courses for graduates primarily by graduates. Hence, we assume that the courses for undergraduates and graduates are in fact courses for undergraduates and courses for graduates are in fact courses for graduates. (In the spring term 1956 the percentage of Arts and Science graduate enrollment in courses for undergraduates and graduates was 14 or 1 per cent of the 1181 enrolled in these courses; the enrollment of undergraduates in courses primarily for graduates was 10 of 482, or 2 per cent).
  2. Increase in the Number of Undergraduate Courses, 1909-10 to 1955-56. Table 1 reveals relatively unimportant changes in the number of courses for undergraduates; and the net change in the number of courses for undergraduates and graduates (in fact undergraduate courses) in the last 40-50 years has not been large. In 1909-10, there were 10½ undergraduate courses (inclusive of half courses for undergraduates and graduates and exclusive of bracketed courses); in 1955-56, there were 14½ of such courses.
  3. Increase in the Number of Graduate Courses, 1909-10 to 1955-56. It is especially in graduate courses that the rise has been spectacular. In 1909-10 there were 1½ graduate courses in Economics (exclusive of bracketed ones); by 1929-30, there were 11; by 1939-40, there were 12½ courses; by 1949-50, there were 21½ courses; and by 1955-56, there were 24. All these totals include half courses.
  1. Table 1 — Distribution of Courses by Academic Rank, 1909-10 to 1955-56*
    (Refers to Units of Full Courses)
  1909-10 1919-20 1929-30 1939-40 1949-50 1955-56
Rank U G U G U G U G U G U G
Full Prof. 8 1 3 7 4 ½ 7 7 ¼ 16 ¾ 8 15 ¼ 5 18
Assoc. Prof. — — — — 3 3 3 ¼ 1 ¾ 1 3 ¼ 3 2 ½
Asst. Prof. 1 ½ ½ 3 ½ 2 ½ 1 — ½ — 2 ½ — 4 2
Instructor & Lecturer 1 — 3 1 1 ½ 1 1 ½ 1 3 3 2 ½ 1 ½
Total 10 ½ 1 ½ 9 ½ 10 ½ 10 11 12 ½ 19 ½ 14 ½ 21 ½ 14 ½ 24
  1. Table 2 — Courses Given by Faculty, 1909-10 to 1955-56, by Rank*
    (Refers to Nearest Decimal point)
  1909-10 1919-20 1929-30 1939-40 1949-50 1955-56
Rank U G U G U G U G U G U G
Full Prof. 76 66 32 67 45 64 58 86 55 73 35 75
Assoc. Prof. — — — — 30 27 26 9 7 14 21 10
Asst. Prof. 14 — 36 24 10 — 4 — 17 — 27 8
Instructor & Lecturer 10 34 32 9 15 9 12 5 21 13 17 7
Total 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100

* U = “undergraduate” and “undergraduate and graduate”;  G = “graduate”.
Source: Compiled from Course of Study Volumes.

  1. Table 3 — Percentage of Courses, Undergraduate and Graduate
Total No. of Courses % of Total Courses
(Exclusive of Bracketed Courses)
“Undergraduate” and
“Undergraduate & Graduate”		 Graduate
(Inclusive of G.S.P.A. Economics Courses)
1909-10 12 88 12
1929-30 21 56 44
1939-40 32 39 61
1949-50 36 41 59
1955-56 38½ 38 62

From 1909 to 1929-30 the percentage of graduate courses was up from 12 to 44 per cent; but since 1929-30 the rise has been less spectacular. In Table 2, we note the courses, both undergraduate and graduate, given by men of various rank, from 1909-10 to 1955-56. The following points should be noted.

  1. The Increased Importance of Graduate Instruction. In 1909-10 there were but 1½ out of 12 courses, or 12 per cent, graduate courses. By 1929-30 courses were roughly evenly divided between graduate and undergraduate. By 1939-40 and 1949-50 the ratio was about 60 per cent graduate courses; and by 1955-56, 62 per cent of all courses were graduate courses, or 5 times as much relatively as in 1909-10.
  2. Reduced Undergraduate Instruction by Higher Ranking Members Faculty. Whereas in 1909-10 full professors accounted for 76 per cent of undergraduate course work, by 1955-56 they gave only 35 per cent of these courses; and there has been a marked decline since 1949-50. The total of undergraduate courses taught by them dropped from 1949-50 to 1955-56 by 3, or 37 per cent, and of graduate courses rose by 2¾ or 18 per cent. A similar trend is evident for associate professors, though from 1949-50 to 1955-56, the percentage of undergraduate courses taught by associate professors rose. It is a striking fact that in 1955-56, full professors taught 37 per cent less undergraduate courses and 1700 per cent more graduate courses than in 1909-10. In the former year there were 4 full professors, each responsible on the average for 2 full undergraduate courses and ¼ graduate courses. In 1955-56, 13 full professors averaged 1/3 of 1 undergraduate course and 1.4 graduate courses. (All 13 were not on full time). It is clear that the trend is away from undergraduate teaching for permanent members of the Department.
  3. Ibid., Statistical Summary. As might be expected, the percentage of all graduate courses taught by full professors tends to rise and of undergraduate courses to fall — the latter courses taught by professors declined from 76 per cent in 1909-10 to 45 per cent in 1929-30, and to 35 per cent by 1955-56.
  4. Number of Faculty by Rank. In this connection, the number at different ranks is of some interest. The full professors account for a somewhat larger proportion (teaching fellows omitted) than 50 years ago; but permanent appointments are an increased percentage.
  1909-10 1929-30 1939-40 1949-50 1955-56
Professors 4 5 12 13 13
Assoc. Professors — 3 3 2 4
Asst. Professors 1 2 1 4 4
Lecturers and Instructors 3 2 3 4 3
Visiting, etc. Professors 2
(part-time)		 3
(part-time)		 — — 1
Total (excl. Visiting) 8 12 19 23 24
———— ———— ———— ———— ———— ————
% Full Prof. (excl. Visiting) 50 42 63 57 54
% Permanent (incl. Permanent Lecturers) 50 67 89 74 75

Relations with the Graduate School of Public Administration

  1. Teaching Responsibilities of Economics Department in G.S.P.A. Our relations with the G.S.P.A. are of great importance. It is now close to 20 years since the G.S.P.A. was founded and yet the Department of Economics has never taken a long look at our relations. The Economics Department accounts for about one half the teaching burden of the G.S.P.A. and students in the G.S.P.A. account for about one third of all the graduate students in economics (on a full-time basis).
  2. Contributions of G.S.P.A to Economics Department. The G.S.P.A. has made an important contribution towards the Economics Department. It provides some research and secretarial help, good physical facilities, useful library, central facilities for students and faculty, an opportunity to give our students excellent seminars, and to meet outstanding scholars and practical men in government.
  3. Over-all Consideration of Number of G.S.P.A. Seminars. It may be that a decision should be made concerning the number of seminars. We tend to add one at a time, and the numbers now are at such a level that we may be putting a disproportionate amount of energy into these seminars. At any rate, net additions should be considered with care, given our available manpower. At present only 6 of the 18 permanent members of our faculty are not associated with the G.S.P.A.; and of the 6, Professors Dorfman and Duesenberry are about to participate. Of 27 courses to be given by permanent members of the Department, 7¼ will be as seminars in the G.S.P.A.

Library Problems

  1. Library Problems. Professor Arthur Cole retires this year. He has for many years been responsible for the acquisition of books in economics. Unless this responsibility is assumed by another, our economic collection will deteriorate. So far we have not been able to work out an arrangement acceptable to the Dean and the Director of the library. In my opinion, there is need for a central responsibility for library acquisitions in economics.

Fellowships

  1. Inadequate Fellowships. One of our most serious problems is fellowships. A study of fellowship funds announced as available to students suggested that Harvard was falling way behind. In a recent period of 5 years, five institution which are our strongest competitors had 30, 23, 20, 10, and 5 times as much money available for fellowships per Ph.D. granted in these five years. Increasingly we are losing the best students to rival institutions.
  2. Campaign for Additional Money. We have discussed this problem with Dean Bundy and Dean Elder, and also with our Visiting Committee. We have set up a committee consisting of Dean Mason, Professors Slichter, Dunlop and Harris to seek aggressively more fellowship funds. We are seeking these funds in the expectation that the major part of new funds will be available as additional funds for the Economics Department. Our goal is 6 fellowships at $2500 per year, or $15,000 per year additional. We discovered last year that by offering large fellowships to a limited number, we were more successful than in the past in attracting the more able candidates.
  3. Outside Fellowships. Our fellowship problem is eased by the availability of fellowships given by outside groups — governments, foundations etc. For example, Harvard received 5 of the 15 Wilson National fellowships for 1956-57. But it should be observed that there is often pressure to deny applicants access to the major universities and especially to Harvard. There is pressure to distribute widely, Moreover, a large proportion of these fellowship holders are often below our usual fellowship standards.

Research and Personnel Problems

  1. Competition of Research Fellowship Money for Potential Teachers. It is becoming increasingly easy for graduate students writing theses to receive fellowships that generally pay at least as much as a teaching fellowship. This year we lost 10 potential teachers as a result of these lucrative fellowships.
  2. Research Projects. Many of the Senior members of the staff are associated with large research projects, some of them of great significance. At least 9 of these projects may be classified as giant projects, three of them involving outlays of one half million or more dollars in the next 3-5 years. In 1955-56, Professor Leontief received almost one half million dollars to continue the projects of the Harvard Economic Group, and Dean Mason received $450,000 for a study of the New York Metropolitan area.
  3. Financing of Pay of Directors of Projects. It has always seemed to the Chairman, at least, that the foundations ought to pay part of the salary of the faculty members who direct these projects. When these projects are the major interest of those responsible for them, a case could be made for the foundation paying part of the salary of the relevant members of the faculty.
  4. Small Research Grants. It would be helpful to get some help from the Ford Foundation for small research projects especially for those who do not participate in the giant projects. I have had some preliminary discussion with the Ford Foundation, and I believe they would look with favor on an application for $25,000-30,000 per year for research help. Grants might vary from a few hundred dollars to $1,000-2,000 and be tied with specific projects. The great danger here is abuse of the privileges. Hence any such grant would have to be carefully administered – with some representation of outside economists on the committee.
  5. Secretarial Help. A related problem is that of secretarial help. Most of the Senior members, through administrative posts, control of seminars, editorial work, and research grants, manage to get the minimum amount of secretarial help. But 5 of our permanent members have virtually no access to secretaries and this is also true of most of our assistant professors. It would be helpful if some provision could be made for secretarial help for those without it. We realize this raises serious problems of finance.
  6. Personnel Changes. Professor Hansen retires this year and Professor Williams next year. We thus lose the best combination in money, cycles, and fiscal policy available anywhere. It is going to be difficult to fill this gap. Professor Black’s departure has also left a serious gap. We have added 2 very able assistant professors, Drs. J. Henderson and Valavanis, aside from two appointments (Drs. Moses and Conrad) in which the Economics Department shares one quarter of the cost. For 1957-58 and 1958-59, the Economics Department will have the services of Dr. E. Hoover for 3/7 of his time. We probably have the most able group of assistant professors in our history. It is not going to be easy to fill the gaps noted above, and make the most effective use of the young talent now in the Department. The Visiting Committee is again raising the question of a Professor of Business Enterprise, a matter to which we should give earnest attention. President Conant and Provost Buck were apparently prepared at the last discussion of this problem to provide an additional appointment for this purpose.
  7. Honors, etc. Dean Mason received an honorary degree from Harvard, and was a United States Representative at the United Nations Conference in Geneva on Peaceful Use of Atomic Energy.

Professor Hansen gave the Walgreen lectures at the University of Chicago.

Professor Harris served as Chairman of the Nor England Governors” Textile Committee,

Professor Galbraith advised the Indian Government on their Five Year Plan.

Professor Smithies was a Visiting Professor at Oxford and Professor

Kaysen at the London School of Economics.

 

Books:

Galbraith and Holton: Marketing Efficiency in Puerto Rico.

Harris: Keynes: Economist and Policy Maker.

Harris: New England Textiles and the New England Economy: Report to the Conference of New England Governors.

Kaysen: United States v. United Shoe Machinery Corporation: An Economic Analysis of an Anti-Trust Case.

Kaysen and Harris were two of the four co-authors of the American Business Creed.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Department of Economics, Correspondence and Papers (UAV 349.11). Box 2,  Folder: “Departmental Annual Reports to the Dean, 1955-”.

Image Source: Seymour E. Harris in The Harvard Class Album 1957.

 

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard Suggested Reading Syllabus Undergraduate

Harvard. Syllabus and exams for Government Policy Toward Business. Kaysen, 1961

 

Carl Kaysen
from the 1958 Harvard yearbook

Carl Kaysen, who just this year [1958] was promoted to the position of Professor of Economics, has risen quickly up the educational ladder and has a distinguished record of non-academic accomplishments as well. At the age of 20, he served on the National Bureau of Economic Research, two years later he joined the Office of Strategic Services, and he served in the Air Force from 1943 to 1945. At thirty, he became an Assistant Professor of Economics at Harvard, and was promoted to Associate Professor two years ago. He is a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and a Guggenheim Fellow.

Professor Kaysen is primarily interested in industrial organizations and monopoly practices. He is a co-author of The American Business Creed and is currently engaged in a study of the complexity of modern business firms.

Source: Harvard Class Album 1958.

______________________

Course Description

Economics 144. Government Policy Toward Business
Half course (spring term). M., W., F., at 10. Professor Kaysen.

This course surveys the major areas of government regulation of the functioning of markets in the United States. Anti-trust policy, agricultural policy, public utility regulation, and the regulation of transportation are examined with an eye to both their underlying economic rationale and their outcome in practice.

Source: Courses of Instruction: Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. LVII, No. 21 (August 29, 1960), p. 96.

______________________

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 144. Government Policy Toward Business. Professor Kaysen. Half course.

(Spring) Total 88: 2 Graduates, 29 Seniors, 32 Juniors, 19 Sophomores, 5 Radcliffe, 1 Other.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1960-61, p. 76.

______________________

Economics 144
Government Policy Toward Business

Professor Kaysen        Littauer 212    MW 11-12
Dr. Fromm                  Littauer 214    MW 11-12
Mr. Wilson                  Littauer 214 Tues 4-6

  1. Policy Goals, Economic Systems, and Policy Instruments (Feb. 6-17)

Watson, Donald S., Economic Policy: Business and Government, Part I, pp. 3-196.

  1. Competition: Enough and Just Enough (Feb. 20 – March 20)

Wilcox, Clair, Public Policies Toward Business, Revised Edition, Chapters 3-5, pp. 49-123.

Bain, Joe S., Industrial Organization, Chapter 13, pp. 477-539.

United States, Department of Justice, Report of the Attorney General’s National Committee to Study the Antitrust Laws, Chapters 1 and 3, pp. 1-64 and 115-128.

Stelzer, Irwin M., Selected Antitrust Cases: Landmark Decisions in Federal Antitrust, Chapter 1 (except Yellow Cab Company, et al.) pp. 3-40, 44-59, Chapter 3, pp. 79-94, Chapter 4, pp. 95-105.

Oppenheim, S. Chesterfield, Recent Cases on Federal Anti-Trust Laws, 1951 Supplement to Cases on Federal Anti-Trust Laws;

United States v. American Can Co., pp. 434-451
Tag Mfrs. Institute, et al. v. Federal Trade Commission, pp. 304-318
United States v. Aluminum Company of America, pp. 209-289

Federal Supplement, United States v. Bethlehem Steel Corporation and Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co., 168 F. Supp. 576.

Levitan, Sar A., Federal Assistance to Labor Surplus Areas, A Report to the Committee on Banking and Currency, United States House of Representatives, 85th Congress, 1st Session, April 15, 1957, pp. 5-35.

Watson, Donald S., Economic Policy: Business and Government, Chapter 25, pp. 658-691.

Joint Economic Committee, Congress of the United States, Staff Report on Employment, Growth, and Price Levels, December 24, 1959, Chapter 7, pp. 189-204.

  1. Monopolies, Near Monopolies (March 22 — April 17)

Wilcox, Clair, Public Policies Toward Business, Revised Edition, Chapters 19-22, pp. 539-642.

Watson, Donald S., Economic Policy: Business and Government, Chapter 16, pp. 391-421.

Meyer, J.R., Peck, M.J., Stenason, J., and Zwick, C., The Economics of Competition in the Transportation Industries, Chapters 6-9, pp. 145-273.

  1. External Effects and Ignorance (April 19-28)

Rostow, Eugene V., A National Policy for the Oil Industry, Chapters 3-6, pp. 16-53.

Bain, Joe S., The Economics of the Pacific Coast Petroleum Industry, Volume III, Chapter III, pp. 23-67.

Owen, Wilfred, Cities in the Motor Age, Chapter 2, pp. 18-41, Chapter 8, pp. 138-150.

Haar, Charles M., “The Master Plan: An Inquiry in Dialogue Form,” Journal of the American Institute of Planners, August 1959, pp. 133-142.

  1. General Overview (May 1-3)

To be announced.

Reading Period assignment to be announced.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003, Box 7, Folder “Economics, 1960-1961 (1 of 2)”.

______________________

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics
Reading Period Assignments
Spring Term, 1960-61

Ec. 144:

J. E. Meade, Planning and the Price Mechanism, Ch. I, III, IV, AND W.A. Lewis, Principles of Planning, Ch. I, II, IV, VI, VII-IX
OR E. Devons, Planning in Practice.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003, Box 8, Folder “Economics, 1960-1961 (2 of 2)”.

______________________

ECONOMICS 144
Hour Examination
April 14, 1961

Answer ALL questions.

PART I
20 Minutes

  1. Some economists have suggested that a “market power” standard should be used in judging monopolization cases under Section 2 of the Sherman Act. What would the differences between this standard and the exiting performance standard be? What would be achieved by adopting the proposed standard? What new problems might it create?

 

PART II
30 Minutes

  1. Outline the role of government economic policy as interpreted by:
    1. reform liberals
    2. neo-liberals
    3. conservatives
  2. What is the essential economic problem presented by the agricultural sector and the depressed areas? [handwritten note: “allocation of resources + factor mobility”]
  3. There is wide agreement that some regulation of the utility industries, such as electric power, is necessary. What economic facts and judgments underlie this agreement?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003, Box 7, Folder “Economics, 1960-1961 (1 of 2)”.

______________________

ECONOMICS 144
Final Examination

PART I

Answer both questions.

  1. (a) Some problems in anti-trust regulation are:
    1. Parallel pricing vs. collusive behavior
    2. Monopolizing vs. monopoly
    3. Market power vs. monopoly

Discuss each in the light of Sherman Act enforcement and the cases you have read.

  1. Assume that you were an economic adviser to the Anti-trust Division during the Dupont Cellophane case. After you had heard Dupont present its defense, what arguments would you have given the Government’s lawyers in order to help them prepare their reply?
  1. (a) Why does the market fail to allocate resources properly in the oil industry? What possible remedies would you recommend and why?

(b) Discuss briefly the arguments why interference with the market mechanism is necessary in order to achieve an optimal allocation of land uses in a city. What do you consider to be the most difficult problems that an urban planning authority would face?

 

PART II

Answer one question only.

  1. (a) What are some of the difficulties encountered by the regulatory authorities when they attempt to set utility rates so as to guarantee a “fair return on investment”?

(b) Give reasons why the present system of pricing by electric utilities leads to misallocation of power uses. Set up a utility pricing scheme that would remove this misallocation.

  1. (a) What accounts for the existence of natural monopoly elements in the transportation industries? What distinguishes these industries from “pure” natural monopolies, such as electric utilities?

(b) Some economists have argued that railroads should be subject to less rather than more regulation. What arguments can be used to support their position? What problems would arise if the railroads were subject to no special regulation at all?

 

PART III

Answer one question only.

  1. Evaluate some of the arguments put forward by Meade and by Lewis to support their contention that some state planning is necessary to improve the functioning of the economic system. Discuss to what extent each of their proposals is an attempt to improve the functioning of competitive markets and to what extent it is an attempt to supplant market determined goals.
  2. Discuss Devon’s account of the problems that arise when planning is carried out in the absence of prices. Why would the use of prices help to solve some of these problems?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University. Final Examinations 1853-2001 (HUC 7000.28). Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Papers Printed for Final Examinations [for] History, History of Religions,…, Economics,…Naval Science, Air Science  in (Bound) Volume 134, Social Sciences. Final Examinations, June 1961.

Image Source:  Carl Kaysen in the Harvard Class Album 1958.

Categories
Harvard Suggested Reading Syllabus

Harvard. Industrial organization. Reading List, Kaysen and Peck, 1955

 

I have had the enormous good fortune of having excellent mentors during the course of my own economics education. The first was Professor Merton J. Peck who taught the double credit course “Early Concentration Economics” during the fall semester of my freshman year at Yale (1969-70). He liked a paper I wrote enough to show it to his colleague James Tobin who thought it was good enough to be written by a graduate student, or at least so I was told. With such a boost to my self-esteem, how could I not have continued in economics?

Mr. Peck (at Yale professors are addressed without the honorific “Professor”) offered me a job to be his bursary boy, a 10 hour a week student assistantship, with a variety of tasks spanning photocopying articles and chapters to editing his rough drafts (what humility, allowing a sophomore/junior at Yale to improve his writing!) When I complained to Mr. Peck once that there was no course in the History of Economics at Yale at that time, he told me to give “Willy Fellner” a call. That led to my second Yale mentor and the beginning of my education in the history of economics (a two semester tutorial reading economic classics). There were two major projects that Mr. Peck was working on during my years working for him: on industrial/technological policy in Japan for a Brookings book Asia’s New Giant and Economic Aspects of Television Regulation (with Roger Noll and John McGowan). 

Incidentally, in Robert Litan’s book (Trillion Dollar Economists, p. 103) I discovered to my delight that my mentor had spotted the talent in the young Frank Fisher and forwarded Fisher’s undergraduate paper to his colleague Carl Kaysen. 

As I was looking at my collection of syllabi from Harvard this evening, I spotted the course below co-taught by Carl Kaysen and Merton J. Peck. This syllabus is my first tribute to the memory of my mentor Joe Peck. I have appended his official Yale obituary. He is also of interest for my project on graduate education, having received a Harvard Ph.D. (1954).

_______________________________

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics
Spring Term 1955

Economics 161
Professor Kaysen and Dr. Peck

 

  1. Markets of Large Numbers (2 Feb. – 28 Feb.)

General introduction
Agriculture
Crude oil
Women’s clothing

R. Schickele, Agricultural Policy, Ch. 9-11, 13-17.
J.K. Galbraith, Basic Factors in Farm Price Policy (mimeo.)
K. Brandt, Farm Price Supports, Rigid or Flexible?
N. Ely, “The Conservation of Oil,” Ch. 11 in Readings in the Social Control of Industry.
E.V. Rostow, A National Policy for the Oil Industry, Part II.
“Adam Smith on 7th Avenue,” Fortune, Jan. 1949.

 

  1. The Regulated Industries (2 March – 30 March)

Electric Power
Transportation

Twentieth Century Fund: Electric Power and Government Policy, Ch. I-IV, X
M.L. Fair and E.W. Williams, Jr., Economics of Transportation, Ch. 18-23, 25, 30, 32.

  1. Economic Mobilization (11 April – 18 April)

D.H. Wallace and L.V. Chandler, Economic Mobilization and Stabilization, Ch. 1-5, 23-26.

 

  1. Nationalization and Planning (20 April – 27 April)

J.E. Meade, Planning and the Price Mechanism.
R.W. Lewis, British Planning and Nationalization, Ch. 1-3.
H.A. Clegg and F.E. Chester, The Future of Nationalization, Ch. 1, 3.

 

Reading Period

A.A. Berle, 20th Century Capitalist Revolution.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003. Box 6, Folder “Economics, 1955-1956 (2 of 2)”.

_______________________________

In memoriam: Merton Joseph Peck

YaleNews, March 6, 2013

Merton Joseph Peck, the Thomas DeWitt Cuyler Professor Emeritus of Economics, died March 1, at age 87. He resided in Florida and had been ailing for quite some time, according to his family.

Peck was a specialist in industrial organization, and wrote on a variety of topics including the aluminum industry, transportation, the defense industries, and cable and television. He also wrote about the transition to a market economy in the Soviet Union, as well as technological change.

He served in the U.S. Defense Department under Robert McNamara 1961–1963 as director of systems analysis, and he was designated by Time Magazine as one of the “Pentagon Whiz Kids” in 1962. Peck returned to Washington in 1968 to serve on Lyndon Johnson’s Council of Economic Advisors.

At Yale he served as department chair in various years throughout the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, setting a record for number of years in that post. He also served as director of graduate studies, director of undergraduate studies, and acting dean of the Yale School of Management. He was a fellow of Pierson College at Yale.

Peck was born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1925. Much of his very early youth was spent in Germany and Strasbourg in Alsace France. His father, Kenneth Peck, was head of European production for American Rake and Hoe. Both his parents died before he was 12, and he was subsequently raised by his aunts and grandmother in various small towns in Ohio. During World War II, Peck served in the Army Signal Corp and participated in the occupation of Japan. After leaving the army, he attended Oberlin College and graduated in 1949. He received his Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University in 1954 under the tutelage of Edward Mason.

Peck taught at Michigan (1955-1956) and Harvard (1956-1962) before coming to Yale, where he served on the faculty 1963–2002. He was also associated with the Rand Corporation and Brookings Institution.

He is survived by his children Richard, Katherine, Sarah, and David; and four grandchildren. His wife of 55 years, Mary Bosworth Peck, predeceased him in 2004.

Source:  YaleNews, March 6, 2013.

Image Source:  ditto.

Categories
Curriculum Harvard Uncategorized Undergraduate

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

 

 

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

_______________________

The Harvard Crimson
April 22, 1953

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

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

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

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

Tutorial

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

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

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

Basic Courses

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

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

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

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

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

Labor Economics

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

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

Source: The Harvard Crimson, April 22, 1953.

 

 

Categories
Harvard Suggested Reading Syllabus

Harvard. Undergraduate Honors Economic Theory Readings. Duesenberry and Kaysen, 1951-52

 

 

For some reason the annual Report of the President of Harvard College for 1951-52 does not include the staffing and enrollment figures for courses offered during the academic year. I have been using these annual reports to verify the actual staffing for courses because the course announcements are sometimes inaccurate, being by their nature listings published before the academic year gets going, but at least certainly before the second semester begins. Many times, though not always, there is an instructor’s name at the head of the course reading assignments that have been filed with the library for placing items on reading reserve. Thus for the undergraduate honors course “Economic Theory and Policy” (Economics 101), I am only certain that James Duesenberry taught the first semester (he is named in the Crimson article excerpt below, also in the course announcement, and finally on the first semester reading list itself). Carl Kaysen is mentioned in the course announcement for the second semester of the course, but there is no name on the second semester reading list nor can I verify without an ex post staffing report for the course. Let’s just say there is a strong presumption that Carl Kaysen indeed taught the second semester of Economics 101.

Note the second semester reading list ends with “to be continued” but, alas,  there is no further list to be found in the file.

___________________

Harvard Crimson Report

Three Steps to Economics

The Department’s courses have been organized on three levels, although Economics 1 is the only prerequisite for any course. Economics 1 is the first level course, a dull but thorough introduction to the field. A department committee is now at work considering revising the curriculum, and it is hoped that this basic course will be brighter next year.

There are four courses on the second level, each covering a division of the department. Theory and Policy (101) discusses current theories of production, exchange, and distribution. Professor Duesenberry will take over complete charge of this course next year. It is generally considered dull but important. Almost all of the students are honors candidates, and the course is graded accordingly….

Source: The Harvard Crimson, April 28, 1950.

___________________

Course Announcement

For Undergraduates and Graduates

The courses for Undergraduates and Graduates, unless otherwise stated, are open only to students who have passed in Economics 1.

Economics 101. Economic Theory and Policy

Full course. Mon., Wed., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Fri., at 12.
Fall term: Assistant Professor Duesenberry; Spring term: Assistant Professor Kaysen.

Current theories of production, exchange, and the distribution of the national income, with some indications as to their relevance to contemporary economic problems. The course will be carried on mainly by discussion. It is intended primarily for candidates for the degree with honors and may be taken only with the consent of the instructor.

 

Source. Final Announcement of the Courses of Instruction Offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences During 1951-52. Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. XLVIII (September 10, 1951) No. 21, p. 76.

___________________

James S. Duesenberry

Economics 101a—Economic Theory
Fall term, 1951-52

I. The Problems of Economics

Samuelson: Economics. Chapter 1
Phelps-Brown: Framework of the Pricing System. Chapter 1
Council of Economic Advisers: Mid-year Report. July 1951

 

II. The Classical System

Ricardo: Principles of Political Economy and Taxation. Chapters 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 21
Mill: Principles of Political Economy. Book I, Chapters 4, 5, 6, 10, 11, 12, 13
Book II, Chapters 11, 12, 13, 15, 16
Baumol: Economic Dynamics. Chapter 2

 

III. General Equilibrium Theory

Phelps-Brown: Framework of the Pricing System. Chapters 2-5
Marshall: Principles of Economics 8th edition. Books V and VI
Stigler: Theories of Production and Distribution. Chapters 4, 9

___________________

Economics 101, Spring Term 1951-52
Reading List

I. The Keynesian System

  1. Keynes, General Theory, Chs. 1-3, 8-11, 13, 15, 18
  2. J. R. Hicks, “Mr. Keynes and the Classics”, No. 24 in Blakiston, Readings in Business Cycle Theory.
  3. L. R. Klein, The Keynesian Revolution, Ch. 1-3.

 

II. Dynamics

  1. Keynesian Dynamics
    1. Keynes, General Theory, Ch. 22
    2. E. D. Domar, “Expansion and Employment,” American Economic Review, March 1947
    3. W. J. Fellner, Monetary Policy and Full Employment, Ch. 1, 2, 3
  2. Schumpeterian Dynamics
    1. Schumpeter, Business Cycles, Volume I, Ch. 3, 4, 6
  3. Marxian Dynamics
    1. Schumpeter, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, Ch. 1-4
    2. J. Robinson, Essay on Marxian Economics
  4. General Review
    1. W. J. Baumol, Economic Dynamics, Chs. 3, 4

[to be continued]

Source:   Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003. Fox 5, Folder “Economics, 1951-1952 (1 of 2)”.

Image Source: Duesenberry in Harvard Class Album 1951; Kaysen as 1955 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellow

Categories
Courses Harvard Syllabus

Harvard. Business Organization and Control. Mason and Kaysen, 1950-51

 

The frequency of posting has been reduced during this three week trip to archives for more material. From yesterday’s haul from the Harvard archives I have transcribed the syllabus for an industrial organization and regulation course taught at mid-century by Edward S. Mason and Carl Kaysen.

__________________

Economics 261 (formerly Economics 161a and 162b). Business Organization and Control

Full course. Mon., Wed., Fri., and 3. Professor Mason and Assistant Professor Kaysen.

 

Source: Courses of Instruction Offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences During 1950-51. Official Register of Harvard University. Vol. XLVII, No. 23 (Sept. 1950), p. 86.

__________________

Obituary: IN MEMORY OF Carl Kaysen
February 9, 2010

Twenty years ago, as the crumbling of the Berlin Wall signaled the end of the Cold War, Carl Kaysen wrote an essay whose title asked: “Is War Obsolete?” Coming from someone else, the question might have seemed rhetorical or whimsical, but Dr. Kaysen’s career brought to his musings the force of history.

He was President John F. Kennedy’s personal representative to talks that resulted in the 1963 signing of the Partial Test Ban Treaty to prevent nuclear bomb tests in the atmosphere, underwater, and outer space. He succeeded J. Robert Oppenheimer, who directed the Manhattan Project, as director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J.

John Kenneth Galbraith, the noted economist who died in 2006, once called Dr. Kaysen “the most widely read, the most widely informed man I know.”

“He was a very wise man, one of Kennedy’s wisest counselors,” said Theodore C. Sorensen, Kennedy’s special counsel and speechwriter.

Dr. Kaysen, a professor emeritus of political economy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, died in his sleep Feb. 8 at his home in Cambridge. He was 89. His health had failed after a bad fall in October and a decade of battling spinal stenosis.

In the Kennedy administration, Dr. Kaysen was deputy special assistant for national security affairs, a second-in-command to McGeorge Bundy, the president’s national security adviser.

As Kennedy, Bundy, and others spent 13 days and nights of brinksmanship during the Cuban missile crisis, “Carl was essentially in charge of all other White House foreign policy matters during that time,” Sorensen said. “The president had complete confidence in him.”

Dr. Kaysen’s leadership led some in the White House to nickname him the “vice president in charge of the rest of the world.” Reflexively modest, he never trumpeted that role.

“He was low-key, never loud, and maybe that’s why he is an unsung hero,” Sorensen said. “He received much less publicity and attention compared to other people in Kennedy’s White House and inner circle.”

Although Dr. Kaysen’s career as an economist took him to teaching posts at Harvard and MIT, along with the Institute for Advanced Study, his most lasting contribution may lie in his work for Kennedy while negotiating the Partial Test Ban Treaty.

“I think he was the principal officer in the White House helping to shepherd that through,” said Sorensen, who added that he would miss Dr. Kaysen, one of his closest friends.

“He spent his entire life, right up to last week, trying to deflect and change the impulse toward war,” said James Carroll, a columnist for the Globe’s opinion pages who chronicled some of Dr. Kaysen’s contributions in the 2006 book, “House of War: The Pentagon and the Disastrous Rise of American Power.”

Dr. Kaysen “played a pivotal role at what is the pivot of the whole story, when Kennedy basically shifted US policy from arms buildup to arms control,” Carroll said. “Kaysen was critical in putting in place the arms control regime, which ultimately enabled the Soviet Union and the United States to end the conflict nonviolently.”

In his 1990 essay, Dr. Kaysen searched for a way for the world to stop seeing war as inevitable.

“The international system that relies on the national use of force as the ultimate guarantor of security, and the threat of its use as the basis of order, is not the only possible one,” he wrote. “To seek a different system with a more secure and a more humane basis for order is no longer the pursuit of an illusion, but a necessary effort toward a necessary goal.”

Born in Philadelphia, Dr. Kaysen graduated in 1940 with a bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania, then did graduate studies at Columbia University while serving on the staff of the National Bureau of Economic Research.

During World War II, Dr. Kaysen served as an intelligence officer, helping pick targets for bombardiers in the Army Air Corps.

“We invented a form of poetry called bomb damage assessment,” he told Carroll during interviews for “House of War.”

Rather than send planes to bomb civilian areas, Dr. Kaysen and his colleagues sought to specify locations, such as oil refineries, that would hobble the German Army.

After the war, he went to Harvard, where he studied economics and received a master’s and a doctorate. He began teaching at Harvard in the mid-1950s and, except for his work with the Kennedy administration, stayed until 1966, when he became head of the Institute for Advanced Study. He resigned from that position in 1976 and joined MIT’s faculty.

Dr. Kaysen married Annette Neutra, whom he had known since they sat next to each other in first grade, in 1940. They had two daughters, Susanna of Cambridge and Jesse of Madison, Wis., and moved where his career took them: to Washington, D.C., to London on one study grant and Greece on another.

His wife died in 1990. Four years later, he married Ruth Butler, a writer.

“He did great things, but he was extremely modest,” Butler said. “There was a quietness about his sense of his own life that was really enchanting.”

Dr. Kaysen, she added, “had a beautiful voice,” the kind that — combined with his intellect —could dominate any room and any discussion, though he usually chose to avoid doing so.

“He was a famously great teacher,” said Susanna, who wrote the acclaimed memoir “Girl, Interrupted.” “Of course, I never took a class from him, but my whole life was a class from him.”

She said her father, who was known for reading a few books at a time, had tastes that ranged from high culture to popular fare. He could quote the German writer Goethe and liked to listen to jazz pianist Fats Waller.

For decades, Dr. Kaysen was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in Cambridge, and cochaired its Committee on International Security Studies. In 2002, he coauthored “War With Iraq: Costs, Consequences, and Alternatives.”

Leslie Berlowitz, CEO of the organization, said with “a very quiet wisdom and a wry, ironic sense of humor,” Dr. Kaysen brought “his wealth of experience in arms control and international negotiations to the academy,” which became a key area of study.

“He was the soul of calm and kindness,” Carroll said of Dr. Kaysen’s leadership at the academy. “He was the most unfailingly gracious person, and was profoundly respectful of other people.”

Dr. Kaysen also leaves a sister, Flora Penaranda, of Bogot·.

A memorial service will be announced.

— Bryan Marquard
The Boston Globe

Source: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The Tech. Volume 130, Issue 3 (February 9, 2010).

__________________________

READING ASSIGNMENTS
Economics 261a
1950-51

Authorized for purchase by veterans:

R. A. Gordon, Business Leadership in the Large Corporations.
Twentieth Century Fund, Electric Power and Government Policy.

First Week: History and Legal Structure of the Corporation.

Reading:

Purdy, Lindahl and Carter, Corporate Concentration and Public Policy, Chapters 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7.

Second, Third, and Fourth Weeks:

Determination of Corporate Income.
Depreciation and Replacement.
Patterns of Corporate Financial Structure.
Flow of Funds—Savings and Investment.

Reading:

A. S. Dewing, Financial Policy of Corporations, either 3rd or 4th Editions; Book III, Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, and 6.
Richard Ruggles, National Income and Income Analysis, Chapters 2 and 3.
T.N.E.C. Monograph No. 37, pp. 1-71.
T.N.E.C. Monograph No. 12, Part III.

Fifth Week: Internal Organization of the Corporation.

Reading:

R. A. Gordon, Business Leadership in the Large Corporation, Chapters 3, 4, 12, 13, and 14.
Peter Drucker, Concept of the Large Corporation, Part II.
Berle and Means, The Modern Corporation and Private Property. Book IV.

Sixth and Seventh Weeks: Economic Concentration and the Position of the Large Corporation.

Reading:

Federal Trade Commission, The Merger Movement.
John Lintner and Keith Butters, “The Effect of Mergers on Industrial Concentration”, Review of Economics and Statistics, February, 1950.
Willard Atkins, George Edwards, and Harold S. Moulton, The Regulation of Security Markets.

Eighth, Ninth, and Tenth Weeks: Public Utility Regulation—Electric Power.

The Nature of Public Utilities.
Cost and Demand Structure of the Power Industry.
History and Prospects of Regulation.
Theory of Rate-Making.
Government vs. Private Power Operations; Power in Multi-Purpose Projects.

Reading:

Twentieth Century Fund, Electric Power and Government Policy, Chapter 1; 4; 9, pp. 480-540;10.
Bauer, J., Transforming Public Utility Regulation, Chapters 1 through 8.
W. A. Lewis, Overhead Costs, Chapter 2.
A. M. Henderson, “The Pricing of Public Utility Undertakings”, Manchester School, September, 1947.

Eleventh, Twelfth, and Thirteenth Weeks: Railroad Transportation.

Demand and Cost Conditions in Transportation.
Structure of Freight Rates.
Interrelations of Freight Rates and Industrial Location.
Railroad Regulation: Aims, Problems and History.
Intercarrier Competition.

Reading:

D. P. Locklin, Economics of Transportation, 3rd Edition, Chapters 2, 3, 7, 8 18, 19.
D. H. Wallace, “Joint and Overhead Costs in Railway Rate-Making”, Quarterly Journal of Economics, August, 1934.
C. Dearing and W. Owen. National Transportation Policy, Chapters 9, 11-16 inclusive.
W. A. Lewis, Overhead Costs, Chapter 1.

__________________________

ECONOMICS 261
1950-51
Reading Assignments—Second Term

First Three Weeks:

Cost Behavior and Price Determination.

National Bureau of Economic Research, “Cost Behavior and Price Policy”, Chapters 2, 3, 5, 10, 11.
Fritz Machlup, “Marginal Analysis and Empirical Research”, American Economic Review, September, 1946.
E. G. Nourse, Price Making in a Democracy, Chapters 7, 9, 10, 11.
Blakiston, Survey of Contemporary Economics, Chapters 3, 4.

Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth Weeks:

  1. Oligopoly.

W. J. Fellner, Competition Among the Few, Chapters 1, 4, 5, 6, 7.

  1. Integration and Price Discrimination (Including Basing-Point Systems).

T.N.E.C. Monograph 27, Part VI, The Product Structure of Large Corporations, Chapters 1, 2, 4, 5.
D. H. Wallace, Market Control in the Aluminum Industry, Chapters 8, 9, 10 Sec. 3 (pp. 216-224) only, 16.
M. A. Adelman. “The Large Firms and Its Suppliers, Review of Economics and Statistics, May, 1949.
Fritz Machlup, The Basing Point System, Chapters 4, 5, 6, 7.
Carl Kaysen. “Review of Machlup”, Review of Economics and Statistics, August, 1950.

  1. Patents and Industrial Research.

A. A. Bright, Jr. and R. Maclaurin, “Introduction of the Flourescent Lamp”, Journal of Political Economy, October, 1943.
R. L. Bishop, “The Patent System and Patent Reform”, (mimeographed).
H. Bergson, “Patents and the Anti-Trust Laws” (mimeographed).

Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh, and Twelfth Weeks:

Anti-Trust Policy.

T.N.E.C. Monograph 38, A Study of the Concentration and Enforcement of the Federal Anti-Trust Laws.
Other reading to be assigned.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003, Box 5. Folder “Economics 1950-51 (2 of 2)”.

 

Image Sources: Edward S. Mason, Harvard Class Album 1950; Carl Kaysen, 1955 fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.

 

Categories
Courses Harvard Syllabus Undergraduate

Harvard. Business Organization and Control. Sydney Alexander 1948-49.

Sydney Stuart Alexander (1916-2005) [Harvard S.B., 1936; A.M., 1938; Ph.D. 1946] taught the popular undergraduate course on Business Organization and Control before it was taken over by John Kenneth Galbraith and Carl Kaysen. While waiting for a delivery of material one day in the Harvard Archives, I thumbed through the 25th anniversary report of the Class of 1936 and came across Alexander’s report to his class (1961). You can see him standing in the front-row of the Department of Economics (MIT) group picture taken in 1976.

I was touched by the philosophical reflection in his 1961 report to his class that I have transcribed and now post before his syllabus for Economics 161.

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If you find this posting interesting, here is the complete list of “artifacts” from the history of economics I have assembled. You can subscribe to Economics in the Rear-View Mirror below. There is also an opportunity for comment following each posting….

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“My professional life since graduation can be told as a tale of three cities: Cambridge, New York and Washington, each with a multiple exposure. Three tours of duty in Cambridge as teacher and research worker, two in New York, once in empirical research and once in business, and two in Washington, once in wartime intelligence-oriented economic research, and once as an international civil servant for the International Monetary Fund….the many job shifts have simply been alterations between theory and practice. Now I juggle both theory and practice at the same time. I teach economic theory to practically oriented students of management at the School of Industrial Management at M.I.T…

“…I try to balance my interest in applied economics with the study, as yet embryonic, of the foundations of welfare judgments…There is a substantial body of economic doctrine, in the theory of economic welfare, which deals with the problem of how given wants of individuals can be best (most economically) satisfied. But the doctrine starts from the assumption of given want, and it leaves open the question of how important it is to satisfy those wants. Once the problem is viewed more broadly, it becomes obvious that the merit of want satisfaction depends on the desirability of the wants. The wants themselves are generated largely by the social framework, not least by the economy itself as it operates to satisfy the wants.

Inquiry into this range of problems runs counter to the last fashion but one in the social sciences—that of positivism, which scorned the questions that could not be expressed in operational terms. It is my thesis that the most important social issues cannot be handled in operational terms like problems in physics, nor yet in analytical terms, like problems in mathematics, but only by a sort of discussion which is more like literary criticism. That discussion cannot be based on the authority of experimental evidence or logical truth, though it may draw upon both. Its foundations, however, must be in the non-operational field in which terms like important, better, or worse have meaning…”

Source: Twenty-fifth Anniversary Report, Harvard Class of 1936. Cambridge, 1961, pp. 11-12

__________________________

[Economics 161, 1948-49: Enrollment]

161 (formerly Economics 61a and 62b). Business Organization and Control. (Full Co.) Assistant Professor Alexander.

(F) 1 Graduate, 68 Seniors, 147 Juniors, 31 Sophomores, 4 Freshmen, 10 Radcliffe:   Total 261.
(Sp) 66 Seniors, 126 Juniors, 15 Sophomores, 7 Radcliffe: Total 214

Source: Report of the President of Harvard College and Reports of Departments for 1948-49, p. 77.

__________________________

Economics 161 (formerly Economics 61a and 62b). Business Organization and Control
Full Course. Mon., Wed., Fri., at 10. Assistant Professor Alexander.

Source: Harvard University. Final Announcement of the Courses of Instruction Offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences for the Academic Year 1948-49, p. 75.

__________________________

 

Economics 161
1948-49
Business Organization and Control

 

I. Fundamentals of Economic Organization

September 28

 Introduction Brookings, Ch. 2
Fainsod and Gordon, Ch. 1
Meade and Hitch, Part D, Chs. 1 and 2

October 1

 The Free Enterprise System

II. Nature and Origin of the Corporation

October 4

 The legal character of the corporation: Buchanan, Ch. 3
B & M, Book II, Ch. 1
Dewing, Book I, Chs. 1 and 2

October 6

 The history of the corporation:

III. Financial Structure and Operation of the Corporation

October   8

 Structure and Operation MLPF & B (entire pamphlet) and
Dewing, Book I, Ch. 4 to p. 83, Ch. 7, 8, 9 to p. 218, and 230-242
Dewing, Book III, Chs. 1 and 2

11

13

14 or 15

 Section

IV. The Large Corporation

October 11

 The extent and consequences of concentration: Gordon, Ch. 2, 4, and 5
Baker, Ch. IVB & M: Book I, Ch. I; Book IV, Chs. I through IV
Burnham, Chs. VI-IX, & XVI

20

 The operation of the large corporation:

22

 Section

25

 The separation of ownership from control:

27

 The managerial revolution?

29

 Section

V. Active Governmental Regulation of the Corporation

November 1

 New issues and the securities markets: Cherrington, Chs. 9 & 10 and
Dewing, Book IV, Ch. 9 & 6

3

5

 Section

8

 The holding company & its regulation: Allen, Ch. 9

10

 Corporate reorganization: Buchanan, Ch. XV or
Dewing, Book V, Chs. 3, 5, & 6

12

 Section

VI. Theory of Markets

November 15

 Competition, perfect and monopolistic: Boulding, Chs. 24 and 27
F & G, Ch. 9

17

 Duopoly and oligopoly:

19

 Section

VII. Markets and Their Regulation

November 22

 Railroads and their Regulation: Locklin, Chs. VIII, XV, & XVI

24

26

 Section

29

 Agriculture and the Government: Black & Kiefer, Chs. VIII, IX, XI, XVIII, XX, XXI, XXV, and XXX.

December 1

3

 Section

6

 The Petroleum Industry Rostow, Parts I, II, III and V.

8

10

 Section

13

 Lumber industry and trade associations: Burns, Ch. II and IV

15

 The meat industry

17

 Section

Reading period

 

References

Allen, Frederick L., The Lords of Creation, 1935.
Baker, John C., Directors and Their Functions, 1945.
Berle, A. A., and Gardiner C. Means (B & M), The Modern Corporation and Private Property, 1932.
Black, John D., and M. E. Kiefer, Future Food and Agricultural Policy, 1948.
Boulding, Kenneth E., Economic Analysis.
Brookings Institution (Lyon and associates), The Government and Economic Life, Vol. I, 1939.
Buchanan, Norman S., The Economics of Corporate Enterprise.
Burnham, James, The Managerial Revolution (Penguin, 1945).
Burns, Arthur R., The Decline of Competition.
Cherrington, Homer V., Business Organization and Finance, 1948.
Dewing, Arthur S., Financial Policy of Corporations, 1941, 2-vol. edition.
Fainsod, Merle, and A. L. Gordon (F & G), Government and the American Economy, 1941.
Gordon, Robert A., Business Leadership in the Large Corporation, 1945.
Locklin, D. Philip, Economics of Transportation, 1947.
Meade, J. E., and Charles Hitch, An Introduction to Economic Analysis and Policy.
MLPF & B: Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner and Beans, How to Read a Financial Report.
Rostow, Eugene V., A National Policy for the Oil Industry, 1947.

__________________________

Reading Period — Economics 161 — December 1948

Read 5 articles in FORTUNE, all from within one of the following groups. Within your chosen group read at least two articles from subgroup a, the remaining three articles may be chosen freely from either subgroup a or b. For brevity, titles are not given verbatim. Bracketed items should be read together as a group.

All copies of FORTUNE needed for this course may be found with the other bound periodicals on the open shelf.

Group I—Transportation

Subgroup a

Subgroup b
1. British Rys., p. 87, April ‘47 1. Penns. R.R., I, p. 67, May ‘36

2. Penns. R.R., II, p. 87, June ‘36

3. Penns. R.R., III, p. 84, March ‘48
2. Rate Battle, p. 149, Oct. ‘44
3. Railroads, p. 50, Aug. ‘39
4. Inland Waterways, p. 39, Oct. ‘31 4. Young & Ce & O., p. 97, May ‘46
5. R.R. Consolidations, p. 39, Mar. ‘30 5. Santa Fe, p. 122, Nov. ‘48
6. Rock Island, p. 140, Dec. ‘44

7. Keeshin Trucking, p. 47, Feb. ‘36
8. Pullman I, p. 39, Jan ‘38

9. Pullman II, p. 73, Feb. ‘38
10. Southern Pacific, p. 91, Nov. ‘37

 

Group II—Petroleum and Gas

Subgroup a

Subgroup b
1. Oil Shortage? p. 94, Jan. ‘44 1. Amerada, p. 128, Jan. ‘46
2. Oil Play, p. 69, Aug. ‘48 2. Engineers of Energy, p. 107, Nov. ‘48
3. Pipelines, p. 125, Jan. ‘45 3. Sun Oil, p. 51, Feb. ‘41
4. Natural Gas, p. 56, Aug. ‘40 4. Socony, I, p. 111, Nov. ‘42

5. Socony II, p. 114, Feb. ‘43
5. Ickes Arab. Nights, p. 121, June ‘44
6. Oil Abroad, p. 37, March ‘31 6. Standard (N.J.)I, p. 49, April ‘40

7. Standard (N.J.)II, p. 79, May ‘40

8. Standard (N.J.)III, p. 61, June ‘40
9. Gulf, p. 79, Oct. ‘37
10. Sinclair, p. 60, Nov. ‘32

 

Group III—Steel

Subgroup a

Subgroup b
1. Steel in War, p. 121, May ‘46 1. Labrador Venture, p. 115, Dec. ‘48
2. Basing Point Muddle, p. 73, Sept. ‘48 2. Spark in Steel, p. 95, Dec. ‘48
3. Iron Ore Dilemma, p. 129, Dec. ‘45 3. Steel in West, p. 130, Feb. ‘45
4. Steel I, p. 85, May ‘31 4. Great Lakes I, p. 31, July ‘40
5. Steel II, p. 52, July ‘31 5. Great Lakes II, p. 43, July ‘40
6. Steel III, p. 41, Sept. ‘31 6. Bethlehem, p. 61, April ‘41
7. National, p. 31, June ‘32
8. Republic, p. 54, Sept. ‘33
9. U. S. Steel I, p. 59, March ‘36

10. U.S. Steel II, p. 127, April ‘36

11. U.S. Steel III, p. 113, June ‘36

 

Group IV—Agriculture

Subgroup a

Subgroup b
1. Agriculture, p. 68, July, ‘40 1. Garm Co-ops, p. 153, Aug., ‘45
2. Planning for Plenty, p 61, Oct., ‘41 2. Cotton I, p. 138, Nov. ‘45

3. Cotton II, p. 159, Dec., ‘45
3. Agriculture, p. 80, March, ‘36
4. Cattle, p. 88, April, ‘43
5. Wingate, p. 72, Oct. ‘41
6. Farm Income, p. 89, Oct. ‘37
7. Milk in Chicago, p. 80, Nov. ‘39

8. Grade A, p. 83, Nov., ‘39

 

Group V—Food Processing, etc.

Subgroup a and b combined
1. Continental Baking, p. 67, July ‘38 18. Pineapple, p. 33, Nov. ‘30
2. Nabisco, p. 86, June, ‘48

3. Nabisco, p. 64, Aug., ‘36

 19. Armour and Co., p. 59, June ‘34

20. Hormel and Company, p. 127, Oct. ‘37

21. Swift and Co., p. 55, Feb. ‘30
4. Standard Brands, p. 77, Jan. ‘38
5. Life Savers, p. 94, Feb ‘38 22. Procter and Gamble, p. 77, April ‘39
6. Planters’ Peanuts, p. 78, Apr. ‘38 23. General Mills, p. 117, April ‘45

24. General Mills, p. 81, Nov. ‘30
7. Del Monte, p 77, Nov. ‘38
8. Corn Products, p. 55, Sept. ‘38 25. Nestle’s, p. 117, Feb. ‘46
9. Coca-Cola, p. 65, Dec. ‘38
10. Cream of Wheat, p. 68, Jan. ‘39
11. Frozen Foods, p. 61, June ‘39
12. Wessen Oil, p. 67, Sept. ‘39
13. General Goods, p. 69, Oct. ‘34
14. Hershey Chocolate, p. 72, Jan. ‘34
15. Ralston, p. 84, Jan. ‘48
16. Beech Nut, p. 85, Nov. ‘36
17. Campbell Soup, p. 69, Nov. ‘35

 

Group VI—Public Utilities

Subgroup a

Subgroup b
1. Power to Burn, p. 141, Feb. ‘45 1. I. T. & T., p. 145, Sept. ‘45
2. A. T. & T., p. 37, Sept. ‘30 2. A. G. & E., p. 165, Dec. ‘45
3. Com & Sou., p. 83, May ‘37
4. TVA, p. 167, May ‘35
5. TVA, p. 92, Oct. ‘33
6. Cal. G. & E., p. 77, July ‘30
7. Niagara Hudson, p. 43, June ‘31

 

 

Group VII—Retail Trade

Subgroup a and b combined
1. Marshall Field, p. 143, Dec. ‘45

2. Marshall Field, p. 79, Oct. ‘36

 9. May Stores, p. 109, Dec. ‘48
10. Bergdorf-Goodman, p. 62, June ‘31
3. Allied Stores, p. 123, March ‘47 11. Neiman-Marcus, p. 133, Nov. ‘37
4. Sears Roebuck, p. 84, Aug. ‘48

5. Sears Roebuck, p. 43, Feb. ‘32

 12. Woolworth, p. 63, Nov. ‘33
13. A & P, p. 41, July ‘30

14. A & P, p. 53, March ‘33

15. A & P, p. 93, April ‘38
6. Montgomery Ward, p. 69, Jan. ‘35
7. Macy’s, p. 82, May ‘30

8. Macy’s, p. 23, April ‘33

 

Group VIII—Coal and Coke

Subgroup a

Subgroup b
1. British Coal, p. 118, Oct. ‘46 1. Koppers, p. 73, April ‘37
2. Coal I, p. 86, March ‘47 2. Pittsburgh, p. 57, Oct. ‘33
3. Coal III, p. 99, April ‘47 3. Island Creek, p. 87, March ‘38
4. Anthracite, p. 72, Feb. ‘31

 

Group IX—Distilling and Brewing

Subgroup a

Subgroup b
1. Whiskey, p. 28, Nov. ‘33 1. Seagram’s, p. 97, Sept. ‘48
2. Liquor Reviewed, p. 98, Oct. ‘34 2. Schenley, p. 99, May ‘36
3. Econ. of Repeal, p. 47, May ‘32 3. Anheuser-Busch, p. 42, July ‘35
4. Ballantine’s, p. 64, June ‘38
5. Hiram Walker, p. 68, March ‘39

 

Group X—Automobiles

Subgroup a

Subgroup b
1. Ford, Chev., Plym., p. 86, Oct. ‘31 1. Studebaker, p. 89, Feb. ‘35
2. General Motors I, p. 41, Dec. ‘38 2. Chrysler, p. 103, Oct. ‘48
3. General Motors II, p. 37, Jan., ‘39 3. Chrysler, p. 57, Dec. ‘40
4. General Motors IV, p. 45, March ‘39 4. Willys, p. 80, Aug. ‘46
5. Kaiser, p. 91, Dec. ‘47
6. Nash, p. 125, Sept. ‘45
7. Borg-Warner, p. 109, June ‘46
8. Ford, p. 63, Dec. ‘33
9. Ford, p. 82, May ‘46
10. C.I.T., p. 71, Jan. ‘33
11. Auto Selling, p. 38, Dec. ‘31
12. Packard, p. 55, Jan. ‘37
13. Used Car, p. 39, June ‘38

 

Group XI—Ferrous Metals

Subgroup a and b combined
1. Aluminum Co., p. 20, Nov. ‘32
2. Aluminum Co., p. 46, Sept. ‘34
3. Anaconda, p. 53, Jan. ‘42

4. Anaconda, p. 83, Dec. ‘36

5. Anaconda, p. 71, Jan. ‘37

6. Copper Ind’y., p. 70 April ‘30

7. Phelps Dodge, p. 40, July ‘32
8. St. Joseph Lead, p. 93, June ‘37
9. U.S. Smelting, p. 74, July ‘35
10. Climax Molybdenum, p. 105, Oct. ‘36

 

Group XII—Housing

Subgroup a

Subgroup b
1. Mr. Wyatt’s Shortage, p. 105, April ‘46 1. Metro. Life in Housing, p. 133, April ‘46
2. Fed. Housing Policy, p. 76, June ‘35 2. Where is Prefabrication? p. 127, April ‘46
3. Slum Clearance, p. 27, Feb. ‘34 3. Ind’y. Capitalism Forgot, p. 61, Aug. ‘47
4. Housing Survey I, p. 61, Feb. ‘32
5. Housing Survey III,   p. 35, April ‘32
6. Housing Survey VI, p. 60, July ‘32

__________________________

 

Spring Term, 1948-49
Economics 161—Business Organization and Control

 

Text: Burns, required; Purdy, optional.

Outline and Assignments

Date

 Lecture

Reading
Feb. 9 Integration Purdy, Ch. 22, and Burns, Ch. IX and pp. 76-92, 140-145; TNEC No. 21, pp. 121-132.
Feb. 11 Price Leadership
Feb. 14 Price Discrimination and the Basing Point System Burns, Ch. VI and VII
Feb. 16
Feb. 17 & 18 Sections
Feb. 21 Patents TNEC No. 21, pp. 158-165, 215-224;
Brookings, V 1, Ch. VI;
Purdy, Ch. 24; Stocking, Ch. 3
Feb. 23 Cartels
Feb. 24, 25 Sections
Feb. 28 Competition among Giants Hamilton, Section II; F& G, pp. 636-654
TNEC, No. 21, pp. 31-39, 48-51, 24-26, 194-198 and pp. 179-182, 170-172
March 2 Too Much Competition?
March 3 and 4 Sections
March 7 Housing, Problem Industry TNEC No. 8, Ch. IV; 20th Century, Housing. Chs. 5 and 6; TNEC No. 21, pp. 287-293
March 9 Non-Price Competition Burns, Ch. VIII
March 10-11 Sections
March 14 Chain Stores 20th Century, Distribution, pp. 133-141, and pp. 146-165; F&G 595-608
March 16 Problems of Small Business Kaplan, Chs. II, VIII, X
March 17-18 Sections
March 21 Anti-Trust History Purdy, Chs. 15, 16, and 17
Readings, Chs. 1 and 2
March 23
March 24-26 Sections
March 28 Recent Landmarks in Anti-Trust Purdy, Ch. 11; TNEC No. 21, p. 185-189; Oppenheim, Ch. 5 and pp. 310-328
March 30
Mar 31/Apr 1 Sections
April 3-10 Vacation
April 11 Unfair Competition and the F.T.C. F & G, Ch. 14

Burns, Ch. X
April 13 The N. R. A.
April 14-15 Sections
April 18 O. P. A. and W. P. S. U. S. at War, pp. 50-63, and Chs. 5, 9, and 10 (excluding pp. 281-298)
April 20
April 21-22 Sections
April 21 (sic) Price Flexibility Economic Report, January, 1948, pp. 75-79; Economic Report, January, 1949, pp. 43-45, 65-66
N.R.C., Part II, pp. 27-34; TNEC No. 1, ch. II; Nourse, Ch. XI
April 28-29
April 28-29 Sections
May 2 Modification of Competition and Full Employment Wallace, Entire Article
May 4 Workable Competition
May 6 Summary of Course

Reading Period Assignment to be Announced

 

References

Brookings Institution (Lyon et al.), Government and Economic Life, Vol. I
Burns, Arthur R., The Decline of Competition
Economic Report, Economic Report of the President, January, 1948 and January, 1949
F. and G., Fainsod and Gordon, Government and the American Economy
Hamilton, Walton H., Price and Price Policy
Kaplan, A. D. H., Small Business: Its Place and Problems
Nourse, Edwin, Price Making in a Democracy
N. R. C., U. S., National Resources Committee, Structure of the American Economy, Part II (Note that the assignment is in Part II, a volume separate from part I)
Oppenheim, S. Chesterfield, Cases on Federal Anti-Trust Laws (1948)
Purdy, Lindahl and Carter, Corporate Concentration and Public Policy
Readings in the Social Control of Industry (Blakiston Press)
Stocking and Watkins, Cartels or Competition? (Not to be confused with Cartels in Action by the same authors)
TNEC: U. S., Temporary National Economic Committee Monographs.

No. 1, Price Behavior and Business Policy
No. 8, Toward More Housing
No. 21, Competition and Monopoly in American Industry

20th Cent.; Distribution, Dewhurst et al., Does Distribution Cost Too Much?
20th Cent., Housing
U. S. at War, U. S. Bureau of the Budget, The United States at War
Wallace, Donald, “Industrial Markets and Public Policy,” in Public Policy, 1941, edited by Friedrich and Mason, pp. 59-129

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003 (HUC 8522.2.1), Box 4, Folder “Economics, 1948-49 (2 of 2)”.

Image Source: Harvard Album 1950.