http://michaelperelman.wordpress.com/2007/03/22/how-to-succeed-as-an-economist/
I have a file of big time economists who act as expert witnesses. Here is a historical note about the subject from my new book, Confiscation of American Prosperity, which comes out in a month. At the time, the private power industry spoke nonchalantly about the ease of buying the services of college professors, knowing full well that business pressure had already led to the purging of many of those who opposed the industry's practices. For example, M. H. Aylesworth, the managing director of the industry trade association, the National Electric Light Association (NELA), "issued an exuberant advisory directive to member utilities in a 1923 speech that became part of Federal Trade Commission investigation records. What it lacked in subtlety, it possessed in explicit counsel on how to buy an educator": ##I would advise any manager who lives in a community where there is a college to get the professor of economics -- the engineering professor will be interested anyway -- interested in our problems. Have him lecture on your subject to his classes. Once in a while it will pay you to take such men and give them a retainer of one or two hundred dollars per year for the privilege of letting you study and consult with them. For how in heaven's name can we do anything in the schools of this country with the young people growing up, if we have not first sold the idea of education to the college professor? [Rogers 1972, pp. 71-72] The multifaceted Reverend Dr. Charles Aubrey Eaton, a New Jersey congressman, who also happened to be a manager of the industrial relations department of the General Electric Company, recognized that teaching in college was one of the "starveling professions" (Rogers 1972, p. 72). The reverend counseled the industry: ##Here is a professor in a college, who gets $2,500 a year and has to spend $3,000 to keep from starving to death, who walks up to his classroom in an old pair of shoes and some idiot of a boy drives up and parks a $5,000 automobile outside and comes in and gets plucked. Then because that professor teaches that boy that there is something wrong with the social system, we call him a Bolshevik and throw him out. ## What I would like to suggest to you intelligent gentlemen is that while you are dealing with the pupils, give a thought to the teachers and when their vacation comes, pay them a salary to come into your plants and into your factories and learn the public utility business at first hand, and then they will go back, and you needn't fuss -- they can teach better than you can. [Rogers 1972, pp. 72-73] On Thu, Aug 30, 2007 at 09:00:18AM -0700, Jim Devine wrote: > rintable to 8bit by bengal.ecst.csuchico.edu id l7UG0Nwf029686 > Status: O > X-Status: > X-Keywords: > X-UID: 12737 > > what's a good example of an economist -- preferably a well-known one > -- receiving a big fee for doing special pleading for some big > corporation or similar organization? > -- > Jim Devine / "In the years since the phrase became a cliché, I have > received any number of compliments for my supposed ability to 'think > outside the box.' Actually, it has been a struggle for me to perceive > just what these 'boxes' were why they were there, why other people > regarded them as important -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu michaelperelman.wordpress.com
