Walter E. Williams

Walter Edward Williams (born March 31, 1936) is an American economist, commentator, and academic. He is the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University, as well as a syndicated columnist and author known for his classical liberal and libertarian views.[2] His writings frequently appear on Townhall.com, WND, and Jewish World Review.

Walter E. Williams
Williams speaks at Texas Tech University in 2013.
Born
Walter Edward Williams

(1936-03-31) March 31, 1936[1]
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Spouse(s)
Connie Taylor
​
(
m. 1960; died 2007)
InstitutionGeorge Mason University (1980–present)
Temple University
Los Angeles City College (1972–1974)
California State University, Los Angeles (1969–1970)
Grove City College
FieldEconomics, education, politics, free market, race relations, liberty
School or
tradition		Laissez-faire
Alma materCalifornia State University, Los Angeles
(B.A.) 1965
UCLA (M.A.) 1967
UCLA (Ph.D.) 1972

Early life and education

Williams's family during childhood consisted of his mother, his sister, and him. Williams's father played no role in raising Williams or his sister.[3] He grew up in Philadelphia. The family initially lived in West Philadelphia, moving to North Philadelphia and the Richard Allen housing projects when Williams was ten years old. His neighbors included a young Bill Cosby. Williams knew many of the individuals that Cosby speaks of from his childhood, including Weird Harold and Fat Albert.[4]

Following graduation from Benjamin Franklin High School, he went to California to live with his father and attend one semester at Los Angeles City College.[5] Williams later returned to Philadelphia and drove taxi for Yellow Cab Company.[6] In 1959, he was drafted into the military and served as a Private in the United States Army.[4][7] While stationed in the South, he "waged a one man battle against Jim Crow from inside the army". He challenged the racial order with provocative statements to his fellow soldiers. This resulted in an overseeing officer filing a court-martial proceeding against Williams. Williams argued his own case and was found not guilty.[4] While considering filing countercharges against the officer that had brought him up for court martial, Williams found himself transferred to Korea. Upon arriving there, Williams marked "Caucasian" for race on his personnel form. When challenged on this, Williams replied wryly if he had marked "Black", he would end up getting all the worst jobs. From Korea, Williams wrote a letter to President John F. Kennedy denouncing the pervasive racism in the American government and military and questioning the actions black Americans should take given the state of affairs, writing:

Should Negroes be relieved of their service obligation or continue defending and dying for empty promises of freedom and equality? Or should we demand human rights as our Founding Fathers did at the risk of being called extremists ... I contend that we relieve ourselves of oppression in a manner that is in keeping with the great heritage of our nation.[4]

He received a reply from the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, Alfred B. Fitt, a response which he termed "the most reasonable response that I received from any official."[8]

Following his military service, Williams served as a juvenile group supervisor for the Los Angeles County Probation Department from 1963 to 1967.[9] Williams also resumed his education, earning a bachelor's degree in economics in 1965 from California State College at Los Angeles (now California State University, Los Angeles, or Cal State Los Angeles for short).[9] He earned both his master's degree (1967) and his Ph.D. (1972) in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).[10][11] Williams's doctoral thesis was titled The low-income market place.[12]

Speaking of his early college days, Williams said: "I was more than anything a radical. I was more sympathetic to Malcolm X than Martin Luther King because Malcolm X was more of a radical who was willing to confront discrimination in ways that I thought it should be confronted, including perhaps the use of violence. But I really just wanted to be left alone. I thought some laws, like minimum-wage laws, helped poor people and poor black people and protected workers from exploitation. I thought they were a good thing until I was pressed by professors to look at the evidence." While at UCLA, Williams came into contact with economists such as Armen Alchian, James M. Buchanan, and Axel Leijonhufvud who challenged his assumptions.[13]

While Williams was at UCLA, Thomas Sowell arrived on campus in 1969 as a visiting professor. Although he never took a class from Dr. Sowell, the two met and began a friendship that has lasted for decades. In the summer of 1972, Sowell was hired as director of the Urban Institute's Ethnic Minorities Project, which Williams joined shortly thereafter.[14] Correspondence between Sowell and Williams appears in the 2007 "A Man of Letters" piece by Sowell.

Academic career

During his doctoral studies, Williams was an instructor in economics at Los Angeles City College from 1967 to 1969 and Cal State Los Angeles from 1967 to 1971.[9]

Returning to his native Philadelphia, Williams was an economics professor at Temple University from 1973 to 1980.[9] For the 1975–76 academic year, Williams was a visiting scholar at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.[15] In 1980, Williams joined the economics faculty at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia; Williams began writing a syndicated column, "A Minority View," for Heritage Features Syndicate, which merged with Creators Syndicate in 1991.[9] From 1995 to 2001, Williams chaired the economics department at George Mason.[16] Courses taught by Williams at George Mason include "Intermediate Microeconomics" for undergraduate students and "Microeconomic Theory I" for graduate students.[17][18]

Since 1971, Williams has written hundreds of research articles, book reviews, and commentaries for scholarly journals including American Economic Review, Policy Review, and Journal of Labor Research as well as popular journals including The American Spectator, Newsweek, Reason, and The Wall Street Journal.[19]

Williams was awarded an honorary degree at Universidad Francisco Marroquin. In addition, he has served on advisory boards including the Review Board of Economics Studies for the National Science Foundation, Reason Foundation, the National Tax Limitation Committee, and Hoover Institute.[9][16]

Williams has written ten books, beginning in 1982 with The State Against Blacks and America: A Minority Viewpoint.[16] He wrote and hosted documentaries for PBS in 1985. The "Good Intentions" documentary was based on his book The State Against Blacks.[20]

Economic and political views

As an economist, Williams is a proponent of free market economics and opposes socialist systems of government intervention.[21] Williams believes laissez-faire capitalism is the most moral, most productive system humans have ever devised.[22]

In the mid-to-late 1970s, Williams conducted research into the Davis-Bacon Act of 1931 and on the impact of minimum wage laws on minority employment. His research led him to conclude the government's interventional programs are harmful. Among those state programs Williams was critical of were minimum wage and affirmative action laws, stating both practices inhibit liberty and are detrimental to the blacks they are intended to help. He published his results in his 1982 book The State Against Blacks, where he argued that laws regulating economic activity are far greater obstacles to economic progress for blacks than racial bigotry and discrimination.[13] Subsequently, Williams has spoken on the topic and penned a number of articles detailing his view that increases in the minimum wage price low skill workers out of the market, eliminating their opportunities for employment.[23][24][25][26] Williams believes that racism and the legacy of slavery in the United States are overemphasized as problems faced by the black community today. He points to the crippling effects of a welfare state and the disintegration of the black family as more pressing concerns. "The welfare state has done to black Americans what slavery couldn't do, and that is to destroy the black family."[13] Although in favor of equal access to government institutions such as court houses, city halls, and libraries, Williams opposes anti-discrimination laws directed at the private sector on the grounds that such laws infringe upon the people's right of freedom of association.

Williams views gun control laws as a governmental infringement upon the rights of individuals, and argues that they end up endangering the innocent while failing to reduce crime.[27] Williams also makes the argument that the true proof of whether or not an individual owns something is whether or not they have the right to sell it. Taking this argument to its conclusion, he supports legalization of selling one's own bodily organs.[28] He argues that government prohibiting the selling of one's bodily organs is an infringement upon one's property rights.[29][30]

Williams has praised the views of Thomas DiLorenzo,[31] and wrote a foreword to DiLorenzo's anti-Abraham Lincoln book.[32] Williams maintains that the U.S. states are entitled to secede from the union if they wish, as the Confederate states attempted to do during the Civil War,[31] and asserts that the Union's victory in the Civil War allowed the federal government "to run amok over states' rights, so much so that the protections of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments mean little or nothing today."[32]

In reaction to what he viewed as inappropriate racial sensitivity that he saw hurting blacks in higher education, Williams began in the 1970s to offer colleagues a "certificate of amnesty and pardon" to all white people for Western Civilization's sins against blacks – and "thus obliged them not to act like damn fools in their relationships with Americans of African ancestry." He still offers it to anyone. The certificate can be obtained at his website.[33]

Williams is opposed to the Federal Reserve System[34] arguing that central banks are dangerous.[35]

In his autobiography, Williams cited Frederick Bastiat, Ludwig von Mises, F. A. Hayek, and Milton Friedman as influences that led him to become a libertarian.[36] Williams praised Ayn Rand's 1967 work Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal as "one of the best defenses and explanations of capitalism one is likely to read."[37]

Besides his weekly columns, Williams has been a guest host for Rush Limbaugh's radio program when Limbaugh is away traveling. Reason has called Williams "one of the country's leading libertarian voices."[4] In 2009, Greg Ransom, a writer for the Ludwig von Mises Institute, ranked Williams as the third-most important "Hayekian" Public Intellectual in America, behind only Thomas Sowell and John Stossel.[38]

Personal life

Williams has lived in Devon, Pennsylvania, since 1973.[39] He was married to Connie (née Taylor) from 1960 until her death on December 29, 2007. They had one daughter, Devyn.[40] When he began teaching at George Mason, Williams rented a cheap hotel room in Fairfax, Virginia where he lived from Tuesdays through Thursdays around his teaching schedule.[41] Williams is a cousin of former NBA player Julius Erving.[42]

Williams served on the board of directors of Media General from 2001 until his retirement from the board in 2011. He was also chairman of the Audit Committee.[43][44]

Bibliography
  • Williams, Walter E. (1982). The State Against Blacks. New York: McGraw-Hill. ISBN 9780070703780. OCLC 15984778.
  • Williams, Walter E. (1982). America: A Minority Viewpoint. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 9780817975623. OCLC 492741326.
  • Williams, Walter E. (1987). All It Takes Is Guts: A Minority View. Washington: Regnery Gateway. ISBN 9780952265696. OCLC 242317610.
  • Williams, Walter E. (1989). South Africa's War Against Capitalism. New York: Praeger. ISBN 9780275931797. OCLC 246932397.
    • Williams, Walter E. (1990). South Africa's War Against Capitalism (revised ed.). Kenwyn [South Africa]: Juta. ISBN 9780702124457. OCLC 758452218.
  • Williams, Walter E. (1995). Do The Right Thing: The People’s Economist Speaks. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 9780817993825. OCLC 32666686.
  • Williams, Walter E. (1999). More Liberty Means Less Government: Our Founders Knew This Well. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 0-8179-9612-5. OCLC 237344402.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Williams, Walter E. (2008). Liberty Versus the Tyranny of Socialism: Controversial Essays. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 9780817949129. OCLC 495418182.
  • Williams, Walter E. (2010). Up From The Projects: An Autobiography. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 978-0-8179-1255-0. OCLC 670480882.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Williams, Walter E. (2011). Race & Economics: How Much Can Be Blamed on Discrimination?. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 978-0-8179-1244-4. OCLC 939069012.
  • Williams, Walter E. (2015). American Contempt for Liberty. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 978-0-8179-1875-0. OCLC 1044305521.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)

Filmography
gollark: That sounds doable.
gollark: Oh yes, I'll just use Rust's stdlib in my glorious C.
gollark: Well, it does at most `(arrayorsomethinglength * arrayorsomethinglength * arrayorsomethinglength * 3) / 2` iterations.
gollark: *And* it terminates in bounded time.
gollark: It's optimized because it uses XOR over inefficient temporary variables.

See also

References
Notes
  1. Cato Editors (2011-03-31). "Happy Birthday Walter Williams". Cato@Liberty.
  2. Free Market Mojo
  3. Williams 2010, p. 3
  4. Root, Damon (January 28, 2011). "Man Versus the State". Reason. Archived from the original on January 31, 2011. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  5. Williams 2010, p. 28
  6. Williams, Walter E. (December 27, 2006). "Reinstating the military draft". Creators Syndicate. Archived from the original on October 22, 2007.
  7. Williams 2010, p. 36
  8. Williams 2010, pp. 63–65
  9. "About Walter Williams". Creators Syndicate. Archived from the original on February 26, 2000. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  10. Keenan, Patrick (March 7, 2017). "Walter E. Williams, M.A. '66, PH.D. '72". UCLA Alumni Association. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  11. Williams 2015, p. xxi
  12. Williams, Walter E. (1972). The low-income market place (Ph.D.). University of California, Los Angeles.
  13. Riley, Jason (January 22, 2011). "The State Against Blacks". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on January 23, 2011.
  14. Williams 2010, pp. 91–93
  15. Williams 2010, pp. 106-108
  16. "Walter E. Williams Biographical Sketch". WalterEWilliams.com. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  17. http://walterewilliams.com/courses/econ306spring2019.pdf
  18. https://economics.gmu.edu/courses/econ811/course_sections/40395
  19. http://walterewilliams.com/publications/publications/
  20. George Mason University. "Biography, Walter E. Williams".
  21. Williams 1999, pp. 42–44
  22. Williams, Walter (January 2000). "Capitalism and the Common Man". The Freeman. Archived from the original on December 9, 2003. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  23. Williams, Walter E. (December 1, 2010). "Minimum Wage, Maximum Folly". Creators Syndicate. Archived from the original on February 9, 2011.
  24. Williams, Walter E. (April 14, 2010). "Minimum wage cruelty". Creators Syndicate. Archived from the original on July 30, 2010.
  25. Williams, Walter E. (March 24, 2005). "Minimum Wage Is Not An Anti-Poverty Tool". Investors Business Daily.
  26. Williams, Walter E. (July 12, 2017). "Minimum wage cruelty". Creators Syndicate. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  27. Williams 1999, pp. 59–61
  28. Williams 1999, pp. 138–140
  29. Williams 1999, p. 140
  30. Williams, Walter E. (October 2002). "My Organs Are For Sale". Ideas on Liberty. Archived from the original on January 6, 2003. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  31. Williams, Walter (March 22, 2005). "DiLorenzo Is Right About Lincoln". LewRockwell.com. Retrieved April 7, 2007.
  32. DiLorenzo, Thomas (2003). "Foreword". The Real Lincoln: A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War. Foreword by Walter Williams. New York, New York: Three Rivers Press. p. xii-xiii. ISBN 0-7615-2646-3. Retrieved December 7, 2014.
  33. "Gift of Amnesty and Pardon" (PDF).
  34. "Walter Williams". jewishworldreview.com.
  35. "Counterfeiting Versus Monetary Policy". townhall.com.
  36. Williams 2010, p. 83
  37. Williams, Walter E. "Book Recommendations". Walter Williams Homepage.(ret'd. 12-30-2011)
  38. Ransom, Greg (April 2, 2009). "The Top 30 Hayekian Public Intellectuals In America". Mises Economics Blog, Ludwig von Mises Institute. Retrieved November 16, 2010.
  39. Williams 2010, p. 94
  40. Rockwell, Lew (December 30, 2007). "Connie Williams, RIP". LewRockwell.com. Archived from the original on January 1, 2008.
  41. Williams 2010, p. 113
  42. Miller, John J. (April 4, 2011). "Walter Williams's Big Classroom". National Review. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  43. "Walter E. Williams - Executive Bio, Compensation History, and Contacts - Equilar Atlas". people.equilar.com. Retrieved 2017-02-17.
  44. "Executive Compensation & Stock Trading - Businessweek". Businessweek.com.

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