My father and my daughter, 2004.
Daniel Klein
I am Professor
of Economics at George Mason University. I hold degrees from George
Mason University and New York University, where in both cases I studied
the classical liberal traditions of economics. My teaching focuses on
economic principles, public policy issues, and the liberal tradition of Adam Smith and Friedrich Hayek.
I've
published research on policy issues including toll roads, urban transit,
auto emission, credit reporting, and the Food and Drug Administration. I've also written on spontaneous order, coordinaton, the discovery of opportunity, the
demand and supply of assurance, why government officials believe in the
goodness of bad policy, why people favor government intervention more than they should, and the relationship between liberty, dignity, and
responsibility.
Lately my research dwells on Adam Smith. Russ Roberts and I produced a multipart audio book club on The Theory of Moral Sentiments.
I am the chief editor of Econ Journal Watch, an online journal dedicated to economic criticism from a Smith-Hayek viewpoint. I've contributed several papers on the character heterogeneity of economists. I push the point that the cleavages in character run deeper than is usually acknowledged. Like Gunnar Myrdal, I think that deep-seated ideological sensibilities play a role in one's purpose, basic formulations, and judgment throughout, and that candid communication calls for openness about own ideological sensibilities.
My sensibilities are libertarian/classical liberal. My "Mere Libertarianism" offers a definition of libertarianism as movement and political persuasion.
I have published several studies on the ideology of faculty in the social sciences (several studies coauthored with the Swedish sociologist Charlotta Stern and one with Christopher Cardiff).
I am the coauthor (with Adrian Moore and Binyam Reja) of Curb Rights: A Foundation for Free Enterprise in Urban Transit, editor of Reputation: Studies in the Voluntary Elicitation of Good Conduct, and editor of What Do Economists Contribute? I co-edited with Fred Foldvary a book The Half-Life of Policy Rationales: How New Technology Affects Old Policy Issues. I have coauthored with Alex Tabarrok an extensive Web site on the Food and Drug Administration (FDAReview.org).
I spend several months every year in Stockholm, where I am affiliated with the Ratio Institute as an Academic Advisor and Associate Fellow.
Here are links to my stuff.
My mother and my younger brother, 1965.