Unfortunately I recently learned that Dr. Walter E. Williams passed away on December 2, 2020 at the age of 84. He died suddenly in his car not too long after teaching the final class of the semester for economics PhD students (the course ended at around 9:30 P.M) and then passing less than 12 hours later. His medical history would show that Walter had a history of hypertension and obstructive pulmonary disease. What many people may not know is that he drove two and half hours (each way) from his home in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania (Walter would fill his drives with recorded scientific lectures from The Teaching Company). Walter got his wish of wanting to be able to pass away after teaching his final course. Walter liked to remind people that he had been around for nearly a 1/3 since the country started in 1776 (which is mathematically accurate). Walter was an intellectual giant that had a profound change in my way of thinking of economics (Walter was actually tall too standing at 6'5). According to life long friend Thomas Sowell Walter was a black belt and did kick some butt in real life. Walter would spend most of his career trying to explain basic principals of economics to the masses and explaining why things like minimum wage, affirmative action, and other government policies while all sounding good didn't make any sense when examining the results.
I first learned about Walter Williams back on February 7, 2007 when I was in college and I can clearly remember working out (I was in college at the time on an elliptical and it was a Friday afternoon) and I use to watch Kudlow and Company and Walter came out and debated Gary Gensler who was a former Treasury undersecretary and I can remember Dr. Williams explaining in a clear manner why labor unions weren't good and why the minimum wage didn't make any sense either. What I recall was how unique Dr. Williams was compared to anyone I ever heard before. After this I spent more time following the work of Dr. Walter Williams and then learned about other economists such as Thomas Sowell and spent more time studying Milton Friedman (I was somewhat aware of Milton Friedman after his passing back in late 2006). At the time YouTube wasn't as big as it currently is but I remember going to Dr. Williams website and reading his syndicated columns. What was clear was that Walter could take economics a seemingly and boil it down into digestible and understandable pieces. I took micro and macroeconomics as an undergraduate back in the fall of 2005/spring of 2006. What I recall was the classes were mostly either graphs/math/memorization which lead me to believe economics was more difficult then it was. I realized after reading more from Dr. Williams how easy economics really is when you get to the basics.
What many people have not been aware of is Dr. Walter E. Williams put into practice his free market philosophy regarding his own personal wealth. Dr. Williams was able to command a $20,000-$30,000 speaking fee (at one point he was getting on a commercial flight 2-4 times per month which would say that just from speaking fees he was earning Walter could have been earning $600,000 to $1.2 million per year! The reality is the amount is probably substantially less because given he was teaching economics between September to December and January to June would reduce the ability to market his services. This doesn't include his income from teaching, his regularly published syndicated columns, or any fees from published books. His professorship was fully paid for my an endowment of the John M. Olin Foundation (Walter according to this video never met and he earned $175,000 per year towards the later end of his career. It should be pointed out that Walter also lived well as in 2010 he purchased a brand new Lexus LS 460 that was $70,000 at the time (it was published in an article in which he was trying to describe international trade. In addition to a all this he is was actually on the board of directors of Media General (for over a decade (from 2001-2011) and was the chairman of the audit committee. I am honestly surprised he was on more boards given he could run rings around most corporate board members when it comes to logic and reason.
I can recall Walter in a speech one time saying "You know if I don't tell you these things you may go the rest of your life not knowing them". The name of this blog is in some ways an ode to his saying of pushing back the frontiers of ignorance. Back in 2003, some friends of Walter had a toast/roast for him that was captured on video. In the video (around the 33 minute mark) Charles Koch discussed how he had at the time known Walter for nearly 20 years and their friendship. This video I was lead me to my curiosity of Charles Koch and Koch Industries which then lead to my fascination and lead to this blog posting more on Koch Industries than any other source available. In a way you could say this blog really was inspired my Walter Williams and created many positive things.
Walter turned out to live a good, rich, and fulfilling life, he lived 84 years on this earth (also especially true since he was a smoker/however he did work out). He lead a very productive life as a professor, economist, public figure, and no question woke up countless numbers of people to how economics truly works. What is even more interesting is that Walter who grew up in the Richard Allen housing project would lead a life as someone in the top 1% and in the year he was born (1936) the average life expectancy was less than 57 years old! My only wish is that Walter could have lived for another 184 years. Dr. Williams was one of the few defenders of personal liberty, individual rights, railed against the welfare state, and was against good sounding policies and was one of the few people I know that had the courage to do the right thing. His intellect, charm, wit, and take no prisoners' approach was rare and most likely won't ever be repeated again for many generations. You can look at the passing of Walter Williams as inspiring given that on the day he passed he taught his last course and just a few days before had his final syndicated column published which shows he maximized his marginal productivity.
No comments:
Post a Comment