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Title: William John Fellner papers
Date (bulk): 1975-1983
Collection Number: 87005
Contributing Institution: Hoover Institution Library and Archives
Language of Material: The collection is in English
Physical Description:
67 manuscript boxes, 1 card file box, 2 phonotape cassettes
(27.3 Linear Feet)
Abstract: Correspondence, speeches and writings, conference papers, reports, studies, testimony, charts, and statistics related to economic
conditions and governmental economic policy in the United States, and laissez-faire economic theory, including particularly
questions of unemployment, inflation, and monetary policy.
Creator:
Fellner, William, 1905-1983
Physical Location: Hoover Institution Library & Archives
Box 69 may not be used without permission of the Archivist. The remainder of the collection is open for research; materials
must be requested in advance via our reservation system. If there are audiovisual or digital media material in the collection,
they must be reformatted before providing access.
For copyright status, please contact the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
Acquired by the Hoover Institution Library & Archives in 1987.
[Identification of item], William John Fellner papers, [Box no., Folder no. or title], Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
| 1905 | Born, Budapest, Hungary |
| 1929 | Ph.D. in economics, University of Berlin |
| 1929-1938 | Partner in family business in Hungarian manufacturing industry |
| 1939-1952 | Member of economics faculty at University of California, Berkeley |
| 1942 | Author, A Treatise on War Inflation |
| 1946 | Author, Monetary Policies and Full Employment |
| 1949 | Author, Competition Among the Few: Oligopoly and Similar Market Structures |
| 1952-1973 | Professor of economics, Yale University |
| 1956 | Author, Trends and Cycles in Economic Activity: An Introduction to Problems of Economic Growth |
| 1956-1958 | Member, Executive Committee, American Economic Association |
| 1960 | Author, Emergence and Content of Modern Economic Analysis |
| 1965 | Author, Probability and Profit: A Study of Economic Behavior Along Bayesian Lines |
| 1969 | President, American Economic Association |
| 1970-1983 | Adviser, Brookings Panel on Economic Activity |
| 1972 | Author, with Phillip Cagan, Economic Policies and Inflation in the Sixties |
| 1973 | Author, with Phillip Cagan and Marten Estey, A New Look at Inflation: Economic Policy in the Early 1970s |
| 1973-1975 | Member, Council of Economic Advisors |
| 1973-1983 | Resident scholar, American Enterprise Institute |
| 1976 | Author, Towards a Reconstruction of Macroeconomics |
| 1983 | Died |
Scope and Content of Collection
The papers document the career of economist William John Fellner through correspondence, speeches and writings, conference
papers, reports, studies, testimony, charts, and statistics related to economic conditions and governmental economic policy
in the United States, and laissez-faire economic theory, including questions of unemployment, inflation, and monetary policy.
Feller immigrated to the United States in 1938, joining the economics faculty at the University of California, Berkeley. He
was a professor at Yale University from 1952 to 1973, after which he became a member of the Council of Economic Advisors.
The
Biographical file includes material from Fellner's memorial service, as well as his Festschrift.
The
Correspondence contains Fellner's letters to and from economists, including scholars associated with the American Enterprise Institute,
such as Phillip Cagan and Gottfried Haberler. These files often contain preliminary drafts of scholarly papers sent as enclosures.
Fellner wrote about a variety of topics in economics, including inflation, full employment, balance of payments, oligopoly,
and tax indexing. The
Speeches and writings include typescripts of Fellner's last published book,
Towards a Reconstruction of Macroeconomics, as well as typescripts and proofs of his scholarly articles.
Fellner was a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, where he directed the Contemporary Economic Problems
project to publish annual volumes on topics in economics. The
American Enterprise Institute file includes correspondence and papers submitted to the Contemporary Economic Problems project, as well as a transcript of a
presentation given by Friedrich August von Hayek in 1975.
After retiring from his professorial work, Fellner was involved in several economics organizations and boards. The
Subject file contains correspondence, memoranda, and conference papers related to groups such as the Brookings Panel on Economic Activity,
the Congressional Budget Office, the Council of Economic Advisors, and the Gold Commission.
A significant portion of the collection contains
Writings by others, mainly in the form of conference papers or preliminary drafts send to Fellner by other economists.
The collection includes
Sound recordings of the Public Policy Forums program. In a recording from 1977, Henry Aaron and Rudolph Penner discuss ways to avoid bankruptcy
of the Social Security program. A recording from 1982 contains an economic policy discussion with Phillip Cagan, William Fellner,
Rudolph Penner, and Herbert Stein.
Source: Connell, Carol M. Reforming the World Monetary System: Fritz Machlup and the Bellagio Group. London: Pickering & Chatto,
2013.
Milton Friedman Papers, Hoover Institution Library & Archives
Gottfried Haberler Papers, Hoover Institution Library & Archives
Fritz Machlup Papers, Hoover Institution Library & Archives
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Audiotapes
Free enterprise
Economics
Economists
United States -- Economic conditions -- 1945-
Monetary policy
United States -- Economic policy -- 1971-1981
Inflation (Finance)
Employment (Economic theory)
Council of Economic Advisers (U.S.)