José Piñera
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José Piñera (born October 6, 1948, in Santiago, Chile) is a Chilean free market economist and politician, best known for the implementation of the radical Chilean pension reform of 1981.
Piñera attended the Universidad Católica de Chile as an undergraduate. In 1974 he received his Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University and was Minister of Labor and Social Security (1978–1980) and Minister of Mining (1980–1981) in the cabinet of dictator Augusto Pinochet. As such he was responsible for three structural reforms: the creation of a retirement system based on private personal accounts (the AFP system), the design of a pro-employment labor code that also restablished democratic trade union elections, and the constitutional law on mining that established property rights in this key area of the Chilean economy. In 1981 he resigned from his position to fight for the transition to a democratic system and a free-market economy.[verification needed] In 1982 he reinitiated his magazine of opinion Economia y Sociedad. In 1990, after the successful and constitutional transition to democracy, he founded the "Proyecto Chile 2010" with the goal of making Chile a developed country at its bicentenary. In 1992, in an attempt to prove that the poor could understand free market solutions to their problems, he ran for city councillor in one of Santiago's poorest and leftists neighborhoods, Conchali, and got elected with the largest majority. In 1993 he ran as an independent candidate for President of Chile, coming in third out of six candidates. In 1994 he founded The International Center for Pension Reform to promote all over the world the pioneering Chilean pension model. He became also the co-chair of the Cato Institute's Project on Social Security Choice in 1995. He has written eight books and numerous articles.
[edit] Awards
- "Liberty Award for Opportunity" (1998), Americans for Hope, Growth and Opportunity
- "John S. Bickley Gold Medal" (1999), International Insurance Society
- "Hall of Fame" (2000), International Insurance Society
- "Champion of Liberty" (2003), Goldwater Institute
- "Liberty Award" (2005), Liberalni Institut, Prague
