Steven Horwitz

Steven Horwitz
Born February 7, 1964
Detroit, Michigan
Nationality American
School or tradition
Austrian School
Alma mater University of Michigan

Steven "Steve" Horwitz (born 7 February 1964) is an American economist of the Austrian School.

Early life and education

Horwitz was born in Detroit, Michigan to Ronald and Carol Horwitz. He was raised in Oak Park, Michigan and graduated from Berkley High School in Berkley, Michigan in 1981. He graduated cum laude with an A.B. in Economics and Philosophy from the University of Michigan in 1985, where he was also active with several libertarian student groups and where he wrote and performed with the Sunday Funnies/Comedy Company sketch comedy group.

He received his M.A. (1987) and Ph.D. (1990) in Economics from George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. At George Mason, he studied with Don Lavoie (who chaired his dissertation committee), George Selgin, Karen Vaughn, James M. Buchanan, Don Boudreaux, and Richard E. Wagner.

Professional history

In 1989, Horwitz joined the economics department of St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York, where he continues to be employed at present. In 1993, he was appointed the inaugural Flora Irene Eggleston Chair in Economics. He was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 1995 and to full professor in 2002. In 1999, he was awarded the annual Frank Piskor Lectureship, and in 2003 he was the recipient of the J. Calvin Keene award, which recognizes high standards of personal scholarship, effective teaching and moral concern. In 2007, Horwitz was elected by the faculty to one of six campus-wide Charles A. Dana Professorships.

At St. Lawrence, Horwitz served as the Associate Dean of the First Year from 2001–2007, overseeing the university’s First Year Program. He has a national reputation as an expert on living-learning programs and on teaching research and communication skills to first-year students. He was also Interim Director of the Center for Teaching and Learning in 2003–04.

Horwitz is a long-time faculty member at the summer seminars of the Institute for Humane Studies and the Foundation for Economic Education. In the summer of 2007, he was a visiting scholar at the Social Philosophy and Policy Center at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio. Horwitz is also an Affiliated Senior Scholar of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University in Arlington, Virginia, where he has conducted nationally-recognized research on the role of Wal-Mart and the Coast Guard in the response to Hurricane Katrina. He is also a Senior Fellow of the Fraser Institute in Canada and has been a member of the Mont Pelerin Society since 1996.

Most of Horwitz’s professional work has been in the area of monetary theory and macroeconomics from an Austrian school perspective, with his 2000 book Microfoundations and Macroeconomics: An Austrian Perspective best summarizing that work. He has also contributed to Austrian economics and the history of economic thought as well as the social thought of F. A. Hayek. In recent years, he has been exploring the economics and social theory of the family. His Open Letter to My Friends on the Left in September 2008 was a widely read libertarian analysis of the mortgage crisis and has been translated into five languages.

Horwitz has identified himself as a bleeding-heart libertarian and is a regular contributor to the bleeding-heart libertarians weblog.[1] He also blogs at Coordination Problem.

Personal life

Outside of his professional interests, Horwitz is a huge fan of hockey, especially the Detroit Red Wings, and classic rock, especially the Canadian band Rush. He combined his hobby and his professional life in a scholarly article on Rush in 2003.

Horwitz currently resides in Canton, New York with his wife Jody and his two children Andrew and Rachel.

Books and monographs

As author

Selected articles

As author or co-author

References

  1. "Posts by Steve Horwitz". Bleeding Heart Libertarians weblog.

External links