Williams, Walter E

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AI Overview

The late economist Walter E. Williams was a vocal critic of anthropogenic global warming theories and mainstream climate alarmism. In his nationally syndicated columns, he frequently argued that climate change predictions were fundamentally flawed and driven by political agendas rather than settled science. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]

His core arguments and perspectives on the topic include:

Flawed Past Predictions: He consistently pointed out that historical environmental and climate predictions—ranging from looming ice ages in the 1970s to predictions of ice-free Arctic summers and vanishing polar caps—failed to materialize. [1, 2, 3]

Skepticism of "Settled Science": He viewed the claim that climate science is "settled" as anti-scientific, arguing that all scientific theories must be subject to constant challenge and review. He cited scientists and researchers who dissented from the mainstream climate consensus. [1, 2, 3]

Rejection of Earth's Fragility: He argued that the Earth is not a fragile entity, asserting that mankind's impact is relatively minor compared to the massive parametric changes and destructive forces of nature throughout history (such as massive volcanic eruptions and meteor strikes). [1]

Economic Consequences: He argued that government policies and regulations designed to fight climate change would be incredibly costly, making the general public poorer and less free while redistributing global wealth. [1, 2]

CPI? 2015? SEE IHS BAK

For instance, to support assertions made in a recent, 67-page policy paper, Koch-supported American Encore regularly cites and quotes Mercatus Center research and mentions the center nearly a dozen times.

Among the academic work American Encore’s paper highlights: a 2014 Mercatus Center study by Keith Hall, a senior research fellow who had previously served as commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and a 2014 commentary about a federal regulations tracking and measurement tool by Patrick A. McLaughlin, another senior research fellow.

“Yet another study has confirmed what we already knew — states with lower taxes do better,” read an article by the Kochs’ flagship nonprofit, Americans for Prosperity, about a study published July 7 by the Mercatus Center. “Overall, the rankings provide more evidence that economic freedom works, and bigger government means bigger trouble.”

And the 60 Plus Association, a retiree-focused nonprofit that’s benefited from tens of millions of dollars of the Koch brothers’ money over the years, for a time tapped Walter Williams, a George Mason University economics professor, syndicated columnist and Rush Limbaugh Show fill-in host, as a member of its “truth squad.” His mission: to “battle” against Democrats on Social Security and Medicare programs.

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Global Warming, by Walter E.Williams - Creators Syndicate

Mar 11, 2015 — The next world climate summit in Cancun is actually an economy summit during which the distribution of the world's resources will ...

Creators Syndicate

Economist Walter Williams: Global warming and the cost of idiotic ...

Oct 9, 2019 — MORE ON FOXBUSINESS.COM ... ... In 1939, the U.S. Department of the Interior predicted that American oil supplies would last for o...

Walter E. Williams

Bradley Prize Winner 2017

Professor of Economics.

wwilliam@gmu.edu

(703) 993-1148

D158 Buchanan Hall

Department of Economics

George Mason University

Homepage of the Department of Economics at GMU.

Suppressing Free Speech

I receive loads of mail in response to my weekly nationally syndicated column. Some recent mail has been quite disturbing. Here’s a sample: “Given your support of freedom on a great many issues, I wish to bring to your attention the following George Mason University staff who have formally called on the President to use RICO statutes to punish organizations and individuals who dispute the ‘consensus’ of the” Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The writer goes on to say, “I am appalled that anyone associated with George Mason would so misuse the power of the Federal government.” The writer names 20 signatories, six of whom are GMU faculty members (http://tinyurl.com/nke4l5z).

This letter writer’s problem, like that of many others, is a misperception of George Mason University, where I am an economics professor. We have a distinguished economics department that can boast of having had two homegrown Nobel Prize winners on our faculty. Plus, we have a worldwide reputation as a free market economics department. The university can also boast of a distinguished law school with professors who, in contrast with many other law schools, have respect for the United States Constitution and the rule of law. We can boast of the excellent Law & Economics Center, too.

With this kind of intellectual firepower at George Mason University, most people assume that it is like its namesake, a libertarian or free market university. Little could be further from the truth. My university, at which I’ve toiled for 35 years, has a political makeup like that of most other universities – middle of the road to liberal/progressive. What distinguishes my liberal/progressive colleagues is that they are courteous and civilized, unlike many of those at universities such as the University of Massachusetts and the University of California, Berkeley.

So I investigated this call for the use of RICO, or the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. It turns out that Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., has called for the criminal investigation of people and organizations who are seen as global warming deniers. This would include lawsuits against the coal and oil industries, certain think tanks, and other organizations that question the global warming religion. By the way, so that Whitehouse and his gang don’t appear silly, they’ve changed their concern from global warming to climate change. That’s stupid in and of itself, for when has the climate not been changing, even before mankind arrived?

It turns out that George Mason University meteorologist Jagadish Shukla is the lead signatory of the letter sent to the president and attorney general asking them to use RICO laws to prosecute “corporations and other organizations that have knowingly deceived the American people about the risks of climate change.” This GMU professor calling for the prosecution of climate skeptics has been recently revealed as “climate profiteer.” From 2012 to 2014, this leader of the RICO 20 climate scientists paid himself and his wife $1.5 million from government climate grants for part-time work (http://tinyurl.com/p2c8nx3).

The effort to suppress global warming dissidents is not new. Grist Magazine writer David Roberts said, “When we’ve finally gotten serious about global warming, when the impacts are really hitting us and we’re in a full worldwide scramble to minimize the damage, we should have war crimes trials for these bastards – some sort of climate Nuremberg.” Professor Richard Parncutt has called for the execution of prominent “GW deniers.” Climate Progress Editor Joe Romm called for deniers to be strangled in their beds. James Hansen, who has headed NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, has likewise called for trials of global warming deniers.

The global warming agenda is a desperate effort to gain greater control over our lives. Political commentator Henry Louis Mencken (1880-1956) explained that “the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” That’s the political goal of the global warmers.

PROTO CLIMATE LOCKDOWN GREEN POLICE? TOTALITARIAN TYRANT BS GUBMINT

Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University. To find out more about Walter E. Williams and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

Suppressing Free Speech was published on October 07, 2015.

Fox Business

Walter E. Williams: More scientists speak out against global ...

Dec 24, 2008 — Recently, more and more scientists are summoning up the courage to speak out and present evidence against the global warming rope-

Deseret News

Williams: Predicting climate change has been wrong for decades

Mar 15, 2015 — In 2010, German economist and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change official Ottmar Edenhofer said, "One must say clearly that...

Lubbock Avalanche-Journal

Walter E. Williams: False environmental predictions | Opinion

Oct 14, 2019 — Lead, zinc, tin, gold and silver would be gone before 1990. Kenneth Watt said, “By the year 2000, if present trends continue, we w...

West Newsmagazine

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[### The Legacy of Walter Williams (January 2022)

Online Library of Liberty

https://oll.libertyfund.org › publications › liberty-matters](https://oll.libertyfund.org/publications/liberty-matters/the-legacy-of-walter-williams)

by B Theme — Lastly, Williams was a vocal skeptic of man-made climate change. He cited the numerous grossly inaccurate predictions of doom and gloom related to climate ...Read more

[### Walter Williams: Environmentalists are dead wrong

Lubbock Avalanche-Journal

https://www.lubbockonline.com › columns › 2017/05/01](https://www.lubbockonline.com/story/opinion/columns/2017/05/01/walter-williams-environmentalists-are-dead-wrong/14862525007/)

Apr 30, 2017 — Let's take a look at past predictions to determine just how much confidence we can have in today's environmentalists' predictions.Read more

[### Columnist Walter E. Williams believes that today's wild

Facebook

https://www.facebook.com › posts › columnist-walter-e...](https://www.facebook.com/PanamaCityNewsHerald/posts/columnist-walter-e-williams-believes-that-todays-wild-eyed-climate-change-predic/2930487650312214/)

Columnist Walter E. Williams believes that today's wild- eyed climate change predictions are just like all the wild-eyed climate change predictions of the past: ...

[### Oct. 17 Letter: Walter Williams' straw-man argument

Daily Press

https://www.dailypress.com › 2019/10/16 › oct-17-letter-...](https://www.dailypress.com/2019/10/16/oct-17-letter-walter-williams-straw-man-argument/)

Oct 16, 2019 — Mr. Williams argues against taking action to alleviate global warming by attempting to discredit the supporting science. However, all he's doing ...Read more

[### Walter Williams

Climate Action Campaign

https://www.actonclimate.com › person › walter-williams](https://www.actonclimate.com/person/walter-williams/)

“As a professional dedicated to energy and water conservation for most of my career, I am appalled at the lack of leadership, integrity and courage being ...Read more

Missing: E ‎| Show results with: E

[### Walter E. Williams: More scientists speak out against global ...

Deseret News

https://www.deseret.com › 2008/12/24 › walter-e-willia...](https://www.deseret.com/2008/12/24/20292852/walter-e-williams-more-scientists-speak-out-against-global-warming/)

Dec 24, 2008 — Recently, more and more scientists are summoning up the courage to speak out and present evidence against the global warming rope-a-dope.Read more

[### Walter Williams: Scientists: Dishonest or afraid? Dalton Daily Citizen

https://daltoncitizen.com › 2019/11/22 › walter-williams-...](https://daltoncitizen.com/2019/11/22/walter-williams-scientists-dishonest-or-afraid/)

The absolute worst case of professional incompetence and dishonesty is in the area of climate science. Tony Heller has exposed some of the egregious ...

[### Suppressing Free Speech – Walter E. Williams

walterewilliams.com

http://walterewilliams.com › suppressing-free-speech](http://walterewilliams.com/suppressing-free-speech/)

By the way, so that Whitehouse and his gang don't appear silly, they've changed their concern from global warming to climate change. That's stupid in and of ...

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AI Overview

The legendary Walter E. Williams was the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University. A towering figure in free-market economics, he frequently cited Friedrich Hayek as a foundational intellectual influence who shaped his libertarian philosophy. [1,, 3, 4]

Williams and the Austrian School

While Walter E. Williams took an eclectic approach to economic theory, he drew heavily from the Austrian School—particularly the works of Friedrich Hayek. He often referenced Hayek alongside other classical liberal thinkers like Milton Friedman and Ludwig von Mises in his teachings and autobiography. In his own classes, he emphasized that these scholars were foundational and timeless. [1,, 3, 4]

GMU Legacy and the Hayek Program

George Mason University is famously a powerhouse for classical liberal and libertarian economic thought. The university is home to the F.A. Hayek Program for Advanced Study in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at the Mercatus Center. Walter Williams taught at George Mason University for over 40 years before his passing in 2020, solidifying the school as one of the premier hubs for the economic traditions championed by Hayek. , 2, 3, 4]

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WIKI NO TALK Walter E. Williams - Wikipedia

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alter Edward Williams (March 31, 1936 – December 1, 2020) was an American economist, commentator, and academic. Williams was the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University, a syndicated columnist, and author. Williams held classical liberal and libertarian views,^[1] and wrote frequently for Townhall, WND, and Jewish World Review. Williams was also a popular guest host of The Rush Limbaugh Show when Limbaugh was unavailable.^[2]

Early life and education

Williams was born in Philadelphia on March 31, 1936.^[3] His family during childhood consisted of his mother, his sister, and him; Williams's father played no role in raising Williams or his sister.^[4] The family initially lived in West Philadelphia, and later moved to North Philadelphia's Richard Allen housing projects when Williams was ten years old. He attended and graduated from Benjamin Franklin High School in North Philadelphia.

After graduating from high school, Williams traveled to California, where he lived with his father and attended Los Angeles City College for one semester.^[5] He later returned to Philadelphia and secured a job as a cab driver for the Yellow Cab Company.^[6] In 1959, he was drafted into the military and served as a private in the United States Army.^[7][8]

While stationed in the South, Williams "waged a one-man battle against Jim Crow from inside the army." He challenged the racial order with provocative statements to his fellow soldiers, resulting in an overseeing officer filing a court-martial proceeding against Williams. Williams argued his own case and was found not guilty.^[7] While considering filing countercharges against the officer who brought the charges against him, Williams was transferred to South Korea. Upon arriving there, Williams marked "Caucasian" for race on his personnel form. When challenged on this, Williams replied wryly if he had marked "Black," he would end up getting all the worst jobs. From Korea, Williams wrote a letter to President John F. Kennedy denouncing the pervasive racism in the American government and military and questioning the actions black Americans should take given the state of affairs, writing:

Should Negroes be relieved of their service obligation or continue defending and dying for empty promises of freedom and equality? Or should we demand human rights as our Founding Fathers did at the risk of being called extremists? I contend that we relieve ourselves of oppression in a manner that is in keeping with the great heritage of our nation.^[7]

He received a reply from the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, Alfred B. Fitt, which Williams called "the most reasonable response that I received from any official."^[9]

Following his military service, Williams served as a juvenile group supervisor for the Los Angeles County Probation Department from 1963 to 1967.^[10] Williams also resumed his education, earning a bachelor's degree in economics in 1965 from California State College at Los Angeles (now Cal State Los Angeles).^[10] He earned both his master's degree and his PhD in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).^[11][12] Williams's doctoral thesis was titled The Low-Income Market Place.^[13]

Speaking of his early college days, Williams said: "I was more than anything a radical. I was more sympathetic to Malcolm X than Martin Luther King, because Malcolm X was more of a radical who was willing to confront discrimination in ways that I thought it should be confronted, including perhaps the use of violence. But I really just wanted to be left alone. I thought some laws, like minimum-wage laws, helped poor people and poor black people and protected workers from exploitation. I thought they were a good thing until I was pressed by professors to look at the evidence." During his time at UCLA, Williams came into contact with economists such as Armen Alchian, James M. Buchanan, and Axel Leijonhufvud who challenged his assumptions.^[14]

While Williams was attending UCLA, Thomas Sowell arrived on campus in 1969 as a visiting professor. Although he never took a class from Sowell, the two met and began a friendship that lasted for decades. In the summer of 1972, Sowell was hired as director of the Urban Institute's Ethnic Minorities Project, which Williams joined shortly thereafter.^[15] Correspondence between Sowell and Williams appears in "A Man of Letters," a 2007 autobiography authored by Sowell.^[16]

Career

During his doctoral studies, Williams was an instructor in economics at Los Angeles City College from 1967 to 1969, and at Cal State Los Angeles from 1967 to 1971.^[10]

After returning to his native Philadelphia, Williams taught economics at Temple University from 1973 to 1980.^[10] For the 1975–76 academic year, Williams was a visiting scholar at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.^[17]

In 1980, Williams joined the economics faculty at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. That same year, Williams began writing a syndicated column, "A Minority View", for Heritage Features Syndicate, which merged with Creators Syndicate in 1991.^[10] From 1995 to 2001, Williams chaired the economics department at George Mason University.^[18] Courses taught by Williams at George Mason include "Intermediate Microeconomics" for undergraduate students and "Microeconomic Theory I" for graduate students.^[19][20] Williams continued to teach at George Mason until his death in 2020.^[21]

In his nearly 50-year career, Williams wrote hundreds of research articles, book reviews, and commentaries for scholarly journals including American Economic Review, Policy Review, and Journal of Labor Research and popular journals including The American Spectator, Newsweek, Reason, and The Wall Street Journal.^[22]

Williams was awarded an honorary degree at Universidad Francisco Marroquín. He served on advisory boards including the Review Board of Economics Studies for the National Science Foundation, Reason Foundation, the National Tax Limitation Committee, and the Hoover Institute.^[10][18]

Beginning in 1982, Williams set about writing ten books, beginning with The State Against Blacks and America: A Minority Viewpoint.^[18] He wrote and hosted documentaries for PBS in 1985. The "Good Intentions" documentary was based on his book The State Against Blacks.^[23]

Economic and political views

As an economist, Williams was a proponent of free market economics and opposed socialist systems of government intervention.^[24] Williams believed laissez-faire capitalism to be the most moral, most productive system humans have ever devised.^[25]

In the mid-to-late 1970s, Williams conducted research into the Davis–Bacon Act of 1931 and on the impact of minimum wage laws on minority employment. His research led him to conclude the government's interventional programs are harmful. Williams was critical of state programs, including minimum wage and affirmative action laws, stating both practices inhibit liberty and are detrimental to the blacks they are intended to help. He published his results in his 1982 book The State Against Blacks, where he argued that laws regulating economic activity are far greater obstacles to economic progress for blacks than racial bigotry and discrimination.^[14] Subsequently, Williams spoke on the topic and penned a number of articles detailing his view that increases in the minimum wage price low skill workers out of the market, eliminating their opportunities for employment.^{[26][27][28][29}]

Williams believed that racism and the legacy of slavery in the United States are overemphasized as problems faced by the black community today. He pointed to the crippling effects of a welfare state and the disintegration of the black family as more pressing concerns. "The welfare state has done to black Americans what slavery couldn't do, and that is to destroy the black family."^[14] Although in favor of equal access to government institutions such as court houses, city halls, and libraries, Williams opposed anti-discrimination laws directed at the private sector on the grounds that such laws infringe upon the people's right of freedom of association.^[30]

Williams viewed gun control laws as a governmental infringement upon the rights of individuals, and argued that they end up endangering the innocent while failing to reduce crime.^[31] Williams also made the argument that the true proof of whether or not an individual owns something is whether or not they have the right to sell it. Taking this argument to its conclusion, he supported legalization of selling one's own bodily organs.^[32] He argued that government prohibiting the selling of one's bodily organs is an infringement upon one's property rights.^[33][34]

Williams praised the views of Thomas DiLorenzo,^[35] and wrote a foreword to DiLorenzo's anti-Abraham Lincoln book, The Real Lincoln.^[36] Williams maintained that the American states are entitled to secede from the union if they wish, as the Confederate states attempted to do during the Civil War,^[35] and asserted that the Union's victory in the Civil War allowed the federal government "to run amok over states' rights, so much so that the protections of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments mean little or nothing today."^[36]

In reaction to what he viewed as inappropriate racial sensitivity that he saw hurting blacks in higher education, Williams began in the 1970s to offer colleagues a "certificate of amnesty and pardon" to all white people for Western Civilization's sins against blacks – and "thus obliged them not to act like damn fools in their relationships with Americans of African ancestry." It is still offered to anyone. The certificate can be obtained at his website.^[37]

Williams was opposed to the Federal Reserve System,^[38] arguing that central banks are dangerous.^[39]

In his autobiography, Williams cited Frédéric Bastiat, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek, and Milton Friedman as influences that led him to become a libertarian.^[40] Williams praised Ayn Rand's Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal as "one of the best defenses and explanations of capitalism one is likely to read."^[41]

Aside from authoring his weekly columns, Williams was a frequent guest host for Rush Limbaugh's radio program when Limbaugh was away traveling. In 2009, Greg Ransom, a writer for the Ludwig von Mises Institute, ranked Williams as the third-most important "Hayekian" Public Intellectual in America, behind only Thomas Sowell and John Stossel.^[42] Reason called Williams "one of the country's leading libertarian voices."^[7]

Personal life

Beginning in 1973, Williams lived in Devon, Pennsylvania.^[43] He was married to Connie (née Taylor) from 1960 until her death in 2007. They had one daughter.^[44] When he began teaching at George Mason University, he rented a cheap hotel room in Fairfax, Virginia, where he lived from Tuesdays through Thursdays around his teaching schedule.^[45] Williams was a cousin of Julius Erving, a professional basketball player with the Philadelphia 76ers.^[46] JOKE?

Williams served on the board of directors of Media General, parent company of the Richmond Times-Dispatch, from 2001 until his retirement from the board in 2011. He was also chairman of the company's audit committee.

Death

On December 1, 2020, Williams died in his car in Fairfax, Virginia, shortly after teaching a class at George Mason University, at age 84.^[21] His daughter said that he suffered from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and pulmonary hypertension.^[3] Shortly before his death, Williams was featured in the documentary, Uncle Tom, where he provided commentary on conservatism within the black community and discussed his own perspective as a black conservative.

Bibliography

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MERCATUS OFF BS

Former Distinguished Affiliated Scholar

Walter E. Williams was a Distinguished Affiliated Scholar at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. He was also the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University and held a BA degree in economics from California State University and MA and PhD degrees in economics from UCLA. In addition, he held a Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Virginia Union University.

He served on the faculties of Los Angeles City College, California State University at Los Angeles, and Temple University in Philadelphia. Dr. Williams authored over 150 publications which appeared in scholarly journals such as Economic Inquiry, American Economic Review, Georgia Law Review, Journal of Labor Economics, Social Science Quarterly, and Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy and popular publications such as Newsweek, Ideas on Liberty, National Review, Reader's Digest, Cato Journal, and Policy Review.

He authored ten books including The State Against Blacks, which was made into a television documentary entitled, "Good Intentions."His 2010 autobiography, Up from the Projects: An Autobiography, served as the basis for a 2014 PBS documentary, “Suffer No Fools.” In addition to his books and academic works, Dr. Williams wrote a nationally syndicated weekly column that was carried by approximately 140 newspapers and several web sites.

Financial information:

Dr. Walter Williams - Professor of Economics, George Mason University Fairfax, Virginia; serves on advisory boards of: Landmark Legal Foundation, Institute of Economic Affairs, Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation and others

As an officer, director and/or owner of publicly traded securities, Walter E. Williams has filed documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission. >> See filings