Walter Wolfgang Heller

Background

Heller was born in Buffalo, New York, to German immigrants, Gertrude (Warmburg) and Ernst Heller, a civil engineer

Education

AB, Oberlin College, 1935. Doctor of Laws, Oberlin College, 1964. Master of Arts, University Wisconsin, 1938.

Doctor of Philosophy, University Wisconsin, 1941. Doctor of Laws, University Wisconsin, 1969. Doctor of Letters, Kenyon College, 1965.

Doctor of Laws, Ripon College, 1967. Doctor of Laws, Long Island University, 1968. Doctor of Humane Letters, Coe College, 1967.

Doctor of Humane Letters, Loyola University, 1970. Doctor of Humane Letters, Roosevelt University, 1976.

Career

After attending Shorewood High School in Shorewood, Wisconsin, he entered Oberlin College in 1931, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1935. Heller received his masters and doctorate degrees in economics from the University of Wisconsin. As a Keynesian, he promoted cuts in the marginal federal income tax rates.

This tax cut, which was passed by President Lyndon B. Johnson and Congress after Kennedy"s death, was credited for boosting the United States. economy.

Heller developed the first "voluntary" wage-price guidelines. When the steel industry failed to follow them, it was publicly attacked by Kennedy and quickly complied.

Heller was one of the first to emphasize that tax deductions and tax preferences narrowed the income tax base, thus requiring, for a given amount of revenue, higher marginal tax rates. The historic tax cut and its positive effect on the economy has often been cited as motivation for more recent tax cuts by Republicans.

The day after Kennedy was assassinated, Heller met with President Johnson in the Oval Office.

To get the country going again, Heller suggested a major initiative he called the "War on Poverty", which Johnson adopted enthusiastically. Later, when Johnson insisted on escalating the Vietnam War without raising taxes, setting the stage for an inflationary spiral, Heller resigned. In the early phases of his career, Heller contributed to the creation of the Marshall Plan of 1947, and was instrumental in re-establishing the German currency following World World War II, which helped usher an economic boom in West Germany.

Heller joined the University of Minnesota faculty as an associate professor of economics in 1945, left for a few years to serve in government, and returned in the 1960s, eventually serving as chair of the Department of Economics.

He built it into a top-ranked department with spectacular hires, including Nobel Prize winners Leonid Hurwicz (2008) and Edward C. Prescott (2004). Heller died in Silverdale, Washington.

Achievements

• Walter Wolfgang Heller has been listed as a noteworthy economist, educator, economist by Marquis Who's Who.

Works

More photos

• book

  • New dimensions of political economy, (The Godkin lectures at Harvard University)

    ( Walter W. Heller was Chairman of the Council of Econom...)

  • New Dimensions fo Political Economy
  • New Dimensions fo Political Economy
  • New dimensions of political economy, by Walter W. Heller
  • New Dimensions of Political Economy, the Godkin Lectures at Harvard Univers Ity,
  • Revenue Sharing and the City (RFF Press)
  • The Economy Old Myths and New Realities
  • Economy Old Myths and New Realities
  • Economy: Old Myths and New Realities
  • The economy : old myths and new realities
  • Revenue Sharing and the City
  • Economy: Old Myths and New Realities

Views

I am one of those fortunate individuals who has been able to realise his youthful professional ambitions, namely, a combined career of teaching, research and public service. Teaching and research, especially in taxation and public finance, dominated the first couple of decades of my career. My research was largely concentrated in federal and State income taxation and intergovernmental relations.

Early on, the opportunity to apply some of my training and experience to public policy questions came, first, as an economic analyst for the United States Treasury Department, working on war finance with Roy Blough, Milton Friedman, Albert G. Hart, Joseph Pechman and others, and second, as Chief of Internal Finance and tax adviser to General Lucius Clay, United States Military Governor of Germany 1947-1948. Foreign a time in the early-1950s, working as a consultant with the United Nations and as a summer teacher and researcher at Harvard, I worked and wrote on fiscal policy for less developed countries, with special applications in the field of general taxation and agricultural taxation. Serving as tax adviser to King Hussein and the Royal Commission of Jordan in 1960 and later as Chairman of the Group of Fiscal Experts for Organisation for Economic Company-operation and Development gave me an opportunity to apply some of these and other ‘lessons’ in public finance to practical policy problems. Since serving as Chairman of the President"s Council of Economic Advisers under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson in 1961-1964, my career interests have shifted even more to the translation of economic analysis and research into public policy.

Coupled with that has been an emphasis on the wider dissemination of economic ideas and findings to the informed lay public and policy-makers in business, finance and the government.

Membership

Member Carnegie Commission on the Future of Public Broadcasting, 1977—1978. Trustee Oberlin College, 1966—1978, 1985—1987, German Marshall Fund, College Retirement Equities Fund, 1968—1972, Lupus Foundation American, Inc., chairman national campaign committee. Fellow: American Academy Arts and Sciences, American Philosophical Society, American Economic Association (distinguished, vice president 1967-1968, president 1974).

Member: National Bureau Economic Research (director, chairman 1971-1974, 1982-1983), International Management and Development Institute (associate), Skylight (Minneapolis), Alpha Kappa Psi, Beta Gamma Sigma, Phi Beta Kappa.

Interests

• 010 General Economics. 310 Domestic Monetary and Fiscal Theory and Insdtutions.

Connections

Married Emily K. Johnson, September 16, 1938 (deceased ). Children: Walter P., Eric J., Kaaren Louise.

Father:

Ernst Heller

Mother:

Gertrude (Warmburg) Heller

Spouse:

Emily K. Johnson

child:

Kaaren Louise Heller

child:

Eric J. Heller

child:

Walter P. Heller