Lawrence H. White

Who is he: Lawrence H. White specializes in the theory and history of banking and money and is an economics professor at George Mason University teaching graduate level courses in monetary theory and policy. Dr. White is co-editor of Econ Journal Watch and on the board of associate editors of the Review of Austrian Economics. Dr. White is a contributing editor to the Foundation for Economic Education's magazine, The Freeman, and an adjunct scholar of the Cato Institute.

Dr. White, while not willing to place himself within the mainstream of Austrian economics, considers himself an "economist who values the Austrian tradition." White approaches banking from the standpoint of monetary economics. Dr. White's Free Banking in Britain focused famously on the competitive banking practices in Scotland for 128 years and the private fractional reserve system that was its foundational element.

While defending private fractional reserve systems from a historical standpoint, Dr. White is open to the possibility that historically some markets have found favor with a full reserve system. White believes that competition is the best way to adjudicate different approaches. Steve Hanke writes of Dr. White that he, "provides a uniquely insightful perspective into a difficult and controversial area, and his arguments and analysis are unbeatable."

Ironically, Lawrence White, a visiting scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, is known for wanting to do away with the Fed. Dr. White has often criticized the Fed and mercantilist central banking in general. Such banks, White holds, "divert money to the most vote-productive uses rather than the most economically productive uses."

Background: Dr. White received his A.B. from Harvard and his Ph.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr. White previously taught at New York University, the University of Georgia, and was F.A. Hayek Professor of Economic History at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

Professor White is the author of The Theory of Monetary Institutions (1999), Free Banking in Britain (2nd ed., 1995), and Competition and Currency (1989) and editor of The History of Gold and Silver (3 vols., 2000) and Free Banking (3 vols., 1993), among others.

Dr. White's articles on monetary theory and banking history have appeared in the American Economic Review, the Journal of Economic Literature, the Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking and other leading professional journals. In 2008 Lawrence White received the Distinguished Scholar Award of the Association for Private Enterprise Education.

Dr. White has been a visiting research fellow at the American Institute for Economic Research, a visiting lecturer at the Swiss National Bank, and a visiting scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.

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