Leo Wolman
| Leo Wolman | |
|---|---|
| Born |
February 24, 1890 Baltimore, Maryland, U.S. |
| Died | October 2, 1961 (aged 71) New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Nationality | Polish American |
| Occupation | Economist |
| Known for | Labor economist, public service |
Leo Wolman (February 24, 1890 – October 2, 1961) was a noted American economist whose work focused on labor economics. He also served on a number of important boards and commissions for the federal government.
Wolman was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1890 to Morris and Yetta (Wachsman) Wolman, first generation Polish-Jewish immigrants to the United States. He attended Johns Hopkins University, receiving his A.B. degree in 1911 and his Ph.D. in political economy in 1913.
After receiving his doctorate, Wolman worked as a special agent for the Commission on Industrial Relations, a U.S. federal government commission which investigated industrial working conditions in the United States from 1912 to 1915. Returning to academia after the Commission ended its work, he taught at Hobart College, Johns Hopkins University, and the University of Michigan. After the United States entered World War I in 1917, he served on the Council of National Defense (a U.S. federal government agency which advised the President on economic production issues) and later was appointed head of the section on production statistics of the War Industries Board. In 1919, he served six months with the American Peace Mission which negotiated the Treaty of Versailles.
Returning to the U.S. in late 1919, Wolman joined the faculty at the New School for Social Research, where he remained for 19 years. In 1920, he became director of research for the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union (ACWU), resigning in 1931. In 1922 he was elected as a Fellow of the American Statistical Association. During this time, he was a director of the Amalgamated Bank of Chicago and the Amalgamated Bank of New York, banks owned by the ACWU, and Amalgamated Investors, Inc., an ACWU-owned investment trust. He became a freelance researcher for the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) in the mid-1920s, and formally joined the staff in 1931, directing its labor research programs and in time becoming director-at-large for research. A number of studies he authored for NBER became the subject of national attention and debate, including a 1925, he report on the size and strength of labor unions in the United States, a 1929 study on changes in patterns of consumption and the effect on standards of living, and a 1930 report on the role of public works in helping reduce unemployment. Although he increasingly disassociated himself from the labor movement after the early 1930s, he still supported unions in certain circumstances. For example, he was one of many educators who signed an open letter denouncing violence against labor union members in the "Harlan County War" in 1932.
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