Robert Higgs
1944- American economist · United States · On the map · Academics
Robert Higgs is an American economic historian and economist. He is known for research on the growth of the United States government, especially the ratchet effect, the idea that state power expands during wars and other crises and only partly recedes afterward, which he developed in Crisis and Leviathan (1987).
Robert Higgs is read about 26 times a day, in 12 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 13 June 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 60 days, one point a day.
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About this person
He is a retired senior fellow in political economy at the Independent Institute, where he founded and later served as editor at large of The Independent Review, and he has held faculty appointments at the University of Washington, Lafayette College, and Seattle University. In an essay he has described his political philosophy as a libertarian anarchism.
