Max Otto Lorenz (; September 19, 1876 – July 1, 1959) was an American

economist An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this field there are ...

who developed the

Lorenz curve In economics, the Lorenz curve is a graphical representation of the distribution of income or of wealth. It was developed by Max O. Lorenz in 1905 for representing inequality of the wealth distribution. The curve is a graph showing the proportio ...

in an undergraduate essay. He published a paper on this when he was a doctoral student at the

University of Wisconsin–Madison A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United Stat ...

. His doctoral thesis (1906) was on 'The Economic Theory of Railroad Rates' and made no reference to perhaps his most famous paper. The term "

" for the measure Lorenz invented was coined by Willford I. King in 1912. He was of German ancestry, his father having been born in Essen in the Rhine Province of the

Kingdom of Prussia The Kingdom of Prussia (german: Königreich Preußen, ) was a German kingdom that constituted the state of Prussia between 1701 and 1918. Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. ...

in 1841. He was active in both publishing and teaching and was at various times employed by the U.S.

Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal Statistical System of the United States, U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the Americans, Ame ...

, the U.S. Bureau of Railway Economics, the U.S. Bureau of Statistics and the U.S. Interstate Commerce Commission. In 1917 he was elected as a

Fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

of the

American Statistical Association The American Statistical Association (ASA) is the main professional organization for statisticians and related professionals in the United States. It was founded in Boston, Massachusetts on November 27, 1839, and is the second oldest continuousl ...

.List of ASA Fellows
retrieved 2016-07-16. He was married to Nellie, and fathered three sons.

External links

* Lorenz, M. O. (1905). ''Methods of measuring the concentration of wealth'' Publications of the

. Vol. 9 (New Series, No. 70) 209–219. * Richard T. Ely, Adams, Thomas A. Adams, Max O. Lorenz, and Allyn Young (1908). ''Outlines of Economics''. New York: Macmillan. * King, W.I. (1912). ''The Elements of Statistical Method''. New York: Macmillan. * A discussion of generalised Lorenz curves

* Some history of economists from the

school around

John R. Commons John Rogers Commons (October 13, 1862 – May 11, 1945) was an American institutional economist, Georgist, progressive and labor historian at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Early years John R. Commons was born in Hollansburg, Ohio on ...

* *

References

1876 births 1959 deaths University of Wisconsin–Madison alumni University of Iowa alumni Fellows of the American Statistical Association People from Sunnyvale, California American people of German descent Economists from California People from Burlington, Iowa Economists from Iowa {{US-economist-stub