Robert Ralph Neild (10 September 1924 – 18 December 2018) was a Professor of

Economics Economics () is the social science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and intera ...

Cambridge University , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

. Robert Neild was born in Hertfordshire in 1924, and was educated at

Charterhouse School (God having given, I gave) , established = , closed = , type = Public school Independent day and boarding school , religion = Church of England , president ...

and

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by Henry VIII, King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge ...

. Elected a Fellow of Trinity in 1971, he has also served on the Secretariat of the UN Economic Commission for Europe and has held posts in the UK

Cabinet Office The Cabinet Office is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for supporting the prime minister and Cabinet. It is composed of various units that support Cabinet committees and which co-ordinate the delivery of government objecti ...

HM Treasury His Majesty's Treasury (HM Treasury), occasionally referred to as the Exchequer, or more informally the Treasury, is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for developing and executing the government's public finance policy and ec ...

(its first Economic Advisor in the 1960s) and at the MIT Center for International Studies, India Project. A former Deputy Director of the

National Institute for Economic and Social Research The National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR), established in 1938, is Britain's oldest independent economic research institute. The institute is a London-based independent UK registered charity that carries out academic researc ...

, he was in 1966 appointed as founding Director (with Alva Myrdal and then Gunnar Myrdal as chairman) of the

Stockholm International Peace Research Institute Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) is an international institute based in Stockholm. It was founded in 1966 and provides data, analysis and recommendations for armed conflict, military expenditure and arms trade as well a ...

(SIPRI) and has held other influential posts in commerce and on advisory bodies. In that same year, he was appointed by

Harold Wilson James Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx, (11 March 1916 – 24 May 1995) was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from October 1964 to June 1970, and again from March 1974 to April 1976. He ...

as a member of the Fulton Committee on the Civil Service. Widely published on issues concerned with economics and peace studies, Neild was also the author of ''The English, The French and the Oyster''. Written on his retirement and spurred by a holiday in France, this is a historical-economic exploration of relative prices of oysters in Britain and France and the political and economic origins of these. He also wrote ''Public Corruption: The Dark Side of Social Evolution'' (Anthem Press). Among memorable quotes, Neild, rebuffing Blair’s claims about Saddam Hussein's alleged biological weapons, wrote: 'To say that the UN inspectors found "enough to have killed the world's population several times over" is equivalent to the statement that a man in his prime can produce a million sperm any day, therefore he can produce a million babies a day. The problem in both cases is that of delivery systems.' He died on 18 December 2018 at the age of 94.Neild
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References

1924 births 2018 deaths British economists Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge Members of the Fabian Society People educated at Charterhouse School {{UK-economist-stub