William Horace Oakland (February 21, 1939 – September 17, 2007) was an American

Economist An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, 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 ...

and Economics Professor at

Tulane University Tulane University, officially the Tulane University of Louisiana, is a private university, private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by seven young medical doctors, it turned into ...

. Born in Chicopee, Massachusetts, Oakland received his BA in Economics from the University of Massachusetts in 1961 and Ph.D in Industrial Economics from the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

in 1965. In addition to being a professor at Tulane University, Oakland served as the Chair of the Economics Department from 1981–1987 and from 1992–1998, Director of the

Murphy Institute The Murphy Institute is a research and educational center that supports a number of academic programs in the fields of political economy and ethics at Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. History The Murphy Institute was founde ...

of Political Economy from 1980–1981, and Director of the Center of Public Policy Studies from 1998-2003. Oakland retired from Tulane University in 2003 and died on September 17, 2007. Prior to teaching at Tulane University, Oakland was the Assistant Professor of Political Economy for

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hem ...

from 1964–1970, Associate Professor of Political Economy for Johns Hopkins University from 1970–1973, and Professor of Economics and Public Administration for

Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...

from 1973-1979. Oakland has made many contributions to

public economics Public economics ''(or economics of the public sector)'' is the study of government policy through the lens of economic efficiency and equity. Public economics builds on the theory of welfare economics and is ultimately used as a tool to improve ...

. He authored/co-authored over 40 scientific publications in prominent economic periodicals. Much of Oakland's work focuses on a few key issues such as taxation, public goods, and welfare.

''Public Goods, Perfect Competition, and Underproduction''

A prominent paper written by Oakland was ''Public Goods, Perfect Competition, and Underproduction''. In this paper, Oakland argues that "atomistic" competition will cause an allocation of public goods which is suboptimal and is inefficiently allocated. He also presents the idea that prices for individual units of a public good will vary but the prices for the public good will not vary across consumers. The paper was published in 1974.

Analysis of post-Katrina New Orleans

Oakland had studied the economics of the city of

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

for many years and following the damage caused by

Hurricane Katrina Hurricane Katrina was a destructive Category 5 Atlantic hurricane that caused over 1,800 fatalities and $125 billion in damage in late August 2005, especially in the city of New Orleans and the surrounding areas. It was at the time the cost ...

, Oakland contributed by performing an analysis to explain the low amount of population return to the area. Oakland’s analysis stated that historically high levels of unemployment and limited job mobility in New Orleans were the root cause of this issue. According to Oakland’s study, there was a very high unemployment rate in the New Orleans area before Hurricane Katrina affected it and this was largely because of the limited job mobility caused by high concentrations of the city’s poorest people living in a few areas. Oakland was quoted in the ''New York Times'' regarding his analysis, “Where there are high concentrations of poverty, people can’t see a way out. Maybe the diaspora is a blessing.” Oakland's analysis showed that the living conditions in New Orleans were not attractive for the poor to begin with and Hurricane Katrina provided an exit from those conditions, resulting in the lack of interest to return to the area.

Honors received

Brookings Institution The Brookings Institution, often stylized as simply Brookings, is an American research group founded in 1916. Located on Think Tank Row in Washington, D.C., the organization conducts research and education in the social sciences, primarily in ec ...

Fellow (1963–1964) # Woodrow Wilson Fellow (1961–1963) # Who's Who in America (1986)

References

# http://www.tulane.edu/~economic/faculty/woakland.html # http://www.tulane.edu/~economic/vita/oakland.pdf # https://www.jstor.org/stable/1829175 # https://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/21/us/nationalspecial/21orleans.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1 {{DEFAULTSORT:Oakland, William Horace 1939 births 2007 deaths Tulane University faculty University of Massachusetts Amherst College of Social and Behavioral Sciences alumni Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni People from Chicopee, Massachusetts Economists from Massachusetts 20th-century American economists