About
Thomas Sowell (born June 30, 1930) is an American economist, social theorist, and senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
Born in North Carolina, Sowell grew up in Harlem, New York. He dropped out of Stuyvesant High School and served in the Marine Corps during the Korean War. Upon returning to the United States, Sowell enrolled at Harvard University, graduating magna cum laude in 1958. He received a master's degree from Columbia University in 1959, and earned his doctorate in economics from the University of Chicago in 1968.
Sowell has served on the faculties of several universities, including Cornell University and University of California, Los Angeles. He has also worked at think tanks such as the Urban Institute. Since 1980, he has worked at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, where he presently serves as the Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy. Sowell writes from a libertarian conservative perspective. Sowell has written more than thirty books, and his work has been widely anthologized. He is a National Humanities Medal recipient for innovative scholarship which incorporated history, economics and political science.
His latest book, CHARTER SCHOOLS AND THEIR ENEMIES, was published in 2020.
Books & Articles
Includes links to purchase such classics as 'Basic Economics', now in it's 5th Edition and just as relevant 22 years into the 21st Century.
Career
Thomas Sowell's career is a testament to the courageous American individual rising from poverty in direct contradiction to the leftist and very racist victimhood mantra.
Commentaries
For current and archived columns visit this external link: JWR: Jewish World Review.
For comprehensive lists of books of collected columns, monographs, articles, essays, and book reviews, begin here at COLLECTED WRITINGS.
Favorite Quotations
'Nowhere at present is there such a measureless loathing of their country by educated people as in America.'
Some Thoughts About Writing
'It is hard for me to regard as a gift something that I worked at for more than a decade—unsuccessfully—before finally breaking into print.'
Speeches
Cultural Diversity: A World View
The Education of Minority Children
Suggested Readings
People who want to get a basic understanding on a particular subject, or who simply want to educate themselves more generally, often ask for a list of suggested readings. There are innumerable outstanding writings on many subjects but plainly written books that can take the reader from square one — little or no previous knowledge of the subject — to a fundamental understanding of the issues involved are all too rare. Here are some that I would recommend.
Contact
Thomas Sowell
Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow
The Hoover Institution
Stanford University
Stanford, California 94305