Selected papers of Allan Sproul /

"December 1980."

Includes bibliographical references.

In selecting and presenting these papers, Professor Ritter has served us well. His brief biography of Sproul is excellent, his chapter introductions put the various papers in context, and his selection of papers is well designed to help us understand
the man and his ideas. A few examples will suggest the nature of Sproul's approach to economic policy though they cannot do justice to the range of his ideas. He believed strongly that money not only matters but matters a lot; that money will not manage itself but must be managed; and that the dominant objective of monetary management should be to promote economic stability, including stability of the price level. But he was no "monetarist," as that term is interpreted today. For one thing, he would accord a stabilization role to fiscal policy as well as monetary policy. Also, he was adamantly opposed to inflexible rules that leave inadequate scope for discretionary human judgment. These papers provide the best available firsthand accounts of two historic controversies over monetary policy. One related to the policy followed during World War II and until March 1951, under which the Federal Reserve pegged prices and yields on government securities, inflation. The other related to an open-market policy called "bills only" or "bills usually," which was announced by the Federal Open Market Committee in March 1953 and abandoned only in February 1961.These papers also present Sproul's insightful comments on other subjects, such as gold standards, interest rate ceilings on deposits, the Vietnam War and its financing, and international financial aid. These papers help explain why Sproul's contemporaries respected him so deeply. He was indeed an extraordinary man.

rpm 02/05/2018

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