Julian Simon facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Julian Lincoln Simon
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| Born | February 12, 1932 |
| Died | February 8, 1998 (aged 65) |
| Nationality | American |
| Institution | University of Maryland Cato Institute University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| Field | Environmental economics |
| School or tradition |
Chicago School of Economics |
| Influences | David Hume, Edward Gibbon, Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Adam Smith, Friedrich Hayek, William James |
Julian Lincoln Simon (February 12, 1932 – February 8, 1998) was an American professor who taught business administration at the University of Maryland. He also worked as a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute. Before that, he was a long-time professor of economics and business at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Simon wrote many books and articles, mostly about economic topics. He is best known for his ideas on population, natural resources, and immigration. Simon believed that human creativity and new technologies could solve problems like limited resources. He thought that even with more people, we could find new ways to live and prosper.
He is also famous for the Simon–Ehrlich wager, a bet he made with a scientist named Paul R. Ehrlich. Ehrlich thought the prices of five metals would go up over ten years because they would become scarce. Simon disagreed and bet they would go down. Simon won the bet because the prices of those metals actually dropped a lot during that time.
Contents
Simon's Ideas on Resources and People
Simon's 1981 book, The Ultimate Resource, challenged common beliefs about running out of resources. At the time, many people worried about population growth and using up too many raw materials. Simon argued that these worries often ignored how prices of raw materials had actually gone down over time.
Human Ingenuity: The Real Resource
Simon believed that as people become wealthier and technology improves, more resources become available. Even if physical supplies are limited, he thought they could be seen as endless economically. This is because old resources can be recycled, and new alternatives are often developed by the market.
He disagreed with the idea that more people would lead to problems like running out of food or resources. Simon argued that people are the solution to resource shortages and environmental issues. This is because people and markets are always finding new and innovative ways to solve problems. Famous economists like Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman praised his ideas.
Looking at Raw Material Prices
Simon studied different raw materials, especially metals, and their prices throughout history. He noticed that, apart from short-term ups and downs, the prices of raw materials usually stayed the same or even went down over time. For example, aluminium was never as expensive as it was before 1886. Also, steel used for medieval armor cost much more back then than modern steel does today. This showed that technology and new methods can make resources cheaper and more available.
His 1984 book, The Resourceful Earth, also challenged common ideas about population growth and resource use. It predicted that oil prices might even fall, which they did for almost 20 years before rising again.
Views on Environmental Issues
Simon was also a bit skeptical about claims that human activities caused major global environmental damage. For example, in 1994, he questioned some ideas about CFCs, ozone depletion, and climate change.
He also suggested that some environmental and health dangers, like those from lead pollution, DDT, and asbestos, had been "definitely disproved." He saw some of these concerns as more about personal opinions than hard facts.
How Simon Influenced Others
Simon was one of the people who started the idea of free-market environmentalism. This idea suggests that markets and individual choices can help protect the environment.
His ideas also inspired Bjørn Lomborg to write his book The Skeptical Environmentalist. Lomborg started his research to argue against Simon's views but changed his mind after looking at the data.
Simon also came up with the idea that airlines should offer money or other benefits to travelers who volunteer to give up their seats on overbooked flights. Before this, airlines would just pick random passengers to "bump" off the plane. His idea was a huge success and is still used today.
While not everyone agreed with all of Simon's arguments, his ideas helped change how people thought about population growth. It shifted from a very negative view to a more neutral one.
Famous Bets with Other Thinkers
The First Bet with Paul R. Ehrlich
Simon challenged Paul R. Ehrlich to a bet in 1980 about the price of metals ten years later. Ehrlich and his colleagues chose five metals they thought would become more expensive due to scarcity. Simon won the bet because the prices of all five metals actually dropped.
Some people who supported Ehrlich said that the price drop was due to an oil price spike in 1980 and a recession in 1990. However, Ehrlich himself chose the metals and called Simon's offer "astonishing" at the time.
The supply of three of these metals (chromium, copper, and nickel) actually increased during this time. Prices also went down for specific reasons:
- The price of tin dropped because people started using more aluminium, which is cheaper and more common.
- New mining technologies helped find huge amounts of nickel, which ended a near monopoly on the market.
- Tungsten prices fell because ceramics started being used more in cookware.
- The price of chromium dropped due to better ways of smelting it.
- The price of copper began to fall because of the invention of fiber optic cable. These cables are made from sand and can do many jobs that copper wire used to do.
In all these cases, better technology led to using existing resources more efficiently or finding cheaper replacements, just as Simon had predicted.
A Proposed Second Bet with Paul R. Ehrlich
In 1995, Simon suggested a second bet. Ehrlich refused, offering instead to bet on how human welfare would change. Simon and Ehrlich could not agree on what to measure, so the second bet never happened.
Bet with David South
In the same year, Simon also made a bet with David South, a professor at Auburn University. This bet was about timber prices. Simon bet that the price of pine timber would decrease over five years, while South bet it would increase. Simon paid South $1,000 before the five years were up because he saw that logging restrictions were driving up timber prices. Simon felt that government interference made the bet unfair according to his economic ideas.
Criticism of Simon's Ideas
Some people, like Jared Diamond in his book Collapse, and Albert Allen Bartlett, thought Simon was too optimistic. They felt some of his ideas didn't fully consider natural limits.
For example, Diamond argued that if the world's population kept growing at a steady rate, it would lead to extreme overpopulation much sooner than Simon suggested. Simon, however, believed that people don't become poorer as the population grows. He thought that more people would create what they needed and find ways to prosper, causing food prices to even drop.
Critics also found it hard to believe Simon's idea that it would be possible to create metals like copper from other elements. Simon believed that human needs for resources are small compared to the vastness of nature. He argued that physical limits play a minor role, and shortages of raw materials are usually local and temporary. Simon's main point was that human brainpower (which he called "The Ultimate Resource") is the most important thing. This allows human activities to continue for a very long time. For example, when copper became scarce, people switched to glass fiber networks for data and communication.
Herman Daly, an American economist, criticized Simon for making big mistakes and exaggerations. He disagreed with Simon's view that resources are not limited and that ecology and entropy (the idea that things naturally tend to disorder) don't matter.
Simon's View on Limited Natural Resources
Simon disagreed with the idea that natural resources are "finite" or limited. He said that the term "finite" is misleading when talking about resources. He argued that it's impossible to count how much of a resource, like copper, will ever be available. This is because:
- We can use copper more efficiently.
- We might create copper or something similar from other materials.
- We can recycle copper.
- We might even find copper from sources beyond Earth.
Because of these possibilities, Simon believed there are no real limits to where "copper" might come from.
Simon's Legacy
Many organizations have honored Julian Simon's work. The Institute for the Study of Labor created the Julian L. Simon Lecture to celebrate his work in population economics. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign held a special event to discuss his work and also set up an endowment in his name. India's Liberty Institute also hosts a Julian Simon Memorial Lecture. The Competitive Enterprise Institute gives out the Julian Simon Memorial Award each year to an economist who shares Simon's views.
Personal Life
Julian Simon was married to Rita James Simon, who was also a professor. Simon struggled with depression for a long time, which sometimes limited his work hours. He also studied the psychology of depression and wrote a book about how to overcome it. Simon was Jewish. He passed away from a heart attack at his home in Chevy Chase in 1998 when he was 65 years old.
Education
- BA, Harvard University, experimental psychology, 1953
- MBA, University of Chicago, 1959
- PhD, University of Chicago, business economics, 1961
Honors
- Doctor honoris causa (honorary doctorate), University of Navarra, (Spain), Economics, 1998
Works
- Simon, Julian (August 1981). The Ultimate Resource (Hardcover ed.). Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 069109389X. https://archive.org/details/ultimateresource00juli.
- Simon, Julian L (1996). The Ultimate Resource 2 (Paperback ed.). Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 0691042691. https://archive.org/details/ultimateresource00simo.
- The Resourceful Earth: A Response to "Global 2000" (1984), ISBN: 0-631-13467-0, Julian Simon & Herman Kahn, eds
- The Economic Consequences of Immigration into the United States
- Good Mood: The New Psychology of Overcoming Depression ISBN: 0-8126-9098-2
- A Life Against the Grain: The Autobiography of an Unconventional Economist ISBN: 0-7658-0532-4
- Scarcity or Abundance? A Debate on the Environment (1994), (with Norman Myers), ISBN: 0-393-03590-5
See also
In Spanish: Julian Lincoln Simon para niños
