Henry Calvert Simons
Henry Calvert Simons | |
|---|---|
| Born | October 9, 1899 Virden, Illinois, U.S. |
| Died | June 19, 1946 (aged 46) Chicago, Illinois, U.S. |
| Academic background | |
| Education | University of Michigan (BA) University of Chicago |
| Influences | Frank H. Knight |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Economics |
| School or tradition | Chicago School of Economics |
Henry Calvert Simons (/ˈsaɪmənz/; October 9, 1899 – June 19, 1946) was an American economist at the University of Chicago. A protégé of Frank Knight, his antitrust and monetarist models influenced the Chicago school of economics. He was a founding author of the Chicago plan for monetary reform that found broad support in the years following the 1930s Depression, which would have abolished the fractional-reserve banking system, which Simons viewed to be inherently unstable. This would have prevented unsecured bank credit from circulating as a "money substitute" in the financial system, and it would be replaced with money created by the government or central bank that would not be subject to bank runs.
Simons is noted for a definition of economic income, developed in common with Robert M. Haig, known as the Haig–Simons equation.