2016 Walton Award Honoree: EconTalk’s Russ Roberts

The Walton Award is presented to an individual who meets some or all of the following criteria:

• has taken an entrepreneurial or innovative approach to economic education;
• has shown exemplary dedication to improving economic education and the teaching of economics;
• has advanced the understanding of economics and the economic way of thinking;
• through  work in programs, teaching, writing, curriculum development, research or public support, has inspired students, teachers or the general public to appreciate economics

The FTE has chosen to honor Dr. Roberts for his innovative approaches to educating an ever-growing audience of students and the general public about the power of the economic way of thinking. His talent and expertise are on display every Monday morning when a new episode of the award-winning podcast, EconTalk, is released to an eager international audience of fans and subscribers. Conducted by Roberts and sponsored by Liberty Fund, Inc.,  EconTalk “features one-on-one discussions with an eclectic mix of authors, professors, Nobel Laureates, entrepreneurs, leaders of charities and businesses, and people on the street. The emphases are on using topical books and the news to illustrate economic principles. Exploring how economics emerges in practice is a primary theme.”

In addition to being an astute scholar, adept interviewer and accomplished conversationalist, Russ Roberts is a prolific writer whose credits include three novels introducing general audiences to powerful economic reasoning tools for critical thinking. The Price of Everything: A Parable of Possibility and Prosperity; The Invisible Heart; and The Choice: a Fable of Free Trade and Protectionism are also used widely in high school and university economics education. Roberts is also exploring the educational power of music and visual media, creating and starring in two popular (7 million YouTube hits) rap videos about the ideas of John Maynard Keynes and F.A. Hayek.

Russell Roberts is currently the John and Jean De Nault Research Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. He has held teaching positions at George Mason University, Washington University in St. Louis (where he was the founding director of what is now the Center for Experiential Learning), the University of Rochester, Stanford University, and the University of California at Los Angeles.