Henry Hazlitt as an Intellectual Middleman of “Orthodox Economics”

Henry Hazlitt was a public intellectual who had unusual strength in both economic reasoning and articulation and played a central role in communicating the ideas of classical, or “orthodox,” economics to the general public. He occupied a unique position in the mid-twentieth-century intellectual life in the United States as a prominent figure in the world of journalism— both as a literary critic and as an economist—and his influence extended to the discipline of economics where his work commanded the attention of professional economists. In his editorial writings in the Nation, the New York Times, and Newsweek, as well as in his best-selling book, Economics in One Lesson, in public speeches, and in numerous appearances on TV and radio, Hazlitt offered economic commentary to the current issues of his day and was fundamental in popularizing the ideas of free market economists from the 1930s through the 1960s.