Sidney Weintraub papers, 1938-1984

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Access restricted. Accessions 1984, 1993-0161, and 2009-0178 require additional arrangement, description, and/or screening because they are unprocessed. Contact Research Services for more information.
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Summary

Creator:
Weintraub, Sidney, 1914-1983
Abstract:
Sidney Weintraub (1914-1983) was a professor of economics at the University of Pennsylvania. This collection primarily documents his professional life through his correspondence, writings, and research. It forms parts of the Economists' Papers Archive.
Extent:
16 Linear Feet (26 boxes and one oversize folder)
Language:
Material in English.
Collection ID:
RL.01360

Background

Scope and content:

This collection documents Weintraub's research on inflation, wages and prices, unemployment, economic growth, and post-Keynesian monetary theory. Other significant topics include his work with the US government on economic policies and his travels in England during and after World War II.

The Correspondence series contains letters to and from Weintraub, who did much of his own typing. He preserved carbon copies of his letters to others, along with original letters sent to him by others. The bulk of this material is from when Weintraub was at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Waterloo. He regularly corresponded with a number of economists, including Joan Robinson, Martin Brofenbrenner, Nicholas Kaldor, Abba Lerner, Henry Wallich, John K. Galbraith, Roy Harrod, Francis Seton, E. Roy Weintraub (son), Alice Vandermeulen, G. C. Harcourt, and many others. He also corresponded with many non-economists, including Senators Barry Goldwater, William Proxmire, Gary Hart, and Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey. The 2009 accession largely consists of personal correspondence to Weintraub's wife, Sheila Ellen Weintraub, during World War II, and it documents his post-war travels.

The Subject Files series is the largest, comprising nearly one-fourth of the initial accession. This material grows out of research undertaken by Weintraub primarily from when he was attempting to influence government policy by promoting the merits of a taxed-based incomes policy (TIP). Of particular interest is the early work on the publication of Capitalism's Inflation and Unemployment Crisis and work that he did for the Canadian Institute for Economic Policy. There is material on the founding of the Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, such as correspondence with coeditor Paul Davidson and publisher M. E. Sharpe, Inc. There is some preliminary correspondence having to do with the publication and writing of Keynes and the Monetarists. There are files dealing with Weintraub's extensive national and international lecturing tours, with material from trips to Europe, Asia, and much of the US (including Puerto Rico). Finally, material on the writing of Modern Economic Thought, editorials for the New York Times, and the Puerto Rico Economic Quarterly is included.

The Writings series includes published and unpublished work by Weintraub and others. Of his own work, there are early versions and drafts of works later published. For example, one finds early work on "Keynes and the Monetarists and Other Essays" (1973) and Our Stagflation Malaise (1981). Several unpublished drafts can also be found, including portions of the uncompleted works "Economic Thought: 1945-1965" and "Economics of Capitalism and Keynesian Evolution: A Theory of Employment, Growth, Income Distribution, Inflation and Money, with Policy Implications." Finally, there are the completed, yet unpublished, works "Pricing Interstate Telephone Services: Some Aspects of FCC Regulations of the Bell System Pricing Policies" and "The Theory of the Structure of Interest Rates."

The Miscellaneous series contains other writings by Weintraub at different times in his professional career. Of particular interest is his testimony to various congressional committees and federal regulatory bodies. Also included are his handwritten notes on several graduate and undergraduate classes that he taught.

The Clippings series contains newspaper and magazine articles by Weintraub or about his economic theories. Included are letters to the editor from publications throughout the US and Canada. These articles mostly deal with aspects of TIP.

Both the Photographs and the Printed Material series are limited. The former contains only a few black and white publicity pictures from one or more of Weintraub's speaking tours. The latter houses only a few journal reprints. Of special interest in the Volumes subseries is an unpublished manuscript sent to Henry Wallich at the time of their first collaboration on TIP. It outlines, in detail, Weintraub's ideas on the subject from Wallich.

Biographical / historical:

Sidney Weintraub (1914-1983) was a white American academic economist who specialized in the post-Keynesian school of economics. He was best known for his proposal to use the federal income tax to discourage wage and price inflation in a tax-based incomes policy (TIP). Raised in New York, he studied at the London School of Economics before being forced to return to the United States at the outbreak of World War II. He earned a PhD from New York University in 1941 and began teaching at St. John's University following the war. He joined the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania in 1950, where he remained for the rest of his career. Weintraub also founded and coedited the Journal of Post Keynesian Economics.

Weintraub married Sheila Ellen Weintraub and had two sons, E. Roy and A. Neil Weintraub. E. Roy Weintraub is a professor emeritus of economics at Duke University.

Acquisition information:
The Sidney Weintraub papers were received by the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library as gifts in 1984, 1999-2001 and 2009.
Processing information:

Preliminary finding aid written by David J. Haas, January 1985.

Processed by Meghan Lyon, August 2009; Ted Holt, November 2009.

Encoded by Meghan Lyon, August 2009.

Accessions described in this collection guide: the original 1984 accession, 1999-0001, 2000-0423, 2001-0021, and 2009-0178.

Arrangement:

The Sidney Weintraub papers are arranged into seven series: Correspondence, Subject Files, Writings, Miscellaneous, Clippings, Photographs, and Printed Material.

Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Contents

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Restrictions:

Access restricted. Accessions 1984, 1993-0161, and 2009-0178 require additional arrangement, description, and/or screening because they are unprocessed. Contact Research Services for more information.

Terms of access:

The copyright interests in this collection have not been transferred to Duke University. For more information, consult the Rubenstein Library's Citations, Permissions, and Copyright guide.

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Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], Sidney Weintraub papers, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Duke University.

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