Morality versus Money: Hayek’s Move to the University of Chicago

In 1950, Friedrich Hayek abandoned the title of University of London Tooke Professor of Economics and Statistics, to become the Professor of Social and Moral Science at the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago (with an intervening Visiting Professorship at the University of Arkansas). The new title is commonly seen as a consolation prize after his failure to obtain a position in the Economics Department at the University of Chicago or, indeed, any other prestigious American universities. In fact, Hayek was recruited by the Committee on Social Thought: he viewed his position as ‘a scholar’s dream’ (Mitch 2010, 2011). The one prior attempt to consider Hayek by the Department of Economics had been in early 1946 (before Milton Friedman’s arrival), was unknown to Hayek and was not taken even moderately seriously by most members of the Chicago Department.