Richard W. Rahn

Senior Fellow

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Richard W. Rahn is a senior fellow of the Cato Institute and the Chairman of the Institute for Global Economic Growth. He is also a weekly economic columnist for The Washington Times, and serves on the editorial board of the Cayman Financial Review.

Dr Rahn served for two terms (2002-2008) as the first non-Caymanian member of the Board of Directors of the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority, which regulates the world's largest offshore financial center. In the 1980s, Dr. Rahn served as Vice President and Chief Economist of the Chamber of Commerce of the United States, Executive Vice President and Board member of the National Chamber Foundation, and as the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Economic Growth. Previously, he was the Executive Director of the American Council for Capital Formation. In 1990-1991, he served as the U.S. co-chairman of the Bulgarian Economic Growth and Transition Project. In 1982, President Reagan appointed Dr. Rahn as a member of the Quadrennial Social Security Advisory Council. During the 1988 Presidential campaign, he served as an economic advisor to President G.H.W. Bush.

In 1990, Dr. Rahn founded the Novecon companies, which included Sterling Semiconductor (now owned by Dow Corning). He continues to serve on boards of private companies.

Professor Rahn has taught at Florida State, George Mason, George Washington, and Rutgers Universities; and at the Polytechnic University of New York, where he served as head of the graduate Department of Management. He also was an instructor for the U.S. Air Force and the Washington economic advisor for New York Mercantile Exchange.

Dr. Rahn is a member of the Mont Pelerin Society. He serves as a member of the Board of: the American Council for Capital Formation, the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council, and the Institute for Research on the Economics of Taxation and as a member of the Board of Visitors of the Pepperdine University School of Public Policy.

Dr. Rahn has written hundreds of articles for newspapers and magazines such as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, The American Spectator, The Weekly Standard, National Review, and The National Interest. He has contributed to numerous books and professional journals and is the author of the book The End of Money and the Struggle for Financial Privacy (1999). As an economic commentator, he has appeared on such programs as the Today Show, Good Morning America, Kudlow and Co., Wall Street Week, MacNeil-Lehrer Newshour and Crossfire, and was a weekly commentator for Radio America. He has testified before the U.S. Congress on economic issues more than seventy-five times.

Dr. Rahn earned: a B.A. in economics at the University of South Florida, from which he received the "Distinguished Alumnus Award," an M.B.A. from Florida State University, a Ph.D. from Columbia University, and was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws by Pepperdine University.