Robert A. Lawson

Robert Lawson is the Jerome M. Fullinwider Centennial Chair in Economic Freedom and director of the Bridwell Institute for Economic Freedom in the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. He is a founding co-author of the Fraser Institute's Economic Freedom of the World annual report, which presents an economic freedom index for over 160 countries. Lawson has authored or co-authored over 100 academic publications and has over 15,000 Google Scholar citations. He is the co-author, with Benjamin Powell, of the Amazon Bestseller, Socialism Sucks: Two Economists Drink Their Way Through the Unfree World (Regnery Publishing). He is a senior fellow with the Fraser Institute, a member of the Mont Pelerin Society, past president (and current vice president) of the Association of Private Enterprise Education (APEE). He was awarded the Distinguished Scholar Award and Adam Smith Award by APEE. Lawson earned his PhD and MS in Economics from Florida State University and his BS in Economics from the Honors Tutorial College at Ohio University. He taught previously at Auburn University, Capital University, and Shawnee State University.