The Spirit of Benjamin Franklin

Dr. Mark Skousen, a sixth generation direct descendant of Ben Franklin, will be speaking as both Benjamin Franklin and as Mark Skousen with a Q & A to follow. Mark will touch on the topics of invention and entrepreneurship and how today's economy can influence inventing and entrepreneurship.

Mark Andrew Skousen is an American economist, investment analyst, newsletter editor, college professor and author.

Like Dr. Franklin, Dr. Skousen has been the author of an almanac, editor of a financial publication, successful entrepreneur, and a public servant.  He earned his Ph. D. in monetary economics from George Washington University in 1977.  Currently he holds the Benjamin Franklin Chair of Management at Grantham University.

In 2004-05, he taught economics and finance at Columbia Business School and Columbia University.  He has also taught at Bernard College, Rollins College and Mercy College.  Since 1980, Skousen has been editor in chief of Forecasts & Strategies, a popular award-winning investment newsletter.   He was an analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency, a columnist for  Forbes magazine, chairman of Investment U, and past president of the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) in New York.  He is the producer of FreedomFest, “the world’s largest gathering of free minds,” which meets every July in Las Vegas.  He has written for the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and the Christian Science Monitor, and has made regular appearances on CNBC’s Kudlow & Co. and C-SPAN Book TV.  His bestsellers include The Making of Modern Economics (M. E. Sharpe, 2009), The Big Three in Economics (M. E. Sharpe, 2007), and EconoPower (Wiley, 2008).  His financial books include Investing in One Lesson (Capital Press, 2007), and The Maxims of Wall Street (Eagle Publishing, 2012).  In 2006, he compiled and edited The Complete Autobiography by Benjamin Franklin (Regnery).  His latest book is A Viennese Waltz Down Wall Street:  Austrian Economics for Investors(Laissez Faire Books, 2013).

In honor of his work in economics, finance and management, Grantham University renamed its business school, “The Mark Skousen School of Business.”  He was recently named one of the top 20 living economists in the world (www.superscholar.org). 

He and his wife, Jo Ann, have five children and have lived in Washington, DC; Nassau, the Bahamas; London, England; Orlando, Florida; and New York.

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