10 Facts About Beardsley Ruml

Beardsley Ruml was an American statistician, economist, philanthropist, planner, businessman and man of affairs in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s.

Beardsley Ruml's mother, Salome Beardsley Ruml, was a hospital superintendent.

Beardsley Ruml viewed society as composed of groups whose traits could be measured and ranked on a scale of normality and deviance.

Beardsley Ruml was an advisor to President Herbert Hoover, especially on farm issues.

Beardsley Ruml was not popular with the faculty and in 1934 Ruml became an executive of Macy's, parent company of the department store, rising to chairman in 1945.

Beardsley Ruml served as a director of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, and was its chairman from 1941 until 1946; he was active at the Bretton Woods Conference, which established the international monetary system.

Beardsley Ruml was active in New Deal planning agencies, but his plans never saw fruition.

Beardsley Ruml proposed an abatement on the previous year's taxes, making up the revenue by immediately collecting on the current year's taxes.

In 1945, Beardsley Ruml made a famous speech to the ABA, asserting that since the end of the gold standard, "Taxes for Revenue are Obsolete".

Beardsley Ruml wrote several books and essays, including The Interest Rate Problem, Memo to a college trustee: A report on financial and structural problems of the liberal college, Government, Business, and Values, and Tomorrow's Business.