A Roland Fryer Primer

The life and work of a brilliant young economist

TGS regulars will no doubt be familiar with the name Roland Fryer. He’s one of the most gifted economists of his generation, and that’s not just me bragging on my friend and former student. At age 30, Roland became the youngest African American to receive tenure at Harvard in any department. He is the recipient of many awards, including a MacArthur “Genius Grant” and the Clark Medal (they don’t just hand those out to anybody). He’s racked up more prestigious fellowships, lecture invitations, and appointments than you can count. And the guy is not even 50 years old yet.

As an economist, I can tell you that Roland’s work merits every single one of these accolades. Two of his projects stand out. The first is a series of massive studies he did in education. This culminated in Roland convincing a public high school in Houston to allow him to redesign their teaching and management practices using insights gleaned from charter schools. Never mind how much work went into the experiment design and analysis (a lot). How do you persuade a principal to hand over their students for such an experiment? How do you get buy-in from the parents, faculty, and staff? It’s a monumental achievement at all levels.

The other study that stands out is a data analysis of police interactions with suspects. Roland found that, while blacks and Latinos are indeed more likely than whites to have interactions with the police, they are no more likely than whites to be shot by the police. Many, many people—including Roland!—found this result shocking. It cuts against not just left-wing ideological assumptions, but what I think had been the commonsense thinking of most people in America. You can imagine the kind of pushback he received.

It takes tremendous skill to pull off these sorts of studies; it also takes tremendous guts. Luckily for us, Roland possesses both. Years ago, I had Roland on my own show. But last month he appeared on Ian Rowe and Nique Fajors’ excellent podcast, Invisible Men, which they have generously allowed me to repost here. It’s a two-parter. In the first part, Roland describes his challenging early life and his discovery of economics. The second part is dedicated to a discussion of his past and current work. Roland has an ebullient personality, so I think you’ll find it both enjoying and edifying. And as always, let me know what you think in the comments!

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