Volume 4 - Paper #56_56AllanGGruchy.pdf: 665 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

Briggs, Vernon M., Jr.

English

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Briggs Volume IV Briggs Papers and Speeches 
December 1990 
Allan G. Gruchy: Master Teacher of Undergraduate Economics 
Vernon M. Briggs Jr. 
vmb2@cornell.edu 
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Allan G. Gruchy: Master Teacher of Undergraduate Economics 
Keywords 
Economic, Gruchy, employment, policy, government, classroom, undergraduate 
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Volume 4 - Paper #56 
This article is available at DigitalCommons@ILR: https://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/briggsIV/1 
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AFEE Meetings
Washington, D.C.
December 28, 1990
Allan G. Gruchy: Master Teacher
of Undergraduate Economics
Vernon M. Briggs, Jr.
CorneJI University
Allan G. Gruchy taught as a full-time member of the economics faculty at the
University of Maryland for forty years---from 1937-1977. I had the privilege of taking
three undergraduate courses from him in 1958 and 1959-happroximately the mid-point of
his teaching career. These courses were "Comparative Economic Systems"; "Modem
Economic Thought", and "National Economic Planning".
Before discussing his undergraduate teaching, it is important to mention briefly the
physical environment in which he taught. For unlike the classroom buildings of today with
their all-season temperature control units, bright florescent lights, tile floors, overhead
projectors and screens, transparencies, marker pens, microphones, metal desks, and
adjustable teaching podiums, Allan Gruchy taught my generation of economics majors in
the wing of a building that was the oldest classroom structure on the University of
Maryland campus. It had been appended to a building called Taliferro Hall. This wing
had been built before the Civil War. Legend had it that it had been the original building
of the medical school before the program had been moved to Baltimore generations earlier.
This wing has since been torn do\\.'n. On its upper floor were the faculty offices and the
departmental office. On the lower floor were three classrooms. All of the classrooms had
very high ceilings---at least twice as high as any normal classroom of today. The windows
stretched from the ceiling to almost the floor and every exterior wall was comprised largely
of such enormous windows. It was not unusual/in fact, for students entering two of these
2rooms to enter or exit directly through one of these open windows. The reason for the big
windows was obvious: their function was to provide ample natural light, since this wing of
the building had been constructed before there was electricity. Lights had subsequently
been installed but, given the high ceilings, the artificial light they provided was still
secondary to the sunlight from outside. The temperature control system was also provided
by the windows: open in the Fall and Spring to let cool air in; closed during the winter to
keep cool air out. The blackboards were so old and had been washed so often that they
had turned a bleached grey which made it very difficult to read what was written on them
with the white chalk that was exclusively used in that era. The largest of the three
classrooms had these enormous windows on three sides. In it, there was only a small
blackboard. It was not on the one interior wall, however, since that was where the
double door entrance was located. Instead, the one panel blackboard had been nailed to a
piece of the wall that divided two of those enormous windows. As a consequence, there
was glass above, below, and on both sides of the board so we students had to look directly
into the outside light as we looked at the board. The wooden walls were reasonably bright
but much of the paint was peeling. The floors were made of cold grey concrete. There
were no maps, pictures, or screens anywhere in these rooms. Our desks were wooden and
rickety. One was never sure when class was over that their desk would survive to be
there when he or she returned for the next class. The desks were so pock-marked and
scarred from years of use that some students wrote in their laps. None of us, in other
words, had any difficulty understanding Galbraith's thesis (which Gruchy taught) about the
tendency of affluent unplanned societies to underinvest in public goods. We were living
the paradox.
3Into this seemingly ban-en learning environment, three times a week, at precisely 9
A.M.; 11 A.M., or 2 P.M. strode Professor Allan Gruchy. Once in the room, he
immediately became the center of attention. No one noticed the dismal physical setting for
the next 50 minutes. Class was in session as soon as he closed the door, walked to the
table at front of the room, unlatched his gold pocket watch from its chain, and placed the
watch on the table.
The opening of class was usually an occasion for a brief ceremony that was a
hallmark of all of Gruchy's classes. Once the door was closed, a tardy student could enter
but he/she had to stand by the side of the door and await the completion of Gruchy's
opening remarks. In a few moments, he would pause and allow the latecomer to tell him
and the class the reason for the tardiness. Gruchy, in turn, would comment about the
validity of the excuse and gesture the student(s) to be seated. Despite how militaristic this
might sound when described to an outsider, it was regarded as anything but this by all of
us. It was a precious few moments of humorous affection that enhanced the bonding
between teacher and student before the formal teaching began. The excuses were often
witty and Gruchy's assessments were always spontaneollsly clever. It was an encounter
that any of us might confront on any day, since there were no bells or buzzers to start or
stop classes or any clocks in Taliferro Hall. The official arbiter of the precise time was
Gruchy's pocket watch. It faithfully signalled the beginning and the end of each class---
right to the second.
This little ritual also had its pedagogical purpose. "Time", he told us, "is the most
important and scarcest of all economic resources." Punctuality should be the hallmark of
any would-be economist. As fate would have it, of course, the day did come when the
Master himself was late. Immediately at 2 P.M., one of my fellow students in the first
4row got up, closed the door, walked to the old table, took off his wrist watch---for who
among us had a pocket watch-hand began to stride in front of the class, clearing his throat
as Gruchy was prone to do, and standing upright in posture as he always did.
Momentarily a somewhat winded Professor arrived. He saw the setting, so he stood at the
appointed spot inside the door and awaited the request to give his excuse. In a few
moments, the student "instructor" tumed to him and gave Gruchy his opportunity. Gruchy
said he had been stopped by the Dean of the College and he informed us of another
important lesson in life: there are hierarchial power structures in society that can force
deviation from normal practices on unsuspecting lower life forms. There are always
exceptions to every rule. As you might expect, for the next few classes, the excuses gIven
by tardy students were that they too had been stopped by the Dean on the way to class.
But Gruchy always got the better of them since none of us knew the Dean's name or
could even vaguely describe what he looked like. This excuse quickly wore thin and those
who continued to use it would immediately encounter a good-natured hiss from the class as
well as a raised eyebrow from Gruchy. Originality, after all, was one of the ground rules
of this tri-weekly institutional practice.
Among undergraduates, Allan Gruchy was extremely popular. His classes were
always filled to room capacity. At least two of them required senior level status to enroll.
He was a hard grader in an era when good grades were almost impossible to earn. His
command of the classroom came from his warm but firm teaching style as well as the
reasonableness and intelligence of his lessons. He could mOtivate the uncommitted. Few
of my fellow undergraduate economics majors in the 1950's thought much about
neoclassical economics (or the "Economics of Automaticity" as Gruchy called it). We
were taught its principles in other courses but it seemed like its utility laid primarily in its
5use as a screening device for entry into the economics profession. It was like requiring
priests to learn Latin as a pre-condition to entering their sacred vocation. The assumptions
of neoclassical economics seemed so patently naive on-its-face that no one with a positive
IQ could ever take such nonsense seriously. It certainly did not describe the U.S. economy
of the 1950's with its "big government", "big business", "big labor" and "big agriculture"
about which we had been taught in his colleagues' courses (e.g., Professor Dudley Dillard's
Economic History class and Professor Eli Clemens' Economics of American Industries
class). Moreover, how could neoclassical economics---with its assumptions of Say's Law,
wage-price flexibility and atomistic competition in both the product and the factor markets-
--ever recover from the debacle of the Great Depression with its mass unemployment
which this theory said could never occur. We were undergraduate students, but we had all
been born in the 1930's. Our parents had filled our minds with first-hand horror stories of
what conditions had been like when we were children. We had empirical evidence that
mass unemployment could occur and could persist in a free market economy. We were
not graduate students. Few among us had committed themselves to the economics
profession. The majority, in fact, would do other things with their lives. Hence, we saw
neoclassical economics just the way the peasant child saw the proverbial Emperor---
without any clothes-hor without any validity or relevance in the case of this theory. In
Gruchy's hands, of course, neoclassical economics sometimes could become pure
intellectual farce. In one brief discussion of the alleged market clearing capacities of a
free market, Gruchy had diagrammed the equilibrium position and marked-off the
rectangular area representing the revenue to the firm with the four letters C-R-A-P.
On the other hand, Keynesian economics (or "Compensatory Economics" as Gruchy
called it), was clearly on the ascendancy in the 1950's. It was surging toward its halcyon
6days that were to come in the 1960's. But Gruchy had already spotted its major flaws
which would only belatedly be recognized by others in the 1970's and 1980's. Namely, he
saw the likelihood of the occurrence of high inflation as a market-oriented economy moved
toward full employment. Moreover, unlike most Keynesians who saw the pursuit of
economic growth as the desired economic objective, Gruchy felt that economic development
would more likely be the critical policy issue to confront policymakers in industrialized
nations over time. It was not the prospect of more of the same that would be the
challenge but, rather, how an economy strives to adjust as economic conditions change
over time that would present the real challenges. .
Thus, the only logical policy course for an economy to follow would, according to
Gruchy, be one that adopted economic planning as an instrument of policy guidance. He
called it "Directive Economics." It was a non-Marxian paradigm whereby democratic
societies would adopt a system of guidance for their future welfare. Government was not
the enemy of the people as it is usually portrayed in neoclassical economics. Rather,
because economic resources are scarce, industrialized society must set priorities. Only
government is capable of assuming this responsibility and performing this function. As
Gruchy taught, "the language of priority-setting is the language of planning". He had no
regard for totalitarian societies where governments suppress all interests except their own
and use unwanted methods to enforce their choices. Rather, he sought a planning system
for free societies where individual preferences do exist, but where certain "societal
essentials"---adequate housing, multiple cultural activities, superior education, environmental
quality, and comprehensive medical care---must be assured for the good of the whole of
society. Planning was necessary to be certain that there was sufficient spending on these
"societal essentials". The planning was to be a collaborative process that did not rely on
7the threat or use of force to carry-out its objectives. It required that a planning body be
legislatively in place; an annual economic budget be set forth and adopted; and a system of
policy controls be available to carry-out the plan's objectives.
This is nOt the place to critique the message of his teaching. All I can say is that
from the undergraduate perspective what he said seemed eminently 10gical---especiaJly in
that somnolent era of the contemporary Eisenhower Administration. For the social time
bombs that would explode in the 1960s had already been planted. The winds of social
activism were picking-up. Sputnik I had been launched as had the Civil Right Movement
in Montgomery, Alabama only the semester before I entered his first class. Moreover, by
the Spring of 1958, the economy was in recession and, over the ensuing 18 months that I
was enrolled in his classes, the national economic crisis deepened. The men he talked
about--- Veblen, Commons, Means, Tugwell, Keyserling, Ayres, and Galbraithn-addressed
their minds to real economic issues and to the "big picture." They did not waste our time
on the abstract theoretical world of neoclassical economics with its artificial controversies
over problems that the world did not even know it had, (e.g., the shape of the demand
came for inferior goods; or the alleged existence of a backward bending supply curve; or
the role of marginal time preferences in measuring consumer buying behavior). The men
whose ideas Gruchy taught focused on full unemployment, the quality of life, the
preparation of the work force, the structure of the economy, and the constructive role that
government could play to enhance life and to ameliorate human suffering. He also showed
us in the planning course how Scandinavian countries actually implemented these ideas.
As a consequence, Gruchy's classes were always filled to room capacity. This
meant there was anywhere from 40 to 75 students---depending on which one of the three
classrooms he was assigned. Hence, we seldom had an opportunity for much two-way
8discussion. In every class there was always some banter between him and we students. It
always occurred when the class began. It was a way to break the ice and get us in the
mood to learn what he wanted to teach that day. Often there would be another break
about mid-way through the hourh-as if he wanted to give us a moment to relax before he
proceeded. The banter was always of a good-natured and of an intellectual nature. He
never told jokes or did anything that would defile the integrity of the learning environment.
He would, for instance, ask us about the relevant paralled lesson taught in Professor Henry
Grayson's class in intermediate micro-theory which all of us were required to endure. He
referred to Grayson's class as "Art 132" rather than "Econ 132"---a reference, of course, to
the extensive graphical analysis used in that class. [Grayson, by the way, would good
naturedly reciprocate by referring to Gruchy' s class as "StOrytelling 137" rather than as
"Econ 137"].
Gruchy often used witty phrases to illustrate a point. We fondly called them
"Gruchyisms". One I remember was a statement that dealt with the difficulty a citizen has
learning what his/her elected officials actually believe. He tOld us that "what fur is to a
grizzly bear, fog is to a politician;" or he would warn us to "beware of simple answers to
complex problems;" or he'd use little self-constructed Latin phrases-ulike the one he wrote
on the chalkboard on the first day of the first class I had from him: "Tuum Est," (which
translated meant "it is up to you").
I cannot do justice in words to describe the experience of being taught by Allan
Gruchy. I can only say that I remember him vividly. I still treasure my class notes and I
have pirated more than a thought or two from them over the years. I am sure that he is
the one who guided me into a career in economics. He raised the issues that I wanted to
study like the rationale for having some form of an industrial policy; or the need for a
9human resource development policy; or the ways to achieve and maintain full employment
in a free society.
It is somewhat ironic, however, that though we greatly admired him and we all
knew he loved to be on center stage in front of us, he was not a person who it was easy
for undergraduate students to know. His office was always cluttered with books,
manuscripts, and papers. Even the visitors chair in his office had stacks of materials piled
on it so there was no place to sit. So, you stood up before him, you asked your question,
and you left. He never tried to be a "buddy" to undergraduate students---indeed, he was
somewhat aloof and quick-spoken if you asked him a direct question outside of class. But
he had sort of an impish smile and a sparkle in his eyes---somewhat like that of Groucho
Marx to whom---with his mustache, his use of his raised eye brows, his clear rimmed
plastic glasses, and his lean physique-hhe bore a faint resemblance that signaled the
warmth of his personality and the respect he had for us. It was the power of his ideas;
the breadth of his knowledge; and the manner of his delivery that held us in his sway---
then and since.
As I remember Allan Gruchy, I can only paraphrase a thought from Ralph Waldo
Emerson. Namely, "there was a time when our universities had wooden buildings but they
were filled with golden teachers; too often today, our universities have golden buildings but
they are filled with wooden teachers". Allan G. Gruchy taught in a wooden building but
he was a golden undergraduate teacher.


Allan G. Gruchy: Master Teacher of Undergraduate Economics

Briggs, Vernon M. Jr.

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Allan G. Gruchy: Master Teacher of Undergraduate Economics

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