19.86 James M. Buchanan Jr

The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 1986 James M. Buchanan Jr. "for his development of the contractual and constitutional bases for the theory of economic and political decision-making"

James McGill Buchanan, Jr. (/bjuːˈkænɨn/; October 3, 1919 – January 9, 2013) was an American economist known for his work on public choice theory, for which he received the Nobel Memorial Prize in 1986. Buchanan's work initiated research on how politicians' and bureaucrats' self-interest, utility maximization and other non-weath maximizing considerations affect their decision making.

Buchanan is considered to be a quasi-member of the Austrian school of economics, not formally associated with the school but sharing many common beliefs.[17] As Buchanan puts it: "I certainly have a great deal of affinity with Austrian economics and I have no objections to being called an Austrian. Hayek and Mises might consider me an Austrian but, surely some of the others would not." Buchanan went on to say that: "I didn't become acquainted with Mises until I wrote an article on individual choice and voting in the market in 1954. After I had finished the first draft I went back to see what Mises had said in Human Action. I found out, amazingly, that he had come closer to saying what I was trying to say than anybody else."