The 50-Year Legacy of George Shultz: The Public Entrepreneur who Terminated Wage-Price Controls

Brian D. Fitzpatrick; Michael M. Tansey; Shahid I. Ali

doi:10.2478/hjbpa-2026-0003

.blurhash-client-img { display: none !important; }

The 50-Year Legacy of George Shultz: The Public Entrepreneur who Terminated Wage-Price Controls

HOLISTICA – Journal of Business and Public Administration

Volume 17 (2026): Issue 1 (June 2026)

By: Brian D. Fitzpatrick, Michael M. Tansey and Shahid I. Ali

Open Access

|Jun 2026

Abstract

April 30, 2024, marked fifty years since the end of the Nixon Administration’s Economic Stabilization Program (1971–74), the last full U.S. wage-price control regime. George Shultz helped launch, manage, and end the program, highlighting its life cycle: initial dependence on government agencies, later reliance on private-sector information, and eventual political pressure for removal. Cooperation collapsed as mandates conflicted, triggering institutional “creative destruction.” As an executive entrepreneur, Shultz and the Cost-of-Living Council advanced supply-side policies that challenged agencies, exposed inflationary practices, and enabled the ESP’s termination—offering a key case for Public Choice and agency-life-cycle theories.

References

Anthony, Robert N. 1960 The Trouble with Profit Maximization, Harvard Business Review, 38 (November-December), pp. 126-134
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Arenson, Karen W. The New Economics View: From the Supply Side. New York Times. March 5, 1981 https://www.nytimes.com/1981/03/05/business/the-new-economics-view-from-thesupply-side.html accessed 5/26/2024
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Baumol, William J. 1993. Entrepreneurship, Management, and the Structure of Payoffs. Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Bernier, L., & Hafsi, T. (2007). The changing nature of public entrepreneurship. Public Administration Review, 67(3), 488–503. DOI:10.1111/J.1540-6210.2007.00731.X
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Beyers, J. and S. Arras. 2020. “Who feeds information to regulators? Stakeholder diversity in European Union regulatory agency consultations.” Journal of Public Policy 40: 573–598.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Breton, Albert and Wintrobe, Ronald. 2008. The Logic of Bureaucratic Conduct. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Burns, Arthur. 2010. Inside the Nixon Administration: The Secret Diary of Arthur Burns, 1969-1974. Robert Ferrell, ed. University Press of Kansas: Lawrence, KS.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Carpenter DP, Lewis DE (2004) Political learning from rare events: Poisson inference, fiscal constraints, and the lifetime of bureaus. Political Analysis 12(3): 201–232. doi.org/10.1093/pan/mph016
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Congleton, R. (1982). A Model of Asymmetric Bureaucratic Inertia and Bias. Public Choice, 39(3), 421–425. http://www.jstor.org/stable/30023634 or DOI:10.1007/BF00118798
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Connally John. 1973. In History’s Shadow: An American Odyssey. Hyperion: New York, NY.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Downs, Anthony. 1967. Inside Bureaucracy Boston Little Brown and Co.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Dunlop, John. 1973. “News” (release for June 24, 1973). Economic Stabilization Program: Cost of Living Council News. Washington D.C.: U.S. Cost of Living Council (Office of Public Affairs).
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Graham, Bradley. 2009. By His Own Rules. New York: Public Affairs (Perseus Book Group)
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Grayson, C. Jackson. 1974. Confessions of a Price Controller. Dow Jones-Irwin, Inc. Homewood Illinois
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Kalmenovitz, Joseph and Lowry, Michelle B. and Volkova, Ekaterina, Regulatory Fragmentation (January 15, 2024). Forthcoming, Journal of Finance, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3802888 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3802888
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Klüver, H. (2012). Informational Lobbying in the European Union: The Effect of Organisational Characteristics. West European Politics, 35, 491 - 510. DOI:10.1080/01402382.2012.665737
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Kornai, J., Maskin, E. and Roland, G., 2003. Understanding the soft budget constraint. Journal of economic literature, 41(4), pp.1095-1136. DOI: 10.1257/002205103771799999
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Larochelle, Ryan (2024). “A Mission Without Precedent”: The Rise and Fall of the Office of Economic Opportunity, 1964–1981”. Journal of Policy History. 36 (1): 1–33. doi:10.1017/S0898030623000313.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Lewis DE (2002) The politics of agency termination: Confronting the myth of agency immortality. Journal of Politics 64(1): 89–107. Doi/10.1111/1468-2508.00119
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Lim, Jae Young. 2021. The evolution of research on organizational termination International Review of Administrative Sciences, 87, (1), (March) 191-207 DOI:10.1177/0020852319852663
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Meyer, Jack. 1982. Wage-Price Standards and Economic Policy. Washington D.C.: American Enterprise Institute.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Mintrom, M. (1997). Policy Entrepreneurs and the Diffusion of Innovation. American Journal of Political Science, 41(3), 738–770. https://doi.org/10.2307/2111674
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Niskanen, William A. 1971. Bureaucracy and Representative Government. Chicago: AlineAtherton.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Ostrom, E. (1998). A Behavioral Approach to the Rational Choice Theory of Collective Action: Presidential Address, American Political Science Association, 1997. The American Political Science Review, 92(1), 1–22. doi.org/10.2307/2585925
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Peltzman, S. 2022. “The theory of economic regulation” after 50 years. Public Choice 193, 7–21 doi.org/10.1007/s11127-022-00996-0
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Peters BG, Hogwood BW (1988) The death of immortality: Births, deaths, and metamorphoses in the U.S. federal bureaucracy 1933–1982. American Review of Public Administration 18(2): 119–133. doi.org/10.1177/027507408801800202
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Rigby, J. (1979). The Administration of Economic Controls: The Economic Stabilization Act of 1970. Case Western Reserve law review, 29, 458. Corpus ID: 156877702
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Roberts, N.C. 1992. Public Entrepreneurship and Innovation. Policy Studies
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Rumsfeld, Donald. 1972. Press Conference on Removal of Small Business Exemption as it Applies to Firms in the Lumber Industry. Cost of Living Council (July 17, 1972. Room 2008, New Executive Bldg., Washington, D.C.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Rumsfeld, Donald. 2011. Known and Unknown: A Memoir. New York: Sentinel.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Safire, William. 1975. Before the Fall: An Inside View of the Pre-Watergate White House. Belmont Tower Books: New York, NYShultx & Dam
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Rycroft, Robert. 1978. Bureaucratic Performance in Energy Policy Making: An Evaluation of Output Efficiency and Equity in the Federal Energy Administration. Public Policy 26 (4) (Fall)
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Satterthwaite, Franklin B. 1975. The Making of the Price Commission: An Administrative Study of a Temporary Government Unit Designed to Meet and Emergency. Yale University Ph.D. in Sociology. Available from Xerox University Microfilms, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Schelling, Thomas C. 1982. Establishing Credibility: Strategic Considerations. AEA Papers and Proceedings 72 (2) pp. 77-80
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Shultz, George and Kenneth Dam. 1977. Economic Policy Beyond the Headlines.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Staats, Elmer B., ed. 1974. Information on Enforcement of Price Controls: Cost of
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Stanley, Laura, Thomas D. Hopkins, Benjamin Miller. 2014. Mercatus website @ https://www.mercatus.org/students/research/research-papers/legacy-council-wage-andprice-stability (accessed July 5, 2024)
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Stein, Herbert. 1984. Presidential Economics: The Making of Economic Policy from Roosevelt to Reagan and Beyond. Simon & Schuster: New York, N.Y.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Tadelis, Steven. 2002. The Market for Reputations as an Incentive Mechanism. Journal of Political Economy 110 (4): 854-881. doi.org/10.1086/340781
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Taylor, John B. 1982. Establishing Credibility: A Rational Expectations Viewpoint. AEA Papers and
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Tullock, G. (1965). The Politics of Bureaucracy. Washington, D.C.: Public Affairs Press.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
U,S. Department of the Treasury (Office of Economic Stabilization) (USDOT). 1974. Historical Working Papers on the Economic Stabilization Program: August 15, 1971, to April 30, 1974, parts I-III. Andrew Munroe, ed.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
U.S. Joint Economic Committee (USJEC). 1973. “The Cost of Living.” Hearings of the 93rd Congress. 1st session (March 21; April 4; May 8, 22, and 23, 1973). Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
U.S. Joint Economic Committee (USJEC). 1971. The President’s New Economic Program. Hearings of 92nd Congress. (Part 1: August 19, 20, and 23, 1971. Part 2: August 30 and 31, September 1 and 3, 1971. Part 3: September 9, 13, 15, and 17, 1971). U.S. Government Printing Office: Washington, D.C.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Walker, William N. 2011. Forty Years After the Freeze. https://nixonswageandpricefreeze.wordpress.com/2011/07/14/nixon-wage-and-pricefreeze/ (accessed on 5 November 2021).
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Weber, Arnold. 1973. In Pursuit of Price Stability: The Wage-Price Freeze of 1971. Studies in WagePrice Policy. The Brookings Institution: Washington, D.C.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Weber, Arnold R. and Daniel Mitchell. 1978. The Pay Board’s Progress: Wage Controls in Phase II. Studies in Wage-Price Policy. The Brookings Institution: Washington, D.C.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Winston, C.M. (1993). Economic Deregulation: Days of Reckoning for Microeconomists. Journal of Economic Literature, 31, 1263-1289. Corpus ID: 153133388
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Wu. Tim, The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires, New York: Knopf, 2010, (ISBN 0307269930, ISBN 978-0-307-26993-5). Cf. pp.187-197, p.177, & various.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article

Articles in this issue

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/hjbpa-2026-0003 | Journal eISSN: 2067-9785 | Journal ISSN: 2457-5720

Journal RSS Feed

Language: English

Page range: 37 - 51

Submitted on: Dec 1, 2025

Accepted on: May 1, 2026

Published on: Jun 29, 2026

Published by: Association Holistic Research Academic (Hora)

In partnership with: Paradigm Publishing Services

Publication frequency: 2 issues per year

Keywords:

Related subjects:

Business and economics,

Business management,

Business management, other,

Business and economics,

Political economics,

Political economics, other,

Social sciences,

Sociology,

Sociology, other

© 2026 Brian D. Fitzpatrick, Michael M. Tansey, Shahid I. Ali, published by Association Holistic Research Academic (Hora)
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Volume 17 (2026): Issue 1 (June 2026)