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Robert Alexander Mundell (born October 24, 1932)
is a Canada|Canadian economist who graduated from
the University of British Columbia in Vancouver.
He attended Massachusetts Institute of
Technology|MIT and London School of Economics and
was top performer in his years there. He went on
to win the 1999 Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic
Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel|Nobel Prize in
Economics.  He is affiliated with Columbia
University's Economics department. In 2002 he was
made a Companion of the Order of Canada.



Among his major contributions are:

* Theoretical work on Optimal Currency Areas.
* Contributions to the development of the Euro
* Helped start the movement known as supply-side
economics.
* Historical research on the operation of the gold
standard in different eras.
* Predicted the inflation of the 1970s. 
* Mundell-Fleming model
* Mundell-Tobin effect

== Work on International Monetary Flows ==

Mundell is best known in politics for his support
of tax cuts and supply side economics; however,
among economists it is his work on currency areas
and international exchange rates which caused him
to be awarded the Nobel Prize. Nevertheless,
supply side economics featured prominently in his
Nobel Prize speech. 

In the 1960s Canada, which Mundell is a native of,
floated its exchange - this caused Mundell to
begin investigating the results of floating
exchange rates, a phenomenon not widely seen since
the 1930's "Stockholm School" successfully lobbied
Sweden to leave the gold standard. 

In 1962 he co-authored the Mundell-Fleming model
of exchange rates, and noted that it was
impossible to have both domestic autonomy, and
price stability and free capital flows - that two,
and only two, of these objectives could be met.
The model is, in effect, an extension of the IS/LM
model applied to currency rates.

According to Mundell's analysis:

* Discipline under the Bretton Woods system was
more due to the US Federal Reserve than to the
discipline of gold. 
* Demand side fiscal policy would be ineffective
in restraining central banks under a floating
exchange rate system.
* Single currency zones relied, therefore, on
similar levels of price stability, where a single
monetary policy would suffice for all.

His analysis led to his conclusion that it was a
disagreement between Europe and the United States
over the rate of inflation, partially to finance
the Vietnam War, and that Bretton Woods
disintegrated because of the undervaluing of gold
and the consequent monetary discipline breakdown.
There is a famous point/counter-point over this
issue between Mundell and Milton Friedman (See
http://www.irpp.org/po/archive/may01/friedman.pdf
Mundell-Friedman debate) 

This work would later lead to the creation of the
Euro, and his prediction that leaving the Bretton
Woods system would lead to "stagflation" so long
as highly progressive income tax rates applied. In
1974 he advocated a drastic tax reduction and a
flattening of income tax rates.

Mundell, though lionized by some conservatives,
has many of his harshest critics from the right:
he denies the need for a fixed gold based currency
or currency board - though he often recommends
this as a policy in hyper-inflationary
environments - and he is both a fiscal and balance
of payments deficit hawk. He is well known for
stating that in a floating exchange rate system,
expansion of the money supply can only come about
through a positive balance of payments.

== The TV personality == 



Robert Mundell has appeared on CBS's The Late Show
with David Letterman
either reading The Top 10 List or telling a series
of jokes through segments of the show. In March
2004 the theme was "You Might Be A Redneck" jokes
and on May 2004|May of the same year "Yo Mama"
jokes.
Here are some of the highlights from his
appearance on The Late Show on Tuesday, May 4,
2004, telling "Yo Mama" jokes:

* Yo Mama's so fat, her blood type is Ragu.
* Yo Mama's so fat, that when she puts on high
heels in the morning, by the afternoon they're
flats.
* Yo Mama's so fat, when she sits around the
house, she sits around the house!
* Yo Mama's so fat, at the zoo elephants started
throwing her peanuts. 
* Yo Mama's so fat, when her beeper goes off,
people think she's backing up. 
* Yo Mama's so fat, she puts on her lipstick with
a paint roller. 
* Yo Mama's so fat, she puts mayonnaise on
aspirin.

==See also==

*List of economists
*List of economics consultancies and think tanks
*Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in
Memory of Alfred Nobel

==External link==

*http://www.robertmundell.net/ Robert Mundell's
homepage
*http://www.singleglobalcurrency.org/ Single
Global Currency Association - Bretton Woods 2024
*http://alop.atspace.com/tui/mundell-press.html
his analysis of monetary and fiscal policy under
different exchange rate regimes and his analysis
of optimum currency areas.