Dr. Ray Perryman

Dr. Ray Perryman is President and CEO of The Perryman Group, an economic research and analysis firm based in Waco, Texas. He was born on Christmas Day (the year is not important) and has never quite accepted the fact that it is not his birthday everyone is celebrating.

Dr. Perryman holds a BS in Mathematics from Baylor University and a PhD in Economics from Rice University. He always felt that the BS would have been somehow more appropriate for Economics. He took his first economics course on a coin flip between economics and psychology. If it had gone the other way, there might be some really messed up people in the world. In addition to his earned degrees, Dr. Perryman has received an honorary doctorate from the International Institute for Advanced Studies. He especially liked that one because he didn’t have to work for it. He told his kids they had to start calling him “Doctor Doctor.” They were not impressed.

Dr. Perryman has held numerous academic positions in his career including ten years as Herman Brown Professor of Economics and five years as University Professor and Economist-in-Residence at Baylor University, as well as five years as Business Economist-in-Residence at Southern Methodist University. He has authored several books and more than 300 academic papers, and has served as President of both the Southwestern Economic Association and the Southwestern Society of Economists. He also lives in Odessa while working in Waco, is the father of five young Texans (ages 16 to 22), gets lost on his own block, and once ran one of his cars into the other one. His current academic roles include Senior Research Fellow of the IC 2 Institute of the University of Texas and Institute Distinguished Professor of Economic Theory and Method at the International Institute for Advanced Studies. His duties in these positions include traveling to exotic places and doing interesting things.

In the professional arena, Dr. Perryman has authored more than 1,500 trade articles, publishes a subscription forecasting service and two monthly newsletters, writes a syndicated newspaper column, hosts a daily radio commentary, and appears regularly on National Public Radio. He has never played in the NBA. He has served on dozens of governmental task forces around the world; plays a significant ongoing role in public policy on international, national, state, and local levels; and is an advisor to scores of federal and state entities. He presently serves on the Governor’s Task Force on Economic Growth and the Governor’s Technology Working Group and was a featured speaker at the recent Bush Economic Forum. His firm engages in a broad range of complex projects for major corporate and governmental interests and has served the needs of more than 1,000 clients. In other words, he is an obsessive-compulsive workaholic.

Dr. Perryman has received hundreds of prestigious awards for his academic and professional efforts. He has been named the Outstanding Young Economist and Social Scientist in the US, the Outstanding Young Person in the World in Business and Economic Innovation, one of Ten Outstanding Young Americans and Ten Outstanding Young Persons in the World. As he loses his hair and puts on his reading glasses, it is highly unlikely that he will ever win another award with the word “Young” in it.

Dr. Perryman has been honored by The Democracy Foundation for his role in promoting capitalism in China, The Asia and World Institute for promoting international trade and academic exchange, and the Systems Research Foundation for his contributions to the field of modeling. (That would be “economic” modeling, not “fashion” modeling. He seems to think there might be some confusion.) He has also received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Institute for Advanced Studies. He was skeptical about that one. He was afraid that a Lifetime Achievement Award was something you received just before you croaked.

Dr. Perryman has received citations from governments around the world, presidents, governors, Congress, and national and state administrative and legislative bodies. He has received even more citations, however, from the Texas Department of Public Safety.

The business press has called Dr. Perryman a “world class scholar,” a “genius,” a “savant,” a “sage,” and a “wizard.” Texas Monthly has called him “The most quoted man in Texas,” and President Bush has called him “one of the world’s leading economists.” His kids have called him a dork, a dweeb, a geek, and a loser, and his wife calls him a big —— well, we won’t go there! Some of his most gratifying work has been in the field of economic development, where he has played a key role in the creation of hundreds of thousands of jobs. He now only hopes that someday at least one of his kids will hold one of those jobs. He is a past recipient of the Outstanding Texas Leader Award and has been honored by the Texas Legislature for his “tireless efforts in helping to build a better Texas.”

Dr. Perryman was recently nominated by the International Institute for Advanced Studies in Baden-Baden, Germany, to receive the 2005 Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel (Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics).