📖 Professor Steve H. Hanke is one of the most consequential applied economists of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries — a man who has stabilized currencies, ended hyperinflations, and advised heads of state across five continents. This archive preserves the full record of his life, career, and intellectual legacy.
🏆 Ranked #3 Most Influential Economics Influencer Globally — FocusEconomics, Barcelona. Professor Hanke was ranked third in the world, behind only Paul Krugman and Nouriel Roubini, and ahead of hundreds of internationally recognized economists.
Biography & Life
Quick Facts
Detail | Information |
Full Name | Steve H. Hanke |
Born | December 29, 1942 |
Birthplace | Macon, Georgia, USA |
Raised | Atlantic, Iowa |
Education | B.S. Business Administration, University of Colorado Boulder (1964); Ph.D. Economics, University of Colorado Boulder (1969) |
Primary Institution | Johns Hopkins University (1969–present) |
Title | Professor of Applied Economics, Whiting School of Engineering |
Notable Roles | Senior Economist, Reagan CEA (1981–82); Adviser to 15+ governments |
Explore This Section
- 📚 Early Life & Education — From Macon, Georgia to the University of Colorado: the formative years that shaped a legendary economist
- 📅 Career Timeline — A decade-by-decade chronicle of a 60-year career in academia, government, and global finance
- 🏅 Awards & Honors — Eight honorary doctorates, a knighthood, and global recognition
The Man Behind the Economist
Steve Hanke grew up in Atlantic, Iowa — a small farming town on the western edge of Iowa's cornbelt. His introduction to markets came not in a classroom but on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, where as a teenager he helped his grandfather hedge egg shipments. By age 14, he had opened his own trading account, speculating in soybean futures.
This early immersion in commodity markets gave Hanke something rare among academic economists: a visceral, practical understanding of how prices actually form and what it feels like when they go wrong. It would define every phase of his career — from his pathbreaking doctoral research on water demand, to his currency board work in Estonia and Bulgaria, to his role as President of Toronto Trust Argentina, the world's best-performing emerging market mutual fund in 1995.
Hanke joined Johns Hopkins University in 1969 as an assistant professor in water resource economics. He became a full professor in 1975 — the fastest such promotion in Whiting School history. He has been at Hopkins ever since, teaching and mentoring for more than five decades.
Prof. Hanke and his wife, Liliane, reside in Baltimore and Paris.
Career at a Glance
Decade | Chapter | Highlights |
1960s | Formation | Commodity trading as a teen; B.S. Colorado (1964); Ph.D. (1969); CSM appointment (1966) |
1970s | Academic Rise | JHU assistant professor (1969); African fieldwork with Richard Leakey (1972); full professor (1975); Reagan policy groundwork |
1980s | Policy Power | Reagan CEA Senior Economist (1981–82); currency board research begins with Sir Alan Walters (1983); JEC adviser (1984) |
1990s | Global Stabilizer | Argentina (1991), Estonia (1992), Lithuania (1994), Venezuela (1995–96), Bulgaria (1997), Indonesia (1998), Montenegro (1999) |
2000s | Scholar-in-Chief | JHU Institute for Applied Economics (founded 1995); honorary doctorates begin (Ecuador, 2003); Zimbabwe hyperinflation analysis (2008) |
2010s | Legacy Builder | Hanke-Krus Hyperinflation Table (2012); Troubled Currencies Project (2013); Knight of the Order of the Flag (2020) |
2020s | Capstone Works | Capital, Interest, and Waiting (2024); Making Money Work (2025); active global commentary |
In His Own Words
"Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon."
— Milton Friedman, a principle Hanke has applied and defended throughout his career
"I have stopped more hyperinflations than any living economist."
— Steve H. Hanke
"A currency board is the simplest, most reliable, and most transparent monetary system that a country can adopt."
— Steve H. Hanke
Key Numbers
Metric | Figure |
Years at Johns Hopkins | 55+ |
Countries advised | 15+ |
Hyperinflation episodes documented | 62 |
Honorary doctorates | 8+ |
Books authored or edited | 20+ |
Monthly peak inflation stopped (Bulgaria, 1997) | 242% per month |
Estimated Zimbabwe peak inflation (Nov 2008) | 7.96 × 10¹⁰% |
Toronto Trust Argentina rank (1995) | #1 emerging market fund globally |
Related Sections
- 💱 Currency Boards — Hanke's signature monetary reform tool
- 📈 Hyperinflation — The Hanke-Krus Table and global hyperinflation research
- 💵 Dollarization — Full dollarization as monetary stabilization
- 📐 Free Market Economics — The intellectual foundations of Hanke's worldview