MacGREGOR, David Hutchison

MacGregor was a well-known professor of economics. 

MacGregor was born at Monifieth, Angus in 1877, the son of a schoolmaster. He was educated at George Watson’s College and then the University of Edinburgh, graduating with a first-class degree in philosophy in 1898. He then went to Cambridge and studied economics under the tutelage of Alfred Marshall, becoming one of the latter’s favourite students, and graduating BA in 1901. In 1904 he was elected a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. 

His first book, Industrial Combinations, published in 1906, immediately established his reputation. After lecturing at Cambridge for a couple of years, in 1908 he was appointed professor of political economy at the University of Leeds. Here he worked with local manufacturers and industrialists to support and expand the department, and it is likely that this is how he first met Benjamin Seebohm Rowntree. MacGregor was also a strong supporter of the Workers’ Education Association. 

From 1915-18 MacGregor served with the British army during the First World War. In 1919 he resigned his post at Leeds, being succeeded by Jack Harry Jones, and became Stanley Jevons Professor of Political Economy at the University of Manchester. In 1922 he became Drummond Professor of Political Economy at the University of Oxford, succeeding Francis Edgeworth. He was one of the best known economists in the country, giving frequent public lectures and sitting on government committees.  

MacGregor retired in 1945 but continued to write and give lectures. He died in Oxford on 8 May 1953. 

His early works, Industrial Combinations and The Evolution of Industry, were very influential. His later works, however, are rather out of date. MacGregor continue to adhere to the ideas of Alfred Marshall, but his reputation declined as Keynesianism became the new orthdoxy. MacGregor’s theories did not move with the times. 

Major works 

Industrial Combinations, 1906. 

The Evolution of Industry, 1911. 

Enterprise, Purpose and Profit: Essays on Industry, 1934. 

Public Aspects of Finance, 1939. 

Economic Thought and Policy, 1949. 

Lee, F., ‘David MacGregor and the Marshallian Tradition at Oxford, 1920-1945’, conference paper, 2008, http://www.ier.hit-u.ac.jp/~nisizawa/frederic%20lee.pdf  

Lecture:  

‘What can British manufacturers and workmen to do hasten the trade revival?’, April 1922, Balliol College