Brilliant Beginnings

This chapter looks at Colin Clark’s early career. He was strongly influenced by his father, James, whom he emulated by becoming an entrepreneur in ideas, rather than merchandise. Clark attended Winchester College where his contemporaries, as later at Oxford, included Sir Kenneth Clark and Hugh Gaitskell. He won a scholarship to read chemistry at Brasenose College, Oxford before becoming entranced by economics. Clark fell into the orbit of former Guild socialist, G. D. H. Cole and was a member of the Cole group of young men and women formed after the 1926 General Strike to discuss the socialist issues of the day. Professionally, Clark was hired by William Beveridge, Director of the London School of Economics (LSE), as a research assistant for both him and Alwyn Young who, in turn, introduced him to the power of increasing returns. In 1930 Clark was appointed to the Economic Advisory Council because of his statistical prowess and watched some of Britain’s top economists grapple with the issue of the depression. He prepared figures for an early version of the multiplier which Keynes and Richard Kahn would use to justify the case for public works to address the British economic slump.