The Forgotten Man: J.M. ‘Pete’ Garland

J.M. ‘Pete’ Garland was an outstanding Australian economist sometimes much overlooked. Despite a promising academic career, as evidenced by his work on land tax, he was lost to Australian universities when the Commonwealth Bank snapped him up on his return to Australia from Cambridge. He became a key figure in the development of Australian central banking practices, establishing a longstanding liquidity convention that the private trading banks upheld for many years. He was also instrumental in building up the economic research department at the Bank. He maintained his links with academe and was considered the man most likely to write the biography of L.F. Giblin.