Jude Wanniski - Career

Career

After college, Wanniski worked as a reporter and columnist in Alaska. From 1961 to 1965 he worked at The Las Vegas Review-Journal as a political columnist from 1961 to 1965, where he taught himself economics as he learned card counting.

In 1965, Wanniski moved to Washington, D.C., to work as a columnist for the National Observer, published by Dow Jones.

From 1972 to 1978, Wanniski was the associate editor of The Wall Street Journal, the part of his career for which he is perhaps best known. He left after being discovered at a New Jersey train station distributing leaflets supporting a Republican senatorial candidate, an act considered an ethics violation.

In 1978 Wanniski started Polyconomics, an economics forecasting firm, where he and his analysts advised corporations, investment banks and others.

He also began directly advising politicians on economic policy, first candidate Ronald Reagan and later presidential hopefuls Jack Kemp and Steve Forbes. He helped design the tax cuts made during Reagan's first term in office. His formal role as a Reagan adviser ended after an interview he gave to the Village Voice was published under the headline "The Battle for Reagan's Mind."

In 1997 Wanniski founded the online learning center known as the "Supply-Side University".

Polyconomics as a corporation ceased operations on June 30, 2006, ten months after Wanniski's death, but the name (a combination of "politics" and "economics") lives on at The Polyconomics Institute, where one can find the Wanniski's collected works for Polyconomics, as well as correspondence with economic policy makers, and lectures. "Supply-Side University" is also part of that institute.