Stein was perhaps best known for having served as a member of President Nixon's Council of Economic Advisers from 1969 to 1971 and as chairman of the council from 1972 to 1974. But he had been shaping economic policy in Washington long before that.

While serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II, Stein won a national contest sponsored by Pabst Brewing Company for his plan on how to maintain high employment after the war. When the war ended, he went to work for the Committee for Economic Development, a new think tank, where he continued to write on how to keep employment levels high. He stayed at the CED for two decades and played a key role in building support in the business community for the occasional strategic use of federal budget deficits. Throughout his career, he argued that whether the budget was in balance or not was less important than is generally credited.

Although Stein counseled President Nixon against imposing a freeze on wages and prices in 1971, he loyally supported Nixon's decision to go ahead with the plan. Writing a dozen years later about the announcement of the policy, he said, "Few days in the life of a president's economic adviser are that exciting. Still, the life is well described by frustration at the level of ideology and policy combined with high satisfaction at the level of atmosphere and activity."

Stein left government in 1974 to become the A. Willis Robertson Professor of Economics at the University of Virginia, and his association with AEI began soon after. In 1975, AEI President William J. Baroody Sr. appointed him an adjunct scholar, and he became a senior fellow three years later.

The institute launched The AEI Economist in 1977, and Stein was the editor and chief contributor of the monthly publication for the twelve years of its existence. During his tenure at AEI he also published several books, including Washington Bedtime Stories: The Politics of Money and Jobs (1986), Governing the $5 Trillion Economy (1989), and What I Think: Essays on Economics, Politics, and Life (1998). In 1996, the AEI Press published the second revised edition of The Fiscal Revolution in America, a magisterial history of U.S budgetary policy from the time of Herbert Hoover through the beginning of the Clinton administration. This past summer, Stein and his AEI colleague Murray Foss completed the third edition of The Illustrated Guide to the American Economy, which the AEI Press will release next month.

Columnist William Safire, who worked with Stein in the Nixon White House, once noted that "Herbert Stein breaks all the rules of economic writing by making the subject understandable." Indeed, Stein had a rare gift for explaining economic issues to politicians and the public, but in his latter years he began to write more frequently about other subjects as well. A sampling of his writings is included in this newsletter.

In a meeting of AEI scholars shortly after Stein's death, President Christopher DeMuth noted that Stein had been the model of a good colleague, encouraging his peers, always reading their work carefully, and offering helpful criticism. He is sorely missed.