CEI Announces 2015 Julian Simon Award Winner, Nobel Laureate Vernon Smith

Today the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) announced its annual dinner program including the 2015 recipient of the Julian L. Simon Memorial Award, 2002 Nobel laureate Dr. Vernon L. Smith. Described as one of Washington’s “most beloved and best-attended social events,” CEI’s annual, invitation-only, event brings together a diverse group of free-market policy professionals, scholars, and supporters to celebrate CEI’s work promoting economic freedom. The annual dinner will be held on June 11, 2015, at the JW Marriott Hotel in Washington, D.C.

Each year, CEI honors free-market economist and professor Julian Simon by presenting the Julian L. Simon Memorial Award, established in 2001, to an individual whose work supports the vision that man is the ultimate resource. Known as the “father of experimental economics,” Dr. Vernon L. Smith will receive the award for his groundbreaking work and contributions to his field.

“Vernon Smith’s passionate belief that voluntary exchange and human ingenuity, despite people’s flaws, creates limitless possibilities is precisely what Julian Simon meant by man’s ‘ultimate resource,’” said CEI president Lawson Bader. “Even after winning the Nobel Prize, Vernon is just as humble as ever about his intellectual achievements and even more optimistic about how people can solve problems.”

Currently, Smith is a professor of economics and law at Chapman University in Orange, California, where he cofounded the university’s Economic Science Institute. He also remains a research scholar at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. Smith won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 2002.

CEI’s annual dinner program will also include business and non-profit leader Carly Fiorina as the keynote speaker and the editor-in-chief of Reason Magazine, Matt Welch, as the master of ceremonies.

With firsthand experience as a business executive, Fiorina appreciates CEI’s work to roll back the government’s intrusive regulatory state.

“Small businesses across America are being crushed because only a big business can handle big government,” said Fiorina. “We need to fundamentally reimagine our government so we can reaffirm America's promise that every American, regardless of their circumstances, has the right and the opportunity to fulfill their potential.”

“As the former CEO of one of the largest technology company in the world, Carly Fiorina recognizes the impact government can have on enterprise and innovation,” said Bader. “She is a respected business leader with the moral courage to defend and promote free enterprise.”

For more information about CEI’s annual dinner or the Julian L. Simon Memorial Award visit cei.org/ceidinner.