Hla Myint

Hla Myint was a Burmese economist born in Pathein, a large city in southern Myanmar, in 1920. At a young age, Myint lost his father, leaving him in the care of his mother, a small shop owner. However, he was quickly noticed in school for his extraordinary intelligence and talent. Myint worked at an accelerated pace and enrolled in Rangoon University at only 15 years old. 

While at Rangoon, he continued to be noticed for his exceptional capabilities and received an offer for a scholarship to study at the London School of Economics (LSE). Due to his incredible academic ability, the school allowed Myint to skip the typical requirement of getting a Master’s degree before proceeding straight to working on his PhD, which he earned with his thesis about theories of welfare economics. He also met his wife while at LSE, who was studying economic history. 

In 1946, Myint returned to Rangoon as an economics professor. This career was short-lived, however, as he was drafted 2 years later as an economic advisor to the newly independent Myanmar government under U Nu. In this position, Myint urged U Nu to allow private and foreign investment in the rice trade, as it was being strangled by government policies. Unfortunately, Myint’s advice and policy ideas did not align with how U Nu wanted to shape the state’s policies, and his advice was not put to use.

Frustrated and feeling unheard, Myint left Myanmar to be a colonial economics lecturer at Oxford. In 1958, he was back at Rangoon University, now as rector for the school. His time in Myanmar was once again brought to a close in 1962 when a military coup led by General Ne Win resulted in the forcible expulsion of many ethnically Chinese and Indian people from the country.

Still stuck with the idea of a free market system focused on growing the agricultural sector, Myint returned to Oxford until 1965, when he went back to his alma mater, LSE, until his 1985 retirement. His work during this time greatly emphasized the importance of free trade, capital accumulation, international specialization, and improving the agricultural sector of a state’s economy first to a thriving economy. 

Myint had not seen the last of Myanmar, however. At age 92, in 2012, he attended a forum in Myanmar called “An Agenda for Equitable and Sustainable Development for Myanmar,” when the country was under the rule of U Thein Sein. Here, he continued to promote the theories exemplified in his life’s work: a free-market system with an emphasis on growing the agricultural sector. He passed away 5 years later, in Thailand. He is remembered by many great economists worldwide as a sage and skilled classical economist.