Bowley, Arthur Lyon

Born Nov. 6, 1869, in Bristol; died Jan. 21, 1957, in Surrey. English economist and statistician; member of the British Academy (1922). Educated at Trinity College, Cambridge University (1893).

Bowley began teaching statistics in 1895 at London University and headed the statistics department from 1919 to 1936; in the period 1940–44 he headed the Institute of Statistics. He participated actively in the work of statistics and economics societies. He was the honorary president of the International Institute of Statistics (1949) and president of the International Econometric Society (1938).

Bowley is famous for his works in the fields of economic theory and the general theory of statistics. He used statistical and econometrical methods widely for the analysis of economic and social phenomena. Agreeing with the basic ideas of the mathematical school of bourgeois political economy, Bowley nevertheless revealed himself to be a major realistic investigator, particularly of the theoretical and methodological problems of the dynamics of social consumer demand. In a series of works Bowley criticized the official bourgeois statisticians of England.