Harry Scherman was an American economist. He wrote several works during the second third of the twentieth century.

Maybe his best known book is The Promises Men Live By, published in 1938. In it he develops an analysis of economic problems in terms of people beliefs. His open criticism to accepted policies and then fashionable Keynesianism brought his work to oblivion; something a little ironic, taking into account that he had been one of the co-founders of The Book of the Month Club

Book of the Month Club

The Book of the Month Club is a United States mail-order book sales club that offers a new book each month to customers.The Book of the Month Club is part of a larger company that runs many book clubs in the United States and Canada. It was formerly the flagship club of Book-of-the-Month Club, Inc...

 in 1926.

Early life and education

Isaac Harry Scherman was born February 1, 1887 in Montreal, Canada. He was the youngest of five children born to Katherine Harris and Jacob Scherman. After his parents separated, Harry and his brothers Louis and William were placed in the Jewish Orphanage Home in Atlanta, Georgia, where they lived from 1893 to 1899. He attended
Central High School in Philadelphia, where his classmates included Alexander Woollcott

Alexander Woollcott

Alexander Humphreys Woollcott was an American critic and commentator for The New Yorker magazine and a member of the Algonquin Round Table....

, the future Algonquin Round Table

Algonquin Round Table

The Algonquin Round Table was a celebrated group of New York City writers, critics, actors and wits. Gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "The Vicious Circle", as they dubbed themselves, met for lunch each day at the Algonquin Hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929...

 member and radio personality, and Ed Wynn

Ed Wynn

Ed Wynn was a popular American comedian and actor noted for his Perfect Fool comedy character, his pioneering radio show of the 1930s, and his later career as a dramatic actor....

, the famous actor. Scherman graduated high school in 1905, and later completed university studies at the Wharton School

Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania

The Wharton School is the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Wharton was the world’s first collegiate business school and the first business school in the United States...

 and the University of Pennsylvania Law School

University of Pennsylvania Law School

The University of Pennsylvania Law School, located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is the law school of the University of Pennsylvania. A member of the Ivy League, it is among the oldest and most selective law schools in the nation. It is currently ranked 7th overall by U.S. News & World Report,...

.

Career

His first jobs included working for Louis Lipsky at "The American Hebrew

The American Hebrew

-History:It began publication on November 21, 1879, in New York City. It was founded by F. de Sola Mendes and its publisher was Philip Cowen. The weekly's publisher was The American Hebrew Publishing Company....

" newspaper, with the Ruthrauff and Ryan advertising firm, and the J. Walter Thompson Company. In 1916 he
established the Little Leather Library, and in 1926 the Book of the Month Club.

Marriage and children

Scherman married Bernardine Kielty on June 3, 1914. The couple had two children, Katherine Rosin (b. 1915) and Thomas Scherman (b. 1917).

Death and afterward

Scherman died November 12, 1969 in Manhattan, New York.

His collected papers were purchased by the University of Georgia's Hargrett Library in 1993.

Published works

• The Promises Men Live By (Random House, 1938)
• The Real Danger in Our Gold 1940
• Will We Have Inflation? 1941
• The Last Best Hope of Earth Random House, New York 1941.