Leeson, Peter T., 1979-

Peter T. Leeson (born July 29, 1979) is an American economist and the Duncan Black Professor of Economics and Law at George Mason University. In 2012 Big Think listed him among "Eight of the World's Top Young Economists". He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Leeson is known for extending rational choice theory into unusual domains, such as to the study of bizarre rituals and superstitions, and to the behavior of Caribbean pirates. As Freakonomics coauthor Steven Levitt put it, "the amazing thing about Pete Leeson is that he takes these crazy topics and through a brilliant mix of meticulous historical research, data gathering, and creative economic thinking he shows that these seemingly nonsensical practices actually make a whole lot of sense... I can't think of another economist whose work has so consistently blown my mind." According to the American Institute for Economic Research's Art Carden, "to the extent that the economics profession has an heir to Gary Becker in the sense of pushing economic analysis as far as we think it will go and then discovering it will go a little farther, it's Leeson." In 2022 Leeson received the Adam Smith Award, previously given to Nobel Laureates Douglass North, James M. Buchanan, Vernon L. Smith, and Elinor Ostrom. Formerly, he held faculty positions at West Virginia University and the University of Chicago.