MI
Distinguished Fellow at Hillsdale College and author of 'The Myth of the Robber Barons,' specializing in American economic history and entrepreneurship.
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Burt Folsom is a Distinguished Fellow at Hillsdale College, where he has taught and researched American economic history. He is the author of The Myth of the Robber Barons, a seminal work that challenges the conventional narrative about American industrialists by distinguishing between political entrepreneurs who relied on government subsidies and market entrepreneurs who succeeded through innovation and competition.
Folsom has appeared on The Kim Monson Show multiple times, spanning from 2019 to 2024, to discuss the history of free enterprise in America. His expertise centers on the transformative period of 1865 to 1905, which he argues produced history's greatest innovations and unprecedented prosperity through market competition rather than government intervention.
Through his scholarship and public engagement, Folsom makes the case that figures like Vanderbilt, Hill, Rockefeller, and Mellon were market entrepreneurs who created genuine value, while their government-subsidized competitors consistently failed to deliver results. His work provides historical foundations for the principles of free markets, limited government, and individual enterprise.
March 4, 2024
Civic Engagement & Grassroots
Burt Folsom debunks robber baron myths, Jeff Toborg launches grocery tax repeal, Brian Joondeph reports from Turkmenistan. March 4, 2024.
“Two bicycle mechanics from Dayton, Ohio, and they did it.”
“I didn't know I wanted an iPhone 15 years ago. Steve Jobs knew I wanted an iPhone before I did. I mean, that's the kind of creative entrepreneurship.”
September 2, 2019
Ballot Measures & TABOR
Historian Burt Folsom debunks the robber baron myth on Labor Day 2019, revealing how Vanderbilt, Hill, Rockefeller, and Mellon built prosperity through free ...
“That generation from, say, 1865 to 1900, they were the ones who launched the American experiment to such success that we went from being a second-rate power in industry to being the dominant industrial power in the world.”
“Prices dropped in every commodity which they sold. I mean, that puts the lie to the word robber right there.”
“He was the first American to be worth a hundred million dollars and he became the richest American by giving customers what they wanted.”
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