The Trip to America

Diary Entry: February 13, 2025

I’m still delving into the 1937 paper, “The Nature of the Firm.” I keep wondering how he developed this whole idea. He visited the United States right before writing it. But get this: during his trip, he met with top-echelon American company executives. Top. Echelon. He was a 21- or 22-year-old British student, and this was during the Great Depression, no less.

How?

How did he manage that? This just boggles my mind.

I’ve been here, a JSD student at a major university, trying to meet professors from another faculty — just to ask for advice about AI. And... nothing. No one will meet with me. I send emails and get no reply, or I receive a polite “no.” It’s as if they are all suspicious, thinking I’m about to ask them to illegally accept me into their program or something. And I just want 15 minutes of guidance.

And here’s this 21-year-old Coase waltzing into the offices of the most powerful executives in America to ask them about the fundamental structure of their companies.

How?

Did his mentor, Arnold Plant, have that much pull? Were his supposed “socialist” credentials what made him a curiosity in the 1930s America? Or was he simply... special?

It makes no sense.

Again... who is this guy?