FEE's Vision

To make the ideas of liberty familiar, credible, and compelling to the rising generation.

FEE's mission is to inspire, educate, and connect future leaders with the economic, ethical, and legal principles of a free society.

These principles include: individual liberty, free-market economics, entrepreneurship, private property, high moral character, and limited government.

FEE's Strategic Objectives

1

FEE will be the movement leader in knowing our customer

2

FEE will be the leader in introducing freedom as a life philosophy

3

FEE will be a leader in the leveraged distribution of ideas on liberty

The Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) is a 501(c)3 educational foundation and has been trusted by parents and teachers since 1946 to captivate and inspire tomorrow’s leaders with sound economic principles and the entrepreneurial spirit with free online courses, top-rated in-person seminars, free books for classrooms, as well as relevant and worldly daily online content.

~ F.A. Hayek, Nobel laureate in Economics

FEE, the first free-market organization in the United States, was founded in New York in 1946 by Leonard E. Read to study and advance the freedom philosophy. FEE has published or hosted lectures by some of the finest minds of the modern age, including Ludwig von Mises, F.A. Hayek, Henry Hazlitt, Milton Friedman, James Buchanan, Vernon Smith, Israel Kirzner, Walter Williams, George Stigler, Frank Chodorov, John Chamberlain, F.A. “Baldy” Harper, and William F. Buckley, Jr., among many others.

FEE Timeline

2017

FEE launches the three-year Youth Education & Audience Research project, or “YEAR,” to develop and distribute new forms of pro-liberty media to newcomers.

2016

FEE.org readership reaches 50,000 readers per month, exceeding the circulation of The Freeman magazine at its height in the 1980s.

2014

FEE completes its move from its ancestral headquarters in Irvington-on-Hudson, New York to Atlanta, Georgia.

2008

Lawrence W. Reed becomes FEE’s tenth president as FEE changes its mission to focus on newcomers to the ideas of liberty.

2003

Richard Ebeling becomes FEE’s ninth president.

2001

Mark Skousen becomes FEE’s eighth president.

1997

FEE.org is launched.

1997

Donald J. Boudreaux becomes FEE’s seventh president.

1992

Hans Sennholz becomes FEE’s sixth president.

1988

Bruce Evans becomes FEE’s fifth president.

1985

Robert Love becomes FEE’s fourth president.

1984

Perry E. Gresham becomes FEE’s third president.

1983

John Sparks becomes FEE’s second president, following the death of founder Leonard E. Read.

1962

FEE republishes Frédéric Bastiat’s classic book The Law, translated into English by Dean Russell.

1952

FEE acquires The Freeman, a journal about ideas on liberty.

1950

FEE is subpoenaed by the U.S. Congress to defend its free-market principles and programs and is pivotal in saving the United States from the post-WWII socialist consensus.

1949

Ludwig von Mises dictates at FEE his masterpiece Human Action. FEE purchases the first few hundred copies, enabling its publication by the Yale University Press.

1946

Ayn Rand’s novella Anthem is published in the U.S. for the first time by FEE founder Leonard E. Read’s Pamphleteers, Inc.

1946

Leonard E. Read and associates found FEE on March 7th. FEE publishes Milton Friedman and George Stigler’s ‘Roofs or Ceilings?,’ an influential publication against rent controls.

Learn more about FEE’s history from former New York Times

editorial board member and founding FEE trustee Henry Hazlitt.

FEE’s Impact

Making the ideas of liberty familiar, credible, and compelling to the rising generation.

FEE is one of the most innovative and effective organizations in the freedom movement

FEE employs commercially-proven digital marketing strategies and life-changing, in-person programs to reach young people directly, at large scale, and at different stages of their personal journeys toward the adoption of freedom as their life philosophy.

Over the last decade, FEE has seen exponential growth in every programmatic area, becoming the global leader in reaching young people with the legal, economic, and ethical principles of a free society.

Videos & Podcasts


In 2018, FEE produced a total of 58 original videos and 201 audio podcasts, which were watched for a total of 29 million minutes.

Seminars


In 2019, FEE will welcome 6,000 students to over 50 in-person seminars—a 38% increase over 2017.

FEE.org


In 2018, FEE.org welcomed 9.6 million unique visitors, nearly half of whom are under the age of 35. December 2018 was the most trafficked month ever for FEE.org with over 1.1 million users.

eBooks


FEE.org hosts an online library of 150+ eBooks and “Essential Guides,” which were downloaded over 100,000 times in 2018.

Classroom Kits


In 2019, FEE will reach directly into classrooms by distributing 500 Classroom Kits to educators across the world, ultimately influencing over 25,000 students.

Our People

The talent at FEE is our most valuable resource

Our team represents expertise in a variety of fields, from economics to technology

Support FEE

An investment in FEE is an investment in the
entire liberty movement.

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