Nationality Australian Role Economist Name Roland Wilson | Occupation Public servant Children none | |
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Born 7 April 1904
Ulverstone, Tasmania, Australia ( 1904-04-07 ) Spouse(s) Valeska Thompson
(m. 1930–1971; her death)
Joyce
(m. 1975–1996; his death) Alma mater University of Tasmania
University of Oxford
University of Chicago Died October 25, 1996, Canberra, Australia Books Capital Imports and the Terms of Trade: Examined in the Light of Sixty Years of Australian Borrowings Education University of Oxford, University of Tasmania, University of Chicago | ||
Sir Roland Wilson (7 April 1904 – 25 October 1996) was a senior Australian public servant and economist.
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Life and career
Wilson was born in Ulverstone, Tasmania on 7 April 1904. Wilson studied at Devonport High School, where he won a scholarship to take an economics course at the University of Tasmania. He became a Rhodes Scholar in 1925, the first Tasmanian from a state school to win the scholarship. The Rhodes Scholarship saw him studying to become a doctor of philosophy at the University of Oxford.
Wilson became Commonwealth Statistician in 1936.
Wilson was appointed Secretary of the Department of Labour and National Service as a war-time secondment in 1940.
In 1946, after World War II was over, Wilson resumed his position as Commonwealth Statistician until the Menzies Government made him Secretary of the Department of the Treasury in 1951.
On leaving Treasury in 1966, Wilson was the Chairman of Qantas until 1972, and between 1973 and 1975 was the Chairman of the Commonwealth Bank.
Awards and honours
He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1941 and knighted in 1955.
The Sir Roland Wilson Building at the Australian National University is named after Wilson, in recognition of his significant contribution to public policy and administration in Australia and in many international forums.