William W. Beach

William W. Beach is the director of the Center for Data Analysis at the Heritage Foundation [http://www.heritage.org] , a conservative think-tank based in Washington D.C.. After holding a variety of posts in the public, private, and academic sectors, Mr. Beach has overseen Heritage's original statistical research on taxes, Social Security, crime, education, trade, and a host of other issues for over a decade.

Career

As a graduate from Washburn University in Topeka, Kan., Mr. Beach also holds a Master's degree in history and economics from the University of Missouri–Columbia. He has served as a litigation economist with two Kansas City, Mo., law firms — Campbell & Bysfield and Watson, Ess, Marshall & Enggas — where he specialized in analyzing anti-trust legal remedies and how they would alter product pricing and availability. Later, as an economist for Missouri's Office of Budget and Planning, he designed and managed the state's econometric model and advised the governor on revenue and economic issues. After a stint in the corporate headquarters of Sprint United Inc., Mr. Beach moved to the Washington, D.C. area to serve as president of the Institute for Humane Studies at George Mason University.

Mr. Beach joined Heritage in 1995, where he has since served as it's director for the Center for Data Analysis. Under his leadership, the Center has acquired a range of analytical models and one of the largest privately-held public policy databases in the United States. Each year it publishes a variety of reports and indices, most notably the Index of Economic Freedom, which measures and ranks the extent to which individuals are free to work, produce, consume, and invest in each of the world's countries, and the Index of Dependency, which measures government expansion in America and the degree of reliance on social support programs.

In addition, Mr. Beach has worked to develop many of the econometric models Heritage uses in its estimates of how proposed tax changes will likely affect individuals, families, various business sectors, and the overall national economy. Under the direction of Mr. Beach, the Center reeguarly competes with the Congressional Budget Office, the Office of Management and Budget, the Joint Committee on Taxation, and many other government agencies that score the potential costs and benefits of legislation.

Studies and Papers

* [http://www.heritage.org/Research/Taxes/wm1373.cfm Increasing IRS Tax Collection Powers Threatens More IRS Abuse: The New Congress Moves to Close the "Tax Gap"]
* [http://www.heritage.org/Research/Taxes/wm1334.cfm The Triple Whammy of Taxes: How the AMT, Repealing the Bush Tax Cuts, and the Social Security Wage Cap Would Raise Taxes on Millions of Americans]
* [http://www.heritage.org/Research/Budget/cda06-11.cfm The 2006 Index of Dependency]