Meet the Econ prof leaving UT because he doesn’t want to get shot this fall

Professor Hamermesh has taught at UT for over 20 years – but is leaving it all behind because of the new open-carry policy.

The longtime Economics teacher is sadly leaving UT, claiming “there’s a non-zero chance” a student could shoot him out of anger come this fall.

We sat down with the legendary professor to talk about his departure, comparisons between Trump and Hitler, and how UT’s new president “doesn’t have the guts” to do the right thing.

First and foremost, what’s the reasoning behind your decision, because I know it’s based on the open-carry law, but could you expand on why/how it effects you?

Because I teach 500 students as you know, and I’m not too worried about the classroom. But I have students that have occasionally in the past come into the office and gotten very angry. If they’re allowed to carry guns into my office, I think there’s a non-zero chance that they might get upset and just pull it on me. Now if I had 20 students, I would be much less worried. Most of the people here are not teaching giant classes and for them I think that although there’s an increased risk, it’s not the same increase in risk that I’ve faced.

Now let me give you responses to that that I have gotten. Some people have said “Well Hamermesh, look a lot of the students are under 21 and therefore can not carry guns. The response is that:

a) Nobody, if you carry a gun that your father or mother gave you is going to stop you just because they think you’re 19 and walking around campus.

b)The gun lobby is about introduce into this state and other state, a dropping of the age for getting a license to 18.

The other argument I have heard is that if you had your own gun, you could protect yourself. My response is two-fold:

1) I don’t want my own gun. I don’t want to be engaged in a gunfight at the Econ Corral with a crazy student and:

2) I’m 72, and my guess is that students are faster on the draw than I am because they’re going to be upset and pull it out on me and by the time I pull my gun out even if i wished to, which I don’t, they’ll have long since [pulled the trigger].

Sounds reasonable enough. So, I know the open-carry law will be put into place in the fall of 2016. There’s still going to be a lot of students here. Do you have any advice for the students who are going to have to deal with this open-carry policy?

No, not really…all I can say is be careful and suck up the increased risk. I’m less worried about people like professors in classrooms and offices than I am about students at frat parties or dormitory parties getting drunk and going crazy. That’s a much bigger risk, and it’ll happen sometime. No question about it.

I know that there have been some anti open-carry rallies around campus. How do you think your decision to not work at UT these coming semesters will affect other professors who are also potentially in the same position? Do you think that’ll spark people to move away?

No. The real effect is that with any policy, the impacts are much less on incumbents than they are on potential people. Because if I am somebody who is a really good scholar and I’m faced between going here and someplace of equal quality where I don’t face the risk of having guns aimed at me, I will go elsewhere. [Secondly], given that the risk is greater with the more students you have, this law provides a disincentive to teach large numbers of students, which means lower-level division classes eventually will be less likely to be taught by regular professors and rather by people who have no other alternatives, which hurts the students also. The basic thing with this law is that it hurts the University of Texas. This is a law that benefits SMU, TCU, and the private schools and hurts the public schools. The legislature is basically whipping the University of Texas system.

Can you expand on how it helps SMU and other private schools?

They look better compared to the public universities. It is less risky to be there. The private schools can opt-out and they all have already. Nobody wants this. No sensible person on campus wants this. It’s indirect. It’s part of the general system where one thing that happens in one place impacts another. Just like in microeconomics, where one market has a spillover effect on another market.

OK. I think that the biggest issue here is on the national level. When we’re talking about gun debates, I know that that’s been a big issue in recent years. How do you think that Texas’s open-carry law relates to the national debate on guns?

I think quite frankly, people elsewhere view Texas as just being crazy. So I don’t think that this has much impact elsewhere other than the people that shake their head in disbelief that people are that crazy here.

Alright, but given the media attention on right-wing candidates…

[Republicans] are going to be beaten like crazy, especially if they nominate one of the nuttier guys. I make fun of this whole thing. I think we should mandate that everybody has to get an assault rifle and be trained. We should all be forced to carry assault rifles around with us. That’s the fear out of absurdity from the “defend yourself” argument. But of course that’s silly. It turns into an armed camp. Look, yesterday there was a terrorist attack in the London Underground. Some guy knifed a couple of people. One guy was seriously injured, the other not at all. And he was tasered and brought down. What would have happened if had been in the United States?

I think he might have had a gun.

He’d have had a gun and blown people away! I mean it’s almost like a controlled experiment. Look at gun deaths here versus elsewhere. It’s not surprising that a lot more people are killed by guns here. And it’s not just by criminals. I mean what does anybody need an assault rifle for? Are they hunting with it? I don’t think so. It’s nuts. But I’m against all guns. I think we should go back to the second amendment: the right to bear arms. It was passed in 1787 and at that time, the militia that was being maintained had muskets. Anything more than that weren’t in the mind of the Founding Fathers. Therefore it shouldn’t be allowed. That’s abiding by the constitution. By the time you get your musket loaded, you just say, “what the hell I’ll let him go.”

The ubiquity of guns in this country, unless you want to have a police state, which certainly Trump would like, being the Führer of the police state as would Ted Cruz, you’re going to keep on having [mass public shootings]. It’s not a matter of chance that this is happening now. you’ve got right wing guys stirring the pot and you’ve got guns readily accessible. It’s going to keep happening, I just don’t want it happening near me… and getting out of here is one way to increase the chances of me living a long life. Not much, I mean it’s not a huge risk, but why should I bear the risk in the first place?

So I’ve gotten your stance on guns. What do you think we can do to solve the issue? Because I know there’s a lot of discussions, but the NRA lobby is still prevalent. 

I think it’d be nice if some of the politicians exhibited a little bit of guts. Again, not all politicians have to be bought.

So do you think there’s anything that we can do as students or faculty? 

Yes. If the president [of UT] had some guts, he would simply say “we’re not going to abide by this except in a very few public places.” He can do that. The president of a major university is in a position of moral leadership. And this is, to me, a moral issue. If he had any guts, he’d do that.

Why do you think he’s not doing that?

Because he doesn’t have the guts. He’s scared. He’s new on the job. He thinks other things are more important. But I’ve learned that when you deal with bullies, when you deal with them, if you give into them, all they want to do is bully you some more. Campuses are supposed to study the law and decide on its impact. Let them show some guts and fight with this legislature. In fact we have some power. The university president does have a moral platform, and I’d like to see him take advantage of it.

Now I know the president has hosted some forums…

Oh, they’ve always hosted these forums. That’s standard academic administration bullshit. I mean they’re always studying the issue. That’s fine and dandy, but I’m sure they’re going to pay no attention to it because they knew the answer right away: everybody is against having guns. They’ll do what they would’ve done in the first place. What would you expect to happen. What, the forum saying “Yes we want guns! Please allow guns everywhere!” Hell no. This a way of people venting or making people feel involved. That’s standard academic stuff.

It seems to me that the way for real change to occur is to get the president to show, as you say, some guts or moral courage. Do you think that there’s a potential for students to get involved? Because I know in Missouri, there were student protests over the president due to not being responsive to race issues.

It might help. Maybe a little bit, if the students really cared. But they don’t, and it’s the classic case where the risks for any one individual are fairly small, nobody wishes to take the time to do anything crazy about it.