LSU donor backs new capitalism research center, focused on its ‘greatest prosperity’

The LSU Board of Supervisors Friday approved the creation of the Prosperity Institute, a research center in its business college that the founding donor hopes will definitively prove the superiority of capitalism. 

Roger Ogden, a New Orleans real estate developer and former LSU board chairman, has been a major donor to the university, He provided the endowment to create the institute, which he said has been in the works for a decade. LSU spokeswoman Meg Sunstrom said the amount of the gift was not public. 

In his comments to the board, Ogden decried socialism and touted the virtues of capitalism.

“What powered me 10 years ago to begin exploring this was I realized in most media forms, profit was a dirty word. Capitalism was an even dirtier word,” Ogden said. 

Ogden said a lack of education about capitalism has led young people and the news media to support socialism and described the institute as a way to prove capitalism’s virtues. 

“Capitalism, when studied and compared — which is what will happen (at the institute) — to other major economic systems throughout history … by far creates the greatest prosperity for …  the most people than any other system that’s been employed in the world,” Ogden said. 

Russell Crook, LSU’s business school dean, said the institute will use research, teaching, study-abroad opportunities and a fellowship program to “accelerate knowledge” of various economic systems and their impact on various countries’ economies. 

Economics professor Areendum Chanda will direct the institute.