Alan T. Peacock
Sir Alan Turner Peacock DSC, FBA, FRSE was a British economist.
Early life
Alan Turner Peacock was born in Ryton-on-Tyne in 1922. He was the son of the scientist Alexander David Peacock, who in 1926 became Professor of Natural History at University College, Dundee. On his father's appointment, the family moved to Broughty Ferry. He was educated at Grove Academy, the High School of Dundee and the University of St Andrews, where he completed a war-shortened degree in economics and history.Career
Having completed correspondence courses in economics while serving with the Royal Navy during the Second World War, upon being demobilised Peacock resumed his studies at St Andrews, graduating with another degree in economics and political science in 1947. He then taught at St Andrews, the London School of Economics, the University of Edinburgh's School of Economics, the University of York, the University of Buckingham of which he was the Vice-Chancellor from 1980 to 1984, and finally at Heriot-Watt University where he was honorary professor of public finance at the Edinburgh Business School until his death.From 1973 to 1976, Peacock was the Chief Economic Adviser to the Department of Trade and Industry of the United Kingdom. He was also a co-founder and the first Executive Director of the David Hume Institute. During the 1970s and 1980s, he played a leading role in the field of cultural economics.
From 1984 to 1986, Peacock served as Chairman of the Committee on the Financing of the BBC, the tenth major British inquiry into broadcasting. The Committee rejected Margaret Thatcher's wish to fund the BBC by advertising and proposed a sophisticated long-term strategy in which given a full broadcasting market with unlimited channels and freedom of entry, subscription would replace the licence fee. The model developed by Peacock later on served as a blueprint for Ofcom's Public Service Publisher.