Frederick Fourie was appointed professor of economics at the University of the Free State (UFS) in 1982 after obtaining a PhD in Economics from Harvard University. He was appointed UFS distinguished professor in 1998. He has published more than 50 articles in accredited journals and has authored a macroeconomics textbook now in its 4rd edition. From 1992-95 he was the founding head of the Unit for Fiscal Analysis in the Department of Finance in Pretoria. He co-authored the policy document leading to the Competition Act 1999 and was a member of the first Competition Tribunal. After serving as DVC: Academic Affairs and then as Vice-Chancellor (2003-08) at the UFS, he returned to academic life as a Research Fellow in the UFS Department of Economics, focusing on unemployment. He also is a Research Affiliate at the Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit (SALDRU) at the University of Cape Town (UCT), where he has been involved in research collaboration on unemployment since 2011. Since 2012 he was Research Coordinator of the Research Project on Employment, Income Distribution and Inclusive Growth (REDI3x3), based at SALDRU and supported by the National Treasury. He convened REDI3x3's Unemployment/Employment focus area as well as the Informal Sector Employment Project (ISEP), and is editor of a resultant book: Fourie FCvN (ed.) The South African informal sector: Creating jobs, reducing poverty. HSRC Press 2018. ISBN: 978-0-7969-2534-3.