Thomas Sowell (born June 30, 1930) is an American author, economist, and political commentator who is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. Sowell is the author of more than 45 books (including revised and new editions) on a variety of subjects including politics, economics, education and race, and he has been a syndicated columnist in more than 150 newspapers. Sowell was born in segregated Gastonia, North Carolina, to a poor family, and grew up in Harlem, New York Ci