Carlos Tello Macías

Mexican economist, academic and diplomat

Carlos Tello Macías


Secretary of Budget and Planning
In office 1 December 1976 – 16 November 1977
President	José López Portillo

Personal details
Born	Carlos Tello Macías (1938-11-04) 4 November 1938 (age 85) Geneva, Switzerland
Nationality	Mexican
Political party	Institutional Revolutionary Party
Spouse	Catalina Díaz Casasús^[1]
Children	3
Residence	Mexico City
Alma mater	Georgetown University Columbia University King's College, Cambridge
Profession	Economist

Carlos Tello Macías (born 4 November 1938) is a Mexican socialist-oriented economist, academic and diplomat.^[2] He is a former ambassador to Cuba, Portugal and Russia and a former Secretary of Budget and Planning in the cabinet of President José López Portillo.^[1] According to a document distributed in the Senate by his political rivals (including some members of his own party), he was responsible for the high inflation rate (which surpassed 100 percent) and the significant increase of the external debt (which grew from 8.6 to 92.4 billion USD) in the López Portillo administration.^[3]

Biography

Tello Macías was born in Geneva, Switzerland, where his parents, Manuel Tello Baurraud and Guadalupe Macías Viadero were serving as Mexican diplomats.^[1] He received a bachelor's degree in Business Administration from Georgetown University (1955–58), a master's degree in Economics from Columbia University (1958–59) and a doctorate's degree in the same discipline from King's College, University of Cambridge (1961–63).^[4]

He joined the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in 1976. Besides serving as Secretary of Budget and Planning in the federal cabinet (a position he was forced to resign from following a long and bitter dispute with the Secretary of Finance, Julio Rodolfo Moctezuma),^[5] Tello worked in the public sector as Undersecretary of Finance (1975–76) and as Directors General of the Bank of Mexico (September 1982 – November 1982),^[1] where he substituted Miguel Mancera, who opposed his foreign exchange controls strategy.^[3]

As an academic, he read several courses at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (1960–87), at El Colegio de México (1964–79), at the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean and worked as a researcher for over nine years at the National Institute of Anthropology and History (1978–87).^[1] He also worked as a guest scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars at Washington, D.C. (1984) and as a visiting researcher at the Center for Mexican-United States Studies at the University of California, San Diego (1984–85).^[4]

Tello Macías is married to Catalina Díaz Casasús,^[1] a descendant of former President Porfirio Díaz.^[6] He has three children, among them, historian Carlos Tello Díaz, author of La rebelión de las cañadas.^[6]

Selected works

Cartas desde Moscú (Letters from Moscow, 1994)
Estado y desarrollo económico: México 1920-2006 (State and Economic Development: Mexico 1920-2006, 2008)

References

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Unidad de la Crónica Presidencial (1992). Diccionario biográfico del gobierno mexicano (2nd ed.). Fondo de Cultura Económica.
^ Byron, Christopher; Branegan, Jay (1982-09-20). "Why Bankers Have the Jitters". Time. Archived from the original on November 4, 2012. Retrieved 2009-12-05. Adding to the uncertainties, the López Portillo government two weeks ago appointed a socialist-oriented economist, Carlos Tello Macias, as head of the Mexican central bank
^ ^a ^b Robles de la Rosa, Leticia (2008-07-02). "Tunden con críticas a coautor de la crisis con López Portillo". Excélsior (in Spanish). Mexico City. Retrieved 5 December 2009. Tello Macías es el responsable de que en México la inflación rabasara el ciento por ciento, que tuviera una elevada devaluación y que la deuda externa pasara de ocho mil 600 millones de dólares a 92 mil 400 millones de dólares.^{[permanent dead link]}
^ ^a ^b Camp, Roderic Ai (1995). Mexican Political Biographies, 1935-1993 (3rd ed.). University of Texas Press. p. 693. ISBN 978-0-292-71181-5. Retrieved 2009-09-23.
^ Philip, George D. E.; Enríquez, Rosario (1988). The Mexican economy. Taylor & Francis. p. 55. ISBN 978-0-415-01265-2. Retrieved 2009-09-23. Tensions existed between key parts of the administrations, notably the rift that developed in 1977 and 1978 between the etatiste Carlos Tello, the Minister responsible for planning and the budget, and Julio Rodolfo Moctezuma Cid, the more orthodox finance minister.
^ ^a ^b Castañón, Adolfo (November 1993). "El exilio: un relato de familia, de Carlos Tello Díaz" (PDF). Letras Libres (in Spanish). Mexico City. Retrieved 5 December 2009.^{[permanent dead link]}