David Schmidtz (born 1955) is Kendrick Professor of Philosophy and joint Professor of Economics at the University of Arizona. He grew up in Saskatchewan, Canada, and earned his PhD at Arizona under the direction of Joel Feinberg and Allen Buchanan and taught at Yale and Bowling Green State University before returning to Arizona. He has recently served as a visiting professor at Florida State University College of Law.

He is author of Elements of Justice (Cambridge, 2006), Rational Choice and Moral Agency (Princeton, 1995), co-author of Social Welfare and Individual Responsibility (Cambridge, a “For & Against” book with Robert Goodin) and editor of a volume on Robert Nozick in the Cambridge University Press "Contemporary Philosophy in Focus" series. He also co-edited Environmental Ethics: What Really Matters, What Really Works (Oxford) with Elizabeth Willott; a second edition of this book will appear in 2010. His first book, The Limits of Government: An Essay on the Public Goods Argument (Westview, 1991), combined his interests in moral philosophy and economic analysis.

He has published in many journals, including the Journal of Philosophy, Ethics, and Political Theory. Over forty of his articles have been (or are in the process of being) reprinted, including Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Turkish, and German translations. Thirteen of his essays (one previously unpublished, on Peter Singer's approach to moral theory) were published by Oxford Press as Person, Polis, Planet in 2008. His current projects are The Purpose of Moral Theory and A Brief History of Liberty (Wiley-Blackwell, 2010), with co-author Jason Brennan.

Schmidtz has also written on rational choice theory and environmental ethics.

In addition to his teaching, he directs a center for the Philosophy of Freedom at the University of Arizona.

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