Roland Gerhard Fryer Jr. is an American economist and professor at Harvard University. He joined the Harvard faculty in 2003 and rapidly rose through the academic ranks, becoming one of the youngest professors and the youngest African American to be awarded tenure at Harvard in 2007 at the age of 30. Fryer has received numerous accolades, including a MacArthur Fellowship in 2011 and the John Bates Clark Medal in 2015.