Erling Dekke Næss (5 September 1901 – 7 February 1993) was a Norwegian shipowner and businessman. Brother of philosopher Arne Dekke Næss, his nephew was the mountaineer and businessman Arne Næss Jr. Best known for his early adoption of flags of convenience, Næss was Deputy Head of Nortraship's New York office from 1942 to 1946. Næss was the initiator behind the OBO carrier. He is also credited as proposing the Norwegian International Ship Register, which allowed Norwegian shipowners to compete on an equal footing with flags of convenience. Family and early years Erling Dekke Næss was born in Bergen, Norway, and was son of Ragnar Næss, a businessman and banker. He had two brothers, the younger being the philosopher Arne Næss. The family moved to Kristiania in 1911, where his father died in 1913. Næss studied economy at the Royal Frederick University and earned a B.S. in 1920. He contemplated continued studies and travelled to Britain to finish a Ph.D. at the London School of Economics. Studies and work in Britain Næss, however, did not have the financial resources to study, so he had to work; after a short stint at Midland Bank, he changed over to C. J. Hambro & Son. He started out as a typist, writing letters to Scandinavian customers, but after a year, he was made assistant in the new currency department. In the evenings, he continued his studies in economics, and was greatly influenced by John Maynard Keynes. Of special interest for his research and work were the imbalances created by the German war reparations, as their consequences could be seen in the currency market with the German mark rapidly losing value against other main currencies. The young Næss was amazed at being in the center of the disastrous decline of the mark, severely undermining the Weimar Republic. By the middle of 1923, Næss decided to concentrate on his Ph.D. and thus ended his engagement with the bank. The aim of his research was to show how fluctuations in the currency market influenced each nation's prices, and he became a member of the Royal Economic Society in order to follow lectures by Keynes and others. Keynes was a proponent of economists investing in the market, in order to "live as one learned", and young Næss followed this. He started out with small investments in rubber, as there were huge imbalances in supply and demand which