History of Economics eJournal最新文献

{"title":"Was Keynesian Economics Ever Dead? If So, Has It Been Resurrected?","authors":"Steven M. Fazzari","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3505677","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3505677","url":null,"abstract":"This article reflects on rising interest in Keynesian macroeconomics in the aftermath of the Great Recession. I identify aspects of Keynesian thinking that never were completely banished from the mainstream as well as threads of Keynesian macroeconomics that have become more influential since the crisis. However, the way most mainstream analysis continues to invoke the zero lower bound for short-term interest rates and the concept of the ‘natural’ rate of interest implies that any Keynesian resurrection outside of heterodoxy remains incomplete. The future may bring broader recognition of how demand leads economic growth and of ways in which the demand side leads the supply side beyond the typical textbook ‘short run.’","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"22 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114207619","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Keynes Demonstrated in Chapter 15 of the A Treatise on Probability That His Non Numerical Probabilities Are Identical to Boole’s Constituent Probabilities: It Is Mathematically Impossible for Keynes’s Non Numerical Probabilities to Be Ordinal Probabilities","authors":"M. E. Brady","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3457973","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3457973","url":null,"abstract":"The claim that Keynes’s non numerical probabilities are ordinal probabilities was shown to be mathematically impossible by Keynes in chapter 15 of the A Treatise on Probability on pp.162-163 and in chapter 17 on pp.186-194.<br><br>Keynes’s non numerical probabilities are identical to Boole’s constituent probabilities. Keynes improved on Boole’s technique and was able to solve Boolean problems much quicker than it took Boole to solve the problems. Part II of the A Treatise on Probability is nearly identical to the analysis provided in his two Cambridge University Fellowships in 1907 and 1908.<br><br><br>","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"47 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121108433","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Tragedy of the Commons after 50 Years","authors":"A. Marciano, Brett M. Frischmann, G. Ramello","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3451688","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3451688","url":null,"abstract":"Garrett Hardin’s “The Tragedy of the Commons” (1968) has been incredibly influential generally and within economics, and it remains important despite some historical and conceptual flaws. Hardin focused on the stress population growth inevitably placed on environmental resources. Unconstrained consumption of a shared resource—a pasture, a highway, a server—by individuals acting in rational pursuit of their self-interest can lead to congestion and, worse, rapid depreciation, depletion, and even destruction of the resources. Our societies face similar problems, with respect to not only environmental resources but also infrastructures, knowledge, and many other shared resources. In this article, we examine how the tragedy of the commons has fared within the economics literature and its relevance for economic and public policies today. We revisit the original piece to explain Hardin’s purpose and conceptual approach. We expose two conceptual mistakes he made: conflating resource with governance and conflating open access with commons. This critical discussion leads us to the work of Elinor Ostrom, the recent Nobel Prize in Economics laureate, who spent her life working on commons. Finally, we discuss a few modern examples of commons governance of shared resources.","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"8 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132048663","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"'I Had Always Operated on the Outside': A Conversation with E. Roy Weintraub on the History of Economics, Science Studies and Academic Morals","authors":"Yann Giraud","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3450631","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3450631","url":null,"abstract":"A transcription of a 2019 conversation with Duke historian E. Roy Weintraub on his intellectual development over the 1980s from mathematician to economist to historian. The conversation also explored Weintraub’s early and continuing attempts to forge new ways to study the history of contemporary economics, and the role of science studies in providing a natural language for such explorations. The interview will be translated by Giraud and published in French in the journal Zilsel: Science, technique, societe.","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"7 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125808629","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Human Capital in the History of Economic Thought: A Critical Examination of the Work of Amartya Sen and Joseph Stiglitz","authors":"Hassan Mustafa","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3447759","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3447759","url":null,"abstract":"This paper traces historically the transformation of the notion of human capital within the history of economic thought. It will briefly trace the transformation from neoclassical to neoliberal economics and then from neoliberal to liberal development economics. It is posited that not merely there has been a conceptual shift in liberal development economics from the neoliberal concept of human capital but an epistemological shift has occurred as well. This paper aims to concisely trace both shifts through the work of Amartya Sen and Joseph Stiglitz.","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"250 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-08-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116716030","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Keynes Always Adhered to His Logical, Objective Probability Relation, Defined As P(a/H) Equals a Rational Degree of Belief, α: Logical Probability Always Remained the Guide to Life for J M Keynes","authors":"M. E. Brady","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3442033","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3442033","url":null,"abstract":"Keynes’s 1931 acknowledgement, that Ramsey’s theory of subjective degree of belief, based on numerically precise probability, was acceptable to him in the special case where w=1, has been constantly misinterpreted. This misinterpretation follows from the lack of understanding of Keynes's weight of the argument relation. This required that Keynes’s second logical relation of the A Treatise on Probability, the evidential weight of the argument, V(a/H)=w,0≤w≤1, where w=K/(K+I) and K defined the amount of relevant knowledge and I defined the amount of relevant ignorance, was defined and explicitly taken into account. It has been completely overlooked by all commentators that Keynes also stated in the same comment in 1931 that Ramsey’s theory did not deal with Keynes’s rational degrees of belief, P(a/h)=α,where 0≤α≤1. Only in the special case where w=1 does Keynes accept Ramsey’s approach because then the lower probability also equals the upper probability, which means that you now have additive, precise numerically definite probabilities.<br><br>Keynes conceded to Ramsey what he had always agree about, that the purely mathematical laws of the probability calculus can be interpreted as coherence constraints requiring that the probabilities of rational decision makers must be consistent with the assumption of additivity if, and only if, w=1.<br><br>The literature on Keynes’s logical probability relation, P, has failed to grasp Keynes’s very clear statements supporting it.","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"8 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-08-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129127484","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Karl Mittermaier’s Pursuit of Classical Liberal Coherence","authors":"D. Klein","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3440643","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3440643","url":null,"abstract":"Karl Mittermaier (1938-2016) was a classical liberal economist at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. He completed a work in 1986 titled The Hand Behind the Invisible Hand: Dogmatic and Pragmatic Views on Free Markets and the State of Economic Theory, being published in 2020 for the first time. Here I treat Mittermaier’s rich meditation, which I interpret as a pursuit of greater coherence in classical liberal thought. Mittermaier emphasizes the moral, cultural, and institutional preconditions of a liberal market order, and he says that some of the preconditions depend on people feeling that they have reason to embrace such classical liberal principles. The preconditions, then, depend in part on the perception of coherence and appeal of the liberal order. The present essay is written for the new volume presenting The Hand Behind the Invisible Hand.","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-08-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121849807","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Virtues of Prudence and Self-Command, not Jeremy Bentham’s Max U or the Invisible Hand of the Market, are Adam Smith’s Foundation for the Wealth of Nations","authors":"M. E. Brady","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3438898","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3438898","url":null,"abstract":"The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759; 1790) is the foundation for the Wealth of Nations(1776).Smith recognized, like all other major spiritual and moral teachers, that Prudence is the most important virtue because nothing can be accomplished without it being applied successfully first. The virtue of Prudence applies in all facets of life. However, there were individual philosophers who rejected virtue ethics. One such individual was Jeremy Bentham (another was Karl Marx). Bentham sought to replace Smith’s Virtue Ethics with his Principle of Maximizing Utility. Bentham argued that only his principle of maximizing utility could support the study of ethics. \u0000 \u0000Bentham attacked Smith’s Virtue Ethics approach in 1787 in the same fashion as J.Viner attacked Smith’s Virtue Ethics in 1927. \u0000 \u0000Both Bentham and Viner argued that \u0000• Smith’s The Theory of Moral Sentiments (virtue ethics) is very flawed \u0000• Smith’s support of interest rate control laws and skewing of bank credit to the sober people and away from the prodigals,imprudent risk takers, and projectors (Bentham was a strong supporter and employee all his life of the major projector company, the British East India Company, which started the American Revolutionary War) was very ill advised \u0000• Smith’s analysis of the macroscopic impact that the prodigals, imprudent risk takers ,and projectors have on an economy,endangering the sober people, was incorrect because the prodigals, imprudent risk takers, and projectors were really just innovative entrepreneurs pursuing their own self interest \u0000• Smith never actually made a single advance in the field of economics (political economy) in his lifetime as all of the parts of his theory were already available from other, earlier sources, which he failed to acknowledge properly and cite \u0000 \u0000Smith responded to Bentham’s two pronged attack in 1787 by rewriting major parts of the The Theory of Moral Sentiments so that its virtue ethics message would be fine tuned in order to target legislators and government officials, which would counter the utilitarian message of Bentham’s Defense of Usury and The Principles of Morals and Legislation. There was now a clear cut choice between two completely different ethical systems upon which to build capitalism. \u0000 \u0000Smith envisaged a completely different approach to capitalism than Bentham. Like the inhabitants of Augustine’s Earthly City and Heavenly City,there were two opposing groups, the middle class sober people, who practiced virtue ethics, and the upper class projectors, imprudent risk takers, and projectors, who practiced utilitarian ethics. The proper role of government was to use legislation, law and sanction to prevent the upper class projectors, imprudent risk takers, and projectors from damaging the middle class, sober people. \u0000 \u0000The Smith and Bentham views about the correct evolution of capitalism over time are as different as night and day. \u0000 \u0000A major confusion among economists, except G.Kennedy, since Smith’s death ","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"44 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-08-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129773078","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Being Neoclassical Before it was Cool to be Neoclassical: The Case of the Theory of the Firm","authors":"P. Walker","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3276451","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3276451","url":null,"abstract":"This paper looks at the contribution made by pre-1870 writers in economics (proto-neoclassicals) to what would later become known as the neoclassical theory of the firm. In particular we briefly consider the work of Dionysius Lardner, Johann von Thünen, John Stuart Mill, Charles Ellet, Jr. and Antoine Augustin Cournot. This paper shows that the proto-neoclassical \"theory of the firm\" gave rise to the neoclassical theory of markets.","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"09 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-08-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115282879","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Road to Serfdom after 75 Years","authors":"Bruce J. Caldwell","doi":"10.1257/JEL.20191542","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1257/JEL.20191542","url":null,"abstract":"This paper revisits Friedrich Hayek’s book, The Road to Serfdom, on the seventy-fifth anniversary of its publication. Though the book is well-known, its arguments are often mischaracterized. The paper traces the origins of the book, noting the various people and arguments that Hayek was responding to, and places it in the context of its times. The structure of the book is explored and some common criticisms addressed. Finally, it is shown how, after its publication, the book took on a life of its own. (JEL B25, B31, P11, P16, P21, P26)","PeriodicalId":253619,"journal":{"name":"History of Economics eJournal","volume":"8 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-08-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128184579","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}