The link between occupation and character began with David Hume and extended by Adam Smith in ser... more The link between occupation and character began with David Hume and extended by Adam Smith in service to their attack on the doctrine of innate national character. Worker\u27s awareness of the relative approbative rewards to occupation is central to Smith\u27s competitive labor market equilibrium. When the division of labor is extended by growth, the variance of character increases. With this insight Smith was able to offer a race-blind theory of civilization, something that escaped even Hume. 19th century anthropological focus on the variance of character can be seen as a racialization of Smith\u27s work
Using the debates between Classical political economists and their critics as our lens, this pape... more Using the debates between Classical political economists and their critics as our lens, this paper examines the question of whether we\u27re the same or different. Starting with Adam Smith, Classical economics presumed that humans are the same in their capacity for language and trade ; observed differences were then explained by incentives, luck and history, and it is the vanity of the philosopher incorrectly to conclude otherwise. Such analytical egalitarianism was overthrown sometime after 1850 , when notions of race and hierarchy came to infect social analysis as a result of attacks on homogeneity by the Victorian Sages (including Thomas Carlyle and John Ruskin), in anthropology and biology (James Hunt and Charles Darwin), and among political economists themselves (W.R. Greg). Two questions were at issue. Do everyone\u27s preferences count equally, and is everyone equally capable of making economic decisions? In Smith\u27s account, philosophers and subjects alike are capable of m...
Best known for reviving the tradition of classical liberalism, F. A. Hayek was also a prominent s... more Best known for reviving the tradition of classical liberalism, F. A. Hayek was also a prominent scholar of the philosopher John Stuart Mill. One of his greatest undertakings was a collection of Mill’s extensive correspondence with his longstanding friend and later companion and wife, Harriet Taylor-Mill. Hayek first published the Mill-Taylor correspondence in 1951, and his edition soon became required reading for any study of the nineteenth-century foundations of liberalism. This latest addition to the University of Chicago Press’s Collected Works of F. A. Hayek series showcases the fascinating intersections between two of the most prominent thinkers from two successive centuries. Hayek situates Mill within the complex social and intellectual milieu of nineteenth-century Europe—as well as within twentieth-century debates on socialism and planning—and uncovers the influence of Taylor-Mill on Mill’s political economy. The volume features the Mill-Taylor correspondence and brings toget...
The collective action problem of economic experts was diagnosed acutely by Knight and Pigou in th... more The collective action problem of economic experts was diagnosed acutely by Knight and Pigou in the 1930s. The interest of economists as a group is in pursuing the public good of truth; the interest of an individual economist is in pursuing the private good of happiness. Pigou’s example is the pursuit of political influence. Deviation from truth-seeking devastates the theory of governance as objective inquiry laid out by Knight and John Rawls, as we saw in the eugenic era. We reformulate the Knight–Rawls position as truth-seeking contingent on a presupposed system. The best case for the Knight–Rawls position is transparency, where presuppositions are common knowledge. If transparency is infeasible making the nontransparency of inquiry itself transparent will serve as a second-best solution to warn third parties to make adjustments. A code of ethics can itself serve as a warning about the temptation. Pigou’s concern about nonpecuniary temptation should be added to the American Economi...
The precise nature of W. S. Jevons\u27s utilitarianism as a guiding rule for economic policy has ... more The precise nature of W. S. Jevons\u27s utilitarianism as a guiding rule for economic policy has yet to be investigated, and that will be the first issue treated in this paper. While J. A. Schumpeter, for instance, asserted that \u27some of the most prominent exponents of marginal utility\u27 (including Jevons), were \u27convinced utilitarians\u27, he did not investigate the further implications for Jevons\u27s policy analysis.
We believe an additional, and contrasting, interpretation of Mill’s method is supported by the ev... more We believe an additional, and contrasting, interpretation of Mill’s method is supported by the evidence. For in our view Mill insisted on the possibility of theory modification in the light of inadequacies revealed by empirical evidence, and also held that the central behavioral axiom is not of universal relevance but is pertinent only to the local circumstances of contemporary Great Britain and America—and, even so, qualified as we shall see—that axiom itself is empirically based. On our reading, there is more in common between his research strategy and that of Milton Friedman than is sometimes granted, at least when Friedman’s position on theory appraisal is appreciated in the manner of Hirsch and De Marchi (1990). As Fels has paraphrased this position in a review: “start with a thorough marshalling of facts, frame a hypothesis to explain them, make predictions from the hypothesis about facts not used in constructing it, compare the predictions with the actual facts, revise the hy...
W. Stanley Jevon’s statistical study of periodicity has received much scrutiny (Aldrich1987), but... more W. Stanley Jevon’s statistical study of periodicity has received much scrutiny (Aldrich1987), but less attention has been given to his theoretical position on economic fluctuations, a circumstance which T.W. Hutchison justly finds surprising considering that “Jevons maintained that aggregate instability, and the distress it caused, presented profoundly serious problems, and devoted some of his most strenuous economic research to their explanation” (Hutchison 1988, p. 6). This paper takes up the challenge to examine the development of Jevon’s though on economic fluctuations from the early 1860s until his death in 1882. I shall distinguish in what follows between Jevon’s “theory of economic fluctuations,” i.e. his explanation for how sunspots cause fluctuations, and his study of periodicity which attempted to prove that periodic solar variation constituted the mechanism causing periodic economic fluctuations.1 My main concern shall be to highlight the less appreciated explanation for ...
Political economy describes how human societies are organized by exchange. The critical issue for... more Political economy describes how human societies are organized by exchange. The critical issue for political economists is the interaction between self-directed decision making and the incentives that turn decisions into approved outcomes. In this interaction, political economists see a key role for leadership, a role that depends upon our common concern for others (Robbins, 1981). There are three roles, then, for leadership in the political economist’s model: self-directed decision making, incentive making, and establishing the criteria for approved outcomes
My purpose is to paint a broad brush narrative—it will have some visual representations as well—o... more My purpose is to paint a broad brush narrative—it will have some visual representations as well—of how nineteenth-century political economists and their critics confronted a set of basic and related questions: Are men and women equally capable of self governance? Are they equally able to decide when and whom to marry and how many children to have? Can they be trusted equally to cast a ballot? Is their right to property inviolate or might new arrangements be designed and adopted for the production and distribution of wealth? This is a story interwoven with extraordinary characters: John Stuart Mill will be featured heavily, though not exclusively. Alongside him frequently was his friend and later his wife, Harriet Taylor. Much of the story related to Mill on socialism will be told through the great critics of socialism in the twentieth century, Ludwig von Mises and (especially) Friedrich A. Hayek. Along the way, we will see that the criticisms in the first instance—in the nineteenth ...
Volume I Part 1. On the Value of Gold Part 2. The Coal Question Volume II Part 3. The Labouring C... more Volume I Part 1. On the Value of Gold Part 2. The Coal Question Volume II Part 3. The Labouring Classes Part 4. The Condition of the Coinage Volume III Part 5. The Theory of Political Economy Part 6. Economic Fluctuations Volume IV Part 7. Logic Part 8. On Economic and Statistical Methods Part 9. Miscellaneous Reviews Part 10. Obituaries
... ratings is no longer a matter of speculation and hearsay (Kolchinsky 2010 ... data by all per... more ... ratings is no longer a matter of speculation and hearsay (Kolchinsky 2010 ... data by all persons involved. As one might expect from Palyi's missing the statistical point about how to think about the ratings' experience, his response to Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz's empirical ...
conference “The Nature and Significance of Economic …, 2007
As a guide to the past Myrdal needs to be taken with great seriousness even though his achievemen... more As a guide to the past Myrdal needs to be taken with great seriousness even though his achievements have been clouded by his 1 involvement in eugenics (Broberg & Tydén 1996). The fact that sterilization of "the unfit" is a viable element in his policy space makes his reading of F. Y. Edgeworth's Mathematical Psychics particularly valuable. Our reading of Edgeworth's eugenic utilitarianism is found in Peart & Levy (2005c, pp. 226-33). There is a brief discussion of eugenics in Pigou's Economics of Welfare (1932, pp. 109-10) on which Rawls does not remark. The chapter "Quality of the People" (1932, pp. 106-22) argues one can bring about an equalization of capacity for happiness by equalizing income. The endogeneity of capacity for happiness might be what Rawls refers to when discussing utilitarianism in "Justice as reciprocity" which we quoted below. The sentence "When pressed they might well have invoked the idea of a more or less equal capacity of men in relevant respects if given an equal chance in a just society" is a nice summary of the hope in Pigou's "Quality of the People" chapter. 2 rather than with unreflecting entities. No one has so successfully waged war upon the position that "since natural objects are not like men, men must be like natural objects" (Robbins 1957, p. 399). In this paper, we begin by documenting Rawls' reading of Robbins and of Knight's Ethics of Competition. Second, we review Robbins' discussion of Wicksteed at the time when interpersonal comparisons of well-being entered choice theory. We note Robbins' opposition to hedonism in N & S, where by "hedonism" Robbins referred to the argument that an agent's choice entails no concern for other people's well-being. We call this "reclusive agency" to emphasize that this is our interpretation of Robbins' "hedonism" and Rawl's "rational unreasonableness." Third, we consider the consequence of economists' refusal to credit the possibility that the agents of their models engage in motivating interpersonal comparisons so the preferences of a Robinson Crusoe would not be perturbed when Friday enters the island (Bator 1957). This model of reclusive agency has fared poorly in the experimental arena (Sally 1995, Camerer and Thaler 1995) Rawls on the Economists Rawls' views on Robbins and Knight are evident from two types of evidence. First, there is what Rawls published. Second, there are the marginal comments about Robbins' and Knight's arguments which Rawls made in his books in the course of his reading. The annotations add to the insights in the published work. It is not obvious from reading Rawls' later work that either Robbins or Knight is important to his argument, but the marginal notations suggest otherwise. Indeed, at the foundation of economics itself Rawls sees two names: Robbins and Knight. Rawls' marginal note on Gunnar Myrdal's definition of the economic problem in Political Element in the Development of Economic Theory singles them out 1 Rawls (1955, p. 19). The second paragraph in Theory of Justice's preface says this: "Perhaps I can best explain my aim in this book as 2 follows. During much of modern moral philosophy the predominant systematic theory has been some form of utilitarianism. One reason for this is that it has been espoused by a long line of brilliant writers who have built up a body of thought truly impressive in its scope and refinement. We sometimes forget that the great utilitarians, Hume and Adam Smith, Bentham and Mill, were social
... Published by Duke University Press ... The famous linguist and political radical, Noam Chomsk... more ... Published by Duke University Press ... The famous linguist and political radical, Noam Chomsky, is one in a long line of recent “de-bunkers” on Smith's contributions to the economics canon, contributions that, ac-cording to Chomsky, place Smith in a line of thinking that is much ...
Page 1. 'Disturbing causes,' 'noxious errors,' and the theory-practice distin... more Page 1. 'Disturbing causes,' 'noxious errors,' and the theory-practice distinction in the economics of JS Mill and WS Jevons SANDRA J. PEART Baldwin-Wallace College Abstract. This paper offers an explanation for why the use ...
faculty-publications Part of the Econometrics Commons, and the Economic Theory Commons This Book ... more faculty-publications Part of the Econometrics Commons, and the Economic Theory Commons This Book Chapter is brought to you for free and open access by the Jepson School of Leadership Studies at UR Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications by an authorized administrator of UR Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact
The link between occupation and character began with David Hume and extended by Adam Smith in ser... more The link between occupation and character began with David Hume and extended by Adam Smith in service to their attack on the doctrine of innate national character. Worker\u27s awareness of the relative approbative rewards to occupation is central to Smith\u27s competitive labor market equilibrium. When the division of labor is extended by growth, the variance of character increases. With this insight Smith was able to offer a race-blind theory of civilization, something that escaped even Hume. 19th century anthropological focus on the variance of character can be seen as a racialization of Smith\u27s work
Using the debates between Classical political economists and their critics as our lens, this pape... more Using the debates between Classical political economists and their critics as our lens, this paper examines the question of whether we\u27re the same or different. Starting with Adam Smith, Classical economics presumed that humans are the same in their capacity for language and trade ; observed differences were then explained by incentives, luck and history, and it is the vanity of the philosopher incorrectly to conclude otherwise. Such analytical egalitarianism was overthrown sometime after 1850 , when notions of race and hierarchy came to infect social analysis as a result of attacks on homogeneity by the Victorian Sages (including Thomas Carlyle and John Ruskin), in anthropology and biology (James Hunt and Charles Darwin), and among political economists themselves (W.R. Greg). Two questions were at issue. Do everyone\u27s preferences count equally, and is everyone equally capable of making economic decisions? In Smith\u27s account, philosophers and subjects alike are capable of m...
Best known for reviving the tradition of classical liberalism, F. A. Hayek was also a prominent s... more Best known for reviving the tradition of classical liberalism, F. A. Hayek was also a prominent scholar of the philosopher John Stuart Mill. One of his greatest undertakings was a collection of Mill’s extensive correspondence with his longstanding friend and later companion and wife, Harriet Taylor-Mill. Hayek first published the Mill-Taylor correspondence in 1951, and his edition soon became required reading for any study of the nineteenth-century foundations of liberalism. This latest addition to the University of Chicago Press’s Collected Works of F. A. Hayek series showcases the fascinating intersections between two of the most prominent thinkers from two successive centuries. Hayek situates Mill within the complex social and intellectual milieu of nineteenth-century Europe—as well as within twentieth-century debates on socialism and planning—and uncovers the influence of Taylor-Mill on Mill’s political economy. The volume features the Mill-Taylor correspondence and brings toget...
The collective action problem of economic experts was diagnosed acutely by Knight and Pigou in th... more The collective action problem of economic experts was diagnosed acutely by Knight and Pigou in the 1930s. The interest of economists as a group is in pursuing the public good of truth; the interest of an individual economist is in pursuing the private good of happiness. Pigou’s example is the pursuit of political influence. Deviation from truth-seeking devastates the theory of governance as objective inquiry laid out by Knight and John Rawls, as we saw in the eugenic era. We reformulate the Knight–Rawls position as truth-seeking contingent on a presupposed system. The best case for the Knight–Rawls position is transparency, where presuppositions are common knowledge. If transparency is infeasible making the nontransparency of inquiry itself transparent will serve as a second-best solution to warn third parties to make adjustments. A code of ethics can itself serve as a warning about the temptation. Pigou’s concern about nonpecuniary temptation should be added to the American Economi...
The precise nature of W. S. Jevons\u27s utilitarianism as a guiding rule for economic policy has ... more The precise nature of W. S. Jevons\u27s utilitarianism as a guiding rule for economic policy has yet to be investigated, and that will be the first issue treated in this paper. While J. A. Schumpeter, for instance, asserted that \u27some of the most prominent exponents of marginal utility\u27 (including Jevons), were \u27convinced utilitarians\u27, he did not investigate the further implications for Jevons\u27s policy analysis.
We believe an additional, and contrasting, interpretation of Mill’s method is supported by the ev... more We believe an additional, and contrasting, interpretation of Mill’s method is supported by the evidence. For in our view Mill insisted on the possibility of theory modification in the light of inadequacies revealed by empirical evidence, and also held that the central behavioral axiom is not of universal relevance but is pertinent only to the local circumstances of contemporary Great Britain and America—and, even so, qualified as we shall see—that axiom itself is empirically based. On our reading, there is more in common between his research strategy and that of Milton Friedman than is sometimes granted, at least when Friedman’s position on theory appraisal is appreciated in the manner of Hirsch and De Marchi (1990). As Fels has paraphrased this position in a review: “start with a thorough marshalling of facts, frame a hypothesis to explain them, make predictions from the hypothesis about facts not used in constructing it, compare the predictions with the actual facts, revise the hy...
W. Stanley Jevon’s statistical study of periodicity has received much scrutiny (Aldrich1987), but... more W. Stanley Jevon’s statistical study of periodicity has received much scrutiny (Aldrich1987), but less attention has been given to his theoretical position on economic fluctuations, a circumstance which T.W. Hutchison justly finds surprising considering that “Jevons maintained that aggregate instability, and the distress it caused, presented profoundly serious problems, and devoted some of his most strenuous economic research to their explanation” (Hutchison 1988, p. 6). This paper takes up the challenge to examine the development of Jevon’s though on economic fluctuations from the early 1860s until his death in 1882. I shall distinguish in what follows between Jevon’s “theory of economic fluctuations,” i.e. his explanation for how sunspots cause fluctuations, and his study of periodicity which attempted to prove that periodic solar variation constituted the mechanism causing periodic economic fluctuations.1 My main concern shall be to highlight the less appreciated explanation for ...
Political economy describes how human societies are organized by exchange. The critical issue for... more Political economy describes how human societies are organized by exchange. The critical issue for political economists is the interaction between self-directed decision making and the incentives that turn decisions into approved outcomes. In this interaction, political economists see a key role for leadership, a role that depends upon our common concern for others (Robbins, 1981). There are three roles, then, for leadership in the political economist’s model: self-directed decision making, incentive making, and establishing the criteria for approved outcomes
My purpose is to paint a broad brush narrative—it will have some visual representations as well—o... more My purpose is to paint a broad brush narrative—it will have some visual representations as well—of how nineteenth-century political economists and their critics confronted a set of basic and related questions: Are men and women equally capable of self governance? Are they equally able to decide when and whom to marry and how many children to have? Can they be trusted equally to cast a ballot? Is their right to property inviolate or might new arrangements be designed and adopted for the production and distribution of wealth? This is a story interwoven with extraordinary characters: John Stuart Mill will be featured heavily, though not exclusively. Alongside him frequently was his friend and later his wife, Harriet Taylor. Much of the story related to Mill on socialism will be told through the great critics of socialism in the twentieth century, Ludwig von Mises and (especially) Friedrich A. Hayek. Along the way, we will see that the criticisms in the first instance—in the nineteenth ...
Volume I Part 1. On the Value of Gold Part 2. The Coal Question Volume II Part 3. The Labouring C... more Volume I Part 1. On the Value of Gold Part 2. The Coal Question Volume II Part 3. The Labouring Classes Part 4. The Condition of the Coinage Volume III Part 5. The Theory of Political Economy Part 6. Economic Fluctuations Volume IV Part 7. Logic Part 8. On Economic and Statistical Methods Part 9. Miscellaneous Reviews Part 10. Obituaries
... ratings is no longer a matter of speculation and hearsay (Kolchinsky 2010 ... data by all per... more ... ratings is no longer a matter of speculation and hearsay (Kolchinsky 2010 ... data by all persons involved. As one might expect from Palyi's missing the statistical point about how to think about the ratings' experience, his response to Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz's empirical ...
conference “The Nature and Significance of Economic …, 2007
As a guide to the past Myrdal needs to be taken with great seriousness even though his achievemen... more As a guide to the past Myrdal needs to be taken with great seriousness even though his achievements have been clouded by his 1 involvement in eugenics (Broberg & Tydén 1996). The fact that sterilization of "the unfit" is a viable element in his policy space makes his reading of F. Y. Edgeworth's Mathematical Psychics particularly valuable. Our reading of Edgeworth's eugenic utilitarianism is found in Peart & Levy (2005c, pp. 226-33). There is a brief discussion of eugenics in Pigou's Economics of Welfare (1932, pp. 109-10) on which Rawls does not remark. The chapter "Quality of the People" (1932, pp. 106-22) argues one can bring about an equalization of capacity for happiness by equalizing income. The endogeneity of capacity for happiness might be what Rawls refers to when discussing utilitarianism in "Justice as reciprocity" which we quoted below. The sentence "When pressed they might well have invoked the idea of a more or less equal capacity of men in relevant respects if given an equal chance in a just society" is a nice summary of the hope in Pigou's "Quality of the People" chapter. 2 rather than with unreflecting entities. No one has so successfully waged war upon the position that "since natural objects are not like men, men must be like natural objects" (Robbins 1957, p. 399). In this paper, we begin by documenting Rawls' reading of Robbins and of Knight's Ethics of Competition. Second, we review Robbins' discussion of Wicksteed at the time when interpersonal comparisons of well-being entered choice theory. We note Robbins' opposition to hedonism in N & S, where by "hedonism" Robbins referred to the argument that an agent's choice entails no concern for other people's well-being. We call this "reclusive agency" to emphasize that this is our interpretation of Robbins' "hedonism" and Rawl's "rational unreasonableness." Third, we consider the consequence of economists' refusal to credit the possibility that the agents of their models engage in motivating interpersonal comparisons so the preferences of a Robinson Crusoe would not be perturbed when Friday enters the island (Bator 1957). This model of reclusive agency has fared poorly in the experimental arena (Sally 1995, Camerer and Thaler 1995) Rawls on the Economists Rawls' views on Robbins and Knight are evident from two types of evidence. First, there is what Rawls published. Second, there are the marginal comments about Robbins' and Knight's arguments which Rawls made in his books in the course of his reading. The annotations add to the insights in the published work. It is not obvious from reading Rawls' later work that either Robbins or Knight is important to his argument, but the marginal notations suggest otherwise. Indeed, at the foundation of economics itself Rawls sees two names: Robbins and Knight. Rawls' marginal note on Gunnar Myrdal's definition of the economic problem in Political Element in the Development of Economic Theory singles them out 1 Rawls (1955, p. 19). The second paragraph in Theory of Justice's preface says this: "Perhaps I can best explain my aim in this book as 2 follows. During much of modern moral philosophy the predominant systematic theory has been some form of utilitarianism. One reason for this is that it has been espoused by a long line of brilliant writers who have built up a body of thought truly impressive in its scope and refinement. We sometimes forget that the great utilitarians, Hume and Adam Smith, Bentham and Mill, were social
... Published by Duke University Press ... The famous linguist and political radical, Noam Chomsk... more ... Published by Duke University Press ... The famous linguist and political radical, Noam Chomsky, is one in a long line of recent “de-bunkers” on Smith's contributions to the economics canon, contributions that, ac-cording to Chomsky, place Smith in a line of thinking that is much ...
Page 1. 'Disturbing causes,' 'noxious errors,' and the theory-practice distin... more Page 1. 'Disturbing causes,' 'noxious errors,' and the theory-practice distinction in the economics of JS Mill and WS Jevons SANDRA J. PEART Baldwin-Wallace College Abstract. This paper offers an explanation for why the use ...
faculty-publications Part of the Econometrics Commons, and the Economic Theory Commons This Book ... more faculty-publications Part of the Econometrics Commons, and the Economic Theory Commons This Book Chapter is brought to you for free and open access by the Jepson School of Leadership Studies at UR Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications by an authorized administrator of UR Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact
Uploads
Papers by Sandra Peart