The graduate economics course at the University of Chicago “Price and Distribution Theory” as taught by Jacob Viner was often referred to by Paul Samuelson. From the Paul A. Samuelson papers at Duke University we have a copy of the examination questions for that course together with a copy of Jacob Viner’s evaluation of his “with one possible exception, the most promising undergraduate I have ever encountered since I began teaching some twenty years ago”. Any clues as to who might have claimed the status of the “one possible exception”? Viner’s cover note to Samuelson and the latter’s gracious response are included for the sake of completeness.
I have already posted the reading list for the 1932 vintage of the course.
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Course Description
[Economics] 301. Price and Distribution Theory.—A study of the general body of economic thought which centers about the theory of value and distribution and is regarded as “orthodox theory,” including the critical examination of some modern systems of this character. Prerequisite: Economics 209 or its equivalent and the Bachelor’s degree. Summer, 9:00 Knight; Winter, 10:00, Viner.
Source: Announcements. The University of Chicago. The College and the Divisions for the Sessions of 1934-35, p. 286. (Note the 1936-37 course description Announcements is identical to that of 1934-35, so we can assume the course announcement in the 1935-36 Announcements would too.)
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[Samuelson’s handwritten note and the copy of the 1935 examination for Economics 301]
My Final Exam for Viner’s famous course. Only 3(a) caused me trouble (no wonder!)
PAS 6/30/72
Examination in Economics 301
Winter Quarter, 1935-
- Discuss the relationship of marginal cost to prices:
- under short-run competitive equilibrium;
- under long-run competitive equilibrium
when (1) the industry is subject to external diseconomies of large production; (2) the industry operates under conditions of constant cost.
- In order that an industry shall operate at constant costs as its output is varied, what conditions must hold as to:
- the definition of “industry”;
- the supply curves, general and partial, of the factors used by that industry;
- the mode of operation of the law of diminishing returns in that industry;
- the presence or absence of internal diseconomies of large-scale firms in that industry;
- the size of the changes in output?
- Comment briefly on the following statements:
- “If labor has effective occupational mobility, the prices of all commodities under competitive conditions will tend to equal their marginal labor costs.”
- “Labor is paid out of current product, and if advances are made, they are made by laborer to employer, rather than vice versa.”
- “Saving is necessary only in an expanding economy. No one need wait for the product of his labor or property in a stationary economy.”
- “Any increase in investment lengthens the production period, and the production period cannot be lengthened unless more investment takes place.”
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Jacob Viner’s Handwritten Note to Paul Samuelson, 1963
Jacob Viner
13 Newlin Road
Princeton, New Jersey
Aug. 7, 1963
Dear Paul,
I have just run across my carbon copy of a 1935 appraisal of you by me and am sending you a reproduction of it not to raise your ego but to raise mine. I recall your report at Pittsburg of a less perspicacious appraisal of about the same period by Paul Douglas. In this instance at least I showed skill apparently as a forecaster.
Cordially yours,
Jack
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Jacob Viner’s Recommendation for Paul Samuelson to SSRC, 1935
The Social Science Research Council
230 Park Avenue
New York City
Mr. Paul A. Samuelson, although an undergraduate, did distinctly better work than any other member of my graduate course in Economic Theory during the past Quarter. He is a sober, careful and extremely able student, equipped with extensive mathematical technique, zealous, original and independent, without the belligerence and the arrogance that so often marks young men with keen minds and the knowledge that they are superior in mental capacity to their classmates. Mr. Samuelson shows all the signs of having it in him to become a very distinguished economic theorist, and is, with one possible exception, the most promising undergraduate I have ever encountered since I began teaching some twenty years ago. I have only known him for some four months, but I do not think that this is a too hasty judgment.
Jacob Viner
Professor of Economics
Chicago, Illinois
April 15, 1935
University of Chicago
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Paul Samuelson’s response to Jacob Viner, 1963
Carbon copy
August 23, 1963
Dear Jack:
I had to be flattered by your August 19 note and the enclosed carbon of your 1935 evaluation of me. I feel as proud of that young man as if he had been my son and prouder still after your early discernment of his “growth-stock” potential.
Your 1935 graduate course certainly stimulated me. It sent me to Harvard well-prepared—over-prepared some of my teachers may have thought!
Last June I basked in the reflected glory of your Harvard degree.
Our love to Frances,
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Source: Duke University. Rubenstein Library. Paul A. Samuelson Papers, Box 74, Folder “Viner, Jacob (corresp) 1935-1990”.
Image Source: University of Chicago Photographic Archive, apf1-08490, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.