Tag: Schumpeter

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Austria Economists

Austrian economist mugshots. Österreichische Nationalbibliothek

 

The Austrian National Library (Österreichische National Bibliothek) has impressive digital resources online that include books, E-books, photographs, newspapers, and journals etc. Below I provide slightly edited copies and links to photographs of nine Austrian economists of note. I have not conducted an exhaustive search, but thought visitors to Economics in the Rear-view Mirror might find the sample below useful for presentation purposes. 

Rudolf Auspitz (1837-1906)
Carl Menger (1840-1921)
Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk (1851-1914)
Friedrich von Wieser (1851-1926)
Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973)
Josef Alois Schumpeter (1883-1950)
Friedrich von Hayek (1899-1992)
Gottfried von Haberler (1900-1995)
Oskar Morgenstern (1902-1977)

 

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Rudolf Auspitz (1837-1906)

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

 

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Carl Menger (1840-1921)

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

 

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Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk (1851-1914)

[1896]

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

 

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

 

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Friedrich von Wieser (1851-1926)

28 February 1914

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

 

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Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973)

1935

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

 

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Josef Alois Schumpeter (1883-1950)

State Secretary for Finance in the Second Cabinet of Renner.

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

 

Welt-Press-Photo, 1920.

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

 

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Friedrich von Hayek (1899-1992)

Ca. 1930.

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

 

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Gottfried von Haberler (1900-1995)

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

 

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Oskar Morgenstern (1902-1977)

Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Graduate economic theory exams. Taussig, 1930-35

 

Today I am relieved to post the final batch (1930-1935) of enrollment data and examination questions for Frank W. Taussig’s core economic theory course. All in all nearly a half-century run for Harvard’s Grand Old Man.

Previous batches of transcribed exams are provided via the links below.

Examinations for 1887-90
Examinations for 1891-94
Examinations for 1897-1900
Examinations for 1904-09
Examinations for 1911-14
Examinations for 1915-17
Examinations for 1918-19 [Bullock and Carver]
Examinations for 1920-22
Examinations for 1923-25
Examinations for 1926-30

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1930-31

Course Enrollment: Economics 11
1930-31

[Economics] 11. Professor Taussig.—Economic Theory

Total 58: 50 Graduates, 1 Senior, 7 Radcliffe.

 

Source: Harvard University. Reports of the President and Treasurer of Harvard College, 1930-31, p. 77.

 

1930-31
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 11
Mid-year Examination

Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.
One question may be omitted.

  1. In an examination paper set at Harvard College in 1876 the following question appears: “What is the error in the proposition that high wages make high prices?”
    What answer would have been expected from a student at that time? What answer would you give now?
  2. “The latent influence by which the values of things are made to conform in the long run to the cost of production is the variation that would otherwise take place in the supply of the commodity. The supply would be increased if the thing continued to sell above the ratio of its cost of production, and would be diminished if it fell below that ratio. But we must not therefore suppose it to be necessary that the supply should actually be either diminished or increased. . . . There is no need that there should be any actual alteration of supply; and when there is, the alteration, if permanent, is not the cause, but the consequence of the alteration in value. If, indeed, the supply could not be increased, no diminution in the cost of production would lower the value: but there is by no means any necessity that it should. The mere possibility often suffices.”
    Is this in accord with Mill’s analysis of demand and supply? with Marshall’s? with business experience?
  3. Can you distinguish between “supply price” and “expenses of production” in the following cases:
    1. the temporary equilibrium of supply and demand;
    2. accountants’ figures of cost for agricultural produce;
    3. accountants’ treatment of depreciation in the accounts of a manufacturing enterprise.
  4. In an examination paper set at Cambridge University, England, in 1929, the following appears: “From the point of view of economic principle, analyze the return obtained to-day from fen land drained in the seventeenth century?”
    What answer would Ricardo or Mill have given? What answer would be expected now from a student in Cambridge, England? What from a student in Cambridge, Mass.?
  5. (1) Marshall’s final conclusion as to the tenability of a distinction between interest and rent.
    (2) The following passages:

“The deepest and most important line of cleavage in economic theory” [is] “the distinction between the quasi-rents which do not, and the profits which do, directly enter into the normal supply prices of produce for periods of moderate length.”
“When the artisan or professional man has once obtained the skill required for his work, a part of his earnings are for the future really a quasi-rent of the capital and labour invested in fitting him for his work, in obtaining his start in life, his business connections, and generally his opportunity for turning his faculties to good account; and only the remainder of his income is true earnings of effort. But this remainder is generally a large part of the whole. And here lies the contrast. For when a similar analysis is made of the business man, the proportions are found to be different: in his case the greater part is quasi-rent.”

Is there inconsistency, apparent or real?

  1.    a.  Adam Smith’s remark, that the division of labor is limited by the extent of the market, has been said to state the gist of all there is to be said about external economies.
    1. It has been said, again, that the only internal economies which signify as regards economic theory are those accruing from the growth of production on a large scale.
    2. “If a commodity obeys the law of increasing return, an increase of demand causes much more of it to be produced, — more than if the commodity obeyed the law of constant return, — and at the same time lowers its price. . . . This line of reasoning has been thought by some writers to lend support to the claim that a Protective duty on manufactured imports in general increases the home market for those manufactured goods; and, by calling into play the Law of Increasing Return, ultimately lowers their price to the home consumer.”
    3. Consider these, separately or as a whole.
  1.     a. “Let us suppose that every one owns whatever capital he uses . . . and is not only of equal capacity, but of equal willingness to work, and does in fact work equally hard; also that all work is unskilled, — or rather, unspecialized in this sense, that if any two people were to change occupations, each would do as much and as good work as the other one had done.”
    1. “Let us suppose that labor is not of one industrial grade, but of several; that parents always bring up their children to an occupation of their own grade; that they have a free choice within that grade, but not outside it. Let us suppose, further, that the increase of population in each grade is governed by other than economic causes; it may be fixed, or may be influenced by changes in custom, in moral opinion, etc.”
    2. What would govern relative wages under each of these suppositions? What would govern the value of goods? Which supposition underlies Marshall’s conclusions on the relation between wages and value?

 

 

1930-31
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 11
Final Examination

Answers questions 1, 2, 3 briefly; 4 and 5 more at length.

  1. Jevons remarked: “Capital, as I regard it, consists merely in the aggregate of those commodities which are required for sustaining laborers of any kind or class engaged in work. . . . The single and all-important function of capital is to enable the laborer to await the result of any long-lasting work, — to put an interval between the beginning and the end of an enterprise.”
    Wherein does this resemble, wherein differ from, the view of Ricardo? Böhm-Bawerk? Marshall? Clark?
  2. Public encouragement or discouragement for industries of increasing, constant, or decreasing returns, — wherein the analysis of Pigou resembles that of Marshall, wherein differs.
  3. The bearing on the national dividend and its maximization, of the price structure obtaining under —

Simple competition,
Simple monopoly,
Joint supply,
Discriminating monopoly.

  1. Are there grounds for considering “profits” as an element in distribution different from wages, interest, rent?
  2. The doctrine that wages are determined by the marginal productivity of labor; the grounds on which it rests; and the aid it may give on such questions as the (1) basis of fair wages in the arbitration of industrial disputes, and the (2) effect on contractual wages of a compulsory system of social insurance (accident, sickness, old age, unemployment).

____________________________________

1931-32

Course Enrollment: Economics 11
1931-32

[Economics] 11. Professor Taussig.—Economic Theory

Total 48: 38 Graduates, 4 Seniors, 1 Business School, 5 Radcliffe.

 

Source: Harvard University. Reports of the President and Treasurer of Harvard College, 1931-32, p. 72.

 

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
1931-32
ECONOMICS 11
Mid-year Examination

Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.
One of the first six questions may be omitted.

  1. “The Classical Economists appreciated the necessity of a fund to support labour during the period of production; but they overlooked the continuous character of production and output, and confused the working capital, which is provided by continuously feeding the flow of available income back into the machine of process, with the liquid capital (goods in stock) at the commencement of any period of process. [Liquid capital is elsewhere defined as “goods yielding nothing, but capable of being used or consumed at any time”; it does not include goods in the hands of merchants.] They did not clearly perceive that the capital to keep labour in employment is found, not in the stocks of goods already available, nor by the abstention from the consumption of available income, but by decisions which have the effect (a) of determining what proportions of the goods emerging from the machine of process are in fixed and in liquid form respectively, and (b) of applying the flow of available income in one way instead of in another, namely, by supporting productive consumers instead of unproductive consumers.” M. Keynes.
    Does the error here described appear in the Classical Economists? and is the criticism of their treatment of abstention valid?
  2. “Marshall’s treatment [of supply] is highly elliptical. A striking illustration of his tendency to telescope his argument is his common practice in his graphs of labelling cost curves and supply curves alike with the symbols s-s’, conventionally used for supply curves, and thus diverting the attention of his readers , and perhaps also occasionally his own attention, from the necessity of selecting from the many possible types of cost curve that one which in the given circumstances alone has claims to being considered as also a supply curve.” Is Marshall open to this criticism? Illustrate and comment.
  3. The bearing (if any) of the concept of a representative firm on the theory of value, of rent, of business profits.
  4. Explain the method by which one can derive the supply price of a commodity produced under conditions of joint supply; that by which one can derive the demand price of a commodity demanded under the conditions of joint demand.
    What bearing, if any, have these methods of analysis on the phenomena of value and distribution in a society which is economically stratified?
  5. “When the artisan or professional man has once obtained the skill required for his work, a part of his earnings are for the future really a quasi-rent of the capital and labour invested in fitting him for his work, in obtaining his start in life, his business connections, and generally his opportunity for turning his faculties to good account; and only the remainder of his income is true earnings of effort. But this remainder is generally a large part of the whole. And here lies the contrast. For when a similar analysis is made of the profits of the business man, the proportions are found to be different: in his case the greater part is quasi-rent.”
    Is the greater part of the earnings of business men to be regarded as quasi-rent? Is the remainder only to be regarded as true earnings of effort?
  6. “The extra income derived from rare natural abilities bears a closer analogy to the surplus produce from the holding of a settler who has made an exceptionally lucky selection, than to the rent of land in an old country.” Is this extra income in the nature of a quasi-rent, in either case?

Not to be omitted.

  1. The following have been suggested, by one writer or another, as the grounds on which the distinction between interest and rent turns:
    1. Land is fixed in amount, instruments made by man are not.
    2. Land is an instrument made by man in essentially the same sense as is any other kind of capital-good; its industrial serviceability and its availability are the result of man’s action.
    3. Competition equalizes the returns on instruments but not those on land.
    4. The returns on land and instruments alike depend on marginal productivity.

Give your own views (briefly) on each point; and sum up with a statement of your conclusion on the tenability of the distinction.

 

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
1931-32
ECONOMICS 11
Final Examination

Arrange your answers in order of the questions.

  1. “With regard to utility, two views are commonly held. The older and more naïve is that an increment of supply (which should always be a continuous stream and not a stock) makes its specific addition to the utility of the total, without affecting the utility of the earlier increments. This is the basis for the familiar utility curve with the implication of consumer’s surplus. On the other hand, it may be held that the utility of all increments is always alike, the addition of each increment to the total bringing down the utility of the earlier ones to the level of its own. Both these views lead to nonsensical results: the first to fantastic magnitudes for total utilities, and the second to the conclusions that the utility of a larger supply may be less than that of a smaller and consequently that people often choose and pay for a reduction in utility.”
    Do these nonsensical results necessarily follow?
  2. “Pure profits are at once necessary and probably non-existent.” What is meant by “pure profits” in this statement? Given the meaning, what do you say to it?
  3. What is the influence of technological improvements on the rate of interest? what the influence of the rate of interest on technological improvements?
  4. “It is obvious that an increase in the supply of capital instruments will make for an increase in the national dividend as a whole. Can it at the same time make for a decrease in the real income of labour? The analysis relevant to this question has been developed by Marshall…. This analysis shows, first, that every factor of production, including entrepreneurs’ work, tends to be remunerated at a rate equivalent to its marginal net product of commodities in general. It shows, secondly, that, other things being equal, the marginal net product, in this sense, of every factor diminishes as the supply of the factor increases beyond a fairly low minimum. This proposition expresses what may be called the law of diminishing returns to individual factors of production. This law must not be confused with the law of diminishing returns to resources in general invested in a given occupation….”
    How far was this analysis developed by Marshall? Are the two laws not to be confused?
  5. Does an elastic demand for one commodity necessarily imply that the demand for some other commodity is inelastic?
  6. What grounds are there for the statement that in Great Britain the elasticity of the aggregate demand for labor is immensely greater than unity?

____________________________________

 1932-33

Course Enrollment: Economics 11
1932-33

[Economics] 11. Professor Taussig.—Economic Theory

Total 42: 33 Graduates, 1 Junior, 6 Radcliffe, 2 Others.

 

Source: Harvard University. Reports of the President and Treasurer of Harvard College, 1932-33, p. 66.

 

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
1932-33
ECONOMICS 11
Mid-year Examination

  1. The original and indestructible powers of the soil; what part they play in Ricardo’s treatment of rent, what in Marshall’s.
  2. “If, for simplicity of exposition, we leave out of account raw materials, the stream of floating capital is constituted almost entirely of wage-goods — goods that are paid over (through money) as wages. Thus, the larger the addition to the normal stream of floating capital that business men can secure in response to a given rise in their interest offer, due to a given improvement in their expectations, the larger proportionately will be the addition made to the real demand for labour. . . .
    “When a boom comes, a large part of the impact is always likely to be upon industries engaged in instrumental trades: and, plainly, extra work there will not lead to an addition to the flow of wage goods — floating capital — for a considerable time. Some part of the primary effect will, however, touch the industries that make these goods and, so far as it does this, we shall have an extra flow of them available to pay for extra labour. This was the important point that the doctrine of the Wages Fund ignored. It must be noticed, however, that this source of additions to floating capital (i.e. extra work) is only available, roughly speaking, so long as unemployed workers are available to be called into industry. If expectations and the desire to employ workpeople go on expanding after this point has been passed, the source is no longer available, and, consequently, the element of elasticity which it accords to the supply of floating capital no longer exists.”
    Was “the important point” here noted in conflict with the Wages Fund doctrine? and is the statement otherwise in conflict with that doctrine?
  3. The tendency of profits to a minimum; how treated by Ricardo, by Mill, by Cairnes?
  4. Explain, with the utmost brevity and precision,

“real cost” of production,
expenses of production,
supply price,
marginal cost,
bulk line cost.

  1. “It may be conceded that if a certain class of people were marked out from their birth as having special gifts for some particular occupation, and for no other, so that they would be sure to seek out that occupation in any case, then the earnings which such men would get might be left out of account as exceptional, when we are considering the chances of success or failure for ordinary persons.”
    Consider whether, given the premise, the conclusion here stated would follow; what is the bearing of the reasoning on Walker’s theory of business profits; what Marshall would say of premise and conclusion.
  2. What bearing, if any, on the concept of non-competing groups do you find on a consideration of, —
    1. universal education, general and technical;
    2. the influence of conventional necessaries;
    3. the representative firm;
    4. the law of derived demand for a commodity demanded jointly with other commodities.

 

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
1932-33
ECONOMICS 11
Final Examination

  1. “Ricardo appears to have seen distinctly almost everything of primary importance in the scientific doctrine of capital, very much as it is known now.” Marshall.
    If so, wherein? If not, wherein not?
  2. — The price of wheat raised on good land is the same as that of wheat raised on the marginal zone, and it affords a surplus above wages and interest paid by farmers for labor and capital used in the tilling of the good land.
    — The existence of this surplus in its original form, that of wheat, affects the supply and the price of that product.
    — The price of cloth woven on good looms is the same as that of equally good cloth woven on marginal ones, and it affords a net surplus above the cost of maintaining the stock of looms and the wages and interest paid by manufacturers for further capital used in connection with the good looms.
    — The existence of this surplus in its original form, that of cloth, affects the supply and the price of this product.
    Discuss (1) the bearing of these statements on the older distinction between capital and land, and (2) the connection between these surpluses and price.
  3. “The diminishing return which arises from an ill proportioned application of the various agents of production into a particular task has little in common with the broad tendency to the pressure of a crowded and growing population on the means of subsistence. . . . It has no very close connection with the tendency of agriculture in an old country to yield a diminishing return to a general increase of resources well applied in cultivation: and indeed exactly parallel cases can be found of a diminishing return to particular resources when applied in undue proportion, even in industries which yield an increasing return to increased applications of capital and labour when appropriately distributed.”
    Is this statement in accord with the general current of economic theory at the present time? Do you agree with it?
  4. “An increase in the supply of capital . . . will make for an increase in the national dividend as a whole. Can it at the same time make for a decrease in the real income of labour? The analysis relevant to this question has been developed by Marshall. Subject to certain important qualifications, which do not affect the present argument, this analysis shows, first, that every factor of production, including entrepreneurs’ work, tends to be remunerated at a rate equivalent to its marginal net product of commodities in general. It shows, secondly, that, other things being equal, the marginal net product, in this sense, of every factor diminishes as the supply of the factor increases beyond a fairly low minimum. . . . This proposition expresses what may be called the law of diminishing returns to individual factors of production. This law must not be confused with the law of diminishing returns to resources in general invested in a given occupation.”
    Wherein does this distinction differ from that contained in the preceding extract? Do you agree with it?
  5. Consider whether it is (1) justifiable, (2) practicable to “charge what the traffic will bear”
    1. when there is a large element of overhead costs;
    2. when there is a large element of joint cost;
    3. when there is simply monopoly;
    4. when there is discriminating monopoly.

____________________________________

1933-34

Course Enrollment: Economics 11
1933-34

 

[Economics] 11. Professor Taussig.—Economic Theory

Total 20: 11 Graduates, 2 Seniors, 5 Radcliffe, 2 Business School.

 

Source: Harvard University. Reports of the President and Treasurer of Harvard College, 1933-34, p. 85.

 

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
1933-34
ECONOMICS 11
Mid-year Examination

One question may be omitted.

  1. “The foundations of the theory [of cost of production and value] as they were left by Ricardo remain intact.” Does Marshall’s treatment of the relation of “general wages” to value bear out this statement? of differences of wages?
  2. Explain
    1. Internal economies of large-scale production.
    2. External economies of large output.
    3. External dis-economies of large output.
  3. “Ricardo, and the economists of his time generally were too hasty in deducing this inference [tendency to increased pressure] from the law of diminishing return; and they did not allow enough for the increase of strength that comes from organization. But in fact every farmer is aided by the presence of neighbours, whether agriculturists or townspeople. . . If the neighbouring market town expands into a large industrial centre, all his produce is worth more; some things which he used to throw away fetch a good price. He finds new openings in dairy farming and market gardening, and with a larger range of produce he makes use of rotations that keep his land always active without denuding it of any of the elements that are necessary for its fertility.” Do you agree?
  4. “The flow of investment of resources for future needs consists of two streams. The smaller consists of new additions to the accumulated stock: the larger merely replaces that which is destroyed; . . . The annual flow of this second stream is probably not less than a quarter of the total stock of capital, even in a country in which the prevailing forms of capital are as durable as in England. It is therefore not unreasonable to assume for the present that the owners of capital in general have been able in the main to adapt its forms to the normal conditions of the time, so as to derive as good a net income from their investments in one way or another.” Has this any bearing on the doctrine of quasi-rent?
  5. If the values of goods were proportional to their real costs, would the utility curve and the demand curve be the same, for persons receiving labor incomes?
  6. What is to be said
    1. of the necessaries of life, as regards elasticity of demand, consumer’s surplus, value and differences of wages;
    2. of conventional necessaries, in the same particulars?
  7. — “The price of wheat raised on good land is the same as that of wheat raised on the marginal zone, and it affords a surplus above wages and interest paid by farmers for labor and capital used in the tilling of the good land.
    — “The fact that farmers pay landlords for this surplus has no effect on the price of wheat.”
    — “The price of cloth woven on good looms is the same as that of equally good cloth woven on marginal ones, and it affords a net surplus above the cost of maintaining the stock of looms and the wages and interest paid by manufacturers for further capital used in connection with the good looms.
    — “The fact that entrepreneurs pay capitalists for this surplus has no effect on the price of cloth.”

What bearing have these passages on the theory of rent? of business profits?

 

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
1933-34
ECONOMICS 11
Final Examination

Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.

  1. Is interest treated as a derivative from “profits”

by Ricardo,
by Marshall,
by Böhm-Bawerk,
by those writers who regard profits as appearing only in a “dynamic” state?

Your own view?

  1. “There is always an interval between the setting to work of a man and the emergence, in consequence of his work, of any finished product, whether for consumption or as a productive instrument for the machine of industry. . . . What is essential is the time interval between the centre of gravity of the labour employed and the output (or, more strictly, the sale) of the finished product. I shall call this interval the period of production.”
    Wherein is the period of production here considered like, and wherein unlike, that discussed by F. A. Walker? by Böhm-Bawerk? For what purposes of economic analysis is the period described in the extract appropriate?
  2. “Autonomous” and “induced” inventions: their bearing on “increasing returns” and on the marginal productivity theorem.
  3. Reflections suggested by a Rembrandt, as regards
    1. market price;
    2. total utility and consumers’ surplus;
    3. the distinction between “wealth” and “capital.”
  4. The problems and distinctions implied in the terms

Economic Welfare,
National Dividend,
Marginal Social Net Product.

____________________________________

 1934-35

Course Enrollment: Economics 11
1934-35

 

[Economics] 11. Professors Taussig and Schumpeter.—Economic Theory

Total 27: 21 Graduates, 1 Senior, 5 Radcliffe.

 

Source: Harvard University. Reports of the President and Treasurer of Harvard College, 1934-35, p. 81.

 

 

Reading List for Economics 11, Fall Semester 1934

Posted from Wolfgang Stolper’s course notes.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
1934-35
ECONOMICS 11
Mid-year Examination

One question may be omitted. Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.

  1. “Suppose that society is divided into a number of horizontal grades, each of which is recruited from the children of its own members; and each of which has its own standard of comfort, and increases in numbers rapidly when the earnings to be got in it rise above, and shrinks rapidly when they fall below that standard. Suppose, then, that parents can bring up their children to any trade in their own grade, but cannot easily raise them above it and will not consent to sink them below it. . . .”
    Suppose also that there is free competition as regards the earnings of capital.
    On these suppositions what would be the relation between

    1. the values of commodities and their “real cost”;
    2. the values of commodities and their money costs;
    3. the values of commodities and their supply prices?
  2. “Internal economies of large-scale production are primarily a long-run phenomenon, dependent upon appropriate adjustment of scale of plant to each successive output. They should not be confused with the economies resulting from ‘spreading of overhead.’” Why or why not to be thus confused?
    “Internal economies of large-scale production are independent of the size of output of the industry as a whole, and may be accruing to a particular concern whose output is increasing at the same time that the output of the industry as a whole is undergoing a decline.” Why or why not?
  3. Does quasi-rent have the same meaning in the following passages?
    1. “The quasi-rent of farm buildings.”
    2. “When the artisan or professional man has once obtained the skill required for his work, a part of his earnings are for the future really a quasi-rent of the capital and labour invested in fitting him for his work, in obtaining his start in life, his business connections, and generally his opportunity for turning his faculties to good account; and only the remainder of his income is true earnings of effort. But this remainder is generally a large part of the whole. And here lies the contrast. For when a similar analysis is made of the profits of the business man, the proportions are found to be different: in his case the greater part is quasi-rent.”
    3. “In relation to normal value the earnings of high ability are to be regarded as a quasi-rent rather than as a rent proper.”
  4. It is fatal to the conception of consumers’ surplus to admit:
    1. that differences in income make it impossible to measure satisfactions;
    2. that each unit of a homogeneous supply yields ipso facto the same satisfaction as every other unit;
    3. that the satisfaction indicated by the high price paid for an article having “prestige value” will disappear when the article becomes cheap.
  5. Does “capital,” as distinguished from “capital goods,” serve to synchronize the effort of labor with the reward for labor? If so, how? If not, why not?
  6. Explain the distinctions
    1. between the intensive and the extensive margins of cultivation for land;
    2. the intensive and the extensive zones of indifference in the application of labor;
    3. the marginal product of labor and the product of marginal labor.

State summarily your opinion of the usefulness of the distinctions as tools of analysis.

 

Course outline and final exam for Economics 11, Spring Semester 1935

Transcribed from Joseph Schumpeter’s papers and posted earlier.

Source for examination questions: Harvard University Archives. Prof. F. W. Taussig, Examination Papers in Economics 1882-1935 (Scrapbook).

Image Source: Frank W. Taussig in Harvard Class Album, 1934.

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard Suggested Reading Syllabus

Harvard. Graduate Core Economic Theory, Readings and Exams. Schumpeter, 1936-37

 

The reading lists and exams for Schumpeter’s graduate economic theory course in 1935-36 have been posted earlier (the year Paul Samuelson took the course). It is worth noting that Keynes and the General Theory (at least Chapters 11, 13-16) were added to the readings for the second term of 1936-37.

__________________________

Course Announcement, 1936-37

Economics 101 (formerly 11). Economic Theory

Mon., Wed., Fri., at 2. Professor Schumpeter.

Source:  Announcement of the Courses of Instruction Offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences during 1936-37 (first edition). Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. XXXIII, No. 5 (March 2, 1936), p. 142.

__________________________

Course Enrollment, 1936-37

Primarily for Graduates:

[Economics] 101. (formerly 11). Professor Schumpeter.–Economic Theory.

Total 36:  30 Graduates, 3 Seniors, 3 Radcliffe.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College for 1936-1937, p. 93.

__________________________

Economics 101

Following is a list of some of the most important works in English dealing with problems outside the range of perfect competition. They are not all assigned, but assigned reading is taken altogether from this list.

Pigou, A. C., Economics of Welfare, 3rd Edition.
Chamberlin, E. H., The Theory of Monopolistic Competition.
Chamberlin, E. H., On Imperfect Competition, in the March, 1934 Supplement of The American Economic Review, pp. 23-27.
Robinson, Joan, Economics of Imperfect Competition.
Robinson, Joan, What is Perfect Competition, Q. J. E., Nov. 1934.
Zeuthen, F., Problems of Monopoly and Economic Warfare.
Cournot, A. A., Mathematical Principles of the Theory of Wealth.
Edgeworth, F. Y., The Pure Theory of Monopoly (Papers, Vol. I)
Hotelling, Harold, Stability in Competition, E. J., March 1929.
Shove, G. F., The Imperfection of the Market, E. J., March 1933.
Harrod, R. F., Doctrines of Imperfect Competition, Q. J. E., May 1934.
Hicks, J. R., The Theory of Monopoly, Econometrica, Jan. 1935.

The subjects, in the order in which they will be taken up, together with the assigned reading, are given below.

I.  The Technique and the Background.

Pigou, Part II, Ch. XIV.
Robinson, Chs. 1, 2.
Chamberlin, Chs. 1, 2.

  

V. Monopolistic Competition

Chamberlin, Chs. 4, 5, 6, 7.
Robinson, Ch. 7. Q.J.E., Nov. ‘34
Shove, E.J., March ’33.
Harrod, Q.J.E., May ’34.
II.  Simple Monopoly.

Pigou, Part II, Ch. XVI.
Robinson, Chs. 3, 4, 5.

 VI. Discrimination.

Pigou, Chs. XVII, XVIII (Part II).
Robinson, Chs. 15, 16.
III.  Duopoly and Oligopoly

Pigou, Part II, Ch. XV.
Chamberlin, Ch. 3.

  
IV. Bilateral Monopoly.

Hicks, Sect. 3.

  

Source: Harvard University Archives. Joseph Schumpeter Papers. Lecture Notes. Box 9, Folder “Ec 11, Fall 1936”.

__________________________

[Hand-written notes, neat, presumably to be typed]

  1. On Substitution

Marshall, V., Chs. 4, 8; VI, Ch.1.
Hicks, Theory of Wages, Ch. 6.
Robinson, Imperfect Competition, Ch. 22.
Machlup, “Commonsense of the Elast. of Subst.”, Rev. Econ. Stud., Vol II, No. 3. (on Econ. 1 shelf)

More Advanced

Hicks, Appendix.
Various notes on elast. of subs. In Vols I and II, Rev. Econ. Stud., by Hicks, Lerner, Kahn, Tarshis etc.
Hicks, Rev. Econ. Stud. Oct., 1936.
Pigou, Econ. Journal, June, 1934.

  1. On Period of Production

Böhm-Bawerk, E., Positive Theory of Capital, Bk II, Ch. 2, 3.
Knight, F. H., “Capital, Time + the Interest Rate,” Economica, August 1934 (on Econ. 151 shelf)
Hayek, F. A., Q. J. E., Feb., ‘36
Machlup, F. “Professor Knight + the Period of Production,” J. P. E., Oct. 1935.

More Advanced

Gifford, C.H.P., Econometrica, April 1935 (in Econ. 102 shelf).

Source: Harvard University Archives. Joseph Schumpeter Papers. Lecture Notes. Box 9, Folder “Ec 11, Fall 1936”.

__________________________

1936-37
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 101

(Answer any FIVE questions)

  1. What meaning can be attributed to
    1. Positively inclined demand curves?
    2. Negatively inclined long-run average cost curves?
  2. Define arc elasticity of demand and explain the usefulness or otherwise of the concept.
  3. From given demand curves for consumers’ goods we derive demand curves for the producers’ goods or factors of production. From these in turn we derive the prices of factors and hence incomes. And these incomes determine the demand curves for consumers’ goods. Does this involve circular reasoning?
  4. Why is the explanation of market price by means of the theory of marginal utility superior to the explanation of market price by means of the Ricardian theory of quantity of labor?
  5. Consider a commodity A which is the product of two factors of production B and C. Then “an increase in the supply of A raises the demand for B in terms of money if the elasticity of the demand for A is greater than the elasticity of substitution.” Prove.
  6. Show why and in what sense price is determinate in the case of bilateral monopoly.
  7. “Perfect competition exists to such a negligible extent in the modern economy that all theorizing based on this assumption must be regarded as sheer waste of time.” What have you to say to this?
  8. “The key to problems of imperfect competition lies in the conditions of demand. But it is precisely when we come to problems of imperfect competition that the ordinary demand curve apparatus ceases to have any clear meaning.” Comment.

Mid-Year. 1937.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Joseph Schumpeter Papers. Lecture Notes. Box 9, Folder “Ec 11, Fall 1936”.

__________________________

ECONOMICS 101 [“37” is handwritten here]

The first month of the second term will be devoted to a study of the principles underlying the theory of distribution, with special emphasis on wages.

  1. Substitution and Relative Shares
    1. Hicks, J. R., The Theory of Wages, Ch. VI.
    2. Machlup, Fritz, “The Common Sense of the Elasticity of Substitution”, Review of Economic Studies, June, 1935.
    3. Hicks, J. R., “Distribution and Economic Progress: A Revised Version”, Review of Economic Studies, October, 1936.
    4. Also notes and articles on substitution and relative shares in Review of Economic Studies, Vol. I, Nos. 1 and 2, though not required reading, may be consulted.
  2. Theory of Wages and Marginal Productivity
    1. Marshall, Bk. VI, especially Ch. I.
    2. Hicks, J. R., Theory of Wages, Ch. I.
    3. ——-, Marginal Productivity and the Principle of Variation,” Economica, February, 1932.
    4. Schultz, Henry and Hicks, J. R., “Marginal Productivity and the Lausanne School: “A Reply” and “A Rejoinder”, Economica, August, 1932.
    5. Robertson, D. H., “Wage Grumbles” in the volume of essays entitled Economic Fragments.
    6. Chamberlin, E. H., On distribution under Imperfect Competition, pp. 23-27 of the Supplement to the American Economic Review, March, 1934.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Joseph Schumpeter Papers. Lecture Notes. Box 10, Folder “Ec 11, Spring 1937”.

__________________________

 ECONOMICS 101

            The next two or three weeks will be devoted to the discussion of capital and interest. A select bibliography and the assigned reading are listed below.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

  1. Böhm-Bawerk, E., Capital and Interest (a history of interest theories) [: and] The Positive Theory of Capital (the third edition, available only in German, containing the polemical Excursi, is to be preferred to the English translation)
  2. Marx, Karl, Capital (especially Vol. I, Parts III and VII; Vol. II, Part III; Vol. III, Parts II and III)
  3. Wicksell, Knut, Über Wert, Kapital und Rente [, and] Lectures on Political Economy, Vol. I
  4. Fisher, Irving, The Rate of Interest (1907) [; and] The Theory of Interest (1930) (a rewriting of the earlier work)
  5. Taussig, F.W., Wages and Capital
  6. Knight, F.H., “Interest”, article in The Encyc. of Soc. Science
  7. For a rather complete list of the numerous recent articles on capital, interest and the structure of production, Cf. Machlup, Fritz, “Professor Knight and the Period of Production”, Journal of Political Economy, 1935, first footnote.
  8. For an exposition of Böhm-Bawerk, Wicksell and the later work along the same lines done in Sweden, particularly by Gustav Akerman, Cf. Kirchmann, Hans, Studien zur Grenzproduktivitätstheorie des Kapitalzinses.
  9. Keynes, J. M., General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money.

ASSIGNED READING

  1. Fisher, The Rate of Interest, Part I, Chs. 1,2,3; Part III, Ch. 10
  2. Böhm-Bawerk, Positive Theory, Book I, Ch. 2; Book II, Chs. 2,4,5; Book V, Chs. 1,2,3,4,5; Book VI, Chs. 5,6,7; Book VII, Chs. 1,2,3.
  3. Wicksell, Lectures, Vol. I, pp. 144-171; 185-195.
  4. Keynes, J. M., General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money, 11, 13, 14, 15, 16.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Joseph Schumpeter Papers. Lecture Notes. Box 10, Folder “Ec 11, Spring 1937”.

__________________________

1936-37
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 101

Answer FIVE questions. Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.

  1. Saving, by increasing the quantity of capital, will tend to increase its absolute and relative share. At the same time saving will tend to reduce the rate of interest and thereby to decrease capital’s absolute and relative share. State the conditions on which the net effect of saving on the absolute and relative share will depend. What do you think the actual effect is in practice?
  2. Classical economists spoke of a net benefit accruing from free trade. Have we any means to measure that benefit and to determine how it is divided between the trading nations?
  3. Which of the theories of interest which you have studied seems to you most acceptable and why?
  4. What warrant is there for the statement that in perfect competition and perfect equilibrium every firm will produce that quantity which corresponds to the point of minimum average cost?
  5. Discuss the problem of inequality of incomes from the following points of view: (a) measurement, (b) economic effects, (c) relation to welfare.
  6. Could unemployment exist with perfect competition?
  7. What do you regard as the most desirable railroad rate policy? State clearly and justify your criteria of desirability, and show how the policy selected meets these criteria.

Final. 1937.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Joseph Schumpeter Papers. Lecture Notes. Box 10, Folder “Ec 11, Spring 1937”.

Image Source: Harvard University Archives. HUGBS 276.90p(43) Irving Fisher and J. A. Schumpeter (May 12, 1934).

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard Suggested Reading

Harvard. Reading period and final exams. Theory and Money. Schumpeter 1927-28

 

 

Harvard students first experienced Joseph Schumpeter’s teaching in 1927-28 in an advanced theory course (Economics 15: Modern Schools of Economic Thought)  previously taught by Allyn Young [examination questions for Economics 15 for 1921-27 have been posted earlier] and in a money and banking course. For both courses this posting provides the reading period assignments, course enrollments and  final examination questions from the end of the second term. The examination questions for the first term of Economics 15 for 1927-28 are posted here. The examination questions for the first term of Economics 38 for 1927-28 are posted here.

_________________________________________

 Course Enrollments

[Economics] 15. Professor J. A. Schumpeter (University of Bonn).—Modern Schools of Economic Thought.

Total 16: 10 Graduates, 1 Senior, 1 Junior, 4 Radcliffe.

 

[Economics] 38. Professor J. A. Schumpeter (University of Bonn).— Principles of Money and of Banking.

Total 25: 19 Graduates, 2 Seniors, 1 Junior, 2 Radcliffe, 1 Other.

 

Source: Harvard University. Reports of the President and the Treasurer of Harvard College, 1927-1928, p. 75.

 

_________________________________________

 

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
(Inter-Departmental Correspondence Sheet)

Cambridge, Massachusetts
December 6, 1927

Dear Burbank:

The question of the assignment of readings for the reading period is, of course, no easy one in the case of an audience which is so little homogeneous as mine. In both courses I have told them that what I really want is to advise them individually according to everyone’s own needs, and that I wish them to call in my consultation hours before breaking up. With this proviso, I have recommended for those who do not wish for such individual advice, and at the same time still want to take the course for credit, the following:

First, as to Money and Banking:

The looking over of the two volumes of the Senate Commission of Gold and Silver Inquiry on European Currency and Finance, serial 9, volume I and [volume] II, Washington, 1925, (not that they will read it through, all of them, but they will get out of them a quantity of ideas of the European currency situation which, after all, is both theoretically and practically important for them to know).

Second, for the course Economics 15:

I have told them that we do not want to make them read, but to make them think, and I have suggested that they should take one of the three following books and read it critically, and follow up problems or arguments which may strike them in doing so:

Allyn Young, Economic Problems
Hawtrey, The Economic Problem
Sir Alfred Mond, Industry and Politics.

Cordially yours,

[signed]
Josef Schumpeter

 

Source: Harvard University Archives.  Department of Economics. Correspondence & Papers 1902-1950 (UAV.349.10), Box 7.

_________________________________________

 

DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS
SPRING READING PERIOD—1928

Economics 15

  1. Students who have had a modicum of mathematical training are recommended to work up carefully either:
    A. L. Bowley: Mathematical Groundwork of Economics (1924).
    or
    A. Cournot: Mathematical Principles of the Theory of Wealth, ed. of 1927.
  2. Others:
    A. C. Pigou: Economics of Welfare. [1932 edition]
    or  The Colwyn Report.
    [Report of the Committee on National Debt and Taxation (1927); Minutes of Evidence taken before the Committee on National Debt and Taxation. Vol. I and II. (1927)]

 

Economics 38

  1. W. R. Burgess: The Reserve Banks and the Money Market, 1927.
  2. Kirsch and Elkins: Central Banks, 1928.
  3. W. S. Jevons: Investigations in Currency and Finance, ed. 1909.
    [1884 edition]
    or
    3a) Report of the Royal Comm. On Indian Currency and Finance, 1926.

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003. (HUC 8522.2.1). Box 2, Folder “Economics, 1927-28”.

_________________________________________

1927-28
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 15

Modern Schools of Economic Thought

  1. Write as fully as possible on any one of the following subjects:
    1. What is the meaning and importance of the doctrine of maximum satisfaction and its relation to the concept of economic equilibrium?
    2. What do you think of the view that recurrent depressions are due to the inability of earnings to flow promptly into the hands of consumers?
    3. Describe the principle underlying Professor Irving Fisher’s method of measuring marginal utility. What do you think of it?
  2. Answer briefly two out of the four following questions:
    1. Professor H. L. Moore’s statistical demand curve for pig iron slopes up instead of down. How do you account for this?
    2. What is an indifference curve in the sense of Pareto as distinguished from the sense in which Edgeworth uses that concept?
    3. Discuss Professor Edgeworth’s proposition that equilibrium is indeterminate in the case of bilateral monopoly.
    4. What is the difference between physical and value marginal product? Which seems to you more significant, and why?

Final. 1928.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University. Examination Papers 1928  (HUC 7000.28, 70 of 284). Harvard University Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Papers Printed for Final Examinations: History, Church History,…Economics,…Military Science, Naval Science. June, 1928.

 _________________________________________

 1927-28
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 38

Principles of Money and of Banking

I

Discuss ONE of the following topics, devoting at least half your time to this part of the paper.

  1. A capital levy is among the measures recommended for the restoration of a disorganized currency. State the conditions under which this measure may be expected to improve the situation.
  2. The Bank of France used to defend its gold reserve by redeeming its notes in five-franc silver pieces and charging a premium if redemption in gold was insisted upon. How does this method differ from the method of protecting the gold reserve by means of an increase in the discount rate?

 

II

Discuss TWO of the following questions more briefly.

  1. It has been stated that open market operations cannot stave off credit inflation because of their comparatively insignificant amount. (Lehfeldt.) Is this correct?
  2. What is meant by saying that savings do not create deposits?
  3. The chances are that gold production will slow down in the next decade. Are we to expect a general depression on that account? (Cassel.)
  4. During the first three months of the current year there was a net outflow of more than $90,000,000 of gold from this country. How do you interpret this fact and what consequences do you expect therefrom?

Final. 1928.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University. Examination Papers 1928  (HUC 7000.28, 70 of 284). Harvard University Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Papers Printed for Final Examinations: History, Church History,…Economics,…Military Science, Naval Science. June, 1928.

Image source: Joseph A. Schumpeter at table with books, photograph, ca. 1930. Detail from image posted at Harvard University Archives. Joseph Schumpeter Papers. HUGBS 276.90p (38).

 

 

 

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Taussig/Schumpeter/A.Sweezy’s final examination in value and distribution theory, 1935

 

 

In an earlier posting the course readings for the topics “Urban Rent” and “Broader Aspects of Rent” were transcribed for the team-taught course at Harvard of Taussig and Schumpeter, assisted by Alan Sweezy, on theories of value and distribution (first term, 1934-35). From the final examination questions below, we can see that the reading lists from the Harvard Archives collection of course outlines is indeed incomplete for this course. It is entirely likely that other assignments were simply written on the board as needed.

When Taussig taught the course himself in 1932-33 the course description notes “Course 7b undertakes a critical examination of current theories of wages, interest, rent, and profits, particular attention being given to Marshall’s treatment. The course is carried on mainly by discussion. It is meant primarily, though not solely, for candidates for the degree with honors. Students who have attained a grade of A or B in Economics A are admitted without further inquiry. Others must secure the consent of the instructor.”

_____________________________

Final Examination
Theories of Value and Distribution
Professors Taussig and Schumpeter, Dr. A. Sweezy

1934-35
HARVARD UNIVERSITY

ECONOMICS 7b1

  1. Are the earnings (rental) of an urban site used for retail trade a cause or an effect of prices of goods there sold? Are the earnings of a skilled craftsman cause or effect of the prices of the goods made (or services rendered) by him? Are the earnings of a business man?
  2. Does Marshall’s distinction between “situation value” and “site value” bear upon the problems of monopolistic competition? If so, why and how? If not, why not?
  3. “In estimating the utility of an entire supply of apples, we must distinguish between the total utility and the marginal utility of the stock. The total utility of a stock is obtained by adding the utility of each additional apple to that of its predecessor. It will accordingly grow until the point of satiety has been reached. Ten apples possess more total utility than five. The marginal utility of the stock, however, is always equal to the marginal utility of the final unit multiplied by the number of units. The marginal utility of two apples will be twice that of the second, of four apples four times that of the fourth.”
    Do you agree?
  4. “Real costs,” “money costs,” “expenses of production,” “supply price.” The same? If different, wherein?
  5. Are “profits,” as defined by

(1) Marshall
(2) Clark
(3) Schumpeter

to be reckoned among the expenses of production?

  1. Explain briefly two of the following:

(1) Difference between selling and production costs.
(2) Determination of equilibrium of the individual firm under conditions of monopoly and competition.
(3) Effect of product differentiation on price, costs, output of the individual firm, and profits.

 

Final. 1935.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University. Final Examinations, 1853-2001 (HUC 7000.28, 77 of 284). Examination Papers, June, 1935.

Image Source: Harvard Class Albums: Taussig (1923), Schumpeter (1939), A. Sweezy (1929).

Categories
Economists Harvard

Harvard. Appointment of Leontief as Economics Instructor in 1932

 

 

Wassily Leontief was appointed in April, 1932 at Harvard for a three year appointment as instructor, beginning September 1, 1932. In light of current Rube Goldberg procedures and a Noah’s ark of bureaucratic species required to sign off at each stage of the hiring process in universities today, one wonders at this ease of instructor appointment in 1932 as reflected in the following two letters. Of course, in all fairness I should try to fish out similar appointments that were made for lesser lights endowed with stronger personal relations to the departmental and university movers-and-shakers, but visitors to Economics in the Rear-View Mirror might excuse me for oversampling at the top of the scientific significance distribution. Certainly in this case, merit mattered.

___________________________________

To President Lowell from Dean Murdock, February 23, 1932

Harvard University
Cambridge

Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Office of the Dean
20 University Hall

February 23, 1932.

Dear Mr. Lowell:

The Department of Economics is very eager to have appointed as Instructor for three years, beginning September 1 next, Mr. Wassily Leontieff. They would like to have his salary for the first year $3600, for the second, $4000, and for the third, $4400. At present they are budgeted for a member of their staff with a salary of $5,000, who would be replaced by Leontieff, so that there would be a decrease rather than an increase in the salary budget. In talking to Mr. Burbank, I have been very hesitant about encouraging him in regard to the appointment of Leontieff, since it seems to me that ordinarily, and particularly in these times, a new and untried man should come on a one-year appointment. Leontieff, however, will not consider a one-year appointment. The more I hear about him, the more I think that he is, as the Department feels, a young man of unusual brilliance and promise, and that we should miss a real opportunity if we did not appoint him now. Professor Burbank has not only got testimony about him from various people who know him, and examined his publications, but he has also had him here in Cambridge and has interviewed him. Professor Schumpeter, who is probably coming next year and who did not know that we were considering Leontieff, wrote to Professor Taussig the other day, and in his letter included a passage about Leontieff which I send you with this letter.

I realize that this sort of case creates a possibly dangerous precedent; but, on the other hand, since it involves no increase in our expenses for the next few years, and since Leontieff seems to be a thoroughly unusual person I am inclined to think that we might well take whatever risk there is involved. If you approve, perhaps you will be willing to consider this letter as my formal recommendation. If you wish to discuss the matter with me, or, if you disapprove, I hope you will let me know, since I must give Mr. Burbank some report at once, as Leontieff is considering offers elsewhere.

The following information about Mr. Leontieff has been sent to me by Professor Burbank:

“Wassily Leontieff was born in St. Petersburg in 1906, the son of a professor of Political Economy in the University of St. Petersburg. He began his university training in 1921 in the Faculty of Social Sciences in the University of Leningrad, and in 1925 received the degree of Learned Economist. For one year he remained at the University as an Instructor in Economic Theory. He then went to Berlin to continue his studies, and received the degree of Ph.D. from that university in 1928. While at Berlin he worked particularly with Professor L. von Bortkiewicz and with Professor Werner Sombart. In the fall of 1928 he was appointed a member of the research staff at the University of Kiel. After spending two years at Kiel he went to China as an adviser in the economic planning of the prospective railway system of that country. Since 1931 he has been a research associate in the National Bureau of Economic Research in New York.”

Very truly yours,

(signed)

Kenneth B. Murdock
[Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences]

 

President A. Larence Lowell,
5 University Hall.

________________________

To Professor Taussig from Professor Schumpeter, February 6, 1932.

“Leontief has been to Harvard (i.e. on a visit here). He will, under present circumstances, hardly be reappointed at the National Bureau of Econ. Research; and I despair of getting anything for him in Germany. What about Harvard? The great argument in favor of appointing him to some teaching or research position, seems to me to be, that, whatever we think of his two papers on statistical demand and supply curves (and I not only accept some of the criticisms leveled against his method, but I also have a few of my own), yet they are so striking proofs of brilliant gifts and they have made so much impression, that his is one of those cases in which it is to the interest of a great University to have a given man on her staff and under her wings. If a man makes himself internationally known by one paper at 23 as L. did, he almost certainly will go a considerable way, and I should think it good policy for Harvard to use the present opportunity, quite apart from the fact, that I should be glad to have him near me. I am sure he would do good work, the results of which would then be associated with Harvard’s name.”

Source: Harvard Archive, President Lowell’s Papers Oct 1930—Sept. 1933. UAI.5.160. Box 301, Folder 676.

Image Source: Wassily Leontief in Harvard Class Album, 1934.

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Intro to Mathematical Economics Final Exam, Schumpeter 1935

 

The Harvard course “Introduction to the Mathematical Treatment of Economic Theory” (Economics 8a from 1934-35 to 1935-36 then renumbered as Economics 4a thereon through 1940-41) was taught by Wassily Leontief except for its very first year when Joseph Schumpeter was responsible for the course. The original handwritten draft of the final examination for February 4, 1935 can be found in Schumpeter’s papers (though filed along with papers for the other course he taught, Economics 11). The official typed draft of the exam (identical except for a line-break) is transcribed below along with information about the course enrollment and prerequisites.

_____________________________

Course Announcement

Economics 8a 1hf. Introduction to the Mathematical Treatment of Economic Theory

Half-course (first half-year). Mon., 4 to 6, and a third hour (at the pleasure of the instructor). Professor Schumpeter.

Economics A and Mathematics A, or their equivalents, are prerequisites for this course.

 

Source: Announcement of the Courses of Instruction Offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences During 1934-35 (Second Edition) published in Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. XXXI, No. 38 (September 20, 1934), p. 126.

_____________________________

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 8a 1hf. Professor Schumpeter and other members of the Department.—Introduction to the Mathematical Treatment of Economic Theory.

Total 23: 15 Graduates, 3 Seniors, 5 Instructors.

 

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1933-34, p. 85.

_____________________________

 

Final Examination
Introduction to the Mathematical Treatment of Economic Theory
Joseph A. Schumpeter

1934-35
HARVARD UNIVERSITY

ECONOMICS 8a1

Answer at least THREE of the following questions:

  1. Define elasticity of demand, and deduce that demand function, which corresponds to a constant coefficient of elasticity.
  2. Let D be quantity demanded, p price, and D = a – bp the demand function. Assume there are no costs of production. Then the price p0 which will maximize monopoly-revenue is equal to one half of that price p1, at which D would vanish. Prove.
  3. A product P is being produced by two factors of production L and C. The production-function is P = bLkC1-k , b and k being constants. Calculate the marginal degrees of productivity of L and C, and show that remuneration of factors according to the marginal productivity principle will in this case just exhaust the product.
  4. In perfect competition equilibrium price is equal to marginal costs. Prove this proposition and work it out for the special case of the total cost function
    y = a + bx, y being total cost, x quantity produced, and a and b
  5. If y be the satisfaction which a person derives from an income x, and if we assume (following Bernoulli) that the increase of satisfaction which he derives from an addition of one per cent to his income, is the same whatever the amount of the income, we have dy/dx = constant/x. Find y.
    Should an income tax be proportional to income, or progressive or regressive, if Bernoulli’s hypothesis is assumed to be correct, and if the tax is to inflict equal sacrifice on everyone?

 

Final. 1935.

 

[Handwritten note at the bottom of this carbon-copy of the exam questions: “This leads me to believe that the course is advantageous only if the man has had previous mathematical training at least equal to Mat A”]

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University. Final Examinations, 1853-2001 (HUC 7000.28, Box 15 of 284). Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Papers Printed for Final Examinations: History, History of Religions, … , Economics, … , Military Science, Naval Science, January, 1948.

_____________________________

 Schumpeter’s handwritten answer to question 2

[Note: Schumpeter’s draft of his questions for Economics 8a in 1934-35 were incorrectly filed in the Economics 11 course folder for the Fall semester of 1935. Perhaps he used the questions himself in the other course in the following semester.]

{{p}_{1}}=\frac{a}{b}
\frac{dp}{dD}=-\frac{1}{b}
\frac{d\,\,Dp}{dp}=D+p\frac{dD}{dp}=
=a-bp-bp=a-2bp
\therefore p=\frac{a}{2b}

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Joseph Schumpeter Lecture Notes. Box 9, Folder “Ec 11 Fall 1935”.

Image Source: Joseph A. Schumpeter’s note at the end of his handwritten draft of the examination in Harvard University Archives. Joseph Schumpeter Lecture Notes. Box 9, Folder “Ec 11 Fall 1935”.

Categories
Bibliography Harvard Suggested Reading

Harvard. Theories of Rent Readings Lists. Taussig, Schumpeter, Alan Sweezy. 1934

 

 

One page containing the course bibliographies for the topics “Urban Rent” and “Broader Aspects of Rent” from Economics 7b, Theories of Value and Distribution, jointly offered by Frank W. Taussig, Joseph A. Schumpeter and Alan R. Sweezy was found in the collection of course syllabi and reading lists in the Harvard Archives. One would have expected that there would have been separate bibliographies prepared for “Wages”, “Profits” and possibly “Interest” for this course on distribution. I find it less likely that the course was a single “topics” course that happened to be focused on “Rent” for the semester. This was confirmed after looking at the final examination questions for the course. 

Note: Alan’s brother Paul did not receive his Ph.D. until 1937 and Alan was given a three-year appointment at the rank of “faculty instructor” beginning in the Fall of 1934 following his previous year as “graduate instructor”. Hence “Dr. Sweezy” clearly refers to Alan. I have appended a 1955 article from the Harvard Crimson about the famous Sweezy-Walsh case for those who might not be familiar with that episode in the history of tenure review procedures.

 

__________________________

 

*Economics 7b 1hf. Theories of Value and Distribution
[from Course Announcement]

Half-course (first half-year). Tu., Th., at 2, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructors. Professors Taussig and Schumpeter, and Dr. Sweezy.

 

Source: Harvard University. Announcement of the Courses of Instruction offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences during 1934-35 (2nd ed). Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. XXXI, No. 38 (September 20, 1934), p. 126

__________________________

Course Enrollment

*7b 1hf. Professors Taussig and Schumpeter, and Dr. Sweezy.—Theories of Value and Distribution.

Total 23: 14 Seniors, 4 Juniors, 1 Sophomore, 5 Others.

 

Source: Report of the President of Harvard College and Reports of Departments for 1934-1935, p. 81.

__________________________

 

Economics 7b

1934-35 [pencil note]

Urban Rent

E.H. Chamberlin, Monopolistic Competition, appen. D, pp. 200-203
W. C. Clark & J. L. Kingston, The Skyscraper: A Study of the Economic Heighth of Modern Office Buildings, esp. ch. 2, 3, and conclusion.
H. B. Dorau & A. G. Hinman, Urban Land Economics, pp. 158-223. Characteristics of Urban Land. Part V Urban Land Income and Value. (Note: The whole of the book is relevant, but much of it can be skipped over superficially for the problem in hand.)
H. J. Davenport, Economics of Enterprise, ch. 13.
R. M. Haig, “Toward and Understanding of the Metropolis”, Quarterly Journal of Economics, February and May 1926
R. M. Hurd, Principle of City Land Values, especially ch. 6.
F. W. Taussig, Principles, vol. 2, ch. 43.
R. T. Ely, Outlines of Economics, 5th ed., ch. 22.

 

Broader Aspects of Rent

J. B. Clark, either Distribution of Wealth, ch. 13, or “Distribution as Determined by a Law of Rent”, Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 5, 1890-91
F. A. Fetter, “The Passing of the Old Concept of Rent”, Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 15, 1900-01.
A. S. Johnson, “Rent in Modern Economic Theory”, American Economic Association Publications, 3rd. series, vol. 3(1902).
A. E. Monroe, Value and Income, pp. 65-67, 188-194.
Joan Robinson, Economics of Imperfect Competition, Bk. III, ch. 8, pp. 102-116

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003 (HUC 8522.2.1), Box 2, Folder “Economics, 1934-1935”.

Image Sources:  Harvard Class Album.  Taussig (1934), Schumpeter (1939), Alan Sweezy (1929).

 

__________________________

The Sweezy-Walsh Case

Harvard Crimson
January 12, 1955

In a letter elsewhere on the page, Dean Bender rightly points out that the CRIMSON has inadvertently perpetuated an untruth we have long tried to bury. Alan R. Sweezy ’29, it is true, was given a “terminating appointment,” and it was no secret that his views were to the left of most political centers. By working solely from these two facts, some liberals on the Faculty and elsewhere came to a conclusion which was long to prove embarrassing to President Conant. More important, the dropping of Sweezy and the other instructor in the case, J. Raymond Walsh, forced a reform in the University’s appointment system in one of the few instances that the Harvard Faculty has rebelled against its Administration.

Both Sweezy and Walsh were popular and able teachers in the Economics department. Both men held three-year appointments as instructors and when this period was up, In 1937, the Department strongly recommended that both men be retained. When they were not rehired, and when the Administration released a statement that its decision was reached solely on the grounds of “teaching capacity and scholarly ability,” charges accusing the University of various infringements were raised from coast to coast.

The CRIMSON immediately editorialized that, though the University’s statement was “ill-timed and impolitic,” the political views of the two men had nothing to do with the case. By that time, however, alarmists and those Communists who capitalize on such misunderstandings were off and running, joined by friends of the two men who were genuinely confused by the Administration’s actions.

Within a few weeks, the cry about their hue forced Conant to make a special report to the Overseers. The President, who at that time did not enjoy the complete confidence of the Faculty he was later accorded, held fast, arguing that the University cannot appoint a man just because his views are unorthodox. “If academic decisions are to be influenced by the fear of their being misinterpreted as interference with academic freedom,” Conant said, “then academic freedom itself, to my mind disappears.” The New York Herald-Tribune hailed Conant and his stand, describing his as a man “tolerant of everything except intolerance.”

Since even the two principals were now convinced that their politics were not the issue, the outburst began to quiet. But the Faculty, while willing to forgive, could not forget. One hundred and thirty-one of the nonpermanent teaching staff requested an entire investigation of the tenure system. Even if the financial pressures of the depression made it impossible for Conant to keep men like Sweezy, these teachers did not feel that the current methods of selecting permanent appointees were as accurate and well-defined as they might be.

It was significant, and extraordinary, that the appeal for a re-evaluation was not made to Conant but to a committee of eight respected professors including Ralph Barton Perry, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Samuel E. Morison, and Felix Frankfurter. These men wrote to Conant, suggesting what they wanted to study and making it pointedly clear that if they were not authorized to investigate, they would do so anyway.

Two separate reports were issued by this committee, one on Walsh and Sweezy, the second on the entire tenure question. The first recommendation–that the two instructors be re-appointed–was vetoed by the Corporation. The Faculty accepted this action without much comment; by that time, the second report was the chief interest among professors. Published in March, 1939, the report recommended a mathematical evaluation of departments, their concentrators and staffs, with more rigid rules about how often permanent additions could be made to the Faculty.

Conant substantially accepted this report and it was forwarded to the full Faculty and the Corporation which also agreed to its principles. The many complications were referred to the new Assistant Deans of the Faculty, W. C. Graustein and Paul H. Buck. Before his tragic death in an accident, Graustein had worked carefully on the plan and it came to bear his name. Dean of the Faculty Ferguson, who had agreed to hold an Administrative post only during this stormy interim period, soon resigned his position. With the promotion of Paul Buck to the job, the Walsh-Sweezy affair became history and Conant found that he had made his most successful appointment to the Deanship.

 

Categories
Courses Economists Fields Harvard

Harvard. Edward Chamberlin Lobbies to Teach a Graduate Theory Course. 1935

 

 

With the retirements of Charles J. Bullock and Frank W. Taussig in 1935 Edward H. Chamberlin saw his opportunity to start to break out of his designated field box “government and industry” and into “theory”. We have here a letter that Chamberlin wrote to the head of the economics department, Harold H. Burbank. The letter is of the putting-this-conversation-into-the-written-record variety. His deference to Burbank and recognition of the established claims of other colleagues to the theory field are complemented with a dash of false-modesty—“Perhaps I may, however,…put in my own ‘claim’ (if such it may be called) for whatever consideration it deserves.”

In any event, from the subsequent shuffle in instructional assignments for the 1935-36 academic year, we see that Chamberlin succeeded in joining Schumpeter and Leontief at the Harvard theory table.

________________________

Letter from Associate Professor Chamberlin to Chairman Burbank
Requesting to teach a graduate course in theory

 

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

14 Ash Street
Cambridge, Massachusetts
February 26, 1935

Professor H. H. Burbank, Chairman
Department of Economics,
Harvard University,
Cambridge, Mass.

 

Dear Burby:

This is to confirm our conversation of the other day. I should like to ask if arrangements could possibly be made at this late date for me to give a graduate half course next year on “Contemporary Value Theory.”

I have been asked by several people recently why it was that, although the theoretical problems which Mrs. Robinson and myself have raised are the subject of lively controversies in numerous other universities, one finds them very much in the background at Harvard. There does seem to be a general interest in the subject, and, since I have a strong continuing interest in it myself, the occasion seems to present itself of offering to graduate students at Harvard a better opportunity than they now have to study and discuss this set of problems and others related to it.

I realize that others than myself have claims to theory courses and that the problems of fitting the members of the Department to courses are not easy. Perhaps I may, however, even for this very reason, put in my own “claim” (if such it may be called) for whatever consideration it deserves. My work in Public Utilities and Industrial Organization could be reduced without difficulty. Donald Wallace could take my part in Economics 49 with Professors Crum and Mason, and, I am sure, would do an excellent job of it. This arrangement, together with a slight reduction in my tutorial load, would give me the time for another half course and I should continue in the undergraduate 4a and 4c. I should have, even then, only one-fifth of my time in theory, the other four fifths in the practical field of government and industry.

You have recently intimated in conversation that I might soon be given a share of the work in theory. I hope it may be next year, and also that a way can be found to arrange for it without interfering with the work which others are now doing or plan to do in the field.

Sincerely yours,
[signed]
Edward H. Chamberlin

________________________

Copy of letter from Chairman Burbank to Dean Murdock
with changes to 1935-36 course announcements

April 17, 1935

Dear Dean Murdock,

Owing to the retirement of Professor Taussig, several changes in the Course Announcement for the coming year will have to be made. The Department recommends the following:

*Economics 7b1. Theories of Value and Distribution. [listed as “Modern Economic Thought” in Report of the President of Harvard College 1935-36, p. 82; ]

Half-course (first half-year). Mon., Wed., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Fri., at 11. Associate Professor Chamberlin.
[Replacing Taussig, Schumpeter and Sweezy who taught in 1934-35]

Economics 8a2. Introduction to the Mathematical Treatment of Economics.

Half-course (second half-year). Mon., 4-5. Asst. Professor Leontief.
[Replacing Schumpeter who taught in 1934-35]

Economics 11. Economic Theory.

Mon., Wed., Fri., at 2. Professor Schumpeter.
[Replacing Taussig and Schumpeter who taught in 1934-35]

Economics 14b2. History of Economic Thought since 1776.

Half-course (second half-year). Mon., Wed., Fri., at 11. Dr. Monroe.
[Replacing “History and Literature of Economics from the Physiocrats through Ricardo” taught by Professor Bullock in 1934-35. Bullock retired from Harvard September 1, 1935.]

Sincerely yours,

H. H. Burbank

Dean Kenneth B. Murdock
20 University Hall

 

 

Source: Harvard University Archives, Department of Economics, Correspondence & Papers 1902-1950. Box 23, Folder “Course offerings 1926-1937”.

Image Source: Harvard Class Album, 1939.

Categories
Courses Harvard Suggested Reading Syllabus

Harvard. Economic Aspects of War Course Organised by Harris, 1940

 

Nine of the Harvard economics faculty pulled together to offer students a course on the Economic Aspects of War in the second semester of the 1939-40 academic year. According to the annual enrollment statistics, 25 students were registered for the course (perhaps there were auditors?). The enrollment jumped to 116 in 1940-41 and then dropped back down to 66 (1941-42) and fell to 34 (1942-43) as the number of concentrators (as well as instructional staff) fell during the course of WWII.

Addition: The final examination for Economics 18b from 1940.

________________________

WAR’S ECONOMIC PHASES STUDIED IN NEW COURSE
Harvard Crimson
December 19, 1939

Will Analyze Changes in Economics Incurred by War, With Emphasis on Present Conflict

Plans for a course on “Economic Aspects of War” to be given in the second semester were revealed yesterday by Seymour E. Harris ’20, associate professor of Economics, following approval by the Faculty Committee on Instruction.

Harris said, “This course will analyze the rapid dislocation of economic variables that occur in war times, and during the transition to peace. War economics is a branch of economics like Industrial Organization or Money and Banking, giving the department a chance to use Economics in the treatment of problems that face the world today.”

Contents of the Course

The course will use the tools of economic analysis, applying them to the present problem. Economics of past wars; market organization, price control and rationing; money and banking in war times; the relation of money and public and private capital markets; and the relation of war to economic fluctuations will be dealt with in the lectures and reading.

Included in the discussion will be a study of the effects of war on international balance of payments, on the distribution of gold and on commercial policy; repercussions on agriculture; methods of finance in the war and post-war periods; effects of war upon the distribution of income and wealth; trade unionism, money and real wages and employment in war times; and, finally, transition to peace.

Harris will be in charge of the course. Professor Harold H. Burbank, Professor William L. Crum, Professor Alvin H. Hansen, Professor Edward S. Mason, Professor Joseph H. Schumpeter, Professor Sumner H. Slichter, Professor John H. Williams, and Paul M. Sweezy ’32, instructor in Economics, will share in the teaching.

________________________

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 18b 2hf. Associate Professor Harris.–Economic Aspects of War.

Total 25: 16 Seniors, 6 Juniors, 2 Sophomores, 1 Other.

Source: Report of the President of Harvard College and Reports of the Departments, 1939-40Harvard University. , p. 99.

________________________

Economics 18b
1939-40

In order to assure more continuity in the course it has seemed expedient to assign virtually all of the following books.

Bresciani-Turoni, The Economics of Inflation (G. Allen & Unwin).

Cannan, E., An Economist’s Protest.

(Not an assignment in any part but is suggested strongly.) The book deals with numerous problems chronologically and hence is not easily apportioned over the various sections of the course.

Clark, J. M., The Cost of the Great War to the American People.

Pigou, A. C., Political Economy of War.

Stamp, J., The Financial Aftermath of the War

 

E.J. = British Economic Journal.
J.R.S. = Journal of the Royal Statistical Society.

Q.J.E. = Quarterly Journal of Economics.

Proceedings = Proceedings of Academy of Political Science.

R.E.S. = Review of Economic Statistics.

 

Week 1 (Feb. 5-9)
INTRODUCTORY.
Professor Harris.

Plan, readings, bibliography; war economics in historical retrospect; peace versus war economics in broad outlines.

Assignment:

Pigou, A. C., Political Economy of War, pp. 1-71.

Important suggestions:

Slichter, S. H., “The Present Nature of the Recovery Problem,” Proceedings, 1940, pp. 2-15.

United States Government, Industrial Mobilization Plan (revision of 1939). Senate Document No. 134.

War Office, Statistics of Military Efforts of British Empire during the Great War 1914-20.

Wolf, F. B. “Economy in War Tim” in the volume War in the Twentieth Century, pp. 363-408.

Other suggestions:

Clapham, J. H., An Economic History of Modern Britain—An Epilogue, pp. 511-554.

Einzig, P., Economic Problems of the Next War (1939).

Higgins, B., “The Economic War since 1918” in the volume War in the Twentieth Century, pp. 135-90.

Manual of Emergency Legislation (G.B.) with four Supplements, 1914-17.

Noyes, A. D., The War Period of American Finance, Chs. I-III, pp. 1-162.

Possony, S. T., Tomorrow’s War, pp. 135-235.

Speier, H., and Kahler, A., War in Our Times, Chs. 4-7, pp. 78-171.

United States Council of National Defense, Reports 1917-8.

War Cabinet, Report of 1918, Cmd. 325 (1919).

Weeks 2-3 (Feb. 12-23)
INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION.
Professor Mason and Dr. Sweezy.

Industry in war time. Industrial planning for war. Priorities, rationing and price control. The War Industries Board. Techniques of price fixing with special reference to the iron and steel industries. Present prospects for raw materials, industrial capacity and prices.

Assignment:

Clark, J. M., Costs of the World War, Chs. 19-21, pp. 262-291.

Heckscher, E., Sweden in the World War, Part I, pp. 3-42.

Keynes, J. M., “Policy of Government Storage of Foodstuffs and Raw Materials,” E.J., 1938, pp. 449-460.

Mason, E. S., “the Impact of the War on American Commodity Prices,” R.E.S., November, 1939.

Pigou, A. C., Political Economy of War, pp. 112-160.

Taussig, F. W., “Price Fixing as Seen by a Price Fixer,” Q.J.E., Vol. 33, p. 205.

Important suggestions:

Baruch, B., American Industry in the War (1921).

Beveridge, W., British Food Control (1928).

Report of War Industries Board, American Industry in the War (1921).

Other suggestions:

Birkett, M. S., “Iron and Steel Trade during War,” R.S.J., 1920.

Clarkson, G.B., Industrial America in the World War.

Clynes, J. R., “Food Control in War and Peace,” E.J., 1920, pp. 147-155.

Cunningham, W. J., “Railroads under Governemnt Operation,” Q.J.E., Vol. 36, pp. 188 et seq. and Vol. 36, pp. 30 et seq.

Day, E. E., “The American Merchant Fleet,” Q.J.E., Vol. 34, pp. 567 et seq.

Emeny, B., The Strategy of Raw Materials.

Final Report of the Chairman of the United States War Industries Board. (Feb. 1919), pp. 1-111.

Fontaine, A., French Industry during the War.

Great Britain Select Committee on High Prices and Profits, Special Report and Evidence (1917).

Great Britain Departmental Committee on Prices, Interim Report on Committee Appointed to Investigate Prices, Cmd. 8358, Cmd. 8483 (1917-18).

Hines, W. D., War History of American Railroads.

Litman, S., Prices and Price Control in Great Britain during the Great War.

Lloyd, E. M. H., Experiments in State Control.

Mitchell, W. C., Prices and Reconstruction (1920).

Morse, L. K., “The Price Fixing of Copper,” Q.J.E., Vol. 33, pp. 71 et seq.

Nolde, Russia in the Economic War.

Noyes, A. D., The War Period of American Finance, Ch. V (Mobilisation of American Industry), pp. 215-78.

Staley, E., Raw Materials in Peace and War (Council on Foreign Relations 1937).

Surface, M., Grain Trade during War (1921).

Scott, W. R., and Cunnison, J., The Industries of the Clyde Valley during the War.

War Industries Board, History of Prices during the War, W. C. Mitchell.

War Industries Board, International Price Comparisons, W. C. Mitchell.

War Trade Board, Government Control over Prices, P. W. Garrett.

Zagorsky, State Control of Industry in Russia during the War.

Zimmern, D., “The Wool Trade in War Times,” E. J., 1918, pp. 7-29.

Weeks 4-5 (Feb. 26-Mar. 8)
MONEY AND BANKING IN WAR TIMES.
Professors Williams and Hansen.

Objectives of monetary policy; weapons (including rationing); inflationary tendencies; relations of money and private and public capital markets.

Assignment:

Bresciani-Turoni, Economics of Inflation, Chs. 2 and 4, pp. 41-120, 145-182; VI, pp. 224-252.

Important suggestions:

Final Report, Committee on Currency and Foreign Exchange, (Cunliffe), (1919).

Hawtrey, Monetary Reconstruction.

Heckscher, Sweden in the World War, Part III (Monetary History), pp. 129-266.

Other suggestions:

Cannan, E., The Paper Pound of 1797-1821.

Cassel, G., Money and Foreign Exchanges after 1914, pp. 1-62.

Dulles, E. L., The French Franc 1914-28.

Edie, L. D., “The Influence of War on Prices,” Proceedings, 1940, pp. 34-46.

Edgeworth, Currency and Finance in Times of War.

Foxwell, H. S., Papers on Current Finance (1919), pp. 34-68.

Graham, F., and Whittlesey, R., Golden Avalanche.

Indian Exchange and Currency Commission, Report, Evidence and Appendices, Cmd. 527-9 (1920).

Rogers, J. H., Process of Inflation in France 1914-27, Ch. 1-4, 6-8.

Week 6 (Mar. 11-15)
RELATION OF WAR TO ECONOMIC FLUCTUATIONS.
Professor Schumpeter

Effects on consumption and investment demand; innovations; costs; employment, etc.

Assignment:

Bresciani-Turoni, Economics of Inflation, Chs. V, pp. 183-223; VII, pp. 253-281.

Important suggestions:

Clay, H., The Post-War Unemployment Problem, Ch. 1, pp. 1-24.

Other suggestions:

Graham, F. D., Exchange Prices and Production in Hyper-Inflation Germany. Part IV (Effects on German Economy), pp. 241-328.

Mills, F., Economic Tendencies in the United States, Ch. V., pp. 186-241.

 

Week 7 (Mar. 18-22)
EFFECTS ON INTERNATIONAL TRADE.
Professor Harris

Balance of payments and gold; exchange policy; commercial policy.

Assignment:

Bresciani-Turoni, Economics of Inflation, Chs. 1, pp. 23-41; 3, pp. 120-145.

Bullock, Williams, and Tucker, “Balance of Trade during the War,” in Taussig, Readings in International Trade, pp. 198-206.

Harris, S. E., “Gold and the National Economy,” R.E.S., February, 1940.

Hawtrey, R.G., Monetary Reconstruction, pp. 12-22.

Pigou, A. C., Political Economy of War, pp. 161-89.

Important suggestions:

Einzig, P., “The Unofficial Market in Sterling,” E.J., 1939, pp. 670-77.

Keynes, J. M., Tract on Monetary Reform, Chs. III, IV, pp. 81-192.

Other suggestions:

Bergendal, Sweden in the World War: Trade and Shipping Policy, pp. 43-128.

Cassel, G., Money and Foreign Exchanges, pp. 63-100, 137-186.

Dulles, E. L., The French Franc, 1914-28, Ch. 8, pp. 322-361.

Ellix, H., German Monetary Theory, Part III.

Graham, F., Exchanges, Prices, etc. in Germany, Parts II-III, pp. 97-241.

Holden, G., “Rationing and Exchange Control in British War Finance,” Q.J.E., February, 1940.

Loans to Foreign Governments, Senate Document No. 86 (1921).

Reparations and Inter-Allied Debt. Cmd. 1812 (1923).

 

EFFECTS ON AGRICULTURE.
Professor Harris.

Supply, demand, prices, etc.

Assignment:

Clark, J. M., The Costs of the War, Ch. 15, pp. 227-35.

Important suggestions:

Black, J. D., “The Effect of the War on Agriculture,” Proceedings, 1940, pp. 54-60.

Other suggestions:

Bernhardt, J., “Government Control of Sugar during the War,” Q.J.E., Vol. 33, pp. 672 et seq; “Transition of Control of Sugar to Competitive Conditions,” ibid., Vol. 34, pp. 720 et seq.

Eldred, W., “the Wheat and Flour Trade under Food Administration,” Q.J.E., Vol. 33, pp. 1 et seq.

Hibbard, B. H., Effects of the Great War upon Agriculture in the United States and Great Britain.

Reconstruction Committee, Agricultural Policy, Cmd. 9079, (1918).

Royal Commission on Wheat Supplies, First Report, Cmd. 1544 (1921).

 

Weeks 8-9 (Mar. 25-29)
PUBLIC FINANCE.
Professor Burbank.

Methods of Financing a war: Borrowing vs. taxes; tax policies, distribution of burden; management of public debt.

Assignment:

Bullock, C. J., “Financing the War,” Q.J.E., Vol. 31, pp. 357 et seq.

Clark, J. M., The Costs of the World War to the American People, Chs. 5-8, pp. 69-118.

Keynes, J. M., “The Income and Fiscal Potential of Great Britain,” E.J., 1939, pp. 626-35.

Pigou, A. C., Political Economy of War, pp. 71-112.

Important suggestions:

Clapham, J. H., “Loans and Subsidies in Times of War, 1793-1914,” E.J., 1917, pp. 493-501.

Edgeworth, Currency and Finance in Time of War.

Foxwell, H. S., Papers on Current Finance, pp. 1-33.

Great Britain Select Committee on National Expenditures, Reports 1917-22, Present and Pre-War Expenditures, Cmd. 802 (1920).

Keynes, J. M., Monetary Reform, Ch. II, pp. 46-81.

Keynes, J. M., Essays in Persuasion, Part I, pp. 3-76.

“Report of Committee on War Finance of the American Economic Association, A.E.R., Supplement, 1919, pp. 1-128.

Other suggestions:

Bogart, E. L., Direct and Indirect Costs of the Great World War (1919).

Fraser, Sir D., “The Maturing Debt,” R.S.J., 1921.

Jeze, G., and Truchy, H., The War Finance of France.

Mallet and George, British Budgets 1913-21.

May, G. O., “Economic Effects of Tax Policy in Peace and War,” Proceedings, 1940, pp. 61-68.

Moulton and Pasvolsky, World War Debt Settlements, pp. 1-425.

Noyes, A.D., The War Period of American Finance, Ch. IV, pp. 162-214.

Rogers, J. H., The Process of Inflation in France, Ch. V., pp. 48-88.

Silberling, N. J., “Financial and Monetary Policy of Great Britain during Napoleonic Wars,” Q.J.E., Vol. 38, pp. 214 et seq., 397 et seq.

Speier, H., and Kahler, A., War in Our Times, Chs. 8-11, pp. 171-245.

Sprague, O. M. W., “Conscription of Income,” E.J., 1917, pp. 1-25.

Stamp, J., Taxation during the War.

Warren, R., “War Financing and Its Economic Effects,” Proceedings, 1940, pp. 69-76.

 

EFFECTS OF WAR ON DISTRIBUTION OF INCOME AND WEALTH
Professor Crum

Assignment: Read two of the following:

Allen, J. E., “Some Changes in Distribution of National Income during War,” R.S.J., 1920.

Clark, J. M., The Costs of the Great War to the American People, Chs. 10-12, pp. 150-80.

Ezekiel, M., “An Annual Estimate of Savings by Individuals,” R.E.S., 1937, pp. 178-191.

Keynes, J. M., Tract on Monetary Reform, Chs. 1 (Consequences to Society of Changes in Value of Money), pp. 3-45.

Samuel, H., “Taxation of Various Classes of People,” R.S.J., 1919.

Select Committee on Increase of Wealth, Proceedings, Evidence, Appendices, H.C. 102 (1920).

Important suggestions:

Mitchell, W., C., Income in the United States (1921).

Other suggestions:

Bowley, A. L., “Measurement of Changes in Cost of Living,” R.S.J., 1919.

Leven, M., Moulton, and Warburton, America’s Capacity to Consume (1934), Chs. I-IX.

Stamp, J., Wealth and Taxable Capacity, pp. 1-191.

 

Week 10 (April 15-18)
EFFECTS ON LABOR.
Professor Slichter.

Trade unionism; money and real wages and employment.

Assignment:

International Labour Review, November 1939: Articles on “Labour in War Times,” pp. 589-615, 654-687.

Monthly Labour Review, October, 1939: “American Labour in World War,” pp. 785-95.

Slichter, S. H., Economic Factors Affecting Industrial Relations Policy in War Period (Industrial Relations Counselors), 32 pp.

Robinson, E. A. G., “Wage Policy in War Time,” E.J., 1939, pp. 640-55.

Important suggestions:

Cannan, E., “Industrial Unreset,” E.J., 1917, pp. 453-70.

Makower, H., and Robinson, H. W., “Labour Potential in War-Time,” E. J., 1939, pp. 656-662.

Other suggestions:

Bowley, Arthur L., Prices and Wages in the United Kingdom (Oxford, 1921).

Cole, G. D. H., Trade Unionism and Munitions.

Cole, G. D. H., Self-Government in Industry (1918).

Douglas, P., Real Wages in the United States (selected parts).

Gompers, Samuel, American Labor and the War (1919).

Hammond, M. B., British Labor Conditions and Legislation during the War (1919).

Hanna, Hugh S., and Lauck, W. Jett, Wages and the War (1918).

Industrial Unrese, Cmd. 8696 (1917-18).

Kirkaldy, A. N., ed., British Association for Advancement of Science: Labour, Finance and War (1917).

Lescohier, Don D. The Labor Market (1919), Part II.

Lorwin, Lewis L., The American Federation of Labor, Part III.

National Industrial Conference Board, Changes in Wages, September, 1914 to March, 1920.

National Industrial Conference Board, Problems of Labor and Industry in Great Britain, France and Italy (1919).

Proceedings, 1918-1920, “War Labor Policies and Reconstruction,” pp. 139-358.

Speier, H., and Kahler, A., War in Our Times, Ch. 12, pp. 245-269.

United States Council of National Defense, An Analysis of the High Cost of Living Problem.

United States Council of National Defense, Shortage of Skilled Mechanics (1918).

United States Department of Labor, Bulletins No. 244 and 257. Labor Legislation of 1917 and 1918.

United States Department of Labor, History of the Shipbuilding Labor Adjustment Board, 1917 to 1919.

United States Department of Labor, Reports 1918-1921.

United States Department of Labor, The New Position of Women in American Industry (1920).

United States Department of Labor, Industrial Efficiency and Fatigue in British Munition Factories.

United States Railroad Administration, Report of the Railroad Wage Commission.

Watkins, Gordon S., Labor Problems and Labor Administration in the United States during the World War (1919).

Webb, Sidney, The Restoration of Trade Union Conditions (B. W. Huebsch, 1917).

Wolman, L., Ebb and Flow of Trade Unionism, Chs. 2-3, pp. 15-32.

Wolman, L., Growth of American Trade Unions 1880-1923, Chs. 3-4, pp. 67-97.

 

Weeks 11-12 (April 22-)
TRANSITION TO PEACE (an attempt at integration).
Professor Harris.

Problems of costs, prices, money, international trade, public debt and taxation, wages, employment and output, agriculture and the distribution of the burden.

Assignment:

Bresciani-Turoni, The Economics of Inflation, Ch. X (Stabilization Crisis), pp. 359-98.

Clapham, J. H., “Europe after the Great Wars, 1816-1920”, E. J., 1920, pp. 423-36.

Pigou, A. C., Political Economy of War, pp. 161-182, 189-238.

Stamp, J., Financial Aftermath of War, Chs. I-III, V, pp. 9-88, 117-37.

Important suggestions:

Committee on National Debt and Taxation (Colwyn) Report.

Hawtrey, R. G., Monetary Reconstruction, pp. 55-91, 122-175.

Keynes, J. M., Economic Consequences of Peace.

Report of Committee on National Debt and Taxation, pp. 233-246 (Burden of Debt), 246-297 (Capital Levy), 297-351 (Taxes and Debt Redemption)

Scott, W. R., Economic Problems of Peace after War. Second Series.

Other suggestions:

Bonn, M. J., Stabilisation of Mark (1922).

League of Nations, Austria Financial Reconstruction, Summary Report 1926.

Macrosty, H. W., “Inflation and Deflation in the United States and United Kingdom 1919-23,” R. S. J., 1927.

Moulton and Pasovolvsky, World War Debt Settlements (Brookings).

Snowden, P., Labour and national Finance.

Stamp, J., Current Problems I Finance and Government, Ch. XI (The Capital Levy), pp. 227-71.

 

READING PERIOD.
Read one of the following:

Committee on National Debt and Taxation (Colwyn) Report.

Graham, F., Exchanges, Prices, etc. in Germany.

Hawtrey, Monetary Reconstruction.

Keynes, Economic Consequences of Peace.

Mitchell, W., Income in the United States (1921).

Moulton and Pasvolvsky. World War Debt Settlements.

Rogers, Process of Inflation in France, 1914-27.

Scott, W. R., Economic Problems of Peace after War, Second Series.

Speier, H., and Kahler, A., War in Our Times.

Stamp, J., Wealth and Taxable Capacity.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003. HUC 8522.2.1 Box 2, Folder “Economics, 1939-40 (1 of 2)”.

Image Source: Seymour E. Harris from Harvard Class Album 1942.