Cost Choice An Inquiry In Economic Theory

"As he usually does, Professor Buchanan has produced an interesting and provocative piece of work. [Cost and Choice] starts off as an essay in the history of cost theory; the central ideas of the book are traced to Davenport and Knight in the United States, and to a series of distinguished writers associated at various times with the London School of Economics. The author emerges from this discussion with what can be described as the ultimate in subjectivist cost doctrines. . . . Economists should learn the lessons offered to us in this little book—and learn them well. It can save them from serious errors."—William J. Baumol, Journal of Economic Literature

The theory of costs is a cornerstone of economic thinking, and figures crucially in the study of human action and society. From the first day of a principles-level course to the most advanced academic literature, costs play a vital role in virtually all behaviors and economic outcomes. How we make choices, why we trade, and how we build institutions and social orders are all problems that can be explained in light of the costs we face. This volume explores, develops, and critiques the rich literature on costs, examining some of the many ways cost remains relevant in economic theory and practice. The book especially studies costs from the perspective of the Austrian or “causal-realist” approach to economics. The chapters integrate the history of economic thought with contemporary research, finding valuable crossroads between numerous traditions in economics. They examine the role of costs in theories of choice and opportunity costs; demand and income effects; production and distribution; risk and interest rates; uncertainty and production; monopsony; Post-Keynesianism; transaction costs; socialism and management; and social entrepreneurship. Together, these papers represent an update and restatement of a central element in the economic way of thinking. Each chapter reveals how the Austrian, causalrealist approach to costs can be used to solve an important problem or debate in economics. These chapters are not only useful for students learning these concepts for the first time: they are also valuable for researchers seeking to understand the unique Austrian perspective and those who want to apply it to new problems.

This book presents in one volume Professor Wiseman's seminal work on the theory of costs and the economist's treatment of the role of government. The major themes concern the subjectivity of costs and the unknowability of the future. From an initial scepticism about pricing rules, the arguments develop into a comprehensive critique of mainstream economic theory and, more positively, an exposition of the fundamentals of a new political economy grounded in choice-as-opportunity-cost.

An index to the series "The Collected works of James M. Buchanan."

This open access book examines from a variety of perspectives the disappearance of moral content and ethical judgment from the models employed in the formulation of modern economic theory, and some of the papers contain important proposals about how moral judgment could be reintroduced in economic theory. The chapters collected in this volume result from the favorable reception of the first volume of the Virtues in Economics series and represent further contributions to the themes set out in that volume: (i) examining the philosophical and methodological fallacies of this turn in modern economic theory that the removal of the moral motivation of economic agents from modern economic theory has entailed; and (ii) proposing a return descriptive economics as the means with which the moral content of economic life could be restored in economic theory. This book is of interest to researchers and students of the methodology of economics, ethics, philosophers concerned with agency and economists who build economic models that rest in the intention of the agent.

Value and Capital An Inquiry into some Fundamental Principles of Economic Theory

The theory of costs is a cornerstone of economic thinking, and figures crucially in the study of human action and society. From the first day of a principles-level course to the most advanced academic literature, costs play a vital role in virtually all behaviors and economic outcomes. How we make choices, why we trade, and how we build institutions and social orders are all problems that can be explained in light of the costs we face. This volume explores, develops, and critiques the rich literature on costs, examining some of the many ways cost remains relevant in economic theory and practice. The book especially studies costs from the perspective of the Austrian or “causal-realist” approach to economics. The chapters integrate the history of economic thought with contemporary research, finding valuable crossroads between numerous traditions in economics. They examine the role of costs in theories of choice and opportunity costs; demand and income effects; production and distribution; risk and interest rates; uncertainty and production; monopsony; Post-Keynesianism; transaction costs; socialism and management; and social entrepreneurship. Together, these papers represent an update and restatement of a central element in the economic way of thinking. Each chapter reveals how the Austrian, causal-realist approach to costs can be used to solve an important problem or debate in economics. These chapters are not only useful for students learning these concepts for the first time: they are also valuable for researchers seeking to understand the unique Austrian perspective and those who want to apply it to new problems.

Building on a base of simple economic theory and elementary linear algebra and calculus, this broad treatment of static and dynamic optimization methods discusses the importance of shadow prices, and reviews functions defined by solutions of optimization problems. Recently revised and expanded, the second edition will be a valuable resource for upper level undergraduate and graduate students.

This is a definitive statement of Professor Afriat's achievements in the field of choice and value in economics, an area in which he has contributed more than most. As the topics covered, which include optimal programming, social and individual choice, production, and the market, are both central and fundamental, the book forms a source on basic and current topics in economic theory and mathematical economics for any advanced student of the subject. The work is in six parts: the first four discuss generalities about choice and representative economic topics; the final two are more concerned with straight forwardly mathematical subjects that have an application in economics. A characteristic of the book is its conceptual clarifications for choice, value, and price theory generally, and, for special topics, the novelties and simplifications that are uncovered in already well-trodden ground. -

"Selection committee ... George J. Stigler, Kenneth E. Boulding." Bibliography: p. 527-561.

The new institutional economics offers one of the most exciting research agendas in economics today. The book looks at the differences and similarities between the three main approaches.

This clear, precisely written text presents an important branch of the modern, micro-economically based theory of industrial organization and of public finance, utilizing calculus only. Answers are provided to some pertinent economic questions, such as the pricing policies of vote-seeking politicians, of empire-building bureaucrats and of out-put-maximizing and energy-saving public utilities. These policies are compared with the welfare economic benchmark rules e.g. on marginal cost pricing and Ramsey pricing. Great significance is attached to price regulation. The book elucidates the recent replacement of rate of return regulation by price-cap regulation. It also explains why many simple rules like yardstick regulation fail to achieve optimal prices, which shows how complicated it is to induce managers to truthfully reveal their private information. How this can be achieved properly is shown in various principal-agent models on regulation with uncertain costs, uncertain demand and with soft budget constraints.

This monumental twenty-volume series presents the writings of James M. Buchanan, one of the great twentieth-century scholars of liberty. Buchanan, the Nobel laureate in Economics in 1986, has much wisdom to offer--not just to academics and economists--but to all who seek to understand the challenges and opportunities of governance in our age. The Collected Works of James M. Buchanan includes ten monographs and all of the important journal articles, papers, and essays that Buchanan produced in a distinguished career spanning more than half a century. Among the monographs are such famous works as The Calculus of Consent (coauthored by Gordon Tullock) and The Limits of Liberty, as well as Cost and Choice: An Inquiry in Economic Theory. The monographs have been cast into a new format, and new indexes have been created. In addition, each volume includes a foreword by one of the three editors of the series, each of whom is a distinguished economist in his own right. "This is a series," write the editors, "that no serious scholar of public choice theory, public economics, or contemporary political theory will want to be without. It is a series that will also appeal to the general student of liberty, for Buchanan has--perhaps more than any other contemporary scholar--helped us to view politics without the romantic gloss that characterizes much normative political theory and that slips unthinkingly into so much popular commentary. Buchanan has been a resolute defender of 'the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals' and has been a painstaking analyst of the institutional structure that might best support such a society. Buchanan stands with von Mises, Hayek, Popper, and Friedman as one of the great twentieth-century scholars of liberty." As James Buchanan, himself, wrote, "My interest in understanding how the economics interaction process works has always been instrumental to the more inclusive purpose of understanding how we can learn to live with one another without engaging in Hobbesian war and without subjecting ourselves to the dictates of the state." James M. Buchanan (1919-2013) was an eminent economist who won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1986. He founded the Center for Study of Public Choice at George Mason University, where he was a professor of economics, and is considered one of the greatest scholars of liberty of the twentieth century.

This volume presents a collection of Buchanan’s most representative works in economic method and analysis. As Robert D. Tollison points out in his foreword, "[Included] in this volume are some of [Buchanan’s] most often cited works on methodology, including papers reflecting his emphasis on the subjective nature of opportunity costs and the implications of this subjectivity for economic analysis.” The works collected in this volume also demonstrate Buchanan’s interest throughout his career in the ideas and issues posed by economic theory. Buchanan shows throughout this volume that he believes economic theory can help explain the world around us. Spanning nearly his entire fifty-year career, Buchanan’s writings in this volume exhibit a consistency of thought and belief as ideas recur from paper to paper, ever richer and more resonant. The thirty-six works represented here are grouped into the major categories: 1.The Practice and Method of Economic Theory 2.Competition and Entrepreneurship 3.The Theory of Monopoly 4.Input Prices 5.Opportunity Cost and Efficient Prices 6.Increasing Returns and the Work Ethic 7.Economic Theory in a Post-Socialist World Clearly, these papers as a whole reflect a broad range of issues and provide us with countless insights. More than this, they give us a picture of the theorist in his workshop. They acquaint us with what interests him and how he deals with important issues. In his conclusion to the opening essay, "Is Economics the Science of Choice?” Buchanan typifies the richness of thought available throughout this volume: "Modern economics, as practiced by professional scholars, embodies confusions that are fundamentally methodological. For myself, I advance no claim that my own thinking has yet fully rid itself of the paradigms of neoclassical orthodoxy.” James M. Buchanan is an eminent economist who won the Alfred Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1986 and is considered one of the greatest scholars of liberty in the twentieth century. The entire series will include: Volume 1: The Logical Foundations of Constitutional Liberty Volume 2: Public Principles of Public Debt Volume 3: The Calculus of Consent Volume 4: Public Finance in Democratic Process Volume 5: The Demand and Supply of Public Goods Volume 6: Cost and Choice Volume 7: The Limits of Liberty Volume 8: Democracy in Deficit Volume 9: The Power to Tax Volume 10: The Reason of Rules Volume 11: Politics by Principle, Not Interest Volume 12: Economic Inquiry and Its Logic Volume 13: Politics as Public Choice Volume 14: Debt and Taxes Volume 15: Externalities and Public Expenditure Theory Volume 16: Choice, Contract, and Constitutions Volume 17: Moral Science and Moral Order Volume 18: Federalism, Liberty, and the Law Volume 19: Ideas, Persons, and Evennts

Aims to strike a balance between economic theory and applications while describing how economics can help in understanding market behaviour. As well as personal and financial decisions, other areas of behaviour in areas such as politics and crime are also linked to basic economics.

Public-goods theory constituted a major element in James M. Buchanan’s research agenda throughout the 1960s. The Demand and Supply of Public Goods is a major part of that work. At the time that Buchanan was elaborating on his theories of public goods, the prevailing trend in public economics was the emergence of public-expenditure theory, which attempted to form a comprehensive theory of the state around the notion of market failure. The Demand and Supply of Public Goods established Buchanan’s broad purpose of explicitly comparing market performance with political performance. As such, the book is an important part of Buchanan’s contractarian theory of the "productive state.” Conceived originally as a series of lectures given at Cambridge University in 1961 and 1962, The Demand and Supply of Public Goods is written for students, but is in no way a textbook of dry pedagogy. Instead, as Geoffrey Brennan writes in the foreword, "What Buchanan provides here is a clear statement of the contractarian approach to public goods problems, very much in the 'voluntary exchange’ tradition of Wicksell and Lindhal.” James M. Buchanan is an eminent economist who won the Alfred Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1986 and is considered one of the greatest scholars of liberty in the twentieth century. The entire series will include: Volume 1: The Logical Foundations of Constitutional Liberty Volume 2: Public Principles of Public Debt Volume 3: The Calculus of Consent Volume 4: Public Finance in Democratic Process Volume 5: The Demand and Supply of Public Goods Volume 6: Cost and Choice Volume 7: The Limits of Liberty Volume 8: Democracy in Deficit Volume 9: The Power to Tax Volume 10: The Reason of Rules Volume 11: Politics by Principle, Not Interest Volume 12: Economic Inquiry and Its Logic Volume 13: Politics as Public Choice Volume 14: Debt and Taxes Volume 15: Externalities and Public Expenditure Theory Volume 16: Choice, Contract, and Constitutions Volume 17: Moral Science and Moral Order Volume 18: Federalism, Liberty, and the Law Volume 19: Ideas, Persons, and Events Volume 20: Indexes