Category: Chicago

Categories
Chicago Columbia Economists Gender Wellesley

Chicago. Economics Ph.D. alumna, Anna Prichitt Youngman, 1908

 

This entry in the series “Get to know an economics Ph.D. alumna/us” is dedicated to the life and professional career of Anna Prichitt Youngman, the third woman to receive a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago. I have spent several hours verifying that her middle name is indeed spelled “Prichitt”, though even University of Chicago alumni publications and references have sometimes gotten it wrong as have later historians.

A timeline, a linked list of publications, and miscellaneous artifacts documenting her life, e.g. courses taught at Wellesley and salaries paid her while working at the Federal Reserve Board have been assembeled for this post.

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Barbara Libby provides a brief discussion of Youngman’s more important publications in “Anna Pritchett [sic] Youngman” in A Biographical Dictionary of Women Economists, Robert W. Dimand, Mary Ann Dimand, and Evelyn L. Forget (eds.). Northampton, Mass : Edward Elgar, 2000. Pages 486-489.

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Anna Prichitt Youngman.

1882, August 21. Born in Lexington, Kentucky.
1901. Graduated from Female High School in Louisville, Kentucky. Highest grade point average of her class, winning her a scholarship to University of Chicago.
1904. Ph.B. University of Chicago.
1908. Ph.D. University of Chicago.
1908-14. Instructor in economics, Wellesley College.
1911-2. Winter Semester at the University of Berlin. Later at the University of Frankfurt/Main.  August 1911 to July 1912 in Germany.
1914-20. Associate Professor, Wellesley College.
1919-20. Leave of absence from Wellesley College to work at the Federal Reserve Board.
1920-21. Lecturer in Banking, School of Business, University Extension, Columbia University.
1921-22. Research Assistant, Division of Analysis and Research, Federal Reserve Board;
1922. July 5.  Sailed from New York for a three month trip to Europe: countries listed on passport application were Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, France, Holland, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, British Isles.
1924-1933. Editorial writer, Journal of Commerce, 46 Barclay St., New York, N.Y.
1933-52. Editorial Writer, The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.
1974. February 16. Died in Silver Spring, Maryland.
1974. February 21. Buried in Cave Hill Cemetery, Louisville Kentucky

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Publications of Anna Prichitt Youngman

“The Growth of Financial Banking,” Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 14, No. 7 (July, 1906), pp. 435-443.

“The Tendency of Modern Combination. I,” Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 15, No. 4 (April, 1907), pp. 193-208.

“The Tendency of Modern Combination. II,” Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 15, No. 5 (May, 1907), pp. 284-298.

“The Fortune of John Jacob Astor. [I],” Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 16, No. 6 (June, 1908), pp. 345-368.

“The Fortune of John Jacob Astor. II. Investments in Real Estate,” Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 16, No. 7 (July, 1908), pp. 436-441.

“The Fortune of John Jacob Astor. III. Conclusion,” Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 16, No. 8 (October, 1908), pp. 514-530.

The Economic Causes of Great Fortunes [University of Chicago Ph.D. Thesis]. New York: Bankers Publishing, Co., 1909.

The New York Times Saturday Review for February 12, publishes a review of Miss Youngman’s new book which considers the source of some of our large American fortunes. We quote the first paragraph of the review:
“There is nothing feminine about the discussion of the ‘Economic Causes of Great Fortunes,’ by Anna Youngman, Ph.D., (the Bankers’ Publishing Company). She is Professor of Economics in Wellesley College for Women, but she writes as a man to men, rather than as a woman to women…”

Source: Wellesley News (February 16, 1910), p. 6.

“The Tobacco Pools of Kentucky and Tennessee,” Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 18, No. 1 (January, 1910), pp. 34-49.

Review of History of the Great American Fortunes by Gustavus Myers. Journal of Political Economy Vol. 18, No. 8 (October, 1910), pp. 642-643.

Review of Untersuchungen zum Maschinenproblem in der Volkswirtschaftslehre. Ruckblick und Ausblick. Eine dogmengeschichtliche Studie mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der klassischen Schule by Carl Ergang. American Economic ReviewVol. 1, No. 4 (December, 1911), pp. 806-808.

“Frankfort-on-the-Main: A Study in Prussian Communal Finance Part I,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 27, No. 1 (November, 1912), pp. 150-201.

“Frankfort-on-the-Main: A Study in Prussian Communal Finance Part II,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 27, No. 2 (February, 1913), pp. 329-372.

Review of Der Wandel des Besitzes. Versuch einer Theorie des Reichtums als Organismus by Emaneul Sella (trans. by Dr. Bluwstein). American Economic ReviewVol. 3, No. 3 (September, 1913), pp. 627-629.

Review of Die Lohntheorien von Ad. Smith, Ricardo, J. St. Mill und Marx by Fredinand von Degenfeld-Schonburg. American Economic ReviewVol. 5, No. 1 (March, 1915), p. 55.

“The Revenue System of Kentucky: A Study in State Finance,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 32, No. 1 (November, 1917), pp. 142-205.

Review of The Conflict of Tax Laws by Rowland Estcourt. American Economic ReviewVol. 8, No. 4 (December, 1918), pp. 831-832.

“The Efficacy of Changes in the Discount Rates of the Federal Reserve Banks,” American Economic Review, Vol. 11, No. 3 (September 1921), pp. 466-485.

“A Popular Theory of Credit Applied to Credit Policy,” American Economic Review, Vol. 12, No. 3 (September, 1922), pp. 417-446.

Review of Money, Banking and Exchange in India by H. Stanley Jevons. American Economic ReviewVol. 13, No. 3 (September, 1923), pp. 512-513.

Participant in Discussion: Liquidating the War. Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science, Vol. 14, No. 2 (January, 1931), pp. 45-50.

The Federal Reserve System in wartime. National Bureau of Economic Research Occasional Paper No. 21, Jan 1945.

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High School Class Rank

Miss Anna Prichitt Youngman, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. C.A. Youngman, of 1313 Second street, received the highest average of the class of 1901 at the Female High School, and by a unanimous vote of the faculty she was awarded the scholarship at the Chicago University.

Source: The Courier-Journal of Louisville Kentucky (June 8, 1901), p. 6.

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Appointed at Wellesley to succeed Edith Abott in 1908

The fact that Dr. Edith Abbott of the Economics Department has refused reappointment in order to take up research work in Chicago is a source of sincere regret to all who have been brought into contact with her here this year. Miss Abbott will live at Hull House and work in the research department of the Chicago Institute of Social Science.

Dr. Abbott’s successor in the department of Economics is to be Miss Anna Youngman of Louisville, Kentucky. Miss Youngman graduated from the University of Chicago in 1904 and since that time has been doing graduate work in Economics and Political Science. She has held one of the University Fellowships in Political Economy and will receive the Ph.D. degree in June. Miss Youngman’s special studies have been in the line of Trusts and Corporation Finance. During the past year she has published a series of articles in the Journal of Political Economy on “Tendencies in Modern Combination” and her doctor’s thesis on “Great Fortunes” is already in press. Miss Youngman has been assisting in editorial work on the Journal of Political Economy during the past year.

Source: [Wellesley] College News (May 13, 1908), p. 3.

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Berlin and Frankfurt a.M.
Winter Semester, 1911/12

…During her stay at Wellesley, Youngman took time off to study economics at Berlin for the Winter Semester of 1911/12. At Berlin and later at the University of Frankfurt/Main, she concentrated on taxation and banking.
In 1919 Youngman took a leave of absence from Wellesley to work as an economist for the Federal Reserve Board. Youngman then resigned from Wellesley to continue her work with the Federal Reserve Board. From 1924 to 1933 she held a position as an eidtorial writer for the Journal of Commerce in New York City. She left that position to become an editorial writer for the Washington Post, where she remained until her retirement in 1952. At the Post, she wrote columns on financial and business topics. After retiring, Youngman continued to write for the Journal of Commerce.

Source: Sandra L. Singer. Adventures Abroad: North American Women at German-speaking Universities. Contributions in Women’s Studies, Number 201 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 203) p. 141.

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Wellesley College
1912-13
ECONOMICS AND SOCIOLOGY

Professor: Katherine Coman, Ph.B. (on leave 1912-13)
Associate Professor: Emily Greene Balch, B.A.
Instructors: Anna Youngman, Ph.D., Emilie Josephine Hutchinson, M.A.

 

  1. Elements of Economics. I

Open to sophomores, juniors, and seniors, but intended primarily for sophomores. Three hours a week for the year.

Miss Youngman

An introductory course designed to give the student acquaintance with economic facts and training in economic reasoning. Illustrations will be drawn from actual observation of the conditions determining prices, land values, wages, profits, and standards of living. In the second semester, certain legislative problems relating to currency, banking, the tariff, etc., will be discussed in class.

[…]

  1. Statistical Study of Certain Economic Problems. III [not offered 1912-13]

Open to juniors and seniors who have completed two courses in Economics. Three hours a week for the first semester.

Miss Youngman

The course is introduced by lectures on the principles of statistical research. Each member of the class undertakes the investigation of a particular problem, and reports the results of her inquiry in the form of a final paper. Emphasis is placed upon the critical examination of statistical methods.

[…]

  1. The Trust Problem. III.

Open to juniors and seniors who have completed one course in Economics. Three hours a week for the second semester.

Miss Youngman

This course will deal with the various forms of monopolistic organization, the growth of the movement toward large scale production, the history of characteristic combinations, federal and state legislation and judicial decisions relating to the subject, the alleged advantages and evils of trusts, and proposed remedies for the latter.

[…]

  1. Money and Banking. III.

Open to juniors and seniors who have completed one course in Economics. Three hours a week for the first semester.

Miss Youngman

This course deals mainly with the principles of money and banking, but it is also designed to give the student some acquaintance with the history and chief characteristics of typical modern systems of banking.

[…]

  1. Conservation of our Natural Resources. III.

Open to juniors and seniors who have completed two courses in Economics. Three hours a week for the second semester.

Miss Youngman

A consideration of the wastes involved in the exploitation of forests, mineral resources, soil and water power, and the means proposed for scientific conservation. The work of the Department of Agriculture, the Bureau of Forestry, the Reclamation Service, the Bureau of Mines, etc., will be studied in detail.

 

  1. The Distribution of Wealth. III. [not offered 1912-13]

Open to juniors and seniors who have completed course 1 or 15. Three hours a week for the second semester.

Miss Youngman

A discussion of the principles regulating wages, interest, and rent. The course will involve a critical and comparative examination of the distributive theories of such leading exponents of the classical school, as Ricardo, Mills, and Cairnes, and of certain important economists of the present day.

Source:  Wellesley College Bulletin, Calendar 1912-13, pp. 72-77.

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Salaries of the Federal Reserve Board Employees, 1919

ANALYSIS & RESEARCH Present Basic Salary, including Extra Compensation (1919)
Olive M. Bode $1,200
Ruth Cornwall $1,800
Mary Johnson $1,320
W. H. Steiner $2,750
Anna Youngman $2,500

Source: Meeting Minutes of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, December 18, 1919, 3:30 PM, Volume 6, Part 3, page 5.

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Salaries of the Federal Reserve Board Employees, 1920

Dated June 21st [1920] recommending approval of increases in salaries of employees of the Division of Analysis and Research, as follows:

From To
W. H. Steiner $3,500 $4,000
Miss Anna Youngman $2,750 $3,000
Miss Katherine Snodgrass $2,000 $2,750
F. W. Jones $2,400 $2,750
Miss Ruth Cornwall $2,000 $2,400
Miss Faith Williams $1,800 $2,250
J. M. Chapman $1,200 $1,500 ($750 half time)
M. R. Adams $1,500 $1,560
Miss Alice Ross $1,500 $1,560
Miss Rose Heller $1,080 $1,440
Miss Mary Johnson $1,440 $1,560
Miss Helen S. Grant — $1,440
Miss Olive M. Bode — $1,500

Approved.

Source: Meeting Minutes of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, June 22, 1920, 11:00 AM, Volume 7, Part 2, page 7.

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Anna Youngman’s (final) annual salary, 1922

“Letter dated May 8th, from the Director of the Division of Analysis and Research, requesting approval of the appointment of Mr. Woodlief Thomas as an employee in that Division at annual salary of $2600, said authority being requested in view of the retirement of Miss Anna Youngman, who has previously been employed in the Division of Analysis & Research, at annual salary of $3500.”

Source: Meeting Minutes of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, May 10, 1922, Volume 9, Part 1, page 1.

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From Passport Application.
Sworn May 3, 1922

Permanent residence 35 Schermerhorn St., Brooklyn, New York.
Occupation: research assistant.
Height: 5 feet 7 ½ inches

July 5, 1922 to sail from New York on the “Mongolia” to Europe: Germany, Austria, Czecho-Slovakia, Hungary, France, Holland, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, British Isles (“intend to return to the United States within 3 months”)

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Internal Memorandum

February 18, 1954
Washington, D.C.

Interview with Miss Anna Youngman at her new
residence in the Marlyn Apartments

Miss Youngman worked with Parker Willis on the Journal of Commerce. She was an editorial writer but the rumor that she wrote some of the Willis editorials is something which she denies. She says she did not agree with Mr. Willis on banking policies and would not have written editorials attributed to him. She has kept no files and was by no means as useful in connection with the Willis papers as I had had reason to think she would be.

Miss Youngman confirmed what I had heard from other sources that Mr. Willis headed the first Research Division of the Federal Reserve Board and that on being asked to teach at Columbia he took the Division to New York and kept it there for three years. During this time a running fight went on with Mr. Jacobson (now deceased) and Mr. Goldenweiser and Mr. Adolf Miller.

Obviously the distance between the Research Division and the Board for which research was being done caused a great deal of the difficulty and at the end of three years the division was restored to Washington and put into other hands.

When Mr. Eugene Meyer bought the Washington Post he took Miss Anna Youngman with him to write editorials there. She did financial editorials for the Post for many years. Her last job at the Post was the classification of Mr. Myer’s own papers. Miss Youngman says that these papers have now been brought from New York and the summer place belonging to Mr. Meyer at White Plains and are in Washington. She says that they include seven or eight volumes of diaries carefully typed and indexed.

Obviously some of these diaries which, according to Miss Youngman, are better in the earlier period than the later ones will have material which is important to this project. Miss Youngman says that Mr. Floyd Harrison, who is Mr. Meyer’s right hand man in New York, is the person who can give further information about the papers and who will know if any provision has been made for their disposal after Mr. Meyer’s death.

Miss Youngman lives alone with her sister. Both ladies are far from young and any information which is needed from Miss Youngman should be gained as soon as possible.

Concerning Mr. Willis she said that he was not a difficult man to work with because he protected the people who worked with him. Assumed responsibility for the things they did and gave them credit when he thought they deserved it. He was on the other hand a man of lively mind and extremely fond of argument. She suggested that Mr. Jules Bogen, Mr. John M. Chapman of the school of business at Columbia University, who was at one time assistant to Mr. Williams and Mr. W. H. Stiner (correction that might be Steiner but I am not sure [Note: “W. H. Steiner” is correct spelling). At 328 Riverside Drive, New York[.] Might at all of them have further information about Mr. Willis.

Source: Committee on the History of the Federal Reserve System. Interview with Miss Anna Youngman at her new residence in the Marlyn Apartments, Washington, D.C. (February 18, 1954). Entry 167, Box 2, Folder 1, Item 42.

Image Source: Passport application of Anna Youngman (May 3, 1922).

 

 

 

Categories
Chicago Columbia Economists Gender Minnesota Social Work

Columbia. Economics Ph.D. Alumnus Max Ira West, 1893.

 

 

Max Ira West (b. Nov. 11, 1870 in St. Cloud, MN; d. Jan 7, 1909 in Washington, D.C.) entered government service relatively soon after being awarded his Ph.D. in economics at Columbia University with a dissertation on the inheritance tax. He was a student of E.R.A. Seligman. West died at age 38, leaving a wife and five children. 

Max West and his future wife Mary Mills were fellow officers of the University of Minnesota’s Class of 1890. She was the designated class “prophet” and he served as the class “statistician”. Max was a professional economist of the family and rightly the main subject of this post. Max’s widow deserves some mention in Economics in the Rear-view Mirror for her later work. Mary attained great prominence for her pamphlets on pre-natal and infant care for the Children’s Bureau of the U.S. Department of Labor that were analogous to Dr. Benjamin Spock’s Baby and Child Care for later generations of parents. The Children’s Bureau was an absorbing state for the careers of many a professional woman economist of the time.

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Announcement of death of Max Ira West

The following communication with reference to the unfortunate death of Dr. Max West is printed at the request of the committee whose names appear below:

The members of the Association have no doubt read of the recent death, under most unfortunate circumstances, of Dr. Max West, of the Bureau of Corporations, Department of Labor, Washington, D. C.

Dr. West died after a short illness, a slight cold developing into pneumonia. He has left a wife and five children, ranging from thirteen years to only nine months, with no visible means of support, save a very small annuity terminable in ten years. Friends in Washington have contributed a considerable sum for immediate needs, including the expenses pertaining to Dr. West’s sickness and death, and have secured for Mrs. West a temporary position in the Government, which we hope will become a permanent position. This, with the closest economy, will enable Mrs. West to look after the bare physical needs of her five little children, but will leave no margin at all either for education or for contingencies.

It has therefore occurred to us and to some of the other friends of Dr. West that it might be possible to solicit and collect a fund for such a purpose. It is hoped to raise a fund of at least $5000. The suggestion is to be sent to all those who may be supposed to have known Dr. West personally, or to be in sympathy with the scholarly work for which he stood, and the committee will be very glad to receive any subscriptions that you may deem fit to make.

Checks may be sent to Mr. Edwin R. A. Seligman, at No. 324 West 86th street, New York, who has consented to act as treasurer for the committee.

Respectfully yours,

EDWIN R. A. SELIGMAN, Columbia University.

JACOB H. HOLLANDER, Johns Hopkins University.

E. DANA DURAND, Dept. of Commerce and Labor, Washington.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Dr. Max West died of pneumonia at his home in Washington, D. C., on January 7, 1909.

Dr. West was born at St. Cloud, Minnesota, in November, 1870. He was graduated from the University of Minnesota at nineteen, and went at first into newspaper work. In 1891 he went to Columbia University as a fellow in economics. There he received his master’s degree the next year, and his doctorate the year following. From 1893 to 1895 he was connected with the University of Chicago, first as an honorary fellow and then as a docent. The great railroad strike of 1894 drew him again into newspaper work; he reported it for the Chicago Herald. In 1895 he was an editorial writer for the Chicago Record. During the academic year 1895-1896 he lectured at Columbia.

In 1896 he entered the government service, to which the rest of his life was chiefly devoted. For four years he was connected with the Division of Statistics of the Department of Agriculture, and for nearly two years with the Industrial Commission. During the latter part of this period, from 1900 to 1902, he was also associate professor of economics in Columbian University, Washington, and in 1902 he again lectured at Columbia. In that year he became assistant registrar of the Tenement House Department of New York City. In 1903 he went to Porto Rico as chief of the island Bureau of Internal Revenue. His health did not permit him to continue there, and in 1904 he returned to Washington as a special examiner of the Bureau of Corporations. Here he remained until his death.

Dr. West’s chief published work was The Inheritance Tax, which appeared in 1893, was translated into French in 1895, and was republished in a revised and enlarged edition in 1907. A projected work, entitled Principles of Taxation, is left unfinished. He wrote many articles for periodicals, dealing oftenest with taxation, but sometimes with sociological subjects, questions of constitutional law, and other topics.

More of Dr. West’s scanty strength than he could well spare was devoted to the promotion of public well-being. During his two years in Chicago he was a resident successively of Hull House, the University of Chicago Settlement, and the Chicago Commons. At Washington he was warmly interested in social settlement work and in the Associated Charities, and he was the most active and efficient member of the Civic Center.

Source: American Economic Association, The Economic Bulletin, Vol. 2, No. 1 (Apr., 1909), pp. 12-14.

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Mary Mills West, ca. 1926

The following photograph was from a short alumna feature in the University of Minnesota yearbook The Gopher (1926). It is noted there that she was a member of the class of 1890, an editor of that year’s Gopher, and a member of the Delta Sigma literary society. The entry adds:

In 1909, she entered the Government service and filled various offices for the following ten years. She took a great interest in the newly created Children’s Bureau, and while there wrote three pamphlets regarding the health and care of mothers and babies which are widely distributed throughout the United States.

Mrs. West resigned her position with the Children’s Bureau in 1919, and moved to Berkeley where she engaged in newspaper syndicate work and other writings. She is, at present, an instructor in short-story writing for the University of California, and is gaining a considerable foothold in fiction writing for herself. She recently submitted a story to the Forum short story contest of 1924 and was awarded second place by a jury of noted writers and critics.

Image Source: University of Minnesota, The Gopher, 1926, p. 181.

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Production of Mary Mills West’s pamphlets

West’s publications became the best-selling pamphlets of the Government Printing Office in the 1910s. The first edition of West’s pamphlet, Prenatal Care, sold out in two months. Only six months later, the Bureau had distributed 30,000 coopies and could have sent out twice that number but for the inability of the printeres to keep up with the demand. …Nearly a million and a half copies of West’s second pamphlet, Infant Care, were disseminated between 1914 and 1921.

Source:  Robyn Muncy. Creating a Female Dominion in American Reform, 1890-1935 (Oxford University Press, 1991) p. 55.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Children’s Bureau Publications of Mary Mills West

(with Nettie McGill) Child-Welfare Programs: Study Outlines for the Use of Clubs and Classes. U.S. Department of Labor, Children’s Bureau. Bureau Publication No. 73, Children’s Year Follow-up Series, No. 7. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1920.

Prenatal Care. Care of Children Series, No. 1 Children’s Bureau Publication No. 4. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1913.

Infant Care. Care of Children Series, No. 2 Children’s Bureau Publication No. 8 (Revised) Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1921. (first published in 1914)

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Mary Mills West’s obituary

Mrs. Mary West, Writer, Dies at 88

BERKELEY, Aug. 13. Mrs. Mary Mills West, whose pamphlets’ on infants and children’s care have been distributed by the United States Children’s Bureau to millions of American homes, died here yesterday. Her home was at 549 Santa Barbara Road.

Mrs. West, 88, was the widow of Dr. Max West, an economic consultant for the U.S. Departments of Labor and Commerce. She became associated with the Children’s Bureau when it was organized in 1915. After moving to Berkeley 30 years ago, she was associated with the University of California Extension Division as a writing instructor.

Surviving Mrs. West are two daughters, Mrs. W. R. Lorimer of Honolulu and Mrs. Charles Manson of Wausau, Wis., and a son, Philip S. West of Berkeley. Three grandchildren also survive.

Funeral services will be held at 2:30 p.m. tomorrow; in the Berkeley Hills Chapel, Shattuck Ave. and Cedar St .The Rev. Ray L. Wells, assistant pastor of the First Congregational Church, will officiate.

Source: Oakland Tribune (Oakland, California), August 3, 1955, p. 30.

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Image Source: Alumnus feature on Max West published in University of Minnesota, The Gopher, 1896, p. 133.

 

 

Categories
Chicago Exam Questions

Chicago. Graduate prelim exams in economic theory. Metzler, Friedman and Knight, 1951

 

The previous post provided the names of the examination committee members for the economics preliminary exams for the Ph.D./A.M. by field at the University of Chicago for the summer quarter of 1951. The names of the students registered for the respective examinations were transcribed as well. The economic theory examining committee for that round consisted of Lloyd Metzler (chair), Milton Friedman, and Frank Knight. This post provides a transcription of both economic theory exams along with Friedman’s hand-written answer to Question 5 of Part I.

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ECONOMIC THEORY
Part I
Summer Quarter, 1951

(Do not write your name on your paper. Use only the number in the top right-hand corner of this examination.)

Ph.D. candidates. Write 3½ hours. Answer all questions.

A.M. candidates. Write 2½ hours on questions #1 and #2 and one other.

  1. Discuss the probable shape of the long-run cost curve for an industry operating under approximately perfect competition. How would it differ in the short run, i.e., in response to an unanticipated shift in the demand-curve for the product, assumed not to be permanent?
  2. Briefly discuss the Ricardian conception of capital, specifically in relation to his theory of wages. Argue the question whether wages are paid out of (pre-existing) capital or out of (current) product.
    Can you find any relation between the Böhm-Bawerk production-period theory of interest and the Ricardian theory of capital and profit? What is the crucial assumption about the nature and source of capital which underlies the production-period theory, and is it sound? How does diminishing returns to investment enter into Ricardo’s and Böhm-Bawerk’s theories?
  3. Consider a trade union that is strong enough to prevent nonmembers from working at the trade in question and whose membership, for simplicity, will be supposed unaffected by the level of returns to members within broad limits (e.g., future membership consists of present membership minus members who die plus male children of present members). Analyze what its position would be toward the immigration of unskilled labor if it took account solely of the effect of such immigration on the incomes of its members. What considerations, if any, should lead it to favor more extensive immigration? What considerations, if any, to favor restriction on immigration? Is there a clear balance in favor of the one position or the other?
  4. “The orthodox tools of supply and demand assume that sellers and buyers are free to buy or sell any quantities they wish at the price determined by the market. This assumption cannot validly be made when price controls or rations are imposed by government. It follows that these tools are useless in analyzing the effects of such governmental actions. Economists should free themselves from slavish adherence to outmoded concepts and fashion new tools for the new problems raised by the modern Leviathan.” Discuss.
  5. The following figures represent the prices and quantities of two commodities, A and B, consumed by three individuals having the incomes stated in two different periods of time.

First Period

 Second Period
Pa Qa Pb Qb Income Pa Qa Pb Qb

Income
Arthur

$1

 20 $2 10 $40 $2 10 $1 20

$40
John

$2

 20 $1 10 $50 $1 10 $2 20

$50
Paul

$2

 20 $1 10 $50 $2.50 10 $1.25 20

$50

Assuming that each individual spends his whole income on the two commodities, and assuming also that there is no change in tastes between the two periods, indicate for each individual what the above information reveals as to whether the bundle of goods consumed in Period I represents a lower or a higher level of satisfaction that the bundle consumed in Period II. Explain your conclusions fully. (It is recommended that a diagram be used in answering this question.)

 

[Answers to Question 5 in pencil: Arthur “Can’t tell”; John “Inconsistent”; Paul: “First period better”]

From sketch in Milton Friedman’s copy of the exam.

 

 

ECONOMIC THEORY II
Summer Quarter, 1951

Time: 2½ hours.

  1. (a) Describe and discuss briefly the circumstances that gave rise to the establishment of the Federal Reserve System and the major events (including its actions) in its history.
    (b) In light of this survey of the record, comment on the following conclusion of one student: “The Federal Reserve System should be abolished. It served as an engine of inflation in two World Wars and post-war periods, hindered the re-establishment of satisfactory monetary standards throughout the world in the 1920’s, and failed to prevent the Great Depression, if indeed it was not itself largely responsible for the severity of that depression. The United States would have had a happier history if the pre-1913 monetary arrangements had been continued thereafter.”
  2. “From the preceding considerations it would be seen, even if it were not otherwise evident, how great an error it is to imagine that the rate of interest bears any necessary relation to the quantity or value of the money in circulation. An increase in the currency has in itself no effect, and is incapable of having any effect, on the rate of interest.” (J.S. Mill)
    “We can sum up the above in the proposition that in any given state of expectation there is in the minds of the public a certain potentiality towards holding cash beyond what is required by the transactions-motive or the precautionary-motive, which will realize itself in actual cash holding in a degree which depends on the terms on which the monetary authority is willing to create cash…Corresponding to the quantity of money created by the monetary authority, there will, therefore be set.  par. a determinate rate of interest.” (J. M. Keynes)
    “The saving schedule tells us what part of income the community desires to save. The technical conditions…expressed by the marginal-efficiency-of-investment function, determine the marginal efficiency of the amount of investment that the giving up of consumption permits undertaking. (The intersection of the two schedules determines) the equilibrium rate of interest.” (F. Modigliani).
    Can you reconcile these opinions concerning the determinants of the interest rate? Explain fully, making and stating any assumption you like as to the conditions of production, the time period under consideration, and the flexibility of prices and costs.
  3. What measures would you advocate—and give your reasons for inclusion and omission—for controlling the inflationary tendency in the U.S. under present conditions?

 

Source: Hoover Institution Archives. Papers of Milton Friedman, Box 76, Folder “76.2 University of Chicago, ‘Economic Theory’”.

Image Source: Social Science Research Building. University of Chicago Photographic Archive, apf2-07490, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.

Categories
Chicago Economics Programs Economists Fields

Chicago. Schedule of the preliminary economics exams for the Ph.D. and A.M., Summer 1951

 

The following schedule for preliminary examinations in economics at the University of Chicago from the summer quarter of 1951 comes from Milton Friedman’s papers at the Hoover Institution Archives. We see that he was on the two economic theory examination committees along with Lloyd Metzler and Frank Knight. Besides providing the names of the faculty members serving on the nine committees, the schedule also provides the names of the sixty students registered for the examinations during that quarter.

____________________

DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

SCHEDULE FOR PRELIMINARY EXAMINATIONS
FOR THE PH.D. AND FOR THE A.M.

Summer Quarter, 1951

The schedule below shows the examinations requested for the current quarter. Will the chairman of each committee please be responsible for turning in the complete examination at least one week before the date on which it is to be given?

 

Date

 Examination Committee

Students Registered

Thurs., Aug. 2
8:30
Law Court

Agricultural Economics

 D.G. Johnson, chr.
C. Hildreth
T.W. Schultz		 Dunsing, Marilyn (A.M.)
Fox, Kirk (Ph.D)
Hughes, Rufus (Ph.D.)
Taylor, Maurice (Ph.D.)

Tues., July 31
8:30
Law Court

Economic Theory I

 L. Metzler, chr.
M. Friedman
F. Knight		 Baskind, Irwin (Ph.D.) in abs.
Bassett, Marjorie (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Blumberg, Lionel (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Chen, Ho-Mei (Ph.D.)
Chen, Sze-te (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Chien, Chih Chien (Ph.D.)
Cleaver, George (Ph.D.)
Dunsing, Marilyn (A.M.)
Emmer, Robert (Ph.D.)
Fox, Kirk (Ph.D.)
Frank, Andrew (Ph.D.-A.M.) in abs
Gustus, Warren (Ph.D.)
Heizer, Raymond (Ph.D.)
Herlihy, Murray (Ph.D.)
Hoch, Irving (Ph.D.)
Hughes, Rufus (Ph.D.)
Krawczyk, Richard (Ph.D.-A.M.) in abs
Lerner, Eugene (Ph.D.)
Liang, Wei K. Liang (Ph.D.)
Lininger, Charles (Ph.D.)
Lurie, Melvin (Ph.D.)
McGuire, Charles (Ph.D.)
Malhotra, Man Mohan (Ph.D.)
Malone, John (Ph.D.)
Mitcham, Clinton (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Morrison, George (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Sonley, Lorne (Ph.D.)
Taylor, Maurice (Ph.D.)
Terrell, James (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Toscano, Peter (Ph.D.)
Traeger, Gordon (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Viscasillas, Felipe (Ph.D.)
Waldorf, William (Ph.D.)
Weir, Thomas (Ph.D.)
Weiss, Roger (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Zelder, Raymond (Ph.D.)

Tues., Aug. 7
8:30
Law Court

Economic Theory II

 L. Metzler, chr.
M. Friedman
F. Knight		 Chen, Ho-Mei (Ph.D.)
Herlihy, Murray (Ph.D.)
Hoch, Irving (Ph.D.)
Toscano, Peter (Ph.D.)
Weir, Thomas (Ph.D.)

Thurs., Aug. 9
8:30
Law Court

Government Finance

 P. Thomson, chr.
J. Marschak
D.G. Johnson		 Frank, Andrew (Ph.D.-A.M.) in abs
Haskell, Max (Ph.D.) in abs
Henry, Edward L. (Ph.D.)
Horwitz, Bertrand (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Lininger, Charles (Ph.D.)
Selden, Richard (Ph.D.)

Thurs., Aug. 9
8:30
Law Court

Industrial Relations

 F. Harbison, chr.
E. Hamilton
H.G. Lewis		 Barghout, Saad (Ph.D.)
Bechtolt, Richard (Ph.D.)
Hoch, Irving (Ph.D.)
Liang, Wei K. (Ph.D.)
Mullady, Philomena (Ph.D.)
Ness, David (Ph.D.)

Thurs., Aug. 2
8:30
Law Court

International Economics

 L. Metzler, chr.
B. Hoselitz
A. Rees		 Alberts, William (Ph.D.)
Anderson, Edwin (Ph.D.) in abs
Chen, Sze-te (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Chien, Chih Chien (Ph.D.)
Cleaver, George (Ph.D.)
Frank, Andrew (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Glick, Milton (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Gustus, Warren (Ph.D.)
Lukomski, Jesse (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Mitcham, Clinton (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Morey, Donald J. (Ph.D.-A.M.)

Tues., Aug. 7
8:30
Law Court

Money, Banking, and Monetary Policy

 L. Mints, chr.
E. Hamilton
J. Marschak		 Alberts, William (Ph.D.)
Bauer, Milton (Ph.D.)
Blumberg, Lionel (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Chen, Sze-te (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Chien, Chih Chien (Ph.D.)
Cleaver, George (Ph.D.)
Conomikes, George (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Davis, George (Ph.D.) in abs
Emmer, Robert (Ph.D.)
Heizer, Raymond (Ph.D.)
Horwitz, Bertrand (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Hughes, Rufus (Ph.D.)
Krawczyk, Richard (Ph.D.-A.M.) in abs
Lerner, Eugene (Ph.D.)
Liang, Wei K. (Ph.D.)
Lukomski, Jesse (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Meckling, William (Ph.D.)
Mitcham, Clinton (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Morey, Donald (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Ogawa, George (Ph.D.)
Smulekoff, Suzanne (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Sonley, Lorne (Ph.D.)
Taylor, Maurice (Ph.D.)
Terrell, James (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Traeger, Gordon (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Zelder, Raymond (Ph.D.)
Zingarelli, Carla (Ph.D.-A.M.)
Rayack, Elton  (Ph.D.) in abs

Thurs., Aug. 2
8:30
Law Court

Statistics

 T. Koopmans, chr.
C. Hildreth
H.G. Lewis		 Cagan, Phillip (Ph.D.)
Hogan, Lloyd (Ph.D.)
Katzman, Irwin (Ph.D.)
Malhotra, Man Hohan (Ph.D.)
Waldorf, William (Ph.D.)

Thurs., Aug. 2
8:30
Law Court

Economic History

 E. Hamilton Mullady, Philomena (Ph.D.)
Toscano, Peter (Ph.D.)

Source: Hoover Institution Archives. Papers of Milton Friedman. Box 76, Folder “University of Chicago ‘Economic Theory’”.

Categories
Chicago Exam Questions

Chicago. Economic Theory Prelim Exam, Winter Quarter 1957

With this post the stock of old Chicago preliminary examinations for the M.A. and Ph.D. in economics transcribed for Economics in the Rear-view Mirror has grown by one to make it an even dozen.

_____________________

Previously posted prelim examinations at the University of Chicago:

Preliminary Exam (Money and Banking) 1956

Preliminary Exam (Money and Banking) 1959

Prelim Theory 1960.

Preliminary Exam (Price Theory) 1964

Preliminary Exam (Price Theory) 1969

Preliminary Exam (Macroeconomics) 1969

Preliminary Exam (Money and Banking) 1969

Preliminary Exam (International Trade) 1970

Preliminary Exam (Price Theory) 1975

Preliminary Exam (Industrial Organization) 1977

Preliminary Exam (History of Economic Thought) 1989

_____________________

ECONOMIC THEORY I
Preliminary Examination for the Ph.D. and A.M. Degrees
Winter Quarter 1957

WRITE THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION ON YOUR EXAMINATION PAPER:

Your Code Number and NOT your name
Name of Examination
Date of Examination

Results of the Examination will be sent to you by letter after results on all preliminary examinations have been received.

Answer all questions: Time: Four hours.

Do section I of the examination on this paper and turn it in to the proctor with the rest of your examination. You are to do sections II-VII separately.

 

  1. Indicate whether each of the following statements is true (T), false (F), or uncertain (U). Explain briefly the basis for your answer.
    1. _____. If the market elasticity of demand for peaches is -2, a peach producer whose output accounts for 1/20th of the total supply of peaches will be faced by a demand function of elasticity -40.
    2. _____. If a constant amount of carpenters’ services is required per unit of housing constructed, and the elasticity of demand for housing is -1, the elasticity of demand for carpenters’ services used in housing must be less (in absolute value) than unity.
    3. _____. If the production possibilities for wire can be represented by a Cobb-Douglas production function, and the wire industry is competitive, a rise of 10 per cent in the wages of wire-workers will lead to a reduction of 10 per cent in their employment.
    4. _____. The elasticity of demand for a group of commodities with respect to the average price of the group can never be larger in absolute value than the largest of the individual price elasticities of the commodities which comprise the group.
    5. _____. If total consumer expenditures are the same before and after a tax, then an excise tax on a consumer good of elastic demand will lead to an increase in consumer spending on other consumer goods, while an excise tax on a consumer good of inelastic demand will lead to a decline in consumer spending on other consumer goods.
    6. _____. A tax of 10 per cent per year on the rental value (actual or imputed) of all land will in the long run lead to a lowering of the marginal productivity of labor in agriculture.
    7. _____. A technological advance opening up widespread possibilities for new investment in the electronics industry at very high rates of return will tend to lower the real value of the existing stock of residential housing in the United States.
    8. _____. A supply curve passing through the origin has an elasticity equal to unity.
    9. _____. Given certainty, no firm would hold inventories.
    10. _____. A negatively sloping supply curve of labor implies a positively sloping demand curve for leisure.
    11. _____. It is impossible to derive a supply function for a monopolist.
    12. _____. A legally enforced minimum wage for a particular occupation may increase employment in that occupation.
    13. _____. Wage rates rise while interest rates remain the same. It follows that the ratio of capital to labor will increase.
    14. _____. Engel’s laws are due to Friedrich Engels.
  2. “It is too obvious for argument that a single employee bargaining with a great corporation, or even with a moderately small employer, is under a disadvantage, except perhaps in time of serious labor shortage”. (Arthur Larsen, A Republican Looks at his Party, p. 125)
    Analyze, being sure in the process to discuss the concepts of  “bargaining disadvantage” and “labor shortage”.
  3. Derive a demand function for a factor of production. What does it depend on? What things are held constant in the derivation?
  4. a) What was Malthus’ theory of population? In answering, distinguish explicitly between the two variants of his theory, according to the character of the restraints on population.
    b) Tell how equilibrium is established under each variant.
    c) What effect did the theory have on economic theory?
  5. In the analysis of supply, an important role is played by a fourfold classification of economies or diseconomies of production: internal and external, each of these cross-classified as pecuniary and technical.
    1. What does each of the four concepts mean and what role does it play in the analysis of supply?
    2. For each of the four concepts, what would be its counterpart in the analysis of demand? If you can, illustrate by example each type of economy, each type of diseconomy.
    3. Why is so much more importance attached to these concepts in the analysis of supply than in the analysis of demand?
  6. “The interest rate measures the rate of time-preference. Therefore, in a community, the members of which are as anxious to provide for the future as for the present, the rate of interest will be zero. But the rate of interest also equals the marginal productivity of capital. It follows that in such a community the marginal productivity will be zero”.
    Discuss the validity of this argument.
  7. The U.S. government currently guarantees a large fraction of mortgages on newly-constructed houses through the Federal Housing Administration and the Veteran’s Administration. The government guarantee naturally makes these more attractive than non-guaranteed mortgages and so leads to their being available at a lower rate of interest. Recently there has been a decline in residential building. Representatives of the industry have suggested that one means of stimulating building would be to extend the government guarantee to mortgages on existing houses. They claim that the higher cost of mortgages on such houses inhibits their sale and thus prevents individuals currently owning houses from coming into the market for new houses.
    Analyze the effect that the enactment of this proposal would have on the rate of construction of residential housing. Do not discuss the desirability as a matter of public policy of either the existing guarantees or the proposed extension.

 

Source: Hoover Institution Archives. Milton Friedman Papers, Box 76, Folder 2 “University of Chicago ‘Economic Theory’”.

Image Source: Social Science Research Building. University of Chicago Photographic Archive, apf2-07466, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.

Categories
Chicago Economics Programs Funny Business

Chicago. Three things to learn when studying economics at Chicago. Harry Johnson, 1968

 

In an earlier post we found that Harry Johnson thought student course evaluations were useful when interpreted properly but of questionable utility for e.g. hiring and promotion decisions. His message to graduate students in 1968 transcribed below reveals three truths wrapped in irony. Perhaps there is an older Chicago-trained economist who can help younger, non-Chicago trained economists extract Harry Johnson’s intended signal from the satirical noise? At the bottom of this and every page of Economics in the Rear-view Mirror is space for comments.

________________________

SKIT FOR STUDENTS’ PARTY
May 17, 1968
by
Harry G. Johnson

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Pray silence, while you listen to and meditate upon the remarks of Chairman Harberger, as he addresses the new students in the Graduate School of Economics at the University of Chicago, I quote to you from the remarks of Chairman Harberger.

Many of you have graduated with distinction from reputable and respected undergraduate schools of economics; no doubt you expect to put in another three years or so learning those things that you had insufficient time or preparation to study as undergraduates, and acquiring the qualifications to teach in such a school, or to work for the government, or possibly—God forbid—to go into business.

The first thing you will have to learn is that you are stupid and misguided in this expectation. You have not learned what economics is about, and you will have to start all over again by unlearning what you have learnt, or think you have learnt. Real economics, as understood and applied at the University of Chicago is precisely what most of you have been taught to think of as nonsense, an archaic mythology disposed of by the pseudo-economics in which you have been trained. Real economics, the kind you are here to learn, is founded on the assumption that the price system works. This is a hard thing to believe; but after three years or so you too will come to believe it. Real economics is founded also on the assumption that the quantity of money—something most of you have never heard of—really matters. It matters not just for macroeconomics, but also for everything else from personal freedom to the poverty problem. This is an even harder thing to believe; but you will either learn to believe it, or perish in the attempt.

The second thing that you will have to learn is that nothing here is what it is called. Or, perhaps, following Humpty Dumpty, what things are called is not what they mean. Thus, you might be tempted to believe that the sequence of courses in money is designed to help you get through the money part of the Core. You have my personal assurance, publicly recorded this very afternoon, that this is not the case. Or you might expect that Course 302, described as being concerned with distribution theory, is about the theory of distribution. It is not. We offer you instead an embarrassment of riches: a choice between a 302 that is really a 303 on general equilibrium analysis, a course which we shall not be able to introduce formally until 1969; and a 302 which is a mixture of a course called 304, the pure theory of capital, that was discontinued some years ago for lack of student interest, and a course given at another time of the year under the number 371, international economic relations. After these hints, you will not I hope be surprised to learn that our econometrics sequence is not a sequence; and in the opinion of some informed people it is not properly described as econometrics either.

The third thing you will have to learn is that, if you want to learn something here, you will have to study something else. This is another example of the Humpty Dumpty approach towards words and meanings that we practice in this Department. Thus, if you want to be a regression analysis technician, you must do your thesis in labour economics. If you want to be an international trade or monetary economist, study mathematical economics. If you have a broad interest in society’s problems, and an unrepentant hankering after the social philosophizing of your undergraduate days, you must register in agricultural economics. If, by some strange chance, you are interested in agricultural economics, you must register as a specialist in economic history. If on the contrary you are interested in public finance, you must register in economic development—if you register in public finance so-called you will have to become an expert on pubic [sic] triangles. But just to confuse you, we have two specializations that mean what they say—international trade, and money and banking—though if you are interested in the monetary aspects of international trade, you will of course do your thesis in the money and banking workshop.

These are the three most important lessons a University of Chicago graduate student in economics has to learn. And you will learn them as you pass through the Department. If you do not learn them, I have one final remark to make to you. That remark is——goodbye.

Source: The Hoover Institution Archives. Milton Friedman Papers, Box 79, Folder 6 “University of Chicago Miscellaneous”.

Categories
Brookings Chicago Economists Gender Social Work

Chicago. Economics Ph.D. alumna. Helen Russell Wright, 1922

 

From the days when economics still had room for policies of social work, Helen Russell Wright, economics Ph.D. alumna of the University of Chicago (1922). 

_______________________

Helen Russell Wright.

1891, February 26. Born in Glenwood, Iowa.
1912. A.B. Smith College.
Studied economics and social work in the Chicago School of Civics and Philanthropy (CSCP) under Sophonisba Breckenridge and Edith Abbott
1912-13. Appointed research student in the Department of Social Investigation. (CSCP)
1913. Certificate of the Chicago School of Civics and Philanthropy.
1913-14. Senior Research Studentship (honorary). Department of Social Investigation (CSCP)
1914-15. Senior Research Studentship (honorary). Department of Social Investigation (CSCP)
1917-18.  Research assistant at Department of Social Investigation (CSCP)
1918-19. Assistant in Social Investigation (CSCP).
1919-1920. Assistant in Social Investigation (CSCP).
1920-21. Fellow in Political Economy, University of Chicago.
1922. Ph.D. University of Chicago. Thesis: The political labour movement in Great Britain, 1880-1914.
1922. Children of Wage-Earning Mothers: A Study of a Selected Group in Chicago. U.S. Department of Labor, Children’s Bureau, Publication No. 102. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1922.
1922-24. Senior Staff member, Brookings Graduate Institution of Economics, Washington, D.C.
1924-28. Member of the faculty of the Brookings Graduate Institution of Economics, Washington, D.C.
1926. Co-authored with Walton Hale Hamilton, The Case of Bituminous Coal. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1926.
1928. Co-authored with Walton Hale Hamilton, A Way of Order for Bituminous Coal. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1928.
1928. Joins University of Chicago’s School of Social Service Administration.
1931. Associate Professor of Social Economy, Graduate School of Social Service Administration, University of Chicago, Chicago, Ill.
1938. Professor and Assistant Dean of the School of Social Service Administration, University of Chicago, Chicago, Ill.
1944. Social Service in Wartime. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
1942-1956. Succeeded Edith Abbott as Dean of the Social Service Administration, University of Chicago.
1950-56. Editor of the Social Service Review.
1954. Received the University of Chicago’s alumni medal.
1955. Illinois Welfare association’s annual award for outstanding service in 1955.
1956. Retired from the University of Chicago
1957-58. Chief of a technical assistance team of the Council on Social Work Education to assist the development of the schools of social work in India.
Part-time teaching at the University of Southern California.
1969, August 14. Died in Pasadena, Los Angeles, California.

 

Image Source: Helen Russell Wright’s senior year portrait in Smith College, The 1912 Class-Book, p. 56.

Categories
Chicago Exam Questions Socialism Suggested Reading Syllabus Undergraduate

Chicago. Readings and exam for “Wage-labor and capital”, 1970

The following set of course materials from the University of Chicago was included in a folder for “Comparative Economic Systems” in Martin Bronfenbrenner’s papers at Duke University. According to his c.v. he would have still been a professor at Carnegie Tech at that time and there is no mention of a visiting professorship at Chicago. As it turns out, I was correct in presuming that this was not a course taught by Bronfenbrenner. The Head of Research and Instruction of the Special Collections Research Center at the University of Chicago Library, Catherine Uecker, consulted the course timetable for the spring quarter 1970 and found that the instructor was Professor Gerhard Emil Otto Meyer.

_______________________

Social Sciences 273
Spring 1970

“Wage-Labor and Capital” in
Marxian and Modern Theory

GRADE REQUIREMENTS:

a) term paper
b) final examination

TENTATIVE READING LIST (subject to some changes)

Note: All readings except those labelled as “optional” (Opt.) are required. Each student is expected to read, in addition to all required readings, some agreed-upon optional readings which may, but need not, be taken from the list below. The following readings are more or less systematically listed, not in the order they will be assigned.

  1. Karl Marx

Capital, vol. I, chs. 4-9; 11-12; 15 (sec. 1-7); 16-19; 25 (sec. 1-4); 32 (chs. 10 and 24 optional).

The Communist Manifesto
Wage-Labor and Capital
Value, Price and Profit
Critique of the Gotha Programme
[These four readings are available in many editions; conveniently combined in K. Marx and F. Engels, Selected Works (paperback, International Publishers)]

The Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, trans. By M. Milligan (International Publishers), pp. 65-91, 106-131 (pp. 132-164 optional)

Marx’s “Enquête Ouvrière” (mimeographed)

  1. Interpretive Materials on Marx’ Theory (in general, and on Labor-Capital Relations in particular)

Sweezy, Paul M., The Theory of Capitalist Development, Introduction and chs. 1-5 (optional, recommended for those who need a general survey of Marxian “economics”)—or

Ernest Mandel, Marxist Economic Theory (2 vols.), ch. 1-5 (optional-alternative to Sweezy)

Sowell, Thomas, Marx’s “Increasing Misery Doctrine” (mimeographed)

Avineri, Shlomo, The Social and Political Thought of Karl Marx chs. 2-4 and 6 (opt.)

Lefebvre, Henri, The Sociology of Marx, ch. 4 (opt.)

Dahrendorf, Ralph, Class and Class Conflict in Industrial Society, ch. I (opt.)

  1. Modern Economic Theory (especially Wage and Employment Theory):

Hicks, J.R., Theory of Wages (selections) (opt.)

Douglas, Paul H., Theory of Wages (selections) (opt.)

Robertson, D.H., Lectures on Economic-Principles, vol. II, (selections) (opt.)

  1. Modern Sociological Theory with special regard to Problems of Class, Work and Alienation)

Dahrendorf, Ralph, (see above under B), ch. 2 ff. (opt.)

Bendix, R. and S.M. Lipset, Reader on Class, Status and Power (First and Second Editions) (selections) (opt.)

Arendt, Hanna, The Human Condition (selections) (opt.)

Bell, Daniel, The End of Ideology, esp. chs. 12 and 16 (Opt.)

Ruitenbeck, H.M. (ed.), Varieties of Modern Social Theory (selections) (opt.)

Blauner, Robert, Alienation and Freedom (selections) (opt.)

Josephson, E. & M., (ed.), Man Alone. Alienation in Modern Society. (selections) (opt.)

  1. Marxian and Modern Theory Confronting Each Other

Horowitz, David. (ed.), Marx and Modern Economics, pp. 68-116 (other essays opt.)

Robinson, Joan, An Essay on Marxian Economics (opt.)

Lange, Oskar, Political Economy, vol. I (selections) (opt.)

Schumpeter, Joseph, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, part I (opt.)

Aron, Raymond, Main Currents in Sociological Thought, vol. I, pp. 107-180 (opt.)

Kerr, Clark, Marshall, Marx and Modern Times (opt.)

Wolfson, Murray, A Reappraisal of Marxian Economics, ch. 1-3 (opt.) (Penguin Bks.)

Samuelson, Paul, “Wages and Interest: Marxian Economic Models” Am. Ec. Review, Dec. 1957) (opt.)

Selected theoretic and empirical materials on technological unemployment and automation (to be announced).

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Social Sciences 273
Spring 1970

“Wage-Labor and Capital” in
Marxian and Modern Theory

Supplementary List of Optional Readings

1) to Section B:

Solow, Robert, “The Constancy of Relative Shares” in American Economic Review, September 1958.

Ossowski, S., Class Structure in the Social Consciousness

Wesolowski, W., “Marx’s Theory of Class Domination” in: Lobkowitz, H., ed., Marx and the Western World

2) to Section C:

Dobb, M, Wages

Rees, R., The Economics of Trade Unions (both these books are published in ‘Cambridge-Chicago Economic Handbooks’ series)
Hicks, J.R., Theory of Wages has been published in a second edition with important additions and commentary

3) to section D:

Bottomore, T.B., Classes in Modern Society (paperback)

4) to section E:

Robinson, Joan, Economic Philosophy, ch. II

Adelman, Irma, Theories of Economic Growth and Development, ch. 5

5) on technological unemployment and automation:

Lederer, Emil, Technical Progress and Unemployment (International Labour Office) 1938

Woytinsky, W., Three Sources of Unemployment (International Labor Office) 1935

Kaehler, Alfred, “The Problem of Verifying the Theory of Technological Unemployment” in Social Research, vol. II, 1935

Neisser, Hans P., “Permanent Technological Unemployment” in Am. Economic Review, March 1942, pp. 50-71

“The Triple Revolution” in Fromm, E., ed., Socialist Humanism, pp. 441-461

Marcuse, H., Five Lectures, esp. lecture V, “The End of Utopia”

Brunner, Karl, “The Triple Revolution and a New Metaphysics” in New Individualist Review, Spring 1966 (vol. 4, no. 3)

Silberman, Charles E., and the edition of Fortune, The Myth of Automation

Brozen, Yale, Automation: The Impact of Technological Change (1963)

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Social Sciences 273
Spring 1970

“Wage-Labor and Capital” in
Marxian and Modern Theory

Take-home Examination:

Directions: Write two essays, one from group A (topics 1-5) and one from group B (topics 6-11). Devote approximately one hour on each essay. Return the examination to Gates-Blake 431 or 428 not later than Thursday, June 11, at 12:30 P.M. Indicate on your examination a) which kind of grade you expect (P., I. or letter grade) and b) topic of oral report or term paper you have completed or intend to write. If a member of the class wishes to obtain a letter grade (i.e. grade other than P or I) this quarter, the term paper should be handed in not later than Friday, June 12, at 5 P.M. (in G-B 431).

(In none of the topics listed below, will you be graded on the basis of the position taken by you, but rather with regard to the quality of your analysis or argument).

Group A (Choose one topic)

Topic 1. Explain (as far as possible in your own terms) what Marx means by the “wage-labor system” as distinguished from other types of social-economic organization.

Topic 2. In what respects did Marx modify (or retain) his views concerning increasing working class misery (as expressed in the Communist Manifesto) in his later writings?

Topic 3. How do, according to Marx, different kinds of capitalistic accumulation processes affect the position of wage-laborers and the general wage-labor system?

Topic 4. How does Marx conceive the end of the capitalistic system?

Topic 5. Explain the relationship between alienation, exploitation and class domination in Marx (i.e. the younger or more mature one; or both).

Group B (Choose one topic)

Topic 6. Characterize broadly the major differences in the general approach (or “method”) of Marxian theory and “modern” social science.

Topic 7. In what substantive respects do major Marxian theories appear to be paralleled (or confirmed) or contradicted by results of ‘modern’ social sciences?

Topic 8. Does the abandonment of Marx’ labor-theory of value (and the consequent particular theory of surplus value and exploitation) necessarily imply a stand in support of private property and private enterprise?

Topic 9. Assuming that Marxian (classical and present-day) and non-Marxian (“modern”) social analysis are both live options and both faced with new difficulties, problems, and tasks, how would you broadly assess the most fruitful directions(s) of “praxis”-oriented social enquiry?

Topic 10. (If you did not choose topic 5 in Group A): Restate Marx’s conception of “freedom” (with regard to its most relevant social-historical dimensions and stages) in brief contrast with alternative conceptions of freedom.

Topic 11. Choose one of the optional readings not used by you for term paper or oral report and use it either as basis for comment on Marx’ views (concerning the condition of wage-labor) or, vice versa, as object of comments from a “Marxian” point of view.

 

Source: Duke University. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Economists’ Papers Archive. Martin Bronfenbrenner Papers, Box 23, Folder “Comparative Economic Systems a.d.”.

Image Source: From the 65th birthday dinner honoring Gerhard Meyer at Hutchinson Commons. University of Chicago Photographic Archive, apf1-04472, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.

Categories
Chicago Economists Harvard Statistics

Harvard. Semester exams for Statistics. John Cummings, 1896-1900

 

 

 

John Cummings was awarded the first Ph.D. in political economy at the University of Chicago in 1894. His doctoral thesis was “The Poor Law system of the United States”, later published as “The Poor Laws of Massachusetts and New York.” Publications of the American Economic Association, vol. X, no. 4 (July, 1895). His first real academic job was at Harvard, after which he went to have a successful career as a statistician in government service. He was apparently quite a big name in vocational education policy by the end of his career.

This post provides the questions to all of the semester exams from the times he taught the statistics course for when he taught at his undergraduate alma mater during the last five years of the 19th century.

Life and Career of John Cummings

1868. Born May 18 in Colebrook, New Hampshire.

1887. Entered Harvard College.

1891. A.B., magna cum laude, Harvard College

1892. A.M., Harvard College

1893-94. Senior Fellow, Department of Political Economy, University of Chicago.

1894. Ph.D. in Political Economy; Reader in Political Economy, University of Chicago.

1894-1900. Instructor in Economics, Harvard University.

1900-02. Editorial staff New York Evening Post.

1902. Married Carrie R. Howe in Marion, Indiana, December 3, 1902)

1902-10. Assistant Professor in Political Economy. University of Chicago.

1910-16. Expert special agent, Census Bureau.

1917-23. Statistician, Federal Board for Vocational Education, Washington, D.C.

1924-30. Statistician and economist, Division of Research and Statistics, Federal Reserve Board.

1930-1933. Chief of Research and Statistics, Federal Board for Vocational Education, Washington, D.C.

1933-. Chief of research and statistical service, vocation education, United States Office of Education.

1936. Died , June 26.  in Washington, D.C.

Buried at the Crown Hill Cemetery, Indianapolis, Indiana.

Sources: Obituary in Washington Post, June 27, 1936, p. 8. Also “A Tribute to Dr. Cummings” in School Life (September 1936), p. 12.

_____________________

Tribute to Memory of John Cummings

At the annual meeting of the National Committee on Research in Secondary Education, of which organization Dr. Cummings was a member, the following resolution was adopted honoring his memory:

In the passing of Dr. John Cummings, of the United States Office of Education, research lost one of its most careful and effective workers. For a period of more than 20 years, Dr. Cummings was in the forefront of development in vocational education throughout the Nation. As research expert for the Joint Congressional Committee on National Grants for Education during President Wilson’s administration, he was instrumental in providing the bases upon which the legislation known as the Smith-Hughes Act was developed. Subsequently, as Chief of the Research and Statistical Service of the Vocational Educational Division in the Federal Office of Education, he was identified closely with the expansion and improvement of services in his field of work.

Dr. Cummings had the confidence and respect of his associates. By disposition he was kindly, tolerant, and friendly. He was never too busy to help those who came to him for counsel and advice. Gentle and reserved, he was at the same time an aggressive champion of objectives and principles in which he believed. His was a brilliant mind and an indomitable spirit. The National Committee on Research in Secondary Education can pay him no better or more deserved tribute than that voiced by his chief, Dr. J. C. Wright. Assistant Commissioner for Vocational Education, when he said: “As an economist, statistician, and editor, Dr. Cummings rendered invaluable service to the cause of vocational education in the United States. He was a man of outstanding ability, brilliant mentality, and quiet, unassuming personality. The Office of Education, and more particularly the cause of vocational education, has suffered a distinct loss in his death.”

Source:  School Life, vol. 22 (April, 1937), p. 236.

_____________________

Harvard Course: Statistics

Course Description
(1897-98)

[Economics] 4. Statistics. — Applications to Social and Economic Problems. — Studies in the Movements of Population. — Theory and Method. Mon., Wed., Fri., at 11. Dr. John Cummings.

This course deals with statistical methods used in the observation and analysis of social conditions, with the purpose of showing the relation of statistical studies to Economics and Sociology, and the scope of statistical inductions. It undertakes an examination of the views entertained by various writers regarding the theory and use of statistics, and an historical and descriptive examination of the practical methods of carrying out statistical investigations. The application of statistical methods is illustrated by studies in political, fiscal, and vital statistics, in the increase and migration of population, the growth of cities, the care of criminals and paupers, the accumulation of capital, and the production and distribution of wealth.

Source: Harvard University. Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Division of History and Political Science Comprising the Departments of History and Government and Economics, 1897-98, p. 37.

_____________________

Course Enrollment 1895-96
(Half-course)

[Economics] 42. Dr. John Cummings. — Theory of Statistics. — Applications to Social and Economic Problems. — Studies in movements of population. Hf. 3 hours. 2d half-year

Total 19: 2 Graduates, 11 Seniors, 4 Juniors, 2 Sophomores.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1895-1896, p. 64.

 

1895-96.
ECONOMICS 4.
Year-End Final Examination.

[Divide your time equally between A. and B.]

A.
I and II may be treated as one question.

  1. What do you understand by “movement of population”? What light do Statistics throw upon the law of population as stated by Malthus?
  2. What are some of the “more striking facts and more pregnant results of the vast growth of population in Europe, America, and the British Colonies within the last half century”?

 

B.
Take five.

  1. In constructing a life table what correction must be made for abnormal age and sex distributions of the population?
  2. Define the following terms: “Mortality,” “Expectation of Life,” “Mean Duration of Life.” How should you calculate the mean duration of life from the census returns for any community?
  3. How should you calculate the economic value of a population?
  4. What are some of the inaccuracies to which censes enumerations are liable?
  5. What is the nature of a statistical law? Of what categories of social phenomena may statistical laws be formulated? In what sense are they laws? How do they bear upon freedom of the will in human conduct?
  6. How do the conditions of observation in social sciences differ from conditions of observation in the natural sciences?
  7. What do you understand by the law of criminal saturation?
  8. By what considerations should the Statistician be guided in making selection of social phenomena for investigation?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination papers, 1873-1915. Box 4, Bound volume: Examination Papers 1896-97. Papers set for Final Examinations in History, Government, Economics, Philosophy, Fine Arts, Architecture, and Music in Harvard College. June 1896, pp.38-39.

_____________________

Course Enrollment 1896-97
(Year-course)

[Economics] 4. Dr. John Cummings. — Theory and Methods of Statistics. — Applications to Economic and Social Questions. — Studies in the Movement of Population. 3 hours.

Total 15: 8 Seniors, 7 Juniors.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1896-1897, p. 65.

 

1896-97.
ECONOMICS 4.
Mid-Year Examination.

[Divide your time equally between A. and B.]

A.

  1. The development of scientific statistics and the statistical method as employed in the social sciences.
  2. Social and economic causes of the migratory movements which have taken place in the populations of Europe and America during this century, and the laws in accordance with which those migrations have taken place where you can formulate any.

B.
(Take five.)

  1. Rural depopulation and the growth of cities in the United States.
  2. Define: “mean after life,” “expectation of life,” “mean duration of life,” “mean age at death.” What relation does the mean age of those living bear to the mean age at death? To the mean duration of life?
  3. Anthropological tests of race vitality as applied to the American negro?
  4. Explain how the economic value of a population is effected by its age and sex distribution.
  5. The United States census: either (1) an historical account of it, or (2) an account of the work now undertaken by the Census Bureau.
  6. Explain the various methods of calculating the birth rate of a population.
  7. How far are social conditions in a community revealed in the birth rate, the death rate, the marriage rate? Of what are fluctuations in these rates evidence in each case?
  8. What do you understand by the “index of mortality”?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Mid-year Examinations, 1852-1943. Box 4. Bound volume: Examination Papers, Mid-Years. 1896-97.

 

1896-97.
ECONOMICS 4.
Year-End Final Examination.

I.

  1. Give an historical account of the United States census, and a general statement of the ground covered in the census of 1890; also show how the census taking is supplemented by work done in the Department of Labor and in the statistical bureaus established in connection with the several administrative departments.
  2. Define Körösi’s “rate of natality,” and state any statistical evidence you know that the rate is affected by the standard of living.
  3. “It must, at all times, be a matter of great interest and utility to ascertain the means by which any community has attained to eminence among nations. To inquire into the progress of circumstances which have given pre-eminence to one’s own country would almost seem to be a duty….The task here pointed out has usually been left to be executed by the historian.” Porter: “The Progress of the Nation.”
    What contribution has statistics to make in the execution of this task? What do you understand to be the nature of the statistical method, and what are the legitimate objects of statistical inquiry?

II.
[Take two.]

  1. What light does statistics throw upon the “natural history of the criminal man”?
    Give Ferri’s classification of the “natural causes” of crime, and comment upon that classification. Of criminals.
    What do you understand by “rate of criminality”? By “criminal saturation”?
  2. To what extent in your opinion is suicide an evidence of degeneration in the family stock?
    Discuss the influence upon the rate of suicide of education, religious creed, race, climate and other facts of physical, political and social environment.
  3. Comment critically upon the tables relating to crime in the last five federal censuses taken in the United States.
  4. What difficulties beset a comparative study of criminality in different countries?
  5. How far is it possible to give a quantitative statement to moral and social facts?

III.
[Take one.]

  1. What are some of the more salient facts concerning the movement of population and wealth in the United States, England, and France during the present century, so far as those facts are evidenced in the production, consumption and distribution of wealth?
  2. Discuss the movement of wages and prices in the United States since 1890.
  3. What do you understand by “index figures,” “average wages,” “average prices,” and “weighted averages”?

IV.
[Take one.]

  1. How do you account for the increase in the proportion of urban to rural population during this century? What statistical evidence is there that the increased density of a population affects the mean duration of life? What importance to you attach to this evidence?
    Explain the effect of migratory movements upon the distribution of a population according to age, sex and conjugal condition, and upon the birth rate, death rate and marriage rate.
  2. Define and distinguish: “mean age at death”; “mean duration of life”; mean age of those living”; expectation of life.”
  3. The “law of population” as formulated by Malthus and by subsequent writers.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination papers, 1873-1915. Box 4, Bound volume: Examination Papers 1896-97. Papers set for Final Examinations in History, Government, Economics, Philosophy, Fine Arts, Architecture, and Music in Harvard College. June 1897, pp. 39-41.

_____________________

Course Enrollment 1897-98
(Year-course)

[Economics] 4. Dr. J. Cummings. — Statistics. — Applications to Economic and Social Questions. — Studies in the Movement of Population. — Theory and Method. 3 hours.

Total 18: 7 Seniors, 7 Juniors, 3 Sophomores, 1 Other.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1897-1898, p. 78.

 

1897-98.
ECONOMICS 4.
Mid-Year Examination.

[Divide your time equally between A. and B.]

A.
[Take two.]

  1. In what sense do you understand Quetelet’s assertion that “the budget of crime is an annual taxation paid with more preciseness than any other”?
    Comment upon the “element of fixity in criminal sociology.”
    What are the “three factors of crime”?
    Can you account for the “steadiness of the graver forms of crime”? for the increase or decrease of other crimes?
    Define “penal substitutes.”
    What determines the rate of criminality?
    Comment upon the tables relating to crime in the last federal census, and explain how far they enable one to estimate the amount of crime committed and the increase or decrease in that amount.
  2. Comment upon the movement of population in the U.S. as indicated in the census rates of mortality and immigration. Upon the movement of population in France and in other European countries during this century. Can you account for the decline in the rates of mortality which characterize these populations?
    Give an account of the growth of some of the large European cities and of the migratory movements of their populations. Can you account for the depopulation of rural districts which has taken place during this century?
  3. Give some account of the Descriptive School of Statisticians and of the School of Political Arithmetic.
    Of the organization and work of statistical bureaus in European countries during this century.
    Of the census bureau in the United States.

 

B.
[Take four.]

  1. What are some of the “positive” statistical evidences of vitality in a population? “negative”?
  2. Define “index of mortality.”
  3. Comment upon the density and distribution of population in the United States.
  4. What do you understand by “normal distribution of a population according to sex and age”? Define “movement of population.”
  5. Explain the various methods of estimating a population during intercensal years.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Mid-year Examinations, 1852-1943. Box 4. Bound volume: Examination Papers, Mid-Years. 1897-98.

 

1897-98.
ECONOMICS 4.
End-year Examination.

Divide your time equally between A. and B.

A.

I.

“The wealth of a nation is a matter of estimate only. Certain of its elements are susceptible of being approximated more closely than others; but few of them can be given with greater certainty or accuracy than is expressed in the word ‘estimated.’” Why? State the several methods used for determining the wealth of a nation. Give some account of the increase and of the present distribution of wealth in the United States.

II.

What statistical data indicate the movement of real wages during this century? What facts have to be taken into account in determining statistically the condition of wage earners? State the several methods of calculating index numbers of wages and prices, and explain the merits of each method. Explain the use of weighted averages as indexes, and the considerations determining the weights. What has been the movement of wages and prices in the United States since 1860?

III.

Statistical data establishing a hierarchy of European races, the fundamental “laws of anthropo-sociology,” and the selective influences of migratory movements and the growth of cities.

 

B.
Take six.

  1. “I have striven with the help of biology, statistics and political economy to formulate what I consider to be the true law of population.” (Nitti.) What is this law? Is it the true law? Why?
  2. Upon what facts rests the assertion that “the fulcrum of the world’s balance of power has shifted from the West to the East, from the Mediterranean to the Pacific”?
  3. What factors determine the rate of suicide? Consider the effect upon the rate of suicide of the sex and age distribution of the population, of the social and physical environment, and of heredity.
  4. Statistical determination of labor efficiency, and the increase of such efficiency during this century.
  5. How far are statistics concerning the number of criminal offenders indicative of the amount of criminality? Statistics of prison populations? Of crimes? What variables enter in to determine the “rate of criminality”? What significance do you attach to such rates?
  6. The statistical method.
  7. Graphics as means of presenting statistical data.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination papers, 1873-1915. Box 5, Bound volume: Examination Papers 1898-99. Papers set for Final Examinations in History, Government, Economics, Philosophy, Fine Arts, Architecture, and Music in Harvard College. June 1898, pp.43-44.

_____________________

Course Enrollment 1898-99
(Year-course)

[Economics] 4. Dr. John Cummings. — Statistics. — Theory, method, and practice. — Studies in Demography. Lectures (3 hours) and conferences; 2 reports; theses.

Total 19: 10 Seniors, 4 Juniors, 4 Sophomores, 1 Other.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1898-1899, p. 73.

 

1898-99.
ECONOMICS 4.
Mid-Year Examination.

Devote one hour to A and the remainder of your time to B.

A.
Take two.

  1. The growth of modern cities and the laws governing the migrations of population as illustrated in the growth and constitution of the populations of London, Berlin, and other large cities.
  2. Define fully a “normal or life-table population,” considering its age and sex constitution and its movement.
  3. Discuss the development and predominance of the statistical method, and the gradual limitation of the field of statistical science.

B.
Take six.

  1. What do you understand by the “law of large numbers”?
    Discuss some of the principles which should govern the formation of statistical judgments.
  2. The “new law of population.”
  3. The value of criminal statistics and the nature of the statistical proofs that the value of punishments is over-estimated.
  4. “Several tests are employed to measure the duration of human life, and we are at present concerned to determine their precise value, and the relationship existing between them.” What are some of these tests, their precise value and inter-relationship?
  5. What is the nature of the statistical evidence that the “influx of the population from the country into London is in the main an economic movement”?
  6. The rate of mortality in urban an in rural populations.
  7. Decline in the rates of natality in the populations of Europe and the United States.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Mid-year Examination papers, 1852-1943. Box 5, Bound volume: Examination Papers. Mid-years, 1898-99.

 

 

1898-99.
ECONOMICS 4.
End-year Examination.

Devote at least one hour, but not more than one hour and a half, to A, and the remainder of your time to B.

A.

  1. Statistics of wages, manufactures, and capital in the eleventh census of the United States.
  2. Movement of population and the standard of living. Consider in connection with the growth of population and the movement of wages, prices, efficiency of labor and capital, the exploitation of new natural sources of power and wealth, and the relative movements of industrial groups.

B.
Take six.

  1. Average wages as an index of social condition.
  2. Statistical indexes of pauperism.
  3. What is the statistical basis for calculating the doubling period of a population and of what is that period an index?
  4. Define normal distribution of population (a) by sex, (b) by age.
  5. Show how the economic value of a population is affected by its age and sex distribution.
  6. To what extent may the prison population of the United States as given in the eleventh census be accepted as an index of criminality for the population of the United States?
  7. The growth of cities and the movement of population. Consider the effect of “urbanization” upon rates of criminality, natality, and mortality.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination papers, 1873-1915. Box 5, Bound volume: Examination Papers 1898-99. Papers set for Final Examinations in History, Government, Economics, Philosophy, Fine Arts, Architecture, and Music in Harvard College. June 1899, p.30.

_____________________

Course Enrollment 1899-1900
(Year-course)

[Economics] 4. Dr. John Cummings. — Statistics. — Theory, method, and practice. — Studies in Demography. Lectures (3 hours) and conferences; 2 reports; theses.

Total 10: 1 Graduate, 2 Seniors, 4 Juniors, 2 Sophomores, 1 Other.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1899-1900, p. 69.

 

1899-1900.
ECONOMICS 4.
Mid-Year Examination.

Devote one hour to A and the remainder of your time to B.

A.

  1. Urban growth and migration. Consider the sex and age distribution of migrants, the natural increase of urban and rural populations, and the causes of migration into urban centres. Illustrate by considering the actual conditions and movement in some one country or important urban centre.
  2. The data of criminal statistics as an index of amount of criminality. Consider the tables relating to crime in the United States census; the several statistical methods of dealing with crime and with the criminal classes; age, sex, and civil status as a factor in criminality; and the law of criminal saturation.

B.
Elect ten, and answer concisely.

  1. and 2. [counts as two questions]. Statistical measurements of agglomeration. Consider statistical methods of determining degree of concentration, also definition of the urban unit.

3. and 4. [counts as two questions]. Causes tending to make the rate of mortality lower for urban than for rural populations? causes tending to make it higher? the rate of natality?

  1. Methods of estimating population for intercensal years.
  2. Statistical laws and freedom of the will
  3. Define “life-table population.”
  4. Define carefully the following terms: “birth rate,” “rate of natality”; “rate of mortality”; death rate”; “rate of nuptialité”; “marriage rate”; index of mortality.”
  5. What do you understand by normal distribution of population by sex? by age? by civil status?
  6. Economic value of a population as effected by its age and sex distribution? by movement? by immigration?
  7. Of what statistical significance is the doubling period for any population?
  8. Can you account for the retardation in the rate of movement of population during this century?
  9. Tell when, if ever, the following terms are identical:—
    1. mean age at death.
    2. mean age of living.
    3. mean duration of life.
    4. expectation of life.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Mid-year Examination papers, 1852-1943. Box 5, Bound volume: Examination Papers. Mid-years, 1899-1900.

 

1899-1900.
ECONOMICS 4.
End-year Examination.

Divide your time equally between A and B.

A.

  1. Statistical methods of estimating wealth accumulated.
    Comment critically upon the census statistics of wealth accumulated in the United States.
  2. Statistical evidences of the progress of the working classes in the last half-century. Discuss the movement of wages and prices.
    What do you understand by “index figures,” “average wages,” “average prices,” “weighted averages”? Explain methods of weighting.
  3. The growth of cities and social election.

 

B.
Two questions may be omitted.

  1. How far are social conditions in a community revealed in the birth rate? the death rate? by the “index of mortality”? What do you understand by “movement of population”?
  2. In constructing a life table what correction must be made for abnormal age and sex distribution? Define “mortality,” “natality,” “expectation of life.” How should you calculate the “mean duration of life” from the census returns?
  3. The limit to the increase of population in the food supply? in other forms of wealth?
  4. Can you formulate any laws which will be true in general of the migrations of population?
  5. Methods of estimating population for intercensal years.
  6. Statistics of manufacturers in the United States census.
  7. How should you calculate the economic value of a population?
  8. Take one:—
    The rate of suicide as evidence of degeneration.
    The tables relating to crime in the Federal census of the United States.
  9. How far is it possible to give to moral and social facts a quantitative statement?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination papers, 1873-1915. Box 5, Bound volume: Examination Papers 1900-01. June 1900, p. 32.

Image Source: “A Tribute to Dr. Cummings” in School Life, Volume 22 (September 1936), p. 12.

Categories
Chicago Exam Questions

Chicago. Economic Theory Prelim Exam for PhD and AM, 1960

 

The economic theory  preliminary examination committee for the summer quarter of 1960 at the University of Chicago consisted of Milton Friedman (chairman), Martin J. Bailey and Lawrence Fisher. 

Previous posts with University of Chicago preliminary examinations for Ph.D. and A.M.  degrees:

Preliminary Exam (Money and Banking) 1956

Preliminary Exam (Money and Banking) 1959

Preliminary Exam (Price Theory) 1964

Preliminary Exam (Price Theory) 1969

Preliminary Exam (Macroeconomics) 1969

Preliminary Exam (Money and Banking) 1969

Preliminary Exam (International Trade) 1970

Preliminary Exam (Price Theory) 1975

Preliminary Exam (Industrial Organization) 1977

Preliminary Exam (History of Economic Thought) 1989

___________________

ECONOMIC THEORY (Old Rules)
Preliminary Examination for the Ph.D. and A.M. Degrees
Summer Quarter 1960

WRITE THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION ON YOUR EXAMINATION PAPER:

Your Code Number and NOT your name
Name of Examination
Date of Examination

Results of the examination will be sent to you by letter.
Answer all questions. Time: 4 hours.

 

  1. [22 points, 2 each] Define briefly the following terms and indicate their use in economic theory:
    1. Backward bending supply curve
    2. Giffen effect
    3. Composite demand
    4. Elasticity of substitution
    5. Exhaustion of product
    6. Marginal value product
    7. Sunk costs
    8. Rent
    9. Firm
    10. Present value
    11. Rate of time preference
  2. [10 points] Describe the cost curves for an individual firm, explaining the relation between short-run and long-run curves, average and marginal cost curve. Explain the equilibrium of the firm for various market conditions of competition.
    b. [5 points] Describe the demand curves on the part of the individual firm for factors of production under various market conditions of competition.
    c. [5 points] Demonstrate that (a) and (b) are fundamentally translations of one another.
  3. [15 points] The U.S. Steel Corporation produces about one-third of the total ingot steel production in the United States (and a similar proportion of mill shapes and other forms of steel sold to steel-using industries). If the price elasticity of demand for steel is -0.5, what is the minimum absolute value of the elasticity of demand facing the U.S. Steel Corporation? What is the maximum absolute value? What can you conclude, without further information, about the monopoly power of the U.S. Steel Corporation? What further information, if any, would be relevant, and why?
  4. It is sometimes alleged that unionized firms are not injured by competition with non-union firms in the same industry because the presence of the union wage scale and working conditions enables the firm to obtain better quality labor, to have better labor morale and labor relations, etc.
    1. [10 points] Analytically, are these arguments well-founded? Discuss.
    2. [10 points] What data would you need on union and non-union firms to confirm or reject these arguments as an empirical proposition? In particular, would you use comparative output per man-hour, unit labor costs, or what? Why one and not another?
  5. A consumer buys in perfectly competitive markets, spending all of his income. Over a period of time his income changes and prices change, but it is our hypothesis that his tastes do not change.
    1. [10 points] Assuming no price-income situation was every exactly repeated, what possible behavior on his part, if any, could contradict our hypothesis? Why?
    2. [10 points] If the hypothesis is not contradicted, and if we then assume it to be correct, can we also assume that his indifference curves are everywhere convex to the origin? What possible behavior on his part, if any, could contradict the assumption of convexity to the origin? Why?
  6. [15 points] What are Marshall’s four propositions on derived demand? What subsequent contributions have been made concerning these propositions? In the light of these contributions, how would the propositions now be correctly and fully stated?
  7. [20 points] Write a brief essay on TWO of the following men and their contributions to economics:
    1. Hume
    2. Dupuit
    3. Von Thünen
    4. Menger
    5. Jevons
    6. Edgeworth
    7. Taussig
    8. Mitchell

 

Source: Hoover Institution Archives. Milton Friedman Papers. Box 76, Folder 2 “University of Chicago ‘Economic Theory’”.

Image Source: Milton Friedman. University of Chicago Photographic Archive, apf1-06238, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.