Tag: DorfmanJ

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Columbia History of Economics

Columbia. Reading List. Economic Thought Before Adam Smith. Dorfman, ca 1947

 

The following course reading list was included with other history of economics reading lists in Joseph Dorfman’s papers at Columbia University. Course catalogues from 1945-46 through 1957-58 were examined and they confirm that this course was indeed taught by Joseph Dorfman. While listed as offered during the 1947-48 and 1948-49 academic years, the course was explicitly bracketed as not offered from 1949-50 through 1957-58. The course was not offered before 1947-48.

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Course Announcement 1947-1948
[also 1948-49]

Economics 111—History of economic doctrine to Adam Smith. 3 points Winter Session. Professor Dorfman.

Tu.Th. 1:10. 310 Fayerweather.

Various systems of economics with especial attention paid to the wider aspects of connection between theories and organization of industrial society at the time. Antiquity; Middle Ages; mercantilists; Physiocrats; and English precursors of Adam Smith.

Source: Columbia University. Bulletin of Information. Forty-seventh Series, No. 38 (September 13, 1947). Announcement of the Faculty of Political Science for the Winter and Spring Sessions 1947-1948, p. 46.

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ECONOMICS 111

Ashley, W. J. An Introduction to English Economic history and Theory, Chapter VI

Beer, M. An Inquiry into Physiocracy

Beer, M. Early British Economics

Bonar, James Philosophy and Political Economy

Bonar, James Theories of Population

Dempsey, Bernard W. Interest and Usury, Chap. 4-7

Heckscher, Eli Mercantilism

Higgs, Henry The Physiocrats

Johnson, E. A. J. Predecessors of Adam Smith

Laistner, L. M. Greek Economics

Monroe, Arthur Eli Early Economic Thought

Monroe, Arthur Eli Monetary Theory Before Adam Smith

O’Brien, G. An Essay on Medieval Economic Thinking

Somerville, et al. “Interest and Usury,” The Economic Journal, vol. 41, pp. 646-49; vol. 42, pp. 123-37, 3112-23

Viner, Jacob Studies in the Theory of international Trade, Chapters 1 and 2.

Ware, Norman J. “The Physiocrats”, The American Economic Review, XXI, pp. 607-19

Mitchell, The Background of Greek Economics (pp. 24-37)

 

Source: Columbia University Libraries. Manuscript Collections. Joseph Dorfman Collection. Box 13, Folder “College Bound Reports. Examination questions”.

Image Source: From Joseph Dorfman’s 1973 Columbia University picture Identification Card in Joseph Dorfman Collection, Box 13, Unlabelled Folder.

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Columbia History of Economics Undergraduate

Columbia. Undergraduate History of Economics Syllabus, Assignments. Gregg, ca. 1951

 

 

In the Joseph Dorfman Papers Collection at Columbia University, the following materials for a General Studies economics course on the history of economics taught by Dorothy E. Gregg were found. Gregg was awarded an economics Ph.D. in 1951. Dissertation title: The exploitation of the steamboat–the case of Colonel John Stevens.

For the next post I have saved biographical and career information that I found in the process of my sleuthing to identify the mysterious “Dr. D. Gregg”. While she quite apparently never went farther in research concerning the history of economics, her course materials would indicate a fairly serious academic interest in the history of economics. Joseph Dorfman, who taught the graduate history of economics courses at Columbia, added her materials to his own teaching files.

 

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G.S. ECONOMICS 11
HISTORY OF ECONOMIC THOUGHT
Fall Semester
GENERAL OUTLINE OF COURSE
(Dr. Gregg)

The chief object of this course “…is primarily to acquaint you with the way in which economics has developed as part of humanity’s struggle to deal with the problems that evolving social life has brought upon us, to deal with those problems by trying to think them out, by seeing how successive generations have faced their problems, what they thought to be the central points of difficulty, the matters of grave social concern, and how they have dealt with those problems to which they have attached such importance…One of the results of any survey of the development of economic doctrine is to show that in very large measure the important departures in economic theory have been intellectual responses to changing current problems. That is, the economic theorists who have counted most in the development of thought have been men who have been very deeply concerned with problems that troubled their generations. Their theories have…dealt definitely with what ought to be done…We have good ground for supposing that the further growth of our science will be shaped in very large measure by the appearance of how social problems and the reaction of trained minds toward those problems…The times in which we live are likely to produce a very considerable stimulus to the growth of economics…And those of you who are now young and looking forward to the future have…a peculiarly heavy responsibility to face, a responsibility of endeavoring to equip yourselves thoroughly for constructive work in a task which the world need to have solved fare more desperately than it needed such aid or was conscious of needing such aid in recent generations.”
(from class lecture by Professor Wesley Mitchell, Columbia University, 1934-35.)

Books and Materials

The required texts for the course are: (1) Eric Roll, A History of Economic Thought, 1947 ed., (Prentice-Hall), (2) Masterworks of Economics, edited by Leonard Dalton Abbott (Doubleday & Co.), (3) Selections from The Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences (Macmillan, 1 vol. edition).

Unless otherwise noted, the greater part of the reading in the course will be in reference books to be found either in Burgess Library on the fourth floor, southwest wing, of the Nicholas Murray Butler Library or in Business Library, second floor of Butler Library. The running outline of the course is supplied in a mimeographed syllabus.

Reading Assignments

(An asterisk (*) indicates the required readings; the other readings are recommended)

SECTION I – MEDIEVAL ECONOMICS

*Roll, Eric, pp. 33-57
Bloch, M. “Feudalism—European,” in E.S.S., vol. VI, pp. 203-210.
Pirenne, H., Economic and Social History of Medieval Europe, pp. 45-57, 58-67, ch. IV, chs. VI-VII; Medieval Cities (1939 ed.), chs. 7-8
*Tawney, R.H., Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, (35¢ Pelican ed.), ch. I, “The Medieval Background,” pp. 11-60

SECTION II—MERCANTILISM

*Roll, pp. 57-132
*Thomas Mun, “England’s Treasure by Foreign Trade,” in Masterworks in Economics, pp. 11-37
Hayes, C., “Nationalism,” E.S:S:, v. XI, pp. 241-8
Malynes, Gerald, Consuetudo, ch. 9
Cunningham, Growth of English Industry and Commerce, vol. 2, pp. 1-20, 25-52, 214-223

SECTION III—THE PHYSIOCRATS

*Roll, pp. 132-142
*Turgot, “Reflections on the Formation and Distribution of Wealth,” in Masterworks, pp. 39-61
Quesnay, F., Economic Works (ed, A. Oncken, 1888), pp. 305-378, 538

SECTION IV—THE PRECONCEPTIONS OF ECONOMICS

  1. The Basic Preconceptions of Economics
    1. The various strains

*Veblen, Thorstein, “The Preconceptions of Economic Science, I, II, and III,” in The Place of Science in Modern Civilization, pp. 82-179
Ayres, C.E., The Theory of Economic Progress, chs. 1-4
Polanyi, Karl, The Great Transformation, chs. 5-6
*Hamilton, Walton, “Competition,” E.S.S., v. 4, pp. 141-47
*Laski, H.J., “The Rise of Liberalism,” E.S.S., v. 1, pp. 103-124
Brinton, Crane, “The Revolutions,” E.S.S., v. 1, pp. 124-144
*Beard, C.A., “Individualism and Capitalism,” E.S.S., v. 1, pp. 145-63
Mannheim, Karl, Ideology and Utopia, ch. 4
*Cole, G.D.H., “Laissez-faire,” E.S.S., v. 9, pp. 15-20
*Sombart, Werner, “Capitalism,” E.S.S., v. 3, pp. 195-202
“Economics”, “Liberalism”, “Natural Law”, “Natural Harmony”, “Natural Order”, “Utilitarianism”, “Hedonism”, “Social Darwinism”, “Freedom of Contract”, “Liberty”, “Rationalism”, “Nationalism”, “Social Contract”, “Natural Rights”, “Property”, “Vested Interests”, in the Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences
*Becker, Carl, The Heavenly City of the Eighteenth Century Philosophers, ch. 2
*Hofstadter, Richard, Social Darwinism in American Thought, chs. 2-3, 10
Spencer, Herbert, “Poor Laws,” in Man Versus the State(1892 ed.), pp. 144-55
*Commons, J.R., Legal Foundations of Capitalism, chs. 7-9
Tawney, R.H., Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, ch. 4, pp. 164-226
Weber, Max, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, chs. 2, 4-5
Robertson, H.M., Aspects of the Rise of Individualism, ch. 7
Parsons, Talcott, “Capitalism” in Recent German Literature: Sombart and Weber(an essay)
Sombart, Werner, The Quintessence of Capitalism, chs. 1-6
*Arnold, Thurman, The Folklore of Capitalism, chs. 1-5, 8-12
*Hogben, Lancelot, Retreat from Reason, chs. 2-3
Hawkins, Willard E., Castaways of Plenty: A Parable of Our Times(Basic Books)
Sumner, W.G., Folkways, ch. 15

    1. Utilitarianism, or the “felicific calculus”

“For political economy, ever since Adam Smith, has rested entirely on the thesis of the natural identity of interests. By the mechanism of exchange and the division of labour individuals, without desiring or knowing it, and while pursuing each his own interest, are working for the direct realization of the general interest.” (Eli Halévy, The Growth of Philosophic Radicalism,p. 16)

      1. Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)
        *(1) Leslie Stephen, The English Utilitarians, [remaining half line smudged, illegible]
        (2) Eli Halévy, The Growth of Philosophic Radicalism, [remaining half line smudged, illegible]; Pt. II, ch. 3; Pt. III, ch. 1,4
        (3) Edwin A. Burtt, ed., The English Philosophers [remaining half line smudged, illegible]

(a) Bentham, “An Introduction to the Principles [remaining half line smudged, illegible] Legislation,” pp. 791-852

SECTION V—THE CLASSICAL SYSTEM

  1. Adam Smith (1725-1790)
    1. General

*Roll, pp. 143-183
*Smith, Adam, “The Wealth of Nations,” in Masterworks, pp. 63-189

    1. Value

Smith, Adam, The Wealth of Nations, Introduction and Plan of Work, and Bk. I, ch. 4 (last two pages), chs. 5-7 (Cannan’s ed., v. 1, pp. 30-40, 49-65)
Whittaker, Edmund, A History of Economic Ideas, pp. 95-108

    1. Wages

Smith, Adam, the Wealth of Nations, Bk. 1, chs. 8, 10, Pt. I (Cannan’s ed., v. 1, pp. 66-88, 101-120)
Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 199-200, 229-238, 359-362

    1. Profits

Smith, Adam, The Wealth of Nations, Bk. 1, ch. 9; Bk. 2, ch. 4 (Cannan’s ed., v. 1, pp. 89-100, 332-339)
Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 200-203, 276-279, 366-369

    1. Rent

Smith, Adam, The Wealth of Nations, Bk. 1, ch. 11, secs. 1 and 2, and “Conclusion of the Chapter” (Cannan’s ed., v. 1, pp. 45-175, 247-257)
Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 216-221, 310-312

    1. Capital

Smith, Adam, The Wealth of Nations, Bk. 2, “Introduction,” and chs. 1, 3, 5 (Cannan’s ed., v. I, pp. 259-269, 313-331, 340-354)
Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 53-89

MID-TERM EXAMINATION OF NOVEMBER 8. The questions on the exam will be drawn from the “Study Questions” at the end of the syllabus.

  1. The Period 1776-1817
    1. The Doctrine of Population

*Roll, pp. 207-211
*Malthus, T.R., An Essay on the Principle of Population, 1sted., chs. 1, 2, 8, 8-15; 7thed., Bk. 1, chs. 1-2; Bk. 2, ch. 13, Bk. 3, chs. 1-3; Bk 4, chs. 1, 3, OR Masterworks, pp. 191-270.
Bonar, J., “The Malthusiad: Fantasia Economica,” in Essays Contributed in Honor of John Bates Clark, pp. 22-28
Keene, James, “Two lectures on the subject of Machinery, delivered at the Bath mechanics’ institution; tending to prove that machinery is not the cause of the distress among the industrious classes; that the country is not over-populated; and that the real causes of the distress are within the power of the people to remove.” (1831, Seligman Library)

    1. The Doctrine of Diminishing Returns and of Rent

Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 147-168
*Whittaker, E., pp. 384-392
Malthus, T.R., “Observations on the Effects of the Corn Laws”
Malthus, T.R., “On the Policy of Restricting the Importation of Foreign Corn”
Malthus, T.R., “The Nature and Progress of Rent”

    1. Theories of Profit (Interest)
      1. The Residual Claimant Theory (Ricardo)
        *Whittaker, E., pp. 611-613
        Ricardo, D., “The Influence of a Low Price of Corn on the Profits of Stock” (reprinted in Ricardo’s Economic Essays, Gonner ed.)
      2. The Productivity Theory

Lauderdale, An Inquiry Into the Nature and Origin of Public Wealth
Boehm-Bawerk, Capital and Interest, Bk. 2, chs. 1-3 (to p. 149)
*Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 107-109, 203-204

  1. David Ricardo (1772-1823)
    1. General

*Roll, pp. 183-207
*Ricardo, “Principles of Political Economy and Taxation,” in Masterworks, pp. 271-342
Mitchell, W.C., “Postulates and Preconception of Ricardian Economics,” in Essays in Philosophy, ed. By T.V. Smith and W.K. Wright
Stephen, Leslie, The English Utilitarians, v. 2, ch. 5

    1. Value

Ricardo, D., Principles of Political Economy, chs. 1, 4, 20, 28, 30
Hollander, J.H., “The Development of Ricardo’s Theory of Value,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, v. 18, pp. 455-491, Aug., 1904
McCracken, H.L., Value Theory and Business Cycles, ch. 1
Whitaker, A.C., History and Criticism of the Labor Theory of Value, ch. 5

    1. Rent

Ricardo, D., Principles of Political Economy, chs. 2, 3, 24, 32
Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 225-227, 321-332

    1. Wages

Ricardo, D., Principles of Political Economy, ch. 5
Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 242-257
Wermel, M.T., The Evolution of Classical Wage Theory, pp. 153-161

    1. Profits

Ricardo, D., Principles of Political Economy, chs. 11, 21
Boehm-Bawerk, pp. 87-95
Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 279-291, 339-354

  1. Thomas Robert Malthus (1766-1834)
    1. General

*Roll, Eric, pp. 212-226
Patten, T.N., “Malthus and Ricardo,” in Essays in Economic Theory
Stephen, Leslie, The English Utilitarians, chs. 4, 6

    1. Value

*Malthus, T.R., Principles of Political Economy, 2nded., Bk. 1, chs. 2,6

    1. Rent

Malthus, T.R., Principles of Political Economy, Bk. 1, ch. 3
Whittaker, E., pp. 502-503

    1. Wages

Malthus, T.R., Principles of Political Economy, Bk. 1, ch. 4
Cannan, Theories of Production and Distribution, pp. 257-259
Wermel, M.T., The Evolution of Classical Wage Theory, pp. 139-152

    1. Profits and Capital

Malthus, T.H., Principles of Political Economy, Bk. 1, ch. 6; Bk. 2, ch. 1; secs. 3,5

SECTION VI—REACTION AGAINST CLASSICISM

  1. The Romantics.

*Roll, Eric, pp. 226-248
Dorfman, Joseph, The Economic Mind in American Civilization, v. 1, pp. 382-397; OR Johnson, E.A.J., Some Origins of the Modern Economic World, pp. 126-141

  1. Early Social Criticism
    1. General

*Roll, pp. 248-270

    1. Utopian Socialism
      1. Robert Owen

*Owen, Robert, “A New View of Society”, in Masterworks, pp. 343-378
Beer, M., History of British Socialism, v. 1, pp. 160-181
Laidler, H.W., History of Socialist Thought, ch. 10
“Owen and Owenism”, in E.S.S.

      1. Fourier

Fourier, C., Selections from the Works of Fourier (esp. “Introduction”)
Laidler, H.W., History of Socialist Thought, pp. 69-74, 123-133
Ely, R.T., French and German Socialism, ch.. 5
**Fourier and Fourierism” and “Brook Farm” in E.S.S.

  1. Karl Marx (1818-1883) and Friedrich Engels (1820-1895)
    1. General

*Roll, Eric, pp. 271-324.
*Marx, Karl, „Capital“ in Masterworks, pp. 453-614

    1. Marxian Philosophy and Interpretation of History

Handbook of Marxism, ed. by Emile Burns, pp. 21-59, 209-231, 240-301, 370-401, 537-547, 634-673.
Strachey, John, The Theory and Practice of Socialism, chs. 28-32
___________, The Coming Struggle for Power, chs. 1,2

    1. Value and Surplus Value; the Machinery of Capitalist Exploitation

Handbook of Marxism, pp. 405-275, 547-552.
Marx, Capital, v. 3, chs. 1-3, 8-10.
Engels, F., Herr Eugen Dühring’s Revolution in Science (International Publishers, ed.), pp. 211-250
*Dobb, Maurice, Political Economy and Capitalism, chs. 1, 3
Cole, G.D.H., What Marx Really Meant, chs. 7,8
*Sweezy, Paul, The Theory of Capitalist Development, ch. 4

    1. The Laws of Capitalist Development

Handbook of Marxism, pp. 475-547, 552-570
*Dobb, Maurice, Political Economy and Capitalism, ch. 4
*Sweezy, chs. 8, 9, 12
*Lenin, N., “Imperialism”
Cole, G.D.H., What Marx Really Meant, chs. 3,4
Strachey, John, The Coming Struggle for Power, Pt. II, Pt. IV

    1. Criticism of Marxian Theory

*Veblen, T., “The Socialist Economics of Karl Marx, I and II,” in The Place of Science in Modern Civilization, pp. 409-456.
Skelton, O.D., Socialism: A Critical Analysis, chs. 5-7
Boehm-Bawerk, Karl Marx and the Close of His System

  1. Heterodox Socialism
    1. Revisionism

Loucks, and Hoot, Comparative Economic Systems, ch. 15
*Laidler, H.W., History of Socialist Thought, chs. 20-21
Bernstein, E., Evolutionary Socialism

    1. Fabian Socialism

Fabian Tracts, No. 7, 70, 142, 147, 159, 164
*Fabian Essays, pp. 3-29, 131, 149, 173-201
Webb, S. and B., A Constitution for the Socialist Commonwealth of Great Britain
Laidler, H.W., History of Socialist Thought, chs. 17-18, 29

    1. Revolutionary Socialism (non-Marxist brand)

Laidler, H.W., History of Socialist Thought, ch. 22
Estey, J.A., Revolutionary Syndicalism, ch. 5
*Sorel, G., Reflections on Violence

 

G.S. HISTORY OF ECONOMIC THOUGHT
Fall Semester
STUDY QUESTIONS

SECTION I-MEDIEVAL ECONOMICS

    1. Outline the social structure of medieval Europe and the economic organization of the manorial economy.
    2. Trace the development of the medieval concept of “just price” as the beginning of a theory of value.
    3. Trace the evolution of the attitude of the medieval church toward usury.
    4. Trace the evolution of the attitude of the medieval church toward commerce and trade.
    5. What were the most powerful economic forces leading to the breakdown of medieval society?

SECTION II—MERCANTILISM

    1. Discuss the thesis that mercantilism can be explained primarily in terms of state-making. Do you agree?
    2. Discuss the thesis that mercantilism can be explained primarily in terms of the national and international power struggles of the rising bourgeoisie. Do you agree?
    3. Discuss the mercantilist attitude toward; (a) money (b) interest (c) international trade (d) domestic industry (c) wages (f) population.
    4. Distinguish between bullionism and mercantilism proper.
    5. Compare and contrast mercantilism and the classical economic system.

SECTION III—THE PHYSIOCRATS

    1. Discuss the meaning of the phrase “produit net.” Compare this concept with the labor theory of value and surplus value.
    2. Analyze the circulation of this “produit net” as set forth in Quesnay’s “Tableau oeconomique”
    3. What role did agriculture play in the physiocratic theoretical structure? Give reasons for this.
    4. Compare and contrast physiocracy and the classical economic system.

SECTION IV—THE PRECONCEPTIONS OF ECONOMICS

  1. The Basic Preconceptions
    1. The various strains
      1. Trace the importance of the following concepts for the development of the classical economic system:
        (1) Protestant Ethics
        (2) rationalism
        (3) natural order
        (4) individualism
        (5) laissez-faire
        (6) liberalism
        (7) competition, scarcity, and the survival of the fittest
        (8) Social Darwinism
      2. Compare Sombart’s and Weber’s explanations of the main forces leading to the rise and development of capitalism.
    2. Utilitarianism, or the “felicific calculus”
      1. Distinguish between the “Westminster philosophy” and the “Manchester philosophy”, showing the utilitarian roots of each. What major differences in policy flowed from these two schools?
      2. Which school triumphed in England? What social and economic forces brought this about and what were the consequences of the triumph?
      3. According to Bentham, what are the forces which control human behavior and how are these forces to be measured?
      4. What are the major difficulties in Bentham’s theory of human nature? Explore the full implications of Bentham’s theory of human nature.
      5. Discuss Halévy’s statement that “political economy, ever since Adam Smith has rested entirely on the thesis of the natural identity of interests.”
      6. What is the basic paradox of the thesis of the natural identity of interests?

SECTION V—THE CLASSICAL SYSTEM

  1. Adam Smith
    1. State or describe the preconceptions and assumptions of Adam Smith’s system of economic thought.
    2. How did Adam Smith define and measure the wealth of a nation? Can you suggest reasons for his particular definition and measurement? Summarize briefly what Smith regarded as the causes of the wealth of nations and note the implications of his argument.
    3. Develop Smith’s theory of economic order.
    4. State Smith’s theory (or theories) of value.
    5. Develop in some detail Smith’s theory of distribution, noting his concepts of the distributive shares, the determinants of each, and contradictory elements in this theory.
    6. Develop and analyze critically Smith’s theories (a) of saving, and (b) of capital.
    7. Discuss Smith’s theory of production.
  1. The Period 1776-1817
    1. Account for Malthus’ first essay on population and develop the doctrine expounded in the first essay.
    2. What are the chief differences between the first and the second essays?
    3. Appraise the validity of Malthus’ doctrine of population.
    4. Discuss the development during this period of the doctrines of diminishing returns and of rent. Explain both doctrines.
    5. Describe the evolution of the doctrine of diminishing returns.
    6. Why did the classical economists develop the doctrine of diminishing returns solely in relation to production on land? On what grounds did West argue that technological progress could not offset diminishing returns in agriculture? Note weaknesses in this argument.
    7. Compare the theory of rent developed by Sir Edward West in his Essay on the Application of Capital to Land with Malthus’ theory as developed in his essay on The Nature and Progress of Rent.
    8. Discuss the development of Ricardo’s theory of profits ad describe its nature.
    9. State and criticize Lauderdale’s productivity theory of interest.
  1. David Ricardo
    1. State or describe the preconceptions and assumptions of Ricardo’s system of economic thought.
    2. Explain carefully Ricardo’s theory of value, noting its nature, the assumption on which it is based, the problems involved in this type of theory and Ricardo’s solution of them.
    3. What is the significance of the labor theory of value as found in Adam Smith and Ricardo? What are the major differences? Account for the decline of the labor theory of value after Ricardo.
    4. How did Ricardo explain the nature, the existence and the amount of rent? What was his explanation of the relation between ret and prices?
    5. Develop and criticize Ricardo’s theory of wages.
    6. Develop Ricardo’s theory of capital. In what sense is classical theory essentially a theory of capital? How do you account for the particular form which the classical theory of capital formation assumed? On what grounds is this theory subject to criticism?
    7. Explain Ricardo’s theory of economic development. Give the theoretical reasons for his conclusions.
  1. Thomas Robert Malthus
    1. Compare Malthus’ theory of value with that of Ricardo, and account for the difference between them.
    2. With reference to the theory of rent, what were the points of difference between Ricardo and Malthus? What conclusions did each draw from his rent theory?
    3. Develop Malthus’ theory of wages.
    4. Develop Malthus’ theories of saving, capital, and profits. Compare the theories of profits of Ricardo and Malthus. How do you account for the differences between them?
    5. Compare Ricardo and Malthus as to their theories of the effects of capital formation on economic progress and the functioning of the capitalist economy.
    6. Show how in Ricardian economics the business cycle is impossible and how in Malthusian economics it is inevitable.

SECTION VI—REACTION AGAINS CLASSICISM

  1. The Romantics
    1. What were the chief economic forces leading to the rise of the German romantic movement?
    2. Trace a similar development in American economic history in the writings of Mathew Carey and Henry Carey.
    3. What were the major economic doctrines of: (a) Adam Muller, (b) J.G. Fichte, (c) Friedrich List.
  2. Early Socialist Criticism
    1. General
      1. It is sometimes claimed that economic theory is a rationalization of class interests. With reference to classical theory, is there any evidence that this characterization is warranted? If so, what? Would you agree that economic theory can properly be so characterized? Support your position.
      2. Discuss the major criticisms of the weaknesses of capitalism as set forth by Sismondi and evaluate his remedies.
      3. Discuss the major criticisms of the weaknesses of capitalism as set forth by Proudhon and evaluate his remedies.
    2. Utopian Socialism
      1. Outline succinctly Owen’s economic theory.
      2. Outline clearly Fourier’s economic system
      3. Discuss the major differences between Fourier and Owen
      4. What are the chief criticisms of utopian socialism? How valid do you think these criticisms are? Why?
  3. Karl Marx and Friederich Engels
    1. What does Marx mean by (a) forces of production (b) relations of production (c) the class struggle (d) classes? How does he use these concepts in his system of thought?
    2. Define the following terms as used by Marx: (a) use value, (b) exchange value (c) value (d) constant capital (e) variable capital (f) surplus value (g) price of production.
    3. Discuss Marx’s labor theory of value and compare it with Ricardo’s and Smith’s theories of value.
    4. Describe the so-called “great contradiction” in Marx’s labor theory of value and the way in which Marx resolved the contradiction.
    5. Discuss the origin of surplus value and the significance of this concept for Marxian theory.
    6. Discuss Marx’s theory of capitalist competition and the consequences of this. Do you find anything comparable in Ricardo?
    7. Discuss Marx’s theory of economic development and also Lenin’s contribution.
    8. Contrast Ricardo’s explanation of the falling tendency of the rate of profits with Marx’s explanation of the falling tendency of the rate of profits. What conclusions did Marx draw from this theory?
    9. Compare Marx’s theory of crises with Malthus’ theory of market gluts.
    10. Discuss: “Marxist economics is the economics of capitalism; orthodox economics of socialism.”
  4. Heterodox Socialism
    1. What is meant by evolutionary socialism? Describe briefly the chief points of difference between evolutionary socialism and Marxian socialism.
    2. Develop or outline the economic theory of the Fabian socialists. Criticize carefully the main arguments.
    3. On what grounds and in what respects did the revisionists and evolutionary socialists criticize the Marxian analysis and program? What programs of change did these critics set forth? Evaluate these programs.
    4. Describe briefly the chief points of difference between Marxism and the non-Marxist brand of revolutionary socialism (such as syndicalism). In what places in the world has revolutionary socialism had an important following? Why?

*  * *  *  *  *

HISTORY OF ECONOMIC THOUGHT
[Handwritten: “D. Gregg”]

Selected List of Histories of Economic Thought and Other Reference Works

Ashley, W.J., “Introduction to English Economic History and Theory.”
Beer, Max, “An Inquiry into Physiocracy.”
Beer, Max, “Early British Economics.”
Beer, Max, “History of British Socialism.”
Blanqui, J.A., “History of Political Economy.”
Bonar, James, “Philosophy and Political Economy.”
Boucke, O.F., “The Development of Economics, 1750-1900.”
Burtt, Edwin A., “Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Science.”
Cannan, Edwin, “A Review of Economic Theory.”
Commons, J.R., “Legal Foundations of Capitalism.”
Cunningham, William, “Early Writings on Politics and Economics.”
Feguson, J.M., “Landmarks of Economic Thought.”
Gambs, “Beyond Supply and Demand.”
Gide, C., and C. Rist, “History of Economic Doctrines.”
Gray, Alexander, “The development of Economic Doctrine.”
Gruchy, A.G., “Modern Economic Theory.”
Halévy, Elie, “Growth of Philosophical Radicalism.”
Haney, L.H., “History of Economic Thought.” (3rdrev. ed.)
Heckscher, Eli F., “Mercantilism.”
Homan, P.T., “Contemporary Economic Thought.”
Ingram, J.K., “History of Political Economy.”
Johnson, E.A.J., “Predecessors of Adam Smith.”
Laidler, H.W., “History of Socialist Thought.”
Loucks, W.N., and J.W. Hoot, “Comparative Economic Systems”
Palgrave, R.T. (ed), “Dictionary of Political Economy.”
Patterson, S.H., “Readings in the History of Economic Thought.”
Peck, Harvey W., “Economic Thought and its Institutional Background.”
Price, L.L., “A Short History of Political Economy in England from Adam Smith to Alfred Marshall.”
Robertson, H.M. “Aspects of the Rise of Individualism.”
Roll, Eric, “A History of Economic Thought.” (1947 rev. ed.)
Scott, W.A., “Development of Economics.”
Seligman, E.R.A., and A. Johnson (eds.), “Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences.””
Sombart, Werner, “The Quintessence of Capitalism.”
Spann, Othmar, “The History of Economics.”
Spann, Othmar, “Types of Economic Theory.”
Stephen, Leslie, “The English Utilitarians.”
Strong, Gordon, B., “Adam Smith and the 18thcentury Conception of Progress.”
Tawney, R.H., “The Acquisitive Society.”
Tawney, R.H., “Religion and the Rise of Capitalism.”
Weber, Max, “General Economic History.”
Weber, Max, “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.”
Wermel, “The Evolution of Classical Wage Theory.”
Whittaker, Edmund, “A History of Economic Ideas.”
Dorfman, “The Economic Mind in American Civilization”

Selected List of Critical Works

Ayres, C.E., “The Theory of Economic Progress.”
Boehm-Bawerk, E. von, “Capital and Interest.”
Boucke, O.F., “A Critique of Economics. ”
Cannan, E., “A History of the Theories of Production and Distribution in English Political Economy from 1776 to 1848.”
Cannan, E., “A Review of Economic Theory.”
McCracken, H.L., “Value Theory and Business Cycles.”
Polanyi, Karl, “The Great Transformation.”
Spann, Othmar “The History of Economics.”
Taussig, F.W., “Wages and Capital.”
Triffin, R., “Monopolistic Competition and General Equilibrium Theory.”
Veblen, Thorstein, “The Place of Science in Modern Civilization.”
Whitaker, A.C., “History and Criticism of the Labor Theory of Value,” in Columbia Univ. Studies in History, Economics, and Public Law, vol. 19.

Source:  Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Joseph Dorfman Collection. Box 13

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories
Columbia Economists Harvard

Harvard. Career of A.M. in economics alumnus, Arthur Morgan Day (1867-1942)

 

This post began as a simple transcription of two typed pages that Alvin S. Johnson sent to Joseph Dorfman, who at the time was collecting material on the history of economics at Columbia University. The Columbia economics instructor who was the subject of Johnson’s letter, Arthur Morgan Day, was new to me, and I presume something of an unknown even to Joseph Dorfman. My curiosity sparked a chase through a variety of genealogical sources accessible at Ancestry.com, then a search through yearbooks of Barnard College and Columbia University catalogues at archive.org, and eventually a discovery of the reports of the Harvard Class of 1892 (available at hathitrust.org) that taken together provide us a fairly good account of Day’s life and career through age 55.

I have located only a single source that gives the year of his death: “Arthur Morgan Day (1867-1942)” in the National Cyclopaedia of American Biography. Vol. 31. New York: James T. White & Co., 1944.

_______________

Alvin Johnson’s recollection of Arthur Morgan Day at Columbia College

THE NEW SCHOOL
66 West 12th St. New York 11
[Tel.] Oregon 5-2700

July 17, 1951

Dear Joe Dorfman:

This is the best I can do on Day. If you don’t like it, throw it into the waste-basket.

Sincerely,
[signed]
Alvin Johnson

encl.

Dr. Joseph Dorfman
Faculty of Political Science
Columbia University
New York 27, N.Y.

[Handwritten addition by Johnson]

I’m trying to write
something on the
Faculty
AJ

* *  *  * *

Alvin Johnson’s attachment to his letter to Joseph Dorfman of July 17, 1951

When I presented myself to Dean Burgess for registration in November 1898 and announced that I wished to study economics, the Dean advised me to register for the Marshall course by Mayo-Smith, the course on History of Economics by E. R. A. Seligman, the course on theory by John Bates Clark. I confessed that my training had been in classics; that I had never attended a course, nor even a single lecture in economics. I asked whether I ought not to take the course in elementary economics, under an instructor, Arthur Morgan Day. No, said Dean Burgess, that course was only for undergraduate cubs, who had no desire to know economics. The Committee on College Requirements had seen fit to make a required course out of it; but a mature man would be wasting his time under Day.

I did not register for Day’s course. I’m sorry I did not. For Day was a true representative of the old, solid economics of Adam Smith and Malthus and Ricardo, of Senior and Cairnes and John Stuart Mill. He made shift to comprehend the marginal utilitarianism of Marshall, but it gave him no inspiration. He saw no advance in Clark’s theory and he regarded Seligman’s Historismus as merely a change of venue in economic reasoning.

Day detested me, for my ardent devotion to J. B. Clark, for my eager acceptance of Seligman’s wide explorations in all literatures. He pitied me for my destiny of going forth into the world equipped only with fluff and froth, with no sense of the grand old economists who looked facts in the face and wrote in language that the most unlicked cub of a business man could understand. When I was awarded a fellowship Day proposed that I should have the privilege of reading and grading all his examination papers, a privilege I was too immature to appreciate. The President of the University vetoed the proposal. I had my year of complete freedom, to follow my teachers, Clark and Seligman, with uncrippled ardor.

Yet I came to realize that Day was a better economist than we then assumed. It was not possible for him to follow the marginal utility calculus into a field of abstractions divorced from the comprehension of the ordinary citizen. Any man, however sodden in business thinking, could follow John Stuart Mill, agreeing, or most likely disagreeing. Only the intellectual elite could follow Menger and Wieser and Böhm[-]Bawerk, Marshall and Clark, Fisher and Fetter.

If Day were living he would find justification for his repugnance to the marginal utility theories. Keynes, an adept in marginal theory, shifted the emphasis from value to price.

Said Chesterfield, “In mixed company I always talk bawdy, for that is something in which all men can join.” Keynes always talked price. Day, prematurely, talked price, believed in talking price. There was no place for him in the marginal utility universe of talk, of those days. But I surmise, Day was a good deal of a man.

[signed]
Alvin Johnson

 

Source:  Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Joseph Dorfman Collection, Box 13, Folder “C.U. Dept.al history”.

_______________

From the Columbia College Catalogue, 1898-99

Economics A—Outlines of Economics—Recitations, lectures, and essays. 3 hours, second half-year. Professor Mayo-Smith and Mr. Day. [Economics A was required of juniors in the College, and open to sophomores who have taken economics I.]

Economics 1—Economic history of England America—Selected textbooks, recitations, essays, and lectures. 3 hours, first half-year. Professor Seligman and Mr. Day. [Economics I was open to juniors and qualified sophomores in the College.]

[Note: p. 11 under officers of instruction, Assistants. Address given as 128 West 103d Street.]

Source:  Columbia University in the City of New York. Catalogue 1898-99, p. 74.

_______________

1900 U.S. Census

Name: Arthur M Day
Age:    33
Birth Date:     Apr 1867
Birthplace:      Connecticut
Home in 1900:           Danbury, Fairfield, Connecticut
Ward of City: 2
Street: Westoria Avenue
House Number:          28
Race:   White
Gender:           Male
Relation to Head of House:   Son
Marital Status:           Single
Father’s name:            Josiah L Day
Father’s Birthplace:    New York
Mother’s name:          Ellen L Day
Mother’s Birthplace:  Connecticut
Occupation:    College Instructor
Months not employed:         0
Can Read:       Yes
Can Write:      Yes
Can Speak English:    Yes
Household Members:

Josiah L Day  60
Ellen L Day    58
Arthur M Day           33

_______________

From Mortarboard 1902
[Barnard College Yearbook]

Leisure Hours of Great Men
or
Intimate Glimpses of the World’s Workers at Play

Arthur Morgan Day

It is certainly pathetic
How he smothers the aesthetic
Under money, banking, trusts and corporations,
But he soothes his longing heart,
Studying dramatic art,
And high tragedy completes his aspirations.

Source: 1902 Mortarboard , p. 71.

_______________

From the Columbia Daily Spectator, 1902

Mr. Day Resigns

Mr. A. M. Day, Instructor in Economics, has resigned his position at Columbia to take a position on the new Tenement House Commission of New York City. He is to serve as one of two men to take charge of registration and compilation of statistics of tenement houses in the boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn. Mr. Henry Raymond Mussey, Fellow in the Department, has taken Mr. Day’s position as instructor in Economics for the time being. Mr. Mussey has already acquired much popularity and confidence among the students in his classes.

*  *  *  *  *

Congratulations for Mr. Day.

The members of the Course Economics I have sent the following message of congratulation to their instructor, upon his appointment as chief of the Bureau of Statistics of the New York City Tenement House Commission. “We the undersigned members of the course, Economics I, of the current University year, having heard with pleasure of the great honor which has been conferred upon our former instructor Mr. Arthur Morgan Day, desire to extend to him our sincere congratulations and to assure him of our best wishes for a successful career in his new office.

 

Source:  Columbia Daily Spectator, Volume XLV, Number 42, 21 March 1902, page 1.

_______________

From Harvard College Class of 1892 Reports

Arthur Morgan Day (1892)

[Joined the Harvard Class of 1892 in the junior year, received A.B. together with the degree of A.M.]
Honorable Mention: English Composition; Political Economy; History.

 

Source:  Secretary’s Report Harvard College Class of 1892, Number I, (1893), pp. 6, 27, 29.

 

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1896)

“1892-93, graduate student in History and Economics, H.U.; 1893-94, graduate student in History and Economics and assistant in History, H.U.; 1894-95, assistant in Economics, School of Political Science, Columbia College; 1895-96, assistant and lecturer in Economics, School of Political Science, Columbia College, and lecturer in Economics, Barnard College.”

Published “Syllabus of six lectures on ‘Money’ for Extension Department of Rutgers College, 1895.”

Delivered “six lectures on ‘Money,’ Univ. Ex. course, New Brunswick, N.J., December-January, 1894-95; two lectures on ‘Monetary Literature in U.S.’ in course of ‘Free Lectures to the People,’ under direction of Board of Education, N.Y.”

Source:  Secretary’s Report Harvard College Class of 1892, Number II, (1896), pp. 30-31.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1902)

From 1892 to 1894 was graduate student in History and Economics at Harvard; 1893-4, was assistant in History at Harvard; 1894-1902, was successively assistant lecturer, and instructor in Economics at Columbia and Barnard Colleges, and also assistant editor of “Political Science Quarterly” and “Columbia University Quarterly “; in March, 1902, resigned from Columbia to become Registrar of the Tenement House Department of New York City for Brooklyn, Queens, and Richmond.

Has given numerous courses of lectures for the New York Board of Education; has lectured also in extension department of Rutgers College and in the Educational Alliance. Has published syllabi of lectures on “Money” and “Economic History”, signed reviews in the “Political Science Quarterly” and elsewhere, and editorials in a New York daily. Assisted in the preparation of Seligman’s “Essays in Taxation” and “Incidence of Taxation”, Giddings’ “Democracy and Empire “, Clark’s “Distribution of Wealth,” and the second edition (rewritten) of White’s “Money and Banking.”

Source:  Harvard College, Record of the Class of 1892. Secretary’s Report No. III for the Tenth Anniversary (1902),  pp. 46-47.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1907)

Son of Josiah Lyon Day and Ellen Louisa (Baldwin) Day. Born at Danbury, Connecticut, April 12, 1867. Prepared for college at the Danbury High School.

Received A.M. in 1892. From 1892 to 1894 was a graduate student in History and Economics at Harvard; 1893-94, was Assistant in History at Harvard; 1894-1902, was successively Assistant, Lecturer, and Instructor in Economics at Columbia and Barnard Colleges; also Assistant Editor of Political Science Quarterly and Columbia University Quarterly; in March, 1902, resigned from Columbia to become Registrar of the Tenement House Department of New York City for Brooklyn, Queens, and Richmond. In May, 1902, resigned Registrarship to become Assistant to President of Manhattan Trust Co.; in July, 1903, was made Secretary and Treasurer of Casualty Company of America; in January, 1905, entered publicity business. Has published syllabi of lectures on “Money” and “Economic History,” signed reviews in the Political Science Quarterly and elsewhere, and editorials in a New York daily. Assisted in the preparation of Seligman’s “Essays in Taxation” and ” Incidence of Taxation,” Giddings’ “Democracy and Empire,” Clark’s “Distribution of Wealth,” and the second edition (rewritten) of White’s “Money and Banking.” Belongs to Harvard Club of New York.

Source:  Secretary’s Report for the Fifteenth Anniversary. Harvard College Class of 1892, Number IV, (1907), p.48.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1912)

Son of Josiah Lyon Day and Ellen Louisa (Baldwin) Day. Born at Danbury, Connecticut, April 12, 1867. Prepared for college at the Danbury High School.

Attended Harvard 1888-92, A.B. and A.M.; Graduate School 1892-94.

1892 to 1894, graduate student in history and economics at Harvard; 1893-94, assistant in history at Harvard; 1894-1902, successively assistant, lecturer, and instructor in economics at Columbia and Barnard colleges; also assistant editor of Political Science Quarterly and Columbia University Quarterly; in March, 1902, resigned from Columbia to become registrar of the Tenement House Department of New York City for Brooklyn, Queens, and Richmond. In May, 1902, resigned registrarship to become assistant to president of Manhattan Trust Company; in July, 1903, was made secretary and treasurer of Casualty Company of America; in January, 1905, entered publicity business; in June, 1906, employed by United Gas Improvement Company of Philadelphia; in August, 1906, serious attack of typhoid caused long absence from business; in June, 1908, with Blair & Co., bankers, New York; in April, 1910, began independent work as financial agent for various clients; in January, 1912, entered bond department of Prudential Insurance Company at Newark. Has published syllabi of lectures on “Money” and “Economic History,” signed reviews in the Political Science Quarterly and elsewhere, and editorials in a New York daily. Assisted in the preparation of Seligman’s “Essays in Taxation” and “Incidence of Taxation,” Giddings’ “Democracy and Empire,” Clark’s “Distribution of Wealth,” and the second edition (rewritten) of White’s “Money and Banking.” Belongs to Harvard Club of New York.

Source:  Secretary’s Report for the Twentieth Anniversary. Harvard College Class of 1892, [Number V, (1912)], p.54.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1917)

Born at Danbury, Conn., April 12, 1867. Son of Josiah Lyon and Ellen Louisa (Baldwin) Day. Prepared for College at Danbury High School, Danbury, Conn.

Attended Harvard:  1888-92; Graduate School, 1892-94.

Degrees: A.B. and A.M. 1892.

Occupation: Investments.

Address: (home) 28 Westville Ave., Danbury, Conn.; (business) 37 Wall St., New York, N.Y

FROM 1892 to 1894 I was a graduate student in history and economics at Harvard, and during 1893-94 I was assistant in history at Harvard. From 1894 to 1902 I was successively assistant, lecturer, and instructor in economics at Columbia and Barnard colleges; also assistant editor of the Political Science Quarterly and the Columbia University Quarterly. In March, 1902, I resigned from Columbia to become registrar of the Tenement House Department of New York City for Brooklyn, Queens, and Richmond. I held this position until May, 1903, when I resigned to become assistant to the president of the Manhattan Trust Company. In July, 1903, I was made secretary and treasurer of the Casualty Company of America; and in January, 1905, I entered publicity business. I was employed by the United Gas Improvement Company of Philadelphia in June, 1906, but a serious attack of typhoid fever in August of that year caused a long absence from business. In June, 1908, I was with Blair & Co., bankers, in New York, and in April, 1910, I began independent work as financial agent for various clients. In January, 1912, I entered the bond department of the Prudential Insurance Company at Newark, and since December 1, 1915, I have been with Wood, Struthers & Co., bankers, 37 Wall St., N. Y.

Publications: Syllabi of lectures on “Money” and “Economic History,” signed reviews in the Political Science Quarterly and elsewhere, and editorials in a New York daily. Assisted in the preparation of Seligman’s “Essays in Taxation” and “Incidence of Taxation,” Giddings’ “Democracy and Empire,” Clark’s “Distribution of Wealth,” and the second edition (rewritten) of White’s “Money and Banking.”

Clubs and Societies: Harvard Club of New York.

Source:  Secretary’s Report for the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary. Harvard College Class of 1892, Number VI, (1917), pp. 68-69. Includes Graduation picture.

*  *  *  *  *

Arthur Morgan Day (1922)

Born at Danbury, Conn., April 12, 1867. Son of Josiah Lyon and Ellen Louisa (Baldwin) Day. Prepared for College at Danbury High School, Danbury, Conn.

Attended Harvard: 1888-92; Graduate School, 1892-94.
Degrees: A.B. and A.M. 1892.

Occupation: Investments.
Address: (home) 152 Deer Hill Ave., Danbury, Conn.; (business) 5 Nassau St., New York, N.Y.

Since December 1, 1915, I have been with Wood, Struthers & Co., bankers, 5 Nassau Street, New York.

Clubs and Societies: Harvard Club of New York.

Source:  Harvard College Class of 1892, Thirtieth Anniversary Report, Number VIII, (1922), p. 70.
[note: Number IX, June 19-22, 1922 is the Supplementary Report of the Thirtieth Anniversary Celebration]

_______________

From the State of Connecticut, Military Census of 1917

State of Connecticut

By direction of an act of the Legislature of Connecticut, approved February 7th, 1917, I am required to procure certain information relative to the resources of the state. I therefore call upon you to answer the following questions.

MARCUS H. HOLCOMB, Governor.

TOWN or CITY: Danbury
DATE: March 4, 1917
POST OFFICE ADDRESS: 28 Westville Ave.

  1. What is your present Trade, Occupation or Profession ? Banking and Brokerage
  2. Have you experience in any other Trade, Occupation or Profession? College Professor
  3. What is your Age? 49
    Height? 5 ft 8 in
    Weight? 165
  4. Are your Married? Single? or Widower? Single
  5. How many persons are dependent on you for support? None wholly
  6. Are you a citizen of the United States? Yes
  7. If not a citizen of the United States have you taken out your first papers? [not applicable]
  8. If not a citizen of the United States, what is your nationality? [not applicable]
  9. Have you ever done any Military or Naval Service in this or any other Country? No
    Where? [not applicable]
    How Long? [not applicable]
    What Branch? [not applicable]
    Rank? [not applicable]
  10. Have you any serious physical disability? Yes
    If so, name it. Near sighted
  11. Can you do any of the following:
    Ride a horse? [No]
    Handle a team? [No]
    Drive an automobile? [No]
    Ride a motorcycle? [No]
    Understand telegraphy? [No]
    Operate a wireless? [No]
    Any experience with a steam engine? [No]
    Any experience with electrical machinery? [No]
    Handle a boat, power or sail? [No]
    Any experience in simple coastwise navigation? [No]
    Any experience with High Speed Marine Gasoline Engines? ? [No]
    Are you a good swimmer? [Yes]

I hereby certify that I have personally interviewed the above mentioned person and that the answers to the questions enumerated are as he gave them to me.

[signed]
Chas A Stallock[?]
Military Census Agent

Source: Connecticut Military Census of 1917. Hartford, Connecticut: Connecticut State Library. [available as database on-line at Ancestry.com]

 

Image Source: Class portrait and current portrait (ca 1917) of Arthur Morgan Day from Secretary’s Report for the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary. Harvard College Class of 1892, Number VI, (1917), pp. 68-69.

 

Categories
Barnard Columbia Economists Gender Salaries

Columbia. Pay raise for Barnard lecturer Clara Eliot supported, 1941

 

Columbia economics Ph.D. alumna (1926), Clara Eliot published her dissertation as The Farmer’s Campaign for Credit (New York: D. Appleton, 1927). Looking at the Columbia Department of Economics budget proposal from 1941, I saw a statement of support for a salary increase for Clara Eliot and promotion to the rank of assistant professor at Barnard. A brief annex to the budget introduces Eliot. I have added at the end of the post her 1976 New York Times’ obituary to round out her life story.

Since I was looking at Columbia economists’ salaries, I thought it worth seeing how her actual 1941-42 salary of $2,700 and the proposed assistant professor salary for 1942-43 of $3,600 fit into the structure of salaries paid to men at those ranks. It turns out (see the attached budget lines for lecturers and assistant professors), there was salary parity at both ranks. I have been unable to confirm yet whether Clara Eliot actually got her promotion with that pay raise at Barnard then.

The other woman economist, Eveline M. Burns, and her husband Arthur R. Burns were both quite unhappy with the ceilings to their respective advancement in 1940/41. Their story is worth a future post or two. Today is dedicated to Clara Eliot.

_____________________________________

Women in the Columbia Economics Department Budget Proposal
November 26, 1941

[…]

(2) Last year my colleagues directed me to inform Dr. Eveline M. Burns that they found themselves unable to offer her any ground for hope that she could be granted professorial status and she indicated her unwillingness to continue on the basis of a full-time lecturer at the stipend available (viz., $3,000). Thereupon a temporary arrangement was entered into for part-time service for the current academic year, with the specification that no commitment was implied beyond June, 1942. In this budget letter it is recommended that the connection of Dr. Burns with the Department be terminated at that date. The question of the future of her field of social insurance in the departmental plans is being studied by the Mitchell Committee mentioned above. Moreover, this is a field in which the School of Business has an interest…It is therefore suggested that for the present the sum that has in previous budgets been allocated to Dr. Burns be tentatively reserved pending the formulation of a definite proposal which should be forthcoming within perhaps a fortnight [reduced from $2,500 to $2,300 reserve in final budget].

[…]

Should the Barnard budget, when submitted, include a recommendation that recognition be given Clara Eliot, such a recommendation would be supported by the department to the extent of promotion to an assistant professorship and an increase in salary of $900 (Miss Eliot is now a lecturer in Barnard College at $2, 700).

(See Annex G)

[…]

ANNEX G

Statement concerning the Professional Preparation
and Experience of Clara Eliot

 

A. B. 1917, Reed College (major in sociology)

1917-1918, Instructor in Sociology, Mills College, Calif.

1918-20, Research Assistant to Prof. Irving Fisher, Yale Univ.

1920-23, Assistant in Economics, Barnard College (salary, $1,000)

1923-28, Instructor in Economics, Barnard College
(salary: 1923-25, $2,000; 1925-27, $2,200; 1927-28, $2,400)

1926, Ph.D. in Economics granted by Columbia.

1928-29 On leave without pay, travel and study abroad — in Germany and Austria.

1929-36, Lecturer in Economics, Barnard (part-time) (salary, $1,200)

From April 1st, leave of absence without pay to join the Consumer Purchases Study (on a salary basis of $5,600). Despite urging by Dr. Monroe, Chief of the Economics Division of the Bureau of Home Economics, leave could not be continued in the Fall because of the situation in the Barnard Department, with others on leave or ill)

1936—to date, Lecturer in Economics , Barnard College (full-time)
(salary: 1936-37, $2,400; 1937-40, $2,400; 1940-41, $2,700)

 

Projected research:

  1. An analysis of family expenditure data (scale of urgency, “income elasticity of demand”, etc.).
  2. Compiling of materials for use in connection with an introductory course in statistics, non-mathematical, stressing the possibilities and limitations of the quantitative method, stating hypotheses in quantitative terms, illustrating problems of interpretation, relating statistics to logic.

 

Source: Department of economics budget proposal for 1942-43 (dated November 26, 1941) submitted to Columbia University President Nicholas Murray Butler by Robert M. Haig, Chairman, Department of Economics (pp. 2, 6 and Appendix G). Columbia University Archives. Central Files 1890-. Box 386, Folder “Haig, Robert Murray 7/1941—6/1942”.

_____________________________________

ANNEX A

DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS
The [Revised] Budget as Adopted for 1941-1942
Compared with the Budget as Proposed for 1941-1942.
December 30

 

Office or Item

 Incumbent 1941-1942
Appropriations

1942-43
Proposals
Assistant Professor Arthur R. Burns

$4,500

$5,0001
Assistant Professor Robert L. Carey

$3,600

$3,600
Assistant Professor Boris M. Stanfield

$3,600

$3,600
Assistant Professor Joseph Dorfman

$3,600

$3,600

1Promotion to rank of associate professor recommended.

 

Office or Item

 Incumbent 1941-1942
Appropriations

1942-43
Proposals
Lecturer Carl T. Schmidt

$3,000

$3,000
Lecturer (Winter Session) Robert Valeur

($1,500)

—
Lecturer Eveline M. Burns

$2,500

—1
Lecturer Louis M. Hacker

$3,000

$3,6002
Lecturer Michael T. Florinsky

$2,700

$3,000
Lecturer Abraham Wald

$3,000

$3,6004

1Not to be reappointed.
2Promotion to rank of assistant professor recommended.
3 Promotion to rank of assistant professor recommended.

 

Source: Department of economics revised budget proposal for 1942-43 (dated December 30, 1941) submitted to Columbia University President Nicholas Murray Butler by Robert M. Haig, Chairman, Department of Economics. Columbia University Archives. Central Files 1890-. Box 386, Folder “Haig, Robert Murray 7/1941—6/1942”.

 

_____________________________________

Clara Eliot (1896-1976)

Prof. Clara Eliot, who taught economics and statistics at Barnard College, Columbia University, for almost 40 years until her retirement in 1961, died Saturday in Palo Alto, Calif. She was 80 years old.

Dr. Eliot, who used her maiden name professionally, was the wife of Dr. Robert Bruce Raup, professor emeritus of philosophy of education at Teachers College, Columbia University.

Dr. Eliot contributed to research in consumer economics. She was the author of “The Farmer’s Campaign for Credit,” a study of basic issues in credit theory as they were involved in United States agricultural policies early in this century.

She graduated from Reed College in 1917 and received her doctorate from Columbia in 1926. After teaching at Mills College in 1917-18 she was economics secretary to Prof. Irving Fisher at Yale University from 1918 to 1920.

Surviving, besides her husband, are a son, Robert B. Raup Jr.; three daughters, Joan R. Rosenblatt, Ruth R. Johnson and Charlotte R. Cremin; two brothers, a sister and eight grandchildren.

Source:  New York Times, January 19, 1976 (page 32).

Image Source: Barnard College, Mortarboard 1950.

 

 

Categories
Columbia Economists

Columbia. History of Economics Department. Luncheon Talk by Arthur R. Burns, 1954

The main entry of this posting is a transcription of the historical overview of economics at Columbia provided by Professor Arthur R. Burns at a reunion luncheon for Columbia economics Ph.D. graduates [Note: Arthur Robert Burns was the “other” Arthur Burns of the Columbia University economics department, as opposed to Arthur F. Burns, who was the mentor/friend of Milton Friedman, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, chairman of the Board of Governors of the Fed, etc.]. He acknowledges his reliance on the definitive research of his colleague, Joseph Dorfman, that was published in the following year:

Joseph Dorfman, “The Department of Economics”, Chapt IX in R. Gordon Hoxie et al., A History of the Faculty of Political Science, Columbia University. New York: Columbia University Press, 1955.

The cost of the luncheon was $2.15 per person. 36 members of the economics faculty attended, who paid for themselves, and some 144 attending guests (includes about one hundred Columbia economics Ph.D.’s) had their lunches paid for by the university.

_____________________________

[LUNCHEON INVITATION LETTER]

Columbia University
in the City of New York
[New York 27, N.Y.]
FACULTY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE

March 25, 1954

 

Dear Doctor _________________

On behalf of the Department of Economics, I am writing to invite you to attend a Homecoming Luncheon of Columbia Ph.D.’s in Economics. This will be held on Saturday, May 29, at 12:30 sharp, in the Men’s Faculty Club, Morningside Drive and West 117th Street.

This Luncheon is planned as a part of Columbia University’s Bicentennial Celebration, of which, as you know, the theme is “Man’s Right to Knowledge and the free Use Thereof”. The date of May 29 is chosen in relation to the Bicentennial Conference on “National Policy for Economic Welfare at Home and Abroad” in which distinguished scholars and men of affairs from the United States and other countries will take part. The final session of this Conference, to be held at three p.m. on May 29 in McMillin Academic Theater, will have as its principal speaker our own Professor John Maurice Clark. The guests at the Luncheon are cordially invited to attend the afternoon meeting.

The Luncheon itself and brief after-luncheon speeches will be devoted to reunion, reminiscence and reacquaintance with the continuing work of the Department. At the close President Grayson Kirk will present medals on behalf of the University to the principal participants in the Bicentennial Conference.

We shall be happy to welcome to the Luncheon as guests of the University all of our Ph.D.’s, wherever their homes may be, who can arrange to be in New York on May 29. We very much hope you can be with us on that day. Please reply on the form below.

Cordially yours,

[signed]
Carter Goodrich
Chairman of the Committee

*   *   *   *   *   *

Professor Carter Goodrich
Box #22, Fayerweather Hall
Columbia University
New York 27, New York

I shall be glad…
I shall be unable… to attend the Homecoming Luncheon on May 29.

(signed) ___________

Note: Please reply promptly, not later than April 20 in the case of Ph.D.’s residing in the United States, and not later than May 5 in the case of others.

_____________________________

[INVITATION TO SESSION FOLLOWING LUNCHEON]

Columbia University
in the City of New York
[New York 27, N.Y.]
FACULTY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE

May 6, 1954

 

TO:                 Departments of History, Math. Stat., Public and Sociology
FROM:            Helen Harwell, secretary, Graduate Department of Economics

 

Will you please bring the following notice to the attention of the students in your Department:

            A feature of Columbia’s Bicentennial celebration will be a Conference on National Policy for Economic Welfare at Home and Abroad, to be held May 27, 28 and 29.

            The final session of the Conference will take place in McMillin Theatre at 3:00 p.m. on Saturday, May 29. The session topic is “Economic Welfare in a Free Society”. The program is:

Session paper.

John M. Clark, John Bates Clark Professor. Emeritus of Economics, Columbia University.

Discussants:

Frank H. Knight, Professor of Economics, University of Chicago
David E. Lilienthal, Industrial Consultant and Executive
Wilhelm Roepke, Professor of International Economics, Graduate Institute of International Studies, University of Geneva

 

Students in the Faculty of Political Science are cordially invited to attend this session and to bring their wives or husbands and friends who may be interested.

Tickets can be secured from Miss Helen Harwell, 505 Fayer.

_____________________________

[REMARKS BY PROFESSOR ARTHUR ROBERT BURNS]

Department of Economics Bicentennial Luncheon
May 29th, 1954

President Kirk, Ladies and Gentlemen: On behalf of the Department of Economics I welcome you all to celebrate Columbia’s completion of its first two hundred years as one of the great universities. We are gratified that so many distinguished guests have come, some from afar, to participate in the Conference on National Policy for Economic Welfare at Home and Abroad. We accept their presence as testimony of their esteem for the place of Columbia in the world of scholarship. Also, we welcome among us again many of the intellectual offspring of the department. We like to believe that the department is among their warmer memories. We also greet most pleasurably some past members of the department, namely Professors Vladimir G. Simkhovitch, Eugene Agger, Eveline M. Burns and Rexford Tugwell. Finally, but not least, we are pleased to have with us the administrative staff of the department who are ceaselessly ground between the oddity and irascibility of the faculty and the personal and academic tribulations of the students. Gertrude D. Stewart who is here is evidence that this burden can be graciously carried for thirty-five years without loss of charm or cheer.

We are today concerned with the place of economics within the larger scope of Columbia University. When the bell tolls the passing of so long a period of intellectual endeavor one casts an appraising eye over the past, and I am impelled to say a few retrospective words about the faculty and the students. I have been greatly assisted in this direction by the researches of our colleague, Professor Dorfman, who has been probing into our past.

On the side of the faculty, there have been many changes, but there are also many continuities. First let me note some of the changes. As in Europe, economics made its way into the university through moral philosophy, and our College students were reading the works of Frances Hutcheson in 1763. But at the end of the 18th century, there seems to have been an atmosphere of unhurried certainty and comprehensiveness of view that has now passed away. For instance, it is difficult to imagine a colleague of today launching a work entitled “Natural Principles of Rectitude for the Conduct of Man in All States and Situations in Life Demonstrated and Explained in a Systematic Treatise on Moral Philosophy”. But one of early predecessors, Professor Gross, published such a work in 1795.

The field of professorial vision has also change. The professor Gross whom I have just mentioned occupied no narrow chair but what might better be called a sofa—that of “Moral Philosophy, German Language and Geography”. Professor McVickar, early in the nineteenth century, reclined on the even more generous sofa of “Moral and Intellectual Philosophy, Rhetoric, Belles Lettres and Political Economy”. By now, however, political economy at least existed officially and, in 1821, the College gave its undergraduates a parting touch of materialist sophistication in some twenty lectures on political economy during the last two months of their senior year.

But by the middle of the century, integration was giving way to specialization. McVickar’s sofa was cut into three parts, one of which was a still spacious chair of “History and Political Science”, into which Francis Lieber sank for a brief uneasy period. His successor, John W. Burgess, pushed specialization further. He asked for an assistant to take over the work in political economy. Moreover, his request was granted and Richmond Mayo Smith, then appointed, later became Professor of Political Economy, which, however, included Economics, Anthropology and Sociology. The staff of the department was doubled in 1885 by the appointment of E. R. A. Seligman to a three-year lectureship, and by 1891 he had become a professor of Political Economy and Finance. Subsequent fission has separated Sociology and Anthropology and now we are professors of economics, and the days when political economy was covered in twenty lectures seem long ago.

Other changes stand out in our history. The speed of promotion of the faculty has markedly slowed down. Richmond Mayo Smith started as an instructor in 1877 but was a professor after seven years of teaching at the age of 27. E. R. A. Seligman even speeded matters a little and became a professor after six years of teaching. But the University has since turned from this headlong progression to a more stately gait. One last change I mention for the benefit of President Kirk, although without expectation of warm appreciation from him. President Low paid J. B. Clark’s salary out of his own pocket for the first three years of the appointment.

I turn now to some of the continuities in the history of the department. Professor McVickar displayed a concern for public affairs that has continued since his time early in the nineteenth century. He was interested in the tariff and banking but, notably, also in what he called “economic convulsions”, a term aptly suggesting an economy afflicted with the “falling sickness”. Somewhat less than a century later the subject had been rechristened “business cycles” to remove some of the nastiness of the earlier name, and professor Wesley Mitchell was focusing attention on this same subject.

The Columbia department has also shown a persistent interest in economic measurement. Professor Lieber campaigned for a government statistical bureau in the middle of the 19th century and Richmond Mayo Smith continued this interest in statistics and in the Census. Henry L. Moore, who came to the department in 1902, promoted with great devotion Mathematical Economics and Statistics with particular reference to the statistical verification of theory. This interest in quantification remains vigorous among us.

There is also a long continuity in the department’s interest in the historical and institutional setting of economic problems and in their public policy aspect. E. R. A. Seligman did not introduce, but he emphasized this approach. He began teaching the History of Theory and proceeded to Railroad Problems and the Financial and Tariff History of the United States, and of course, Public Finance. John Bates Clark, who joined the department in 1895 to provide advanced training in economics to women who were excluded from the faculty of Political Science, became keenly interested in government policy towards monopolies and in the problem of war. Henry R. Seager, in 1902, brought his warm and genial personality to add to the empirical work in the department in labor and trust problems. Vladimir G. Simkhovitch began to teach economic history in 1905 at the same time pursuing many and varied other interests, and we greet him here today. And our lately deceased colleague, Robert Murray Haig, continued the work in Public Finance both as teacher and advisor to governments.

Lastly, among these continuities is an interest in theory. E. R. A. Seligman focused attention on the history of theory. John Bates Clark was an outstanding figure in the field too well known to all of us for it to be necessary to particularize as to his work. Wesley C. Mitchell developed his course on “Current Types of Economic Theory” after 1913 and continued to give it almost continuously until 1945. The Clark dynasty was continued when John Maurice Clark joined the department as research professor in 1926. He became emeritus in 1952, but fortunately he still teaches, and neither students nor faculty are denied the stimulation of his gentle inquiring mind. He was the first appointee to the John Bates Clark professorship in 1952 and succeeded Wesley Mitchell as the second recipient of the Francis A. Walker medal of the American Economic Association in the same year.

Much of this development of the department was guided by that gracious patriarch E. R. A. Seligman who was Executive Officer of the Department for about 30 years from 1901. With benign affection and pride he smiled upon his growing academic family creating a high standard of leadership for his successors. But the period of his tenure set too high a standard and executive Officers now come and go like fireflies emitting as many gleams of light as they can in but three years of service. Seligman and J. B. Clark actively participated in the formation of the American Economic Association in which J. B. Clark hoped to include “younger men who do not believe implicitly in laisser faire doctrines nor the use of the deductive method exclusively”.

Among other members of the department I must mention Eugene Agger, Edward Van Dyke Robinson, William E. Weld, and Rexford Tugwell, who were active in College teaching, and Alvin Johnson, Benjamin Anderson and Joseph Schumpeter, who were with the department for short periods. Discretion dictates that I list none of my contemporaries, but I leave them for such mention as subsequent speakers may care to make.

When one turns to the students who are responsible for so much of the history of the department, one is faced by an embarrassment of riches. Alexander Hamilton is one of the most distinguished political economists among the alumni of the College. Richard T. Ely was the first to achieve academic reputation. In the 1880’s, he was giving economics a more humane and historical flavor. Walter F. Wilcox, a student of Mayo Smith, obtained his Ph.D. in 1891 and contributed notably to statistical measurement after he became Chief Statistician of the Census in 1891, and we extend a special welcome to him here today. Herman Hollerith (Ph.D. 1890) contributed in another way to statistics by his development of tabulating machinery. Alvin Johnson was a student as well as teacher. It is recorded that he opened his paper on rent at J. B. Clark’s seminar with the characteristically wry comment that all the things worth saying about rent had been said by J. B. Clark and his own paper was concerned with “some of the other things”. Among other past students are W. Z. Ripley, B. M. Anderson, Willard Thorp, John Maurice Clark, Senator Paul Douglas, Henry Schultz and Simon Kuznets. The last of these we greet as the present President of the American Economic Association. But the list grows too long. It should include many more of those here present as well as many who are absent, but I am going to invite two past students and one present student to fill some of the gaps in my story of the department.

I have heard that a notorious American educator some years ago told the students at Commencement that he hoped he would never see them again. They were going out into the world with the clear minds and lofty ideals which were the gift of university life. Thenceforward they would be distorted by economic interest, political pressure, and family concerns and would never again be the same pellucid and beautiful beings as at that time. I confess that the thought is troubling. But in inviting our students back we have overcome our doubts and we now confidently call upon a few of them. The first of these is George W. Stocking who, after successfully defending a dissertation on “The Oil Industry and the Competitive System” in 1925, has continued to pursue his interest in competition and monopoly as you all know. He is now at Vanderbilt University.

The second of our offspring whom I will call upon is Paul Strayer. He is one of the best pre-war vintages—full bodied, if I may borrow from the jargon of the vintner without offense to our speaker. Or I might say fruity, but again not without danger of misunderstanding. Perhaps I had better leave him to speak for himself. Paul Strayer, now of Princeton University, graduated in 1939, having completed a dissertation on the painful topic of “The Taxation of Small Incomes”.

The third speaker is Rodney H. Mills, a contemporary student and past president of the Graduate Economics Students Association. He has not yet decided on his future presidencies, but we shall watch his career with warm interest. He has a past, not a pluperfect, but certainly a future. Just now, however, no distance lends enchantment to his view of the department. And I now call upon him to share his view with us.

So far we have been egocentric and appropriately so. But many other centres of economic learning are represented here, and among them the London School of Economics of which I am proud as my own Alma Mater. I now call upon Professor Lionel Robbins of Polecon (as it used sometimes to be known) to respond briefly on behalf of our guests at the Conference. His nature and significance are or shall I say, is, too well known to you to need elaboration.

[in pencil]
A.R. Burns

Source: Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections, Columbiana. Department of Economics Collection, Box 9, Folder “Bicentennial Celebration”.

_____________________________

[BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION FOR ARTHUR ROBERT BURNS]

 

BURNS, Arthur Robert, Columbia Univ., New York 27, N.Y. (1938) Columbia Univ., prof. of econ., teach., res.; b. 1895; B.Sc. (Econ.), 1920, Ph.D. (Econ.), 1926, London Sch. of Econ. Fields 5a, 3bc, 12b. Doc. dis. Money and monetary policy in early times (Kegan Paul Trench Trubner & Co., London, 1926). Pub. Decline of competition (McGraw-Hill 1936); Comparative economic organization (Prentice-Hall, 1955); Electric power and government policy (dir. of res.) (Twentieth Century Fund, 1948) . Res. General studies in economic development. Dir. Amer. Men of Sci., III, Dir. of Amer. Schol.

Source: Handbook of the American Economic Association, American Economic Review, Vol. 47, No. 4 (July, 1957), p. 40.

 

Obituary: “Arthur Robert Burns dies at 85; economics teacher at Columbia“, New York Times, January 22, 1981.

Image: Arthur Robert Burns.  Detail from a departmental photo dated “early 1930’s” in Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections, Columbiana. Department of Economics Collection, Box 9, Folder “Photos”.