Irving Fisher and the Quantity Theory of Money: The Last Phase

2000 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 329-348 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert W. Dimand
Keyword(s):  
Great Depression ◽  
Monetary Economics ◽  
American Economic Association ◽  
Full Agreement ◽  
Monetary Policies ◽  
Quantity Theory ◽  
Milton Friedman ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Economic Association ◽  
History Of

Frank Steindl poses a surprising question in the title of his 1997 article, “Was Fisher a Practicing Quantity Theorist?” and reaches the conclusion that, “Clearly, with the decade of the Great Depression, Fisher was no longer a practicing quantity theorist” (Steindl 1997, p. 259). Such a change in Fisher's monetary economics would sharply revise the view of Irving Fisher generally prevailing in the history of monetary economics, which is based primarily on The Purchasing Power of Money (Fisher with Brown 1911). Fisher's photograph (along with photographs of Marshall and Wicksell) appears on the cover of The Golden Age of the Quantity Theory (Laidler 1991). As Mark Blaug (1995, p. 3) put it, “isn't Irving Fisher the quintessential quantity theorist if there ever was one [?]” Perhaps the most striking tribute to Fisher in the quantity theory tradition is from Milton Friedman, who, addressing the American Economic Association on the question “Have Monetary Policies Failed?” and having quoted from Fisher's 1910 exchange with J. L. Laughlin, remarked “And now I must cease quoting from Fisher, with whom I am in full agreement, and proceed instead to plagiarize him—albeit with modifications to bring him down to date” (Friedman 1972, p. 12).

scholarly journals 100 Years since the Birth of Milton Friedman

2012 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 185-203
Author(s):  
Marek Loužek
Keyword(s):  
The United States ◽  
Stabilization Policy ◽  
Price Theory ◽  
Consumption Function ◽  
American Economic Association ◽  
Monetary Stability ◽  
Milton Friedman ◽  
Economic Association ◽  
History Of ◽  
Positive Economics

Abstract The paper deals with the economic theory of Milton Friedman. Its first part outlines the life of Milton Friedman. The second part examines his economic theories - “Essays in Positive Economics” (1953), “Studies in the Quantity Theory of Money“ (1956), “A Theory of the Consumption Function” (1957), “A Program for Monetary Stability” (1959), “A Monetary History of the United States 1897 to 1960” (1963), and “Price Theory” (1976). His Nobel Prize lecture and American Economic Association lecture in 1967 are discussed, too. The third part analyzes Friedman’s methodology. Milton Friedman was the most influential economist of the second half of the 20th century. He is best known for his theoretical and empirical research, especially consumption analysis, monetary history and theory, and for his demonstration of the complexity of stabilization policy.

scholarly journals Retrospectives: Was the Monetarist Tradition Invented?

1998 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 211-222 ◽  
Author(s):  
George S Tavlas
Keyword(s):  
Great Depression ◽  
Money Demand ◽  
Government Expenditure ◽  
Quantity Theory ◽  
Milton Friedman ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Long Run

In 1969, Harry Johnson charged that Milton Friedman 'invented' a Chicago oral quantity theory tradition, the idea being that in order to launch a monetarist counter-revolution, Friedman needed to establish a linkage with pre-Keynesian orthodoxy. This paper shows that there was a distinct pre-Keynesian Chicago quantity-theory tradition that advocated increased government expenditure during the Great Depression in order to put money directly into circulation. This policy stance distinguished the Chicago economists from other quantity theorists, leaving them less susceptible to the Keynesian revolution. Those who have been critical of Friedman's claim that his work derives from the earlier Chicago tradition have focused exclusively on Friedman's long-run empirical specification of money demand. Friedman's cyclical analysis is shown to be very much in the Chicago tradition. Other connections between Friedman's views and the Chicago tradition are also discussed.

Planning on the Potomac: A Review Essay on Jason E. Taylor’s Deconstructing the Monolith: The Microeconomics of the National Industrial Recovery Act

2021 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
pp. 244-264
Author(s):  
Joshua K. Hausman
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual History ◽  
Great Depression ◽  
Review Essay ◽  
Working Hours ◽  
Fair Competition ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Econometric Evidence ◽  
History Of ◽  
Recovery Act

Taylor (2019) details heterogeneity in the effects of the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) across industries and across time. Through first the President’s Reemployment Act (PRA) and then industry-specific “codes of fair competition,” the NIRA raised wages and restricted working hours. In some—but far from all—cases industries also used a NIRA code to collude, raising prices and restricting output. The effect of the NIRA peaked in fall 1933 and winter 1934; thereafter, compliance declined. I review the intellectual history of the NIRA, the implementation of the PRA and the NIRA codes, and Taylor’s econometric evidence on their effects. I end with a discussion of the implications of Taylor’s book for understanding the effect of the NIRA on US recovery from the Great Depression. (JEL D72, G01, H50, N32, N42)

Our Daily Bread: ‘Cooperation’, ‘Independence’ and Politics in Mid-1930s Cinema

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Neve
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Great Depression ◽  
The United States ◽  
The State ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Box Office ◽  
Production History ◽  
History Of ◽  
Cooperative Activity ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter revisits and explores the production history of director King Vidor’s independently made movie, Our Daily Bread (1934), its ideological and aesthetic motifs, and its exhibition and reception in the United States and beyond, not least its apparent failure at the box office. It further considers the relationship between the film and contemporary advocacy of cooperative activity as a response to the Great Depression, notably by the California Cooperative League, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, and Upton Sinclair’s End Poverty in California campaign for the state governorship. It also assesses the movie in relation to Vidor’s own cooperative vision through its emphasis on individuals and community as a solution to the Great Depression and the significant absence of the state in this agency.

The Pragmatic Basis of Keynes's Political Economy

1946 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 121-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dudley Dillard
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Great Depression ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
History Of Economic Thought ◽  
John Maynard Keynes ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Widespread Adoption ◽  
The Future ◽  
History Of ◽  
Second World

Although we still live in the shadow of the years between the First and the Second World Wars, already it seems quite clear that future historians of economic thought will regard John Maynard Keynes as the outstanding economist of this turbulent period. As one writer has recently said, “The rapid and widespread adoption of the Keynesian theory by contemporary economists, particularly by those who at first were highly critical, will probably be recorded in the future history of economic thought as an extraordinary happening.” Book after book by leading economists acknowledges a heavy debt to the stimulating thought of Lord Keynes. The younger generation of economists, especially those whose thinking matured during the great depression of the thirties, have been particularly influenced by him.

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