The Coffey-Tomlinson challenge to my view that the behavior of the Japanese firm is best understood without reference to profit maximization is met by arguing that (1) the outsourcing of production in Japan is, by itself, insufficient to warrant a claim of profit maximization; (2) behavior that...

This paper argues that, in attempting to provide accurate explanations of economic behavior, economists have to account, in the structures of their models, for the cultural backgrounds of the agents in question. In particular, utility and profit maximization (or their equivalent) cannot be used...

This paper suggests that mathematics may have become so important in economics for four reasons: (1) to make use of existing human capital, (ii) to attain scientific respectability, (3) to help assure security with respect to claims of truth, and (4) because economics was created primarily by...

This paper presents a model of the firm that includes the possibility of firm and employee on-the-job decision making based on alternatives to profit and utility maximization. Such alternatives are relevant and significant when explaining firm activity in cultural environments in which...