This article aims at showing how Bentham addressed the modern issue of the economic efficiency of the law (as defined by Posner) ; to do that, we focus on Defence of Usury [1787] and the manuscript Sur les prix [1801a] : in 1787, Bentham stated that, in order to increase wealth, the rate of...

Libertarian paternalism is nowadays one of the main proposals within normative economics. Libertarian paternalism relies on researches and findings in behavioural economics in order to show that it is efficient and morally justified for public authorities to use heuristics and cognitive biases...

From Walras to Debreu, the history of general equilibrium analysis went through three major episodes, each linked to a different place. In Lausanne, Walras builds the first general equilibrium equations as an element of a global social science. In Vienna, in the early 1930s, Wald is the first to...

We study how the concept and measurement of correlation has been transformed as econometrics methodology was introduced. They were first imported from British biometrics studied at the turn of the century, then played a major part in the building of the economic barometers in the twenties, until...

This paper examines what economic policy has learned from the contemporary developments in economic research and which lessons have been drawn from them for the formulation and the implementation of French economic policy. Advances in research are grouped under three headings: the intertemporal...

Optimum growth, endogeneous growth theories, real business cycles models find strong support, and partly its very origin on maximum principle which seems specially suited for economic analysis. The comparison with Ramsey model emphasizes how introduction of Maximum Principle did help to clarify...