Nicolas Dutot (1684–1741) is an important figure for the history of economic thought, as a pioneer in monetary theory and price statistics, and for economic history as a chronicler of John Law’s System. Yet until recently very little about him was known, some of it incorrect. I present...

The paper uses the data from Francois Quesnay's writings to derive a social table for pre-revolutionary France, estimate country's mean income and income distribution. These Quesnay-based estimates are compared with more recent estimates of 18th century French incomes and inequality

At the end of the 17th century capitalism had become the new social and economic order in northern Western Europe. Ever since the trading channels through which money and commodities change hands between the different agents, the actual sequence of these all-comprising monetary exchange...

In this work we deal with the theory of price determination in Steuart's writings; in particular with the concept of Double competition. The background is the evolution of the concept of market during the 18th century. Steuart proposed a theoretical construction in order to tackle the problem of...

I summarize the key points of the scholastic theory of usury following The Scholastic Analysis of Usury by John T. Noonan. Usury is the sin of taking interest on a loan without a just title. According to Scholastic moral theology, interest on loans may be justified by the extrinsic titles to...

This paper examines the marginal utility as a theory of value in comparison with the theories which preceded it. It compares in detail the utility theory with the predominant theory of value of classical economics, a cost theory which saw labor as the ultimate source of value. By introducing a...

John Rae has recently been rediscovered as a precursor of the endogenous growth theory. This study argues that Rae needs to be rediscovered a second time for his original contribution to clarify the role of the innovation and technical change within the economic systems. The aim of this paper is...

This paper looks into the scholastic definitions of the “just price” in the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) and Bl. John Duns Scotus (1265-1308) and investigates whether they are conceptually different from the current “market price”. A specific focus is on whether government...

In this paper, I challenge Murray Rothbard's interpretation of the School of Salamanca as proto-Austrian. I argue that Scholasticism is in goals and methods profoundly different from any modern school of economics, and that it is mistaken to use the Austrian school as a standard against which...

This paper sustains that reappraising Austrian economics in the light of Aristotelian ideas is not only possible but also fruitful. First, the paper draws a sketch of the essential features of Austrian economics. Next, it argues about the necessity for a thorough analysis of the notion of...