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Nassau William Senior

1790 - 1864

About the Author

Nassau W. Senior (1790-1864) was a British economist who taught at Oxford University and worked on the marginal aspects of inputs to production. He argued that capital accumulation is a cost of production, and drew careful distinctions between wealth and welfare. His contributions to the Whig party as an advisor included arguments about work hours and wages. Along with Edwin Chadwick, he wrote the revised Poor Law Commissioners’ Report of 1834. [The image comes from “The Warren J. Samuels Portrait Collection at Duke University.”]

In The Library:

• author: Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834-1859, 2 vols. (1872)
• author: Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834-1859, vol. 1 (1834-1851) (1872)
• author: Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834-1859, vol. 2 (1851-1859) (1872)
• author: Four Introductory Lectures on Political Economy (1852)
• author: Letters on the Factory Act (1837)
• author: Political Economy (1850)
• author: Poor Law Commissioners’ Report of 1834 (1834)
• author: Three Lectures on the Transmission of Precious Metals from Country to Country and The Mercantile Theory of Wealth (1828)
• author: Three Lectures on the Rate of Wages (1830)
• author: Two Lectures on Population, to which is added, a Correspondence between the Author and the Rev. T. R. Malthus (1829)

Quotations:

• Nassau Senior objected to any government regulation of factories which meant that a horde of inspectors would interfere with the organization of production (1837) (19 May, 2008)
• Nassau Senior argues that government is based upon extortion (1854) (13 December, 2012)