General Treatises on Economics
About this Collection
These treatments of economics present the basic assumptions about economic life and human behaviour on which economics is based; the main principles of the discipline; how the different branches of economics are related; and the author’s own perspective on the discipline.
Key People
Titles & Essays
Quotes
Socialism & Interventionism
Bastiat criticizes the socialists of wanting to be the “Great Mechanic” who would run the “social machine” in which ordinary people were merely so many lifeless cogs and wheels (1848)
Taxation
David Ricardo considered taxation to be a “great evil” which hindered the accumulation of productive capital and reduced consumption (1817)
Economics
David Ricardo on Taxation
Economics
Destutt de Tracy on society as “nothing but a succession of exchanges” (1817)
Economics
Jean-Baptiste Say argues that there is a world of difference between private consumption and public consumption; an increase in the latter does nothing to increase public wealth (1803)
Free Trade
Jean-Baptiste Say regards regulations which favor producers as a form of political privilege at the expence of the community (1803)
Socialism & Interventionism
Ludwig von Mises argues that monopolies are the direct result of government intervention and not the product of any inherent tendency within the capitalist system (1949)
Economics
Ludwig von Mises argues that the division of labor and human cooperation are the two sides of the same coin and are not antagonistic to each other (1949)
War & Peace
Ludwig von Mises laments the passing of the Age of Limited Warfare and the coming of Mass Destruction in the Age of Statism and Conquest (1949)
Money & Banking
Ludwig von Mises lays out five fundamental truths of monetary expansion (1949)
Property Rights
McCulloch argues that the right to property extends to “the faculties of (one’s) mind and the powers of (one’s) body” (1864)
Free Trade
Mises on how the “boon” of a tariff privilege is soon dissipated (1949)
Free Trade
Mises on how the “boon” of a tariff privilege is soon dissipated (1949)
Economics
Mises on the interconnection between economic and political freedom (1949)
Socialism & Interventionism
Nassau Senior objected to any government regulation of factories which meant that a horde of inspectors would interfere with the organization of production (1837)
Economics
Paul Heyne on THE economic way of thinking (1995)
Economics
Philip Wicksteed on how impersonal economic relations help others (1910)
Economics
Philip Wicksteed on “non-tuism” in economic relations (1910)
Economics
Philip Wicksteed’s positive vision of the “cash nexus” (1910)
Economics
Wicksteed on the subjective theory of value and on opportunity costs (1910)
Social Sciences