’positive’ Economics And Policy Objectives

Rout ledge Library Editions 'POSITIVE' ECONOMICS AND POLICY OBJECTIVES ECONOMICS Routledge Library Editions — Economics METHODOLOGY & PHILOSOPHY OF ECONOMICS In 5 Volumes I Economics and Economic Policy in Britain, 1946-1966 II III IV V 'Positive' Economics and Policy Objectives Economics and Sociology Economic Doctrine and Method Lament for Economics Hutchison Hutchison L öwe Schumpeter Wootton 'POSITIVE' ECONOMICS AND POLICY OBJECTIVES T W HUTCHISON First published in 1964 Reprinted in 2003 by Routledge 2 Park Square, M ilton Park, Abingdon, O x o n 0 X 1 4 4RN or 270 M adison Avenue, N ew York, NY 10016 First issued in paperback 2010 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Croup © 1964 George Allen & U nw in Ltd All rights reserved. N o part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any inform ation storage or retrieval system, w ithout permission in w riting from the publishers. The publishers have made every effort to contact authors/copyright holders of the works reprinted in Routledge Library Editions —Economics. This has not been possible in every case, however, and we would welcome correspondence from those individuals/companies we have been unable to trace. These reprints are taken from original copies of each book. In many cases the condition of these originals is not perfect. The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of these reprints, b u t wishes to point out that certain characteristics of the original copies will, of necessity, be apparent in reprints thereof. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library 'Positive' Economics and Policy Objectives ISBN 978-0-415-31387-2 (hbk) ISBN 978-0-415-60797-1 (pbk) ISBN 978-1-136-51925-3 (ebk) Miniset: M ethodology & Philosophy of Economics Series: Routledge Library Editions —Economics To M y Wife ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This work first began to take on some kind of shape when in the spring of 1960 I delivered four lectures at the Thomas Jefferson Center for Political Economy at the University of Virginia. It was then suggested that these lectures might be written up for publica­ tion. I am deeply grateful to the officers of the Center, Professor J. M. Buchanan and Professor Warren Nutter, and to the mem­ bers of the Economics Department of the University of Virginia, for their valuable criticism and generous hospitality. I am very grateful, also, to Professor Johan Åkerman for helpful suggestions on the occasion of a most enjoyable visit to his seminar at the University of Lund in September 1960, when I read a paper on some of the ques­ tions discussed in this book. My thanks are also due to Professor Giersch and Professor Serf for a very pleasant and profitable stay at the University of Saarbrücken in the spring of 1962, during which I attended a conference of the Verein f ür Sozialpolitik, the forum half-a-century previously of some of Max Weber’s most challenging pronouncements on ‘Wertfreiheif, and again discussing problems of the application of social and economic knowledge to policy. I am specially and deeply indebted to Mr Kurt Klappholz of the London School of Economics. He read the typescript with great care and made many penetrating and helpful criticisms. I know I have benefited immensely from discussions with him, and it is entirel