Description
Book SynopsisWicksteed's classic work, The Co-ordination of the Laws of Distribution, has a central place within the development of marginal productivity theory. It claimed to explain all 'factor returns' on a unified basis and to show how 'marginal productivity factor pricing' just exhausted the total product.
It is presented here with a long introduction by the editor, Ian Steedman, who provides both a careful analysis of the text and an assessment of Wicksteed's place within the development of modern economics. This important new edition will make The Co-ordination of the Laws of Distribution accessible to a fresh generation of economists.
Trade ReviewAcclaim for this Classic in the History of Economics:'This is a gem of a little book that every economist may read. . . '
-- Peter C. Dooley, The Economic Journal
'. . . this is a book that, for the importance of the text and the quality and richness of the Introduction, well deserves to be read. . .' -- Fabio Ranchetti, History of Economic Ideas
'Philip H. Wicksteed's Co-ordination of the Laws of Distribution (1894) is enough alone to insure for him a place of lasting importance in the history of economic thought. . . . its daring and its originality command the highest respect.' -- G.J. Stigler
'P.H. Wicksteed, the purist of marginal theory.' -- P. Sraffa
'[Wicksteed] set forth boldly the naked logic of the matter and also attempted a proof of the propositions - both of them guardedly affirmed but not proved by Marshall - that every "factor's" distributive share will under ideal conditions tend to equal its quantity multiplied by its marginal degree of productivity; and that those shares will tend to sum up to (to "exhaust") the net product of each firm and, in the sphere of social aggregates, Marshall's 'national dividend.' -- J.A. Schumpeter
'Philip Wicksteed might well be regarded as the leading exponent among English economists of "neoclassical" distribution analysis in its purest form.' -- T.W. Hutchison
