Boulding's textbook resulted in the Phillips machine and the Phillips curve stabilization program.

Dorrance, G. 2000. Early reactions to Mark I and II. In Leeson, R. Ed *A.W.H Phillips: Collected Works in Contemporary Perspective*. Cambridge: CUP.  

----- Original Message -----
From: "Travel" <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Sunday, July 27, 2014 2:51:05 PM
Subject: Re: [SHOE] Kenneth Boulding and the 1949 Clark Medal

I wonder if anyone in our group other than myself was raised on Bounding’s wonderful text Economic Analysis. After the dry books I used and consulted as a student of elementary economics at UBC in the late-1940s, I used Bounding’s great book in my second year theory course. (In those days a course lasted a whole academic year, what would now be 21/2  semesters.) It was wonderful and gave me a sense of economics being a really relevant subject. It confirmed me in my as-yet tentative view that I wanted to become a professional researcher in economics.  



Perhaps I might be allowed to add that the series of nearly a dozen articles that Curt Eaton and I wrote in the 1970s on economic geography and monopolistic competition (reprinted in the volume The Foundations of Economic Geography and Monopolistic Competition) and still cited regularly, mainly by economic geographers, was originally motivated when I read Boulding’s  exposition of, and elaborations on, Hoteling’s  duopolistic  competition in a linear market. I think it was Boulding who christened this “The “Principle of Minimum Differentiation”. On reading Boulding’s account, I set myself the research project of discovering if the many generalisations that Boulding suggested followed from Hoteling’s two-firm case would stand up to careful theoretical investigation. I thank Boulding for the 10 fruitful years that Curt and I spent on this subject.



Richard Lipsey 




From: Coffin, Donald A 
Sent: Sunday, July 27, 2014 12:32 PM
To: [log in to unmask] 
Subject: Re: [SHOE] Kenneth Boulding and the 1949 Clark Medal

In response to James Forder's suggestion that "...the recipients after the mid-1970s have a higher propensity to become really notable economists than did those before that time."


Here's the list of recipients from the beginning until 1973:

1947 Paul A. Samuelson
1949 Kenneth E. Boulding
1951 Milton Friedman
1953 No Award
1955 James Tobin
1957 Kenneth J. Arrow
1959 Lawrence R. Klein
1961 Robert M. Solow
1963 Hendrik S. Houthakker
1965 Zvi Griliches
1967 Gary S. Becker
1969 Marc Leon Nerlove
1971 Dale W. Jorgenson
1973 Franklin M. Fisher


I'm not sure how that list supports Dr. Forder's suggestion.  (Except maybe for the 1953 award.)





Don Coffin


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: Societies for the History of Economics [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of James Forder [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Saturday, July 26, 2014 8:54 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [SHOE] Kenneth Boulding and the 1949 Clark Medal


I have sometimes wondered about Friedman in that kind of way too (not particularly in relation to the Bates medal). Before ‘A theory of the consumption function’ (1957) I am not sure that his publications alone really support some of the remarks one can read from that time about how clever he was. Isn’t the answer that in those days, assessments based on personal interactions, comments, private correspondence, discussions at conferences and the like had much more weight than now, as compared to publications? As it turned out, Friedman and Tobin produced more than Boulding, but I am not sure they would have seemed cleverer than him to those who knew them in the ‘40s. It is our publications-based view that tells the misleading story, perhaps? 

Here’s a suggestion that might raise controversy: Looking at the list at http://www.aeaweb.org/honors_awards/clark_medal.php and ignoring the recent awards (since it is too soon to say), the recipients after the mid-1970s have a higher propensity to become really notable economists than did those before that time. I hypothesise that this is because as time went on the award of the medal was increasingly based on publications rather than other assessments, and those who publish much before they are 40 carry on doing so afterwards.

best wishes

James




James Forder
Fellow and Tutor in Political Economy
Balliol College Oxford





On 26 Jul 2014, at 22:42, David Mitch <[log in to unmask]> wrote:


  In 1949, Kenneth Boulding was awarded the John Bates Clark Medal for best economist under the age of 40. He was the second person to get this award, after Paul Samuelson in 1947.  Could anyone explain why Boulding would have been chosen for this award?   It is not evident to me at least that his contributions or potential circa 1949 would have put him in the same league as other early Clark winners including Samuelson, Friedman, and Tobin.  In posing this query, I intend no disrespect for either Boulding, who I think had a quite fascinating and worthwhile career, or the Clark Medal.  I would just like to try to understand why Boulding might have been chosen for this award in 1949.   

  By the way, I have looked at Philippe Fontaine's 2010 article on Boulding in _Science in Context_. I think it is an excellent article. But it doesn't address directly the question of why Boulding might have gotten the Clark Medal. 

  A related query is what were the institutional arrangements for selecting the Clark Medal winner in the late 1940s.  Presumably there was a selection committee.  Who was on this committee? 
  Would John Maurice Clark, JB Clark's son have been involved in the selection process?  Was there some pot of money involved in funding this award?  If so, where did the money come from? 


  David Mitch

  -- 

  David Mitch 
  Professor of Economics
  Graduate Program Director
  Economic Policy Analysis
  Affiliate Professor, Asian Studies
  University of Maryland, Baltimore County
  email: [log in to unmask]