Roy Weintraub wrote:
>I'm confused. What does this have to do with the history of 
>economics? Why would an historian of science care about which kind 
>of reserve requirement is "best?
>
>E. Roy Weintraub
>

Roy, I understand your concern. But I believe you should be less 
rigid. Ask yourself: why is the history of economics relevant? Many 
people would answer by saying that it sheds light on the present and 
helps us make judgments about future policy. To begin by stating a 
policy proposal is a means of generating discussion about past 
proposals of a similar nature. The Sandilands post suggests that he 
was stimulated to do this. Note specifically that the Currie proposal 
he discussed would separate savings from transferable deposits. This 
is precisely what I recommended ought to be done. This is one answer 
to your question. (Of course, I did not claim that my policy proposal is new.)

A second answer concerns the use of terms. As we are seeing from 
Ahiakpor's recent post, the terms used today differ from those used 
by former economists. Also Medaille's post demonstrates a certain 
inability to get a message across even though one uses terms that are 
familiar. In addition to that, Horowitz and I have had a lively 
offlist discussion of what Mises meant by the gold standard. We have 
had to look this up and recognize, in the process, that this term may 
have more than one meaning.

It is necessary for historians of thought to reach agreement on the 
use of terms in order to do the history of economic thought. Stating 
a policy proposal is a means of sorting out the various uses of terms 
which, in turn, may facilitate doing what I presume you would define 
as the history of economics. The exercise I introduced can be 
conceived in this light.

Finally, you may recall that in earlier discussions of the proposal, 
references were made to Adam Smith. The recent messages have merely 
been efforts to clarify my earlier points for Medaille.

J. Patrick Gunning