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From:
[log in to unmask] (Bruce J. Caldwell)
Date:
Fri Mar 31 17:19:19 2006
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----------------- HES POSTING ----------------- 
 
Barkley Rosser wrote: 
 
> Menger may have not been a fan of mathematical methods, but he  
> certainly was a fan of marginal utility theory, it fitting in with his  
> subjectivist view of value. As Streissler stresses, Menger was very  
> consciously drawing on this well-established tradition of German  
> economic literature, a literature either ignored or forgotten by Menger's  
> successors in the Austrian tradition, a point that Bruce Caldwell could  
> probably expound upon more knowledgeably than I can.   
 
Actually, I think that though Menger was certainly a subjectivist, he was  
pretty lukewarm towards marginal utility theory. Streissler makes this  
point in a delightful way when he says (in contrast to T.W. Hutchison,  
who had written that "what was important in marginal utility was the  
adjective rather than the noun") "marginalism was not the essence of  
their endeavor; it remained - pace Hutchison - an adjective, not the  
noun."  See his Fall 1972 _History of Political Economy_ paper, "To  
What Extent Was the Austrian School Marginalist?" for further reading  
on this. 
 
Bruce   
 
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