=================== HES POSTING ==================== Schumpeter is much more serious than Keynes on the history of economic thought. But both of them enthroned analytical innovation, not history of economics. Schumpeter told Smithies in 1943 that he was working on the history of economics because "It is simply the subject, among all those at hand, that is furthest removed from current events" (letter from Schumpeter to Smithies; Arthur Smithies "Memorial: JAS, 1883-1950", in Saymor E. Harris, Schumpeter, social scientifist, 1951). Robert Loring Allen, Opening doors: the life and work of Joseph Schumpeter (1991, chapter 24), told us that, at the end of his life, Schumpeter was really upset with politics (war) and economics (Keynes), and virtually any conversation topic with colleagues was a pain. Allen explanation about Schumpeter's change of interest from theory to history is tought: "The creative juices, however, had abandoned him. He could no longer produce new and original theories. The alternative to creativity and original contribution is scholarship; he could make a contribution to the history of economics, a subject in which profounf knowledge, a prodigious memory, wide reading, literary skill, and analytical ability counted more than invention and inspiration. Possessing all of these qualities in abundance, he tired of failure in attempting to theorize; thus, he began spending more and more time reading and writing on the history of economics" (vol II, p. 144). Manuel Santos-Redondo [log in to unmask] ============ FOOTER TO HES POSTING ============ For information, send the message "info HES" to [log in to unmask]