{"id":105,"date":"2005-12-08T21:35:41","date_gmt":"2005-12-09T01:35:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/2005\/12\/08\/ecce-homo-oeconomicus-doa\/"},"modified":"2005-12-08T21:35:41","modified_gmt":"2005-12-09T01:35:41","slug":"ecce-homo-oeconomicus-doa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/2005\/12\/08\/ecce-homo-oeconomicus-doa\/","title":{"rendered":"Ecce Homo Oeconomicus: DOA"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

By <\/span>John D. Mueller,  <\/a><\/strong>Director, Program on Economics and Ethics,  Ethics and  Public  Policy Center<\/span><\/p>\n

…<\/span> Starting in 1972,
\neconomics departments at major American universities abolished the
\nrequirement that students learn the history of economics before being
\ngranted a degree. This accounts for much of the confusion in public
\ndiscussion of economic policy. Today’s neoclassical economic theory
\nrightly develops three elements that can be traced to Aristotle and
\nAugustine (the theories of utility, production and exchange). But it
\nneglects the most fundamental element (final distribution), and poses
\nmodels of economic behavior that fail to capture the realities of
\npersonal, family, and political life. …<\/p>\n

Personal economy.<\/span> Modern
\neconomic theory inaccurately posits individuals who always act
\nselfishly (even when being “altruistic”) and narrows all economic
\nchoice to the means of self-gratification. …<\/p>\n

Family economy.<\/span> Modern
\neconomic theory begins by inaccurately assuming hypothetical sexless
\nadult individuals who interact solely by means of explicit or implicit
\nexchanges. …<\/p>\n

Political economy.<\/span> …
\nAristotle’s exploration of the two forms of justice, “justice in
\nexchange” and “distributive justice,” remains the indispensable
\nstarting point for addressing basic questions of economic fairness. …
\n“From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs” is
\na fairly accurate description of the family—but not the government, to
\nwhich Karl Marx mistakenly applied it.<\/p>\n

Divine economy.<\/span> While good
\ngovernment is a blessing for saints and sinners alike, Augustine noted,
\nit must not be mistaken for the City of God, whose goal lies beyond
\nthis life. Yet from Augustine’s “divine trace of equity stamped on the
\nbusiness transactions of men” to Adam Smith’s famous “invisible hand”
\nof Stoic pantheism, economics has always been essentially a theory of
\nprovidence, divine as well as human.  …
\n
A Light Unto the Dismals. To be fair, even the Nobel awarders began to glimpse some of this 15 years ago.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By John D. Mueller,  Director, Program on Economics and Ethics,  Ethics and  Public  Policy Center … Starting in 1972, economics departments at major American universities abolished the requirement that students learn the history of economics before being granted a degree. This accounts for much of the confusion in public discussion of economic policy. Today’s neoclassical […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":359,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[781],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/359"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/globalfund\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}