Talk:Economics in One Lesson

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[edit] Miscellany

Added external links and put it in the category of "economics books." 149.68.105.112 14:47, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Just read a few chapters of that book online. It sounds reasonably sound - is there a critique somewhere that disproves Hazlitts ideas or are they universally seen as "correct" as they sound by reading the book? Peter S. 13:44, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Of course they're absolutely correct (and not Hazlitt's ideas). The unassailable proof is given by Ludwig von Mises in his masterwork Human Action. But, equally "of course", they're not universally seen as correct -- Socialists and similar types who don't like economics will always "disagree" with anything that demonstrates the invalidity of their beliefs. Tacitus Prime 03:57, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

I would also like to see a rebuff of this book linked to. What do the socialists and others have to say about it? matturn 05:00, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Paul Samuelson, who isn't a socialist, laughs at this book: http://robertvienneau.blogspot.com/2007/01/samuelson-i-side-with-sraffians.html 151.190.254.108 14:21, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Well, Robert, the definition of “socialism” is a system under which the means of production are owned by and administered for the benefit of the community. That makes Samuelson a socialist, albeït not a particularly thorough-going socialist. (Many socialists are not thorough-going. As Heilbroner noted in Marxism: For and Against, the means of production include labor.)

Now, the immediate problem with Samuelson's sneer is that he presumes that Hazlitt simply embraces Böhm-Bawerk's theory. But Hazlitt was a fan of v. Mises, who rejected the very presumption to which Samuelson objects — that time is necessarily productive. Indeed, at least according to v. Mises, so did Menger. You see, the assumption that the Austrian School is monolithic about capital theory is very much the same sort of bad scholarship as treating the Austrian School as part of a neoclassical monolith, or treating classical economics as monolithic about supply-and-demand.

One scans Economics in One Lesson in vain for a mention of Böhm-Bawerk or of his theory of interest. The claim that Hazlitt makes about interest is that the rate of consumption is affected by it, contrary to the crude Keynesian notion that the rate of interest merely determines the extent to which people place money that would otherwise be stuffed in the mattress instead with in investments or with financial intermediaries.

I don't know whether I would embrace the conceptual content of Hazlitt's book myself. I found what I read of it too tedious to continue, and he certainly made what I regard as errors elsewhere. But, whether Böhm-Bawerk's theory is a glorious pendant or an albatross, it does not belong around Hazlitt's neck. —SlamDiego_←T 10:26, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Opportunity Cost

Isn't this book typically based on the concept of opportunity cost as economists see it?

If that is so we need to state that.Kendirangu 08:52, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, it does the concept of opportunity cost nigh unto death. However, I have a bit of uneasy about your phrase “as economists see it”. Most (alleged?) economists aren't particularly good with this concept (though they're much better than most other folk). —SlamDiego_←T 06:01, 24 February 2008 (UTC)