Three Centuries of Demand and Supply

Abstract

Although the ground I cover in this address is familiar, I approach it as a novice (Clower, 1973). I have written some history of economic thought papers over the past fifty years, but the bulk of my work has been theoretical; and I have known too many good historians of thought to imagine I belong in that class. As W. J. Ashley (1891) observed, “The economic historian … is apt to be confused in theory; [and] the … theorist runs the risk of being unhistorical” (compare Wicksell, 1904, p. 61). Unhistorical or not, I shall discuss some major vicissitudes of economic inquiry over the past three centuries.