Why Economics cannot Explain the Modern World

Why indeed? Because the Great Fact, 1800 to the present, incomes rising by a factor of a factor of 30, and higher if quality is acknowledged, cannot be explained by piling brick on brick, or BA on BA, in the absence of new ideas. As Keynes said, the marginal product of capital would be driven quickly down to zero. If the key were accumulation, which economists love, the Great Fact of modern growth would have happened earlier, or in China. Only ideas, in an environment of liberty and dignity for ordinary people, historically unique to northwestern Europe, work.     

The First World/Third Party Criterion: A Feminist Critique of Production Boundaries in Economics

This paper examines definitions of production boundaries in economics, explores the limitations of these definitions with respect to the inclusion of unpaid domestic labor, and considers the significance of such an exploration for feminist economic analysis. Margaret Reid's ''third party criterion,'' a definition of economic activity advocated by many feminists and one used to set the production boundary for most household production models, sets an implicit market standard for defining nonmarket economic activity and therefore contributes to the marginalization of such production. Similarly, production boundaries considered appropriate in third world contexts, such as those defined in the recently revised System of National Accounts, also use implicit market standards for defining nonmarket economic activity. A ''first world'' criterion implicit in such production boundaries defines nonmarket activity as work only if it would have been dealt with on the market in the first world; this results in the inclusion of some of the unpaid domestic activity of rural women on grounds which reinforce the exclusion of work such as child care and the preparation of meals in theory and policy. Feminist economists should beware the danger of recreating implicit assumptions and definitions which result in the exclusion of unpaid domestic labor.     

实物期权方法的信息经济学解释

本文从信息经济学的角度出发,分析了实物期权价值的根本来源：其所获取的更多的信息及其加工信息的方式。本文还指出了实物期权方法的局限性,并建立了选择实行期权方法的数理模型,由此说明了在投资决策中何时使用实物期权方法。     

空间经济学的现实机制与发展路径

空间经济学利用非现实系统假设能否得出有效的现实结论学术界存在争议。指出空间经济学所揭示的聚集生成机制作为一种自组织机制,超越了非现实系统假设与模型等理论形式,是一种真实存在的现实机制,其生成论的范式指明了空间经济学未来的发展路径,具有现实应用价值。     

经济全球化与现代马克思主义经济学——"世界政治经济学学会首届论坛"综述

由世界政治经济学学会、上海财经大学、中国社会科学院马克思主义研究院共同主办的“经济全球化与现代马克思主义经济学——世界政治经济学学会首届论坛”，于2006年4月2～3日在上海财经大学举办，来自中国、美国、日本、俄罗斯、德国、英国、法国、加拿大、奥地利、比利时、韩国、越南、印度、爱尔兰和卢森堡等15个国家的九十余名中外学者，《光明日报》、《社会科学报》、《中国改革报》、美国全国公共广播电台等多家媒体记者，出席了此次国际学术会议。     

Backwater Economics: A Life Story

Abstract:

Economics is sometimes portrayed as a contest between saltwater and freshwater, between the coastal pseudo-Keynesians and the Great Lakes neo-Walrasians, between the flaws-and-friction model-builders and the free-market hard-liners. As evolutionists know, both habitats are fairly sterile. Evolution occurs in the backwaters, in the mudflats, bogs, lagoons, cypress swamps, and wetlands, in the shadows of perpetually endangered habitat. This essay sketches a personal journey through the backwaters. Intellectually they are my home, as they have been for every other recipient of the Veblen-Commons prize, with just one exception …     

“书市”：走向成熟的读者群

一、“书市”——读者群的分化在我国“书市”的发育过程中,长期受“新华书店”单一渠道的限制和影响,整个图书市场由卖方主导,读者群一直处于混沌与朦胧状态。改革过程中,虽然图书市场逐步出现多渠道的经营格局,但随之而来的是“书市”的混乱局面加剧,尤其是各种不规范行为,如图书价格的暴涨及各种假冒伪劣图书的出现,使读者的消费者主权意识成长发育迟缓,读者对图书的需求基本上是单一的,也是被动的。然而,经过“书市”过于功利性和近乎无序炒作的“洗礼”,消费者主权意识不断强化,读者群逐渐在“书市”上展现其消费者姿态。…     

A Thoroughly Embodied Economics: A Review of Personalist Economics by Edward J. O'Boyle

In a debate on the future of monetary policy and the displacement of money, Woodford argued that, even if innovations should lead to a situation in which the banks' demand for reserves at the central bank is zero, the central bank can still influence the economy's interest rates because its liability is the economy's unit of account. This paper deals with these topics by considering the implications of emphasizing the function of money as unit of account. In the analysis of money from this perspective, social, institutional and economic factors play a crucial role. Money is a social and historical relation. Therefore, the displacement of money and central banks, though possible, is a complex process involving economic, social and political factors, not merely the result of innovations. The paper also looks at some aspects of Kaldor's theory, which is centered on the fundamental importance of money as unit of account.