Government economist by day, blogger by night Games he likes to play: How to define and measure the economy, innovation, national accounting, intellectual property, development economics and of course the history of economics. Favourite Toy: Archives and data Bed-time story: Robert Heilbrohner’s The Worldly Philosophers; Deirdre McCloskey’s Economical Writings Imaginary Friends: John Maynard Keynes, Daniel Defoe, Charles Davenant, Edward Misselden, Vincent de Gournay, Arthur Young and Simon Kuznets. If found, please return to London or where all his papers and vaccinations can be found. |
Benjamin Mitra-Kahn
By this expert
Keynes's 10 Professors... and a Major
I thought I was on to an inside reference when re-reading the General Theory when Keynes calls Marx, Edgeworth and others simply by name, but refers to “Professor Pigou” in several instances.
Holiday announcements... History at the ASSA
Mid August, with the Olympics over, Paralympics and Premiership starting (that’s Soccer for the American readership), it is well and truly the quiet period for most of academia.
Division of labour was common knowledge by the 1770s
I always think of Adam Smith when I hear the term ‘division of labour’ - but I’m being cured of this by reading a bit more about Britains late 18th century in Jenny Uglow’s The Lunar Men.
Life Among the Econ: Talking history with Axel Leijonhufvud
Like many economists, I have enjoyed Axel Leijonhufvud’s “Life among the Econ” and nodded appreciatively when he described the social classifications of the Econ as “Grads, Adults and Elders” and chuckled when the young grad tries to impress the elders of the ‘dept’ through adept ‘modl’ building; so when the man himself was holding a glass of champagne and chatting with me at the INET conference, I had to ask how he got that paper started.