Leon Walras: Elements of Theoretical Economics

Abstract

Two-fold objective assigned to economics: 1 o To provide the people with an income or an abundant level of living; 2 o To furnish the State or the community a suicient income. First observation. Two goals, equally important, but neither of which is the object of a proper science. here is another point of view for economics. Second observation. Two operations equally important, but of a diferent character, one a matter of economic advantageousness and the other a matter of justice.Economics envisaged as the simple exposition of the manner in which wealth is produced, distributed, and consumed. Naturalist point of view, permitting an easy refutation of socialism, but which is inaccurate if applied to the entire science. In regard to the production and distribution of wealth, humans are led to choose one or another combination, not on the grounds of what is most natural, but on the grounds of what is most useful or most equitable.1. he irst thing to be done at the beginning of a course or treatise on economics is to deine the science, its object, divisions, nature, and limits. I have no thought of evading this obligation; but I must warn that it is longer and more diicult to fulill than perhaps is supposed. We lack a deinition of economics. of all the deinitions that have been proposed, not one has met with the general deinitive acceptance that is the sign of truths acquired by science. I shall quote and criticize the most interesting of these deinitions, and I shall try to provide one. In the course of this task, I shall ind occasion to mention certain names, titles of books, and dates that should be known.

Real Wicksell Effect, Demand for Capital and Stability

“…16 According to Walras, for example, agents convert their savings directly into capital goods in order to lend them to firms, which demand their use (cf. Walras, 1977Walras, [1926. This mechanism has recently been taken up by Garegnani in order to argue that 'capital goods are demanded by savers as elements of a single commodity, "perpetual net income" ' (Garegnani, 2011, p. 46).…”

Market implementation of multiple-arrival multiple-deadline differentiated energy services

“…After the long-run evolution of this competitive market, the price of each service converges to an equilibrium price, which should bring no incentives for rational participants to adjust their strategies. The discussions on equilibrium theory can be traced back to the pioneering work of Léon Walras [25]. We herein start with a detailed description of a competitive equilibrium.…”

Economics and the Social Meaning of Money

“…The mathematical simplifications may be loaded, but they have been productive for neoclassical economists. Most immediately useful, the grand optimization problemin which all household income sources are pooled and all consumption choices are centralized -yields choices analyzable with the tools of marginal analysis in the spirit of Walras ([1874]). That leaves neoclassical economists on familiar ground.…”