Whose Feudalism?

This sketch from Monty Python is supposed to be set in feudal England. Apparently these serfs are unaware of the feudal obligation. Enjoy.

Two Definitions of Economics

Economics is (according to these two economists):

1. Lionel Robbins: the study of the allocation of scarce resources among competing ends
2. Allan Gruchy: the science of the social provisioning process.

I argued that how you view economic issues will depend upon which of these definitions you have in mind when you think about the economy. The allocative definition lends itself to problems chiefly associated with exchange. That is, concepts related to purchase and sale, and more generally, the problem of what to do when you have to make a choice between one of two options. You can't have your cake and eat it to! This definition is associated with (orthodox) neoclassical economics.  Hint: Soon we'll introduce the production possibilities frontier, which will allow us to see where this definition comes into its own.

What is Economics?

I defined economics at the end of class on Tuesday as the science of the social provisioning process.We will devote much of the next few weeks to exploring this issue in more detail. The important thing to keep in mind as we go forward in the class is that economic systems, regardless of whether we are dealing with capitalism, feudalism, something based upon slavery, or egalitarian tribal societies, each have these features in common:

1. a system for producing all of the goods and services that we need to carry out our lives.
2. a system for distributing these produced goods
3. some set of institutions that allow the system to reproduce itself. 

For most of the course (once we get through some historical material) we will be concerned with the economic problem under capitalism. That is, what moves us to produce the goods and services in a monetary production economy?