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The article presents an in-depth analysis of the archives of the Brown family, collected at the John Carter Brown Library at Brown University. In it the business activities of the family from the 18th to 20th centuries are charted. Comments are given highlighting the historical value of the papers, citing their remarkable comprehensiveness for such a long period. Issues addressed within the collection include records of business conditions and transactions during the Revolutionary War, the transitions in international business networks after the war, and the family's Western frontier land speculation ventures during the 19th-century.

The article describes the colonial monetary standard in Massachusetts in the 1600s. It discusses the establishment of a commodity standard in 1640 and the official prices of commodities in Massachusetts during the 1600s. The article details the development of the paper-money standard in 1690. It comments on the topics covered by most recent studies of the monetary system of the American colonies. The establishment of a mint in Boston in 1652 is reported. By 1737 the price of silver had risen. In 1750, the Massachusetts Assembly restored specie payments. The article also considers the objections to the continuation of paper-money issues.

Comments on articles about the economic history of the United States. Economic development of the country; Application of eminent domain on expropriate private property for public purposes; Stability of property rights in the country's legal order.

Comments on several research dealing with economic history. Suggestions for improving the articles of author John McCusker; Inaccuracy of the data presented by authors James Shepherd and Gary Walton; Recommendations for the research of author Alice Hanson Jones.

Comments on the economic and historical issues raised in the articles published in the March 1971 issue of the `Journal of Economic History,' which focused on demographic themes. Discussion on the papers by Hill and Uselding concerning the effects of immigration into the United States in the 19th century.

The article discusses researches conducted by economists Paul A. David, Warren J. Scoville and Earl J. Hamilton. Researcher Stanley Engerman in his discussion on David's article suggests that his article represents the most thorough study in the debate concerning American economic growth between 1800 and 1840. It is based both on new time series not previously utilized and upon the resourceful application of available data to clarify certain key points. Another researcher Ross M. Robertson while discussing Scoville's article finds his article on the whole persuasive. Robertson certainly has no quarrel with his quantitative inferences, nor for that matter with his description of French governmental regulation in the eighteenth century. He was not altogether convinced of the direct correlation between the paper industry's expansion and the relaxation of direct governmental controls that Scoville alleges. Perhaps Scoville's more extended publications on this subject will elucidate this relationship.

Presents a series of abstracts on various topics of economics published in the July 1964 issue of the periodical 'International Monetary Fund Staff Papers,' vol. 11. Role of International Monetary Fund in the expansion and contraction of international liquidity; Problems in compilation of gold and foreign exchange statistics; Description of economic conditions of Liberia.

Comments on two articles about the economic history of Europe. Correlation between nation-state, military technology and innovations in art and practice of public finance; Changes on the level of governmental organization and administration between 1400 and 1600.

Presents a preliminary announcement of the program of the Eighty-Fourth Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association in New Orleans, Louisiana on December 26-29, 1971.

The article sheds light on commercial banking in the United States during the sixties. The article makes the conclusion that if the trends emerging in the late 1950s and in 1960 are not reversed by major changes in economic conditions or tax and regulatory policy, then the commercial banks will be unable to play as important a role in financing the 1960s as they have done in previous years. The article's conclusion is based on the expectation that in all years, except those of recession, bank deposits will continue to expand at a slower rate than the growth of the gross national product.

This article focuses on parliamentary records in the custody of the House of Lords Record Office, which are relevant to the study of economic history of Great Britain. The records which are in the care of the Lords Record Office are the following: the archives of the House of Lords from 1497 onwards; a few, post-medieval House of Commons documents which survived in the fire of 1834 and a large proportion of the Commons records which have accumulated since that time. The sources for economic history which are to be found among these records fall into three main groups. First, those which related to the public business of both Houses and to proceedings on public Bills; second, the private Bill records of both Houses and lastly, a varied accumulation of papers laid on the Table of the House of Lords.

Comments on several articles about economic history, published in the December 1965 issue of the `Journal of Economic History.' Principal tasks of Robert Zevin's analysis of the industrialization of New England; Opinion of the paper by Peter McClelland which examined regional economic retardation in New Brunswick; Comments on David Mishkin's paper about the role of commodity trade motive in the colonization of the United States.

Comments on the articles about economic history, which appeared in the December 1965 issue of the `Journal of Economic History.' Information lacking in an essay about the new economic history by Edward Ames; Description of a paper by Herbert Ellison regarding the problem of economic development; Comments on an article by Yasukichi Yasuba et al, on the issues of the theory and policy of economic development.

Comments on several studies related to economic history. Relation between agricultural income and interregional migration; Methodologies used in the studies.

The first section is devoted to the discussion of a valuation technique for making estimates of the value of pension promises consistent with the principles underlying the determination of the value of other assets reported on consumer balance sheets; and the second section to a consideration of the financial magnitude of the unfunded pension promises when valued consistently with other assets. The major purpose of the paper is to show the distortion of the size of consumer wealth arising from the fact that pension promises are not recorded in terms of their economic value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on various books about general works, theory and its history published in 1925. Some of the books included are, "Papers Relating to Political Economy," by F. Y. Edgeworth. The authors scattered papers, rescued from the files of the "Economic Journal," and the periodicals and brought together in these three volumes, make an impressive showing. Even one who, like the present reviewer, counts himself fairly familiar with the author, cannot turn to the pages of these books without a new appreciation of variety and the sustained level of the achievement they represent. "Origins of Sociology," by Albion W. Small. The author tells what sociology is by telling how it came to be, by tracing its differentiation out of the general field of social science. Being a sociologist, he naturally sees the sociological movement as an advance, a passing beyond previous social science. In the preface the movement is described as "a drive from relatively irresponsible discursiveness."

The article presents critical discussion by various economists on the papers by Arnold C. Harberger and G. Warren Nutter about monopoly and the U.S. economy. According to the author the paper by Harberger id addressed to competition in factor markets in the long run. Harberger considers the factor, capital, and defines the long run for statistical purpose. The calculations on which the figures presented in the paper are based and the argument supporting them are stimulating and ingenious. The most serious quarrel with the paper involves what is not in it rather than what is. Nutter, on the other hand, goes on to describe other areas where competition, though irregular and delayed, nevertheless does operate in a direct fashion, and a still larger area where the constant pressure of potential competition works toward competitive ends albeit with delays and discontinuities. To the author the degree of competitiveness has been referred to the length of the adjustment period necessary for demand to become elastic in the neighborhood of where marginal costs and price approach one another.

So much has been written on the theory of interest rates and their influence; yet so indecisive have been the available facts. As usual, theories are more abundant as the facts are few. It has been assumed, for example, that the 60 or 90 day rate on commercial paper is the typical interest rate and that its gyrations are characteristic of interest rates generally. As a matter of fact, this rate applies probably to scarcely 1 per cent of the total amount of money loaned in one form or another in the United States. The questions here to be considered are: what are the typical and dominant interest rates of the country; how much do they vary; and how much influence has this variation on the changes in the trade cycle? The discount rate of the Federal Reserve banks, applying to a sum which in recent years has varied as widely as from nearly 3 billions to less than 200 millions; range of rate within this period, 3 to 7 per cent. There is the large volume of current and casual credit extended by manufacturers, jobbers, retailers and dealers of all sorts to their customers.

This article presents the author's opinion with regard to George Stigler's views on the practice of political economy in the United States. The evidence presented in the paper of Stigler seems persuasive to me. It is difficult to look at this analysis and still subscribe to the widely held view that election results are highly sensitive to swings in business conditions. Once again we seem to have found that what everybody knows to be true is not necessarily true. Since Stigler's analysis on macro evidence is exhaustive and impressive, suppose we turn to micro evidence to see if it provides any clues to an understanding of why the macro results turn out the way that they do. Here we do gain some insight into attitudes pertinent to Stigler's analysis. What the views of Stigler suggest is that within reasonable tolerances, changes in political sentiment are more apt to reflect the myriad of other factors that bear on voter sentiment. If the swing is outside these tolerances, or if the event is sufficiently visible or discrete, economic developments can exert a substantial effect on citizen support or the incumbent. If therefore, the economic indicators start to waver, the economist may sleep well at night, knowing that in all probability it means little, but the politician may for very good reasons remains awake, wondering if this will be one of those cases that transforms him into a statesman.

The article presents authors' comments on three research papers on economic development after Second World War by economists Erik Lundberg, George H. Hildebrand and Shigeto Tsuru. These papers point out some striking contrasts among the experiences of countries including Scandinavia, Japan and Italy and the postwar experience of the U.S. For example, these papers insistently raise the question why the U.S. has done so poorly in achieving stable and rapid growth. They discuss whether it is a matter of economic structure, or partly a fault of economic policy. Research paper by Hildebrand provides a summary both of the Italian postwar economic achievement and of Italy's still pressing problems of unemployment and incomplete development. But there are aspects of his analysis that needs to be questioned. Moreover, papers of Hildebrand and Tsuru gave the impression that something of a catching-up process has been important in the Italian and Japanese economies. In his paper Lundberg drew attention to some destabilizing effects of governmental action in Sweden. They refer to public investments or publicly controlled investments as an instrument of anti cyclical policy.

The themes which emerge from all of the papers here converge to several clear points about professionals and institutions. (a) The social history of professionals and institutions supplies a perspective needed to evaluate the current influence of economic and social conditions on the aims of professional practice. (b) Despite the professional`s sense of independent identity, he usually is firmly entrenched as an organizational "in" with powers and viewpoints that are consistent with this position. (c) The sharp disparities between organizational "ins" and "outs" which pervade economic, legal, and public institutions work to the continuous disadvantage of "outs" whether they are clients and/or poor people. (d) Even the scholarly activities of social scientists reveal a host of intellectual snares and class and caste prejudices that insidiously bias research and policy. The poor, in their encounter with public institutions, have provided insights into our professional and scholarly roles that we dare not ignore. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

SUMMARY The paper discusses the use of fiscal policy as a tool of economic stabilization in seven OECD countries since the mid-fifties. It draws on a recent empirical study, with attached fiscal policy recommendations, made by an expert group within the OECD, in which the author was a member. The method of analysis in the paper is to compare on one hand the 'direct' impact on aggregate demand of fiscal policy changes with on the other hand the timing of the business cycle. Among the countries included in the study, the U. K. and Sweden seem to have most systematically tried fiscal policy as an instrument of economic stabilization. It seems quite clear that the policy in the U. K. has been rather unsuccessful against the background of domestic economic conditions, whereas the experiences in Sweden are considerably more promising. In other countries fiscal policy has been used at particular occasions for economic stabilization, such as in Germany and Belgium during some periods with tendencies to recessions (1958 and 1962), in the U. S. to move the economy closer to full capacity utilization (1964-65) and at several occasions in various countries as part of a policy package to avoid balance of payments crises. It does not seem that forecasting mistakes have been the main obstacle to a more efficient stabilization policy. Time lags in the decision-making procedure, as well as lack of determination and firmness in policy, seem to have been more important obstacles. Another important complication has been conflicts of goals. Sometimes the policy has been more geared to the external than to the internal economic situation. At other times when the policy has been directed to influence the development of prices, unemployment problems have arisen, particularly as the price variable usually seems to lag the business cycle of the volume components. There has also been a tendency to let the expansionary actions during recessions last too long a time, thereby giving the next boom a 'flying start'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the "capital gap" presumption underlying Federal programs of financial assistance to small business and the conflicting views as to its existence and measurement. It also presents evidence developed in a study of the performance of borrowers who had received business loans from the Small Business Administration which appears to support the view that a capital gap does in fact exist for small business as a whole. If this be so, an even wider gap may be assumed for minority persons confronted with additional bars to entry into or survival in business. The paper examines the position of minority-owned businesses both in the inner city--where the largest concentrations of minority-owned firms are now found--and without regard to location. The capital gap in the inner city is all pervasive, extending to consumer, home mortgage and business credit. It is aggravated by a high incidence of crime against business and the availability of crime insurance at several multiples of standard rates, if at all. The cost of doing business is further increased by usurious interest rates and losses on credit customers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Significant changes are introduced in Czech and Russian Enterprise management as part of the economic reforms, particularly in enterprise goals and decentralization of managerial authority. This paper reviews major aspects of this new managerialism and hints that there may be a "theory of convergence" in the making in communist countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]