Hesiod on Scarcity

This study deals with Hesiod’s most important economic contribution. He introduced and explicitly defined the concept of economic scarcity, relating it to the productivity of labor. The latter can be enhanced by an unbounded Prometheus (technology), which permits the exploitation of new materials such as iron. In this paper, a distinction is made between a static and a dynamic definition of scarcity. Related to scarcity is the debate on the etymology of the word “economics”. In Works and Days, the word itself is absent, but, nevertheless, the word “oikos” is mentioned many times to clearly mean family business, which needs economic management within the institutionally-determined peace and justice. Without these two pre-conditions, the economies cannot flourish (grow).