Jacob Viner

“Jacob Viner used to assign exam questions that showed how Ricardo’s Chapter 2 recognized (in modern parlance):P_2 / P_1 = \frac{\text{marginal cost in labour}_1}{\text{marginal cost in labour}_2} = \frac {1/\left[{\partial {Q}_{{1}}/\partial{L}_{{1}}}\right]}{1/\left[{\partial {Q}_{{2}}/\partial {L}_{{2}}}\right]}But, Viner insisted, this was compatible with rent’s being 99 per cent of national income and labour’s importance being derisory. Would that more historians of economic analysis had taken Viner’s EC 301 or brooded more on Ricardo’s text.”

“A comparable error was made by Professor Jacob Viner in an important article on laissez-faire in Smith’s economics. He contrasted the mature realism of The Wealth of Nations with the youthful idealism of the Moral Sentiments, and quoted five passages from the ethical work as evidence for his view of it. The first of his quotations was in fact written for the far from youthful sixth edition.”