The Quantity Theory of Money: From Locke to Keynes and Friedman

by Mark Blaug, Denis O'Brien, Walter Eltis

The quantity theory of money has remained at the heart of much of the comtemporary economic debate, not least in the disputes between monetarist and Keynesian economists.

152 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Mark Blaug is a British economist (naturalised in 1982), who has covered a broad range of topics over his long career. In 1955 he received his PhD from Columbia University in New York. Besides shorter periods in public service and in international organisations he has held academic appointments in - among others - Yale University, the University of London, the London School of Economics and the University of Buckingham. He currently lives in Leiden and works as Visiting Professor in the Netherlands, University of Amsterdam and Erasmus University in Rotterdam, where he is also co-director of CHIMES (Center for History in Management and Economics).
Mark Blaug has made far reaching contributions to a range of topics in economic thought throughout his career. Apart from valuable contributions to the economics of art and the economics of education, he is best known for his work in history of economic thought and the methodology of economics.

Reviews

[Frank Stein · Rating 4 out of 5]

These six fine essays on the quantity theory of money (i.e. increased money leads to proportionally increased prices) offer a wealth of ideas on the development of that theory and its continued relevance. Walter Eltis discusses how John Locke first stated the idea, originally to argue against usury controls and attempts to decrease the value of coins. Denis O'Brien describes the debate over the idea back in the 1830s, and the continued rightness of the ideas of "Currency" or quantity theory, school, relative to the "Banking" school of that era. Robert Skidelsky shows how John Maynard Keynes gradually qualified and finessed the theory as he developed a macroeconomics more based on total output rather than prices. On the whole, this is a notable contribution to the literature on the history of monetary thought.