Andréadés, A. BOOKS RECEIVED Financial Administration of the Nations in the Ionian (In The period Islands. 2 vols. Athens: Hestia. 1914. pp. 415, 350. Greek, with a French preface and table of contents. chiefly covered is the 17th and 18th centuries.) Argentine Republic, Buenos Aires. Year-Book of the City of Buenos Aires, 1913. Buenos Aires: Government. 1915. pp. 327. Argentina, Ministerio de Agriculture. Censo Comercial e Industrial de la República, Boletín No. 20. Buenos Aires: Ministerio de Agricultura. 1915. pp. 84. Babcock, K. C. The Scandinavian Element in the United States. Urbana: University of Illinois. 1915. pp. 223. $1.15. (University of Illinois Studies in the Social Sciences.) Barron, C. W. The Audacious War. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co. 1915. pp. 192. $1.00. Beard, Mary R. Woman's Work in Municipalities. D. Appleton & Co. 1915. pp. 344. $1.50. New York: Böhm-Bawerk, Eugen von. Kapital und Kapitalzins, Erste Abteilung: Geschichte und Kritik der Kapitalzinsteorien. Wagner. 1915. pp. 747. M. 18. Innsbruck: (Third edition, revised; thus completing the 3d edition of the entire work.) Bennett, W. P. The History and Present Position of the Bill of Lading. Cambridge, Eng.: University Press. 1915. pp. 101. 48. Cartwright, O. G., and Anthony, Katharine. The Middle West Side. 1915. Mothers Who Must Earn. New York: Survey Associates. Carver, T. N. Essays in Social Justice. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 1915. pp. 429. $2.00. Casualty Actuarial & Statistical Society of America. Proceedings of the Inaugural Meeting. Lancaster, Pa.: New Era Printing Co. 1915. pp. 76. Clarke, A. G. A Text-Book on National Economy. London: P. S. King & Son. 1915. pp. 105. 38. 6d. Cole, W. M. Accounts: Their Construction and Interpretation. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co. 1915. pp. 445. $2.25. (Revised and enlarged edition.) De Witt, B. P. The Progressive Movement. A Non-partisan, Comprehensive Discussion of Current Tendencies in American Politics. New York: Macmillan. 1915. pp. 376. $1.50. (In Citizen's Doraiswami, S. V. Indian Finance, Currency and Banking. Madras: Drum, John S. Brief: Reciting the Facts which sustain the Position of the Banks of California with Respect to the Proposed Increase in the Rate of State Taxation. Legislative Committee of the California Bankers' Association. 1915. pp. 20. Eldridge, Seba. Sociology. $1.00. Problems of Community Life: An Outline of Applied Ellwood, C. A. The Social Problem. New York: Macmillan. 1915. pp. 255. $1.25. England, Board of Trade. Seventeenth Abstract of Labour Statistics. London: Government Printing Office. 1915. pp. 348. 18. 6d. Gehlke, C. E. Emile Durkheim's Contributions to Sociological Theory. New York: Longmans, Green & Co. 1915. pp. 188. $1.50. (Columbia University Studies, Vol. LXIII, No. 1.) Gould, C. P. Money and Transportation in Maryland, 1720-1765. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press. 1915. pp. 176. (Johns Hopkins University Studies.) Harris, R. S. Practical Banking, with a Survey of the Federal Reserve Act. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co. 1915. pp. 309. $1.75. Haworth, P. L. America in Ferment. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill. 1915. pp. 477. Holt, L. H. An Introduction to the Study of Government. Hooper, W. E. Railroad Accounting. New 1915. pp. 461. $2.00. Hutchinson, Lincoln. The Panama Canal and International Trade Competition. New York: Macmillan. 1915. pp. 283. $1.75. Italy, Institut International d'Agriculture. Annuaire International de Statistique Agricole, 1911 et 1912. Rome: L'Institut International d'Agriculture. 1915. pp. 622. 5 frs. Kellor, F. A. Out of Work: A Study of Unemployment. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. 1915. pp. 569. $1.50. King, C. L. Lower Living Costs in Cities: A Constructive Program for Urban Efficiency. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1915. pp. 355. $1.50. Lippincott, Isaac. A History of Manufactures in the Ohio Valley to the Year 1860. New York: Knickerbocker Press. 1915. pp. 214. McFarlane, John. Economic Geography. New York: Macmillan. 1915. pp. 560. $2.25. National Tax Association. Proceedings of the Eighth Annual Conference. Madison: National Tax Association. 1915. pp. 499. Rappard, W. E. La Révolution industrielle et les origines de la protection légale du travail en Suisse. Berne: Staempfli & Cie. pp. 343. 8.75 fr. 1915. Reed, Susan Martha. Church and State in Massachusetts 1691-1740. Urbana: University of Illinois. 1915. pp. 208. $1.05. 1915. Ricci, Umberto. Les bases théoriques de la statistique agricole internationale. Rome: L'Institut International d'Agriculture. pp. 314. 5 fr. Rohrbach, Paul. German World Policies. New York: Macmillan. 1915. pp. 243. $1.25. (Translated by Edmund von Mach.) Rose, J. H. The Origins of the War. Cambridge, Eng.: The Univer sity Press. 1915. pp. 201. $1.00. (Lectures delivered at Scott, J. F. Historical Essays on Apprenticeship and Vocational Education. Ann Arbor: Ann Arbor Press. 1915. Segre, Arturo. Manuale di Storia del Commercio, Vol. 2: Dalla Rivoluzione Francese ai giorni nostri, 1789-1913. Torino: S. Lattes & C. 1915. Cambridge, 1914.) pp. 513. pp. 96. Smithsonian Institution. Annual Report for 1913. Washington: Government Printing Office. 1915. pp. 804. Suffern, A. E. Conciliation and Arbitration in the Coal Industry of America. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin Co. 1915. pp. 376. $2.00. (Hart, Schaffner and Marx Prize Essays in Economics.) Tangorra, Vincenzo. Trattato di Scienza della Finanza, Vol. I. Milan: Società Editrice Libraria. 1915. pp. 884. L. 20. pp. 108. Re Tennessee, Committee to Investigate Assessment and Taxation. port. Nashville: McQuiddy Printing Co. 1915. True, Ruth S. Boyhood and Lawlessness. The Neglected Girl. New York: Survey Associates. 1915. pp. 215, 143. $2.00. (Russell Sage Foundation, West Side Studies, carried on under the direction of Pauline Goldmark.) U. S. Department of Labor. Government Aid to Home Owning and Housing of Working People in Foreign Countries. Washington: Series No. 5.) Government Printing Office. 1915. pp. 451. (Miscellaneous Uruguay, Director General de Estadística. Anuario Estadístico, 190910, Libro XXII, Tomo II. Montevideo: Juan J. Dornaleche. 1915. pp. 449. Wagel, S. R. Finance in China. Shanghai: North China Daily News Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co. and Herald. 1915. pp. 503. Wheeler, H. D. Are We Ready? 1915. pp. 228. $1.50. Wickware, Francis G. (Editor). The American Year Book, 1914. New York: Appleton. 1915. pp. 862. Women's Educational and Industrial Union. The Public Schools and Women in Office Service. Boston: Women's Educational and Industrial Union. 1915. pp. 187. 80c. (Studies in Economic Relations of Women, Vol. VIII.) THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AUGUST, 1915 THE CONCEPT OF VALUE SUMMARY Need of enlarged concepts, 663.-The "ratio argument nonessential, 664.—The word "rate" might avoid unnecessary verbal implications, 668. - Relation and quality two phases of one fact, 672. THE concept of value is the core of economic thinking, and modern economics is older than American independence, yet the builders of the science are still disputing what value is, or how it shall be conceived. This is altogether necessary and proper, for the concept is by no means in final shape. Indeed, one may hazard the prediction that progress in economic philosophy in the next half century will hinge on the adoption of new and enlarged meanings for its fundamental terms. Only so can we do for the twentieth century as much as our classical forefathers did for their time. It is a question how long nineteenth century formulations will stand the strain of twentieth century development. Our growing mass of economic regulations and social reforms, our general institutional iconoclasm, are a challenge to the values based on free exchange, and the final answer has not yet been given. Theories of conservation and compulsory insurance may be grafted upon the stem of marginal utility, but they will not grow there spon taneously. They represent clashes of values for which the economist has furnished no adequate common denominator. It is fruitless to claim that these are not economic values but values of some other sort; ethical or what you will. The same is true of the aesthetic value of a picture or the dietetic value of a roast of beef. The test is that the economist must deal with them. The socialists have a sufficiently clean-cut philosophy covering these vexed questions of reform, and writers like Patten, Veblen, Hobson, and Davenport deal with the fundamental problem, each in his own way. Economists in general cannot afford to become as those who would put new wine in old bottles. There are questions of social interpretation at issue which are real and important. But just for this reason it is peculiarly unfortunate if the discussion runs off upon non-essential matters and is thus side-tracked. Time is worse than wasted which is spent on merely verbal argument, or in disputing the claims of rival concepts which involve a "distinction without a difference," and the excuse for the present excursion into this field is the hope that thereby some of this intellectual waste motion may be saved and real problems be attacked more directly. It seems to the writer that certain non-essentials have intruded themselves and should be eliminated. One of these is verbal. In the long-standing debate whether value is a quantitative thing or a mere relation, some part of the battle has seemed to hinge on the mere use of the phrase "ratio of exchange." Of those who hold that value is a relation some have called that relation a ratio. And out of this innocent-looking term has grown one of those misunderstandings, those strange failures of mind to connect with mind, which stultify so much good argument. |