Abstract

Neoclassical economics is the stage and branch of economic science since the 1870s through the 1930s and beyond. It was mostly the product or sequel of what economists (Schumpeter, 1954) call the Copernican marginalist revolution in economic theory during the 1870s–1890s. Specifically, the crux of marginalism was a marginal utility theory of exchange value and its extensions (e.g., marginal–productivity principle of income distribution) in reaction and contrast to the labor–cost conception in classical political economy. The founders or pioneers of marginalism are commonly considered to be William Jevons (England), Carl Menger (Austria), and Leon Walras (Switzerland/France), who almost simultaneously in 1871–1874 “discovered” marginal utility value theory as a putative revolutionary alternative to its labor‐based versions in Smith, Ricardo, Mill, Marx, and others. (For instance, Jevons specifically attacked Ricardo and Mill's theories, prompting neoclassical economists like Alfred Marshall to rise in their partial defense.)

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