 The early history of the Phillips curveThomas M. Humphrey Economic Review, 1985, vol. 71, issue Sep, 17-24 Abstract: The Phillips Curve depicts a relationship between inflation and unemployment in graphical or equation form. In a previous article (see the March /April issue of this Review), Thomas Humphrey catalogued the various formulations of the relationship that have appeared since the publication in 1958 of A. W. Phillips famous article on the subject. In the present article, Humphrey turns to the history of monetary doctrines seeking precursors of the modern formulations in the writings of Phillips forerunners. Humphrey finds an early representation of a Phillips Curve relationship in the writings of David Hume. Other pioneers in the curves pre-history include Irving Fisher, who first attempted to verify the relationship statistically, Jan Tinbergen, who estimated the first econometric Phillips Curve equation, and Paul Sultan, who first represented the relationship as a graph. Also considered are the contributions of Henry Thornton, John Stuart Mill, Lawrence Klein, A. J. Brown and others. Despite the work of these men, the Phillips Curve did not gain wide acceptance until the 1960s. Humphrey suggests several reasons for its belated popularity. Keywords: Phillips; curve (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:fip:fedrer:y:1985:i:sep:p:17-24:n:v.71no.5 Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from Access Statistics for this article More articles in Economic Review from Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond Contact information at EDIRC. |
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