Jane Austen and the economic way of thinking

Darwyyn Deyo ()

International Journal of Pluralism and Economics Education, 2016, vol. 7, issue 2, 170-182

Abstract: Jane Austen was an Enlightenment-era philosopher who engaged in the economic way of thinking. She shared the moral sentiments philosophy of Adam Smith, and the two authors act as a bridge to understanding the other's perspective on a changing world. Austen's economic way of thinking can be understood by analysing three major issues in her novels: poverty, human capital accumulation, and the marriage market. She also wrote extensively on trade-offs, opportunity costs, incentives, unintended consequences, and other concepts familiar to modern economists. As a student of human behaviour, Austen's novels provide readers with a new approach to the economic way of thinking.

Keywords: Jane Austen; Adam Smith; history of thought; economics; Enlightenment; novels; human capital accumulation; informal markets; moral sentiments; poverty; marriage market; economic thought; trade-offs; opportunity costs; incentives; unintended consequences; human behaviour. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=78850 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ids:ijplur:v:7:y:2016:i:2:p:170-182

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in International Journal of Pluralism and Economics Education from Inderscience Enterprises Ltd
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sarah Parker ().