EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Jules Dupuit and the railroads: what is the role of the State?

Philippe Poinsot

Post-Print from HAL

Abstract: The emergence of railroads in France in the nineteenth century raised new debates on analytical issues. The issue lies in the fact that they are natural monopolies. In this paper, I focus on Jules Dupuit's work on the operations of the railroads. Curiously, he seemed to have defended two contrasting positions: on the one hand, he claimed that unlimited competition is the most effi cient way to operate in the railroads; on the other, he stated that State management was the best way to run them. I aim to restore the consistency of Dupuit's positions. I show that, for him, unlimited competition is not possible in the railroads and that it is not necessarily good for the welfare of society. Therefore, the State should regulate this sector. Then, I specify the conditions under which Dupuit believed the State should manage the railroads instead of offering concessions to private companies.

Date: 2016-06
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-01383443v1
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Published in Journal of the History of Economic Thought, 2016, 38 (2), ⟨10.1017/S1053837216000080⟩

Downloads: (external link)
https://hal.science/hal-01383443v1/document (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: JULES DUPUIT AND THE RAILROADS: WHAT IS THE ROLE OF THE STATE? (2016) Downloads
Working Paper: Jules Dupuit and the railroads: what is the role of the State? (2012) Downloads
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:hal:journl:hal-01383443

DOI: 10.1017/S1053837216000080

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Post-Print from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-22
Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-01383443