Issues in Contemporary Microeconomics and Welfare [antikvár]

PrefaceThese two volumes are modest attempts to capture and convey the spirit, essence, controversies, richness, variety, achievements and failures of some major advances in contemporary economics. They make no pretence at being comprehensive surveys of contemporary economics, nor at an encyclopaedic exposition of selected issues. They strive to shed some light on the fundamental issues, underlying tensions, and perennial challenges in contemporary economics. They present the reader with a sampling of the recent and ongoing quest to provide sohd, 'hard', scientific foundations for the dismal, yet fascinating subject of economics. This modern quest seeks to define more precisely the limits of economic knowledge and the conditions under which certain theorems hold, to exploit opportunities, and wherever possible to transgress previous limits with an enriched conceptual apparatus and more sophisticated techniques of analysis and measurement.Modern economists often ask smaller questions than did their predecessors. But whether large or small, old questions are being reiterated not only because of their intrinsic vitality and the fact that the available equipment is more sophisticated and thus may yield different and more precisely formulated answers, but also because the questions are framed somewhat differently, possibly affecting some of the answers. They also focus on new questions that have been attacked more or less (un)successfully with the aid of existing techniques. At the same time these techniques are being refined and amended or new ones invented and tried. In scholarly analysis, as in real life, it is the dynamics of the process that matter.The state of the art and science of economics depends vitally on its practitioners' ability to identify real problems, to devise means for overcoming apparently insurmountable difficulties, and to take advantage of unexploited opportunities for doing useful and exciting work. Modern economics is characterized by sharp disagreements about some of the fundamentals and large gaping lacunae in our knowledge and understand-xiii