The Underlying Theory of Modern Orthodox Neoclassical Economics: Mid-Conclusion - Part 4

In sum, then, what we have here in these two theories of Jevons’s and Menger’s is this. First, as pointed out by Vivian Walsh and Harvey Gram, in Jevons’s ‘mathematical’ theory of exchange we have the ‘maximizing individual’ being placed ‘at the center of the picture’ which in turn allows him to construct ‘a mathematical account of the allocation of given stocks of commodities among trading individuals’ (1980: 137-8), which constitutes the first part of the ‘marginalist’ or ‘neoclassical’ picture of a market economy like capitalism. And second, as also pointed out by Vivian Walsh and Harvey Gram, in Menger’s ‘non-mathematical’ theory of production we have the other, complimentary part of the ‘marginalist’ or ‘neoclassical’ picture of a market economy like capitalism, viz., a ‘[non-mathematical] theory of production by means of given resources’ (1980: 138). And furthermore, these two theories of Jevons’s and Menger’s are developed without any reference to social class categories or distinctions.