Deirdre McCloskey reports,
"In one decade in the eighteenth century, according to the Swedish economist and historian Eli Heckscher in his book of 1932, Mercantilism, the French government sent tens of thousands of souls to the galleys and executed 16,000 (that?s about 4.4 people a day over the ten years: you see the beauty of statistical thinking) for the hideous crime of...are you ready to hear the appalling evil these enemies of the State committed, fully justifying hanging them all, every damned one of their treasonable skins? ...importing printed calico cloth..."
This is from her paper, "The Secret Sins of Economics." This sort of thing undoubtedly violates some sort of multilateral trade agreements, or certainly will with the expiration of the rules allowing clothing and textile quotas at the end of the year.
There are many sins, but "in the end they are one, deriving from pride, as all sins do." I can't tell you what the one sin is yet. I've worked my way through the "Virtues misidentified as sins," "Venial Sins, Easily Forgiven," and have reached, "Numerous Weighty Sins Requiring Special Grace to Forgive But Sins Not Peculiar To Economics." The last section is "The Two Real Sins, Almost Peculiar to Economics." She doesn't tell you what the ultimate sin is until the end, and I'm not sure I should tell you when I find out. I don't want to spoil the surprise for you.
I learned about this from a posting by Tyler Cowen: "The Secret Sins of Economics"
P.S. 11-11-04; 11 PM:
After thinking it over this evening, I'm wondering about this estimate of 16,000 executions. Is this really true? It sounds unlikely. John McDermott indicates, in footnote 12 to "Mercantilism and Modern Growth" ) , that Robert Ekelund and Robert Tollison disagree with the 16,000 estimate in their 1981 book Mercantilism as a Rent-Seeking Society. (College Station: Texas A&M University Press).
Comments