NORRIS, RUBY TURNER. The Theory of Consumer's Demand. Pp. xiv, 206. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1941. $3.00

• DOI: 10.1177/000271624222100160
• Date: 01 May 1942
• Published date: 01 May 1942
• Subject Matter: Articles

221

tries

with

undemocratically

inclined

gov-

ernments,

in

contrast

with

the

military

aggressiveness

of

fascist

invaders

who

used

as

a

spœrhead

the

reactionaries

whom

the

tolerant

Spanish

Republic

had

allowed

to

retain

places

of

military,

economic,

and

ec-

clesiastical

power.

The

world

must

be

saved

from

ruin,

not

by

blindly

allowing

the

wealthy

to

retain

the

position

of

pre-emi-

nence

which

they

have

enjoyed

in

many

times

and

places

in

the

past,

even

if

a

par-

ticular

kind

of

distribution

curve

should

be

found

to

describe

this

pre-eminence

better

than

the

Pareto

curve

fits

the

actual

facts,

but

by

ejecting

from

places

of

military,

economic,

and

political

power

the

fascist-

minded,

antidemocratic

reactionaries

who

have

so

often

been

found

at

these

key

points.

President

Conant

of

Harvard

has

called

for

the

development

of

&dquo;roving

scholars&dquo;

whose

competence

and

activities

should

not

be

confined

by

traditional

departmental lim-

its.

Mathematical

statisticians

perhaps

ap-

proximate

more

closely

than

anyone

else

the

ideal

roving

scholar

who

dips

into

all

sorts

of

things

hitherto

considered

separate

and

distinct.

This

remarkable

book

de-

serves

attention

for

many

reasons,

of

which

one

is

the

fact

that

it

displays

the

work

of

a

brilliant

scholar

whose

roving

has

carried

him

into

more

fields

than

even

H.

G.

Wells

ever

reached,

but

who

has

managed

to

establish

connections

among

these

many

diverse

territories.

HAROLD

HOTELLING

Columbia

University

NORRIS,

RUBY

TURNER.

The

Theory

of

Consumer’s

Demand.

Pp. xiv, 206.

New

Haven:

Yale

University

Press,

1941.

$3.00.

&dquo;The

most

hopeful

development

in

eco-

nomic

theory

for

decades

I

believe

to

be

the

theory

of

monopolistic

competition.

It

has

come

about

largely

through

changed

assumptions

as

to

the

elasticity

of

the

de-

mand

schedule

which

confronts

the

indi-

vidual

producer.

Yet

the

development

which

has

resulted

has

been

concerned

al-

most

wholly

with

supply

factors.

We

still

think

of

market,

normal,

total

or

sellers’

demand

schedules

being

integrated

from

individual

demand

schedules

which

reveal

various

quantities

of

identical

undifferen-

tiated

commodities

a

person

would

take

at

various

possible

prices.&dquo;

Following

this

introductory

paragraph,

the

author

says

that

she

aims

to

develop,

in

this

book,

a

theory

of

demand

on

the

basis

of

much

the

same

assumptions

as

those

used

by

Professor

Chamberlin

and

Mrs.

Robinson.

Just

as

they

have

rewritten

sup-

ply theory

in

terms

of

a

limited

number

of

close

competitors

who

sell

differentiated

products,

so

the

author

endeavors

to

re-

write

the

theory

of

demand

in

terms

of

re-

lated

goods.

The

book

is

divided

into

two

parts

of

unequal

length.

In

Part

One,

Dr.

Norris

briefly

reviews

the

economic

theories

of

demand

of

the

Major

schools

of

thought.

She

points

out

the

limited

extent

to

which

the

various

theories

lend

themselves

to

reality,

i.e.,

to

monopolistic

competition.

She

maintains

that

today

the

frontier

of

economic

theory

consists

of

shifting,

step

by

step,

the

assumptions

upon

which

eco-

nomic

theory

is

built

closer

to

this

reality.

She

attempts

to

push

back

the

frontier

on

the

demand

side

by

developing

a

theory

of

consumer’s

demand

based,

in

so

far

as

she

is

able,

upon

facts.

In

her

preface

and

again

in

the

concluding

chapter

Dr.

Norris

stresses

the

point

that

&dquo;it

is

high

time

that

economists,

like

sociologists,

took

to

the

field,&dquo;

that

is,

&dquo;interview

and

study

the

be-

havior

of

the

practicing

price

setter.&dquo;

And

to

the

extent

that

economic

theory

employs

this

realistic

method,

it

becomes

more

and

more

necessary,

the

author

maintains,

to

analyze

demand

in

concrete

terms.

This

she

tries

to

do,

although

she

states

that

since

&dquo;human

nature

is

always

lurking

in

the

background,

demand

theory

can

never

be

very

fully

treated.&dquo;

In Part

Two,

which

is

more

than

twice

the

length

of

Part

One,

Dr.

Norris

develops

a

theory

of

demand

in

terms

of

related

goods.

She

uses

the

various

analyses

re-

viewed

in

Part

One,

selecting

whatever

one

seems

for

the

purpose

the

most

productive;

at

times,

as

in

her

discussion

of

&dquo;The

Long-

run

Theory

of

Demand&dquo;

in

Chapter

VII,

she

presents

her

conclusion

in

three

ways,

namely:

in

marginal-utility

terms,

in

in-

difference

terms,

and

in

preference-index

terms.

After

pointing

out

that

the

Mar-

at SAGE PUBLICATIONS on December 4, 2012ann.sagepub.comDownloaded from