A tasty bit of late nineteenth-century political economy in the news today.

"Complex economic formulas developed by two professors of economics, Curtis Eaton and Mukesh Eswaran, and published in the current edition of the Economic Journal, suggest that greater affluence can seriously damage a nation's health. Based on their mathematical modelling, the economists advance the theory that once a country reaches a reasonable standard of living there is little further benefit to be had from increasing the wealth of its population. Indeed, it could make people feel worse off....

"Their work owes much to the economist Thorstein Veblen, who in 1899 coined the term "conspicuous consumption" in his book The Theory of the Leisure Class. Veblen argued that people seek status through conspicuous consumption, which derives its value not from the intrinsic worth of what is consumed but from the fact that it permits people to attempt to set themselves apart from others.

"As the economy grows, people increasingly choose status symbols or "Veblen goods" over other goods. "Those with above-average wealth consume Veblen goods with a positive impact on their happiness," the authors write. "But those with below-average wealth simply cannot afford these goods, so they have a negative impact on their happiness. This is known as 'Veblen competition'. As average wealth rises, people grow richer but not happier."

From The Observer, Sunday 14 March 2010

Going back over my work on the Christian Socialists and their thoughts on luxury consumption - in order to seek references to Veblen - is on my to-do list.  But overall this is an interesting example of the social and economic issues, and the solutions to them, once discussed at length by Christian Socialists and others, now coming back into vogue, and into the news, today.

Other recent examples include: Brixton's alternative currency. 'Community Cash'; Mark Boyle, the 'Cashless Man'; the Fair Trade Foundation; Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's Landshare scheme, along with food boxes and farmers' markets in general; and, to a lesser extent (because I haven't yet seen it, so this based upon a review only), Michael Moore's Capitalism: A Love Story.

In my thesis, I argue that the Christian Socialists left these ideas behind after 1906, settling for a time broadly upon nationalisation of the means of production, distribution, and exchange, until 1914 whereupon divisions over their conception of socialism returned. But it is important nonetheless that these recent efforts to moralise, escape, or supercede the market were all preceded by, if not being directly influenced by, the Christian Socialists (and many others) in the late nineteenth century.

These comparisons probably won't find their way into the thesis (apart from a footnote here or there), but it bodes well for potential lectures to students and the community, and for the eventual monograph. Plus, when explaining what it is that I do, it makes my life a bit easier.  So thanks guys: your efforts have not been in vain!