Nassau William Senior

Nassau William Senior (born on September 26, 1790 – died June 4, 1864), was an English economist, first professor to occupy chair of political economy in England, and a strong proponent of laissez-faire economy.

Life

William N. Senior was born at Compton, Berkshire, England, the eldest son of the Rev. John Raven Senior, vicar of Durnford, Wiltshire, and Mary Duke, the daughter of the solicitor-general of Barbados. William Senior was educated at Eton and Magdalen College, Oxford. At the university he was a private pupil of Richard Whately, afterwards archbishop of Dublin, with whom he remained connected by ties of lifelong friendship. He obtained the B.A. degree in 1811, and qualified for the Bar in 1819. In 1836, during the chancellorship of Lord Cottenham, he was appointed the Master in Chancery.

Senior became interested in economics already in early stages of his career. He became the first Drummond professor of political economy at Oxford in 1825, the chair he occupied till 1830, and again from 1847 to 1852. In 1830 he was requested by the Prime Minister William Melbourne to inquire into the state of combinations and strikes, to report on the state of the law and to suggest improvements in it. He was the author, together with Edwin Chadwick, of the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834, which led to the establishment of the workhouse system in England. His An Outline of the Science of Political Economy (1836) tried to bring classical economy closer to scientific principles.

Senior was an advisor to successive British governments, advising them on important economic and political issues, including employment policy, trade, wages, working hours, education, etc. He played important role especially as an advisor of Whig Party. He was a member of the Poor Law Inquiry Commission of 1832, and of the Handloom Weavers Commission of 1837; the report of the latter, published in 1841, was drawn up by him, and he embodied in it the substance of the report he had prepared some years before on combinations and strikes. He was also one of the commissioners appointed in 1864 to inquire into popular education in England.

Senior lost his position as Professor of Political Economy at King's College, London, for his support of the Catholic Church of Ireland.

In the later years of his career, he started to travel to foreign countries to study the political and social phenomena they exhibited. Several volumes of his journals have been published, among others Journal Kept in Turkey and Greece (1859) and Conversations and Journals in Egypt and Malta (1882).

Senior was for many years a frequent contributor to the Edinburgh Quarterly, London Review and North British Review, dealing in their pages with literary as well as with economic and political subjects.

He died in Kensington, on June 4, 1864, in the age of 74.

Work

In his major work An Outline of the Science of Political Economy (1836) Senior tries to make economy more scientific and more practical. He criticized John Stuart Mill and others who, in his opinion, saw economy as a hypothetical science, based on postulates not corresponding with social realities. He believed that political economy is purely a deductive science, all the truths of which are inferences from social reality. The premises from which it sets out are, according to him, not assumptions but facts. The political economy as it was until then, however, concerns itself with wealth only, and can therefore give no practical counsel as to political action. It can only suggest considerations which the politician should keep in view as elements in the study of the questions with which he has to deal. Therefore, as such, political economy is impractical and thus limited. The conception of economics as altogether deductive is certainly erroneous, and puts the science from the outset on a false path. But deduction has a real, though limited, sphere within it. Hence, though the chief difficulties of the subject are not of a logical kind, yet accurate nomenclature, strict definition and rigorous reasoning are of great importance. To these Senior gave special attention, and, notwithstanding occasional pedantries, with very useful results.

In several instances he improved the forms in which accepted doctrines were habitually stated. He also did excellent service by pointing out the arbitrary novelties—and frequent inconsistencies of terminology which deface Ricardo's principal works. For example, Senior objected to Ricardo’s use of value in the sense of cost of production, and of high and low wages in the sense of a certain proportion of the product as distinguished from an absolute amount, and his peculiar employment of the epithets fixed and circulating as applied to capital. Senior shows, too, that in numerous instances the premises assumed by Ricardo were false.

Besides adopting some terms, such as that of natural agents, from [[Jean-Baptiste Say|]], Senior introduced the word “abstinence” into economic theory. Abstinence theory of profits describes a process of getting a reward for not spending one’s accumulated capital. He thus believed that the saving and accumulation of capital must be considered a part of the cost of production.

He also opposed Thomas Malthus, leading the revolt among classical economists against his theory of population. Senior argued that the growth of population, combined with the rising living standards, would be able to support the growth of economy, contrary to what Malthusians claimed.

Senior also added some important considerations to what had been said by Adam Smith on the division of labor. He distinguishes usefully between the rate of wages and the price of labor. But in seeking to determine the law of wages he falls into the error of assuming a determinate wage-fund, and states as an economic truth what is only an identical proposition in arithmetic. Senior was one of the developers of the ill-fated "wages-fund" doctrine, which was later harshly attacked by Francis Amasa Walker.

Senior also did important contributions to the theory of rent, and improved the theory on the distribution of precious metals. He also drew relationship between productivity and price levels. His theory that last hour of work was the most productive hour, when profits are made, was used later to oppose the reduction of working hours in manufacturing industry.

Legacy

William Nassau Senior was the first Professor of Political Economy at Oxford, occupying first such chair in England. Through his theories he made significant contributions to the theories of rent, population, money, and international trade. He never became influential as Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, or David Ricardo, but he made some important changes in the theories of those authors. John Stuart Mill was inspired with the ideas of Senior.

Senior’s supply scheme of the utility-based demand and the cost of production can be regarded as an important forerunner of the Marginalist Revolution.

Publications

• Senior, William N. 1835. Statement of the Provision for the Poor and of the Condition of the Laboring Classes in a considerable portion of America and Europe, being the Preface to the Foreign Communications in the Appendix to the Poor Law Report. B. Fellowes, publisher to the Poor-law Commissioners

• Senior, William N. 1837. Letters on the Factory Act, as it affects the cotton manufacture: Addressed, in the spring of 1837, to the Right Honourable the President of the Board of Trade. B. Fellowes, publisher to the Poor-law Commissioners

• Senior, William N. 1965 (original published in 1831). Three Lectures on the Rate of Wages. Augustus M. Kelley Pubs. ISBN 067800126X

• Senior, William N. 1972 (original published in 1865). Biographical sketches. Books for Libraries Press. ISBN 0836928245

• Senior, William N. 1976 (original published in 1831). Two Lectures on Population: Delivered Before the University of Oxford. Ayer Co. Pub. ISBN 0405079966

• Senior, William N. 1977 (original published in 1859). A Journal Kept in Turkey and Greece in the autumn of 1857 and the beginning of 1858. Arno Press. ISBN 0405097204

• Senior, William N. 1990 (original published in 1836). Political Economy. Thoemmes Continuum. ISBN 1843714272

• Senior, William N. 2001 (original published in 1882). Conversations and Journals in Egypt and Malta (2 vols.). Adamant Media Corporation. ISBN 1402193262

• Senior, William N. 2002 (original published in 1836). An Outline of the Science of Political Economy. University Press of the Pacific. ISBN 1410203859

• Senior, William N. 2002 (original published in 1871). Journals Kept in France and Italy from 1848 to 1852: With a sketch of the revolution of 1848. Adamant Media Corporation. ISBN 1421233525

• Senior, William N. 2002. Selected Writings on Economics 1827-1852. University Press of the Pacific. ISBN 141020264X

• Senior, William N. 2002 (original published in 1830). The Cost of Obtaining Money and on Some Effects of Private and Government Paper Money. University Press of the Pacific. ISBN 1410201910

• Senior, William N. 2003. Population and the Poor Laws. Thoemmes Continuum. ISBN 1843714299

• Senior, William N. 2003 (original published in 1828). Transmission of the Precious Metals from Country to Country, and the Mercantile Theory of Wealth. University Press of the Pacific. ISBN 1410209520

• Senior, William N. 2004 (original published in 1861). Education. Thoemmes Continuum. ISBN 1843714329

• Senior, William N. 2004 (original published in 1829). Three Lectures on the Value of Money. University Press of the Pacific. ISBN 141021320X

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Bowley, Marian. 1968 (original published in 1937). Nassau Senior and Classical Economics. Octagon Books. ISBN 0374908745

• Hayek, F.A., Bartley W.W., & Kresge, S. 1991. The Trend of Economic Thinking: Essays on Political Economists and Economic History. University Of Chicago Press. ISBN 0226320677

• Levy, Samuel L. 1970 (original published in 1943). Nassau W. Senior, 1790-1864: Critical Essayist, Classical Economist and Adviser of Governments. A. M. Kelley. ISBN 0678056765

• Niehans, Jürg. 1994. A History of Economic Theory: Classic Contributions, 1720-1980. The Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 0801849764

• Thweatt, William O. 1899. Classical Political Economy: A Survey of Recent Literature. Springer. ISBN 0898382297

External links

• Nassau William Senior #1 – Picture of Senior when he was a boy

• Nassau William Senior #2 - Picture of Senior in his 50s

• Biography – Short biography and bibliography

• Money, Method, and the Market Process - Ludwig von Mises’s article on Senior's views on monetary problems

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