We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
SIR JAMES STEUART ON THE PUBLIC DEBT.
- Authors
Stettner, Walter F.
- Abstract
This article focuses on the literary work of James Steuart related to the subject of public debt. The stupendous rise of the public debt during the present war has aroused concern among both economists and laymen over the ability of the nation to cope with its postwar economic problems in the face of what seems to be an unprecedented burden. This problem, however, is by no means unparalleled in history. During the eighteenth century Great Britain was involved in five wars, spaced over almost half of the century. During that period the public debt grew by leaps and bounds. It was 16.4 million pounds in 1701, 78.3 million in 1748, and 252.5 million in 1793. The impact of this continuous growth of the public debt on the economy of that period was in several respects more striking than that of the much larger increases of our time. In many ways, indeed, it supplies the key to the economic history of Britain and her rapid rise to commercial and industrial supremacy over the Continental nations. It contributed to economic development and exercised a stabilizing influence on British capitalism. Only James Steuart saw the social and economic implications of the growing public debt.
- Subjects
UNITED Kingdom; PUBLIC debts; STEUART, James, Sir, 1712-1780; ECONOMIC expansion; PUBLIC finance; BUSINESS cycles
- Publication
Quarterly Journal of Economics, 1945, Vol 59, Issue 3, p451
- ISSN
0033-5533
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.2307/1884574