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I was asked a fun question this morning

Has there ever been someone versed in Classical Liberal economics in the Commons? Bastiat was in the the French National Assembly, after all.

Hmm. I took a bit of time to answer:

In August 1818 he bought Lord Portarlington’s seat in Parliament for £4,000

I think David Ricardo qualifies?

Cobden obviously. No, Redwood etc don’t count, we mean proper economists who are also MPs. Any more? Keith Joseph?

21 thoughts on “I was asked a fun question this morning”

  1. Are you saying ti would have been better or worse if we had more people who thought the market was a disembodied lab experiment that survived intact from book to real world

    Worse ?

  2. Clement Attlee certainly know about classical economics. But he did not embrace it being attracted by the more fashionable economics of The Left, because then it meant more votes from the lower elementary school educated classes.

  3. The last chancellor with an economics degree (and also banking experience) was Norman Lamont

  4. Is it clasically liberal to buy an elected office?

    “… the market was a disembodied lab experiment that survived intact from book to real world ”

    Er, how does socialism fare, book versus real world?

  5. “I’ll raise you a fedora wearing pensioner”
    wasnae he a student of the sweet science?

  6. Dennis the Peasant

    Are you saying ti would have been better or worse if we had more people who thought the market was a disembodied lab experiment that survived intact from book to real world

    As opposed to morons who write shit comments that read like they’d been cut and pasted from one of Ritchie’s Tax Research UK posts?

  7. “Are you saying ti would have been better or worse if we had more people who thought the market was a disembodied lab experiment that survived intact from book to real world”

    It would certainly be better if we had no people at all who believed that socialism worked and that the answer when it fails is to try it again, only harder and that when THAT fails the answer is to try it again only much much harder

  8. Back in the 1980s, Alex Salmond was ‘an oil economist’ for the Royal Bank of Scotland, which basically meant he guessed the oil price (usually incorrectly) for a job. There was no indication he understood much about economics, or oil for that matter. In fact, he barely even bothered to do that, spending most of his time lunching and playing politics on the company’s time (and dime).

  9. morons who write shit comments that read like they’d been cut and pasted from one of Ritchie’s Tax Research UK posts

    Even Spud is more coherent.

  10. Wasn’t Vince an economist?

    wiki…. degree in economics, Kenyan government economist, then Shell.

  11. As I recall the Kenyan economy has done very well over the years. Strong growth, no poverty, little inflation….

  12. Wasn’t Vince an economist?

    He may have been an economist, but he’s certainly no liberal.

  13. Vince wrote a chapter of the Orange Book, but ever since has seemed to give the impression he was roped into it.

  14. John Stuart Mill, MP 1865-68.

    John Stuart Mill,
    By a mighty effort of will,
    Overcame his natural bonhomie
    And wrote Principles of Political Economy.
    (E.C. Bentley, 1905)

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