Profile Major Works Resources

Fred Manville Taylor, 1855-1932.

Portrait of F.M. Taylor


Son of a Methodist minister in Michigan, Fred (not Frederick, just Fred) Manville Taylor obtained his B.A. from Northwestern University in 1876 and an M.A. two years later. In 1879, F.M. Taylor became an "odds-and-ends" teacher at Albion College in Michigan. From 1884, while still keeping his Albion teaching job, Taylor began to study economics under Ely and Adams at Johns Hopkins. In 1887, Taylor transferred to the University of Michigan and received his Ph.D there. in 1888. 

In 1892, Fred M. Taylor finally left Albion to take up a position and the University of Michigan. He was made full professor at Michigan in 1904. He retired to California in 1929.

An early proponent of Marginalist theory, Fred M.  Taylor was involved in the Socialist Calculation debate, holding a position that would be later taken up by Oskar Lange and Abba Lerner.  This is most famously expressed in his 1928 Presidential Address to the A.E.A.

Fred M. Taylor famously coined the term "Say's Law", crediting Jean-Baptiste Say in his 1907 Readings (p.101 "We can increase our demand for goods only by increasing our production of goods").  The phrase "Say's Law" makes its first appearance in print in Taylor's JPE article of 1909, and is expounded on repeatedly in his textbook Principles of Economics (1911 first edition, p.157 and made the chapter heading in the 1921 8th edition, p.196), 

 

  

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Major Works of Fred M. Taylor

  • "Some Devices for Teaching Historical Geography", 1886, Science (Jun 11), p.525 [js]
  • "The Law of Nature", 1891, AAPSS (Apr), p.558 [js] [av]
  • The Right of the State to Be: An attempt to determine the ultimate human prerogative on which government rests, 1891 [bk]
  • "Review of S. Sherwood's History and Theory of Money", 1893, PSQ (Sep) p.557 [js]
  • "Do we want an elastic currency?", 1896, PSQ (Mar) [repr]
  • "The Objects and Methods of Currency Reform in the United States", 1898, QJE (Apr) p.307 [js]
  •  "The Final Report of the Indianapolis Monetary Commission", 1898, JPE (Jun), p.293 [js]
  • "Monetary Reform in the United States", 1898, EJ (Dec) p.579 [js]
  • Some Chapters on Money, 1906 [bk, av]
  • Some Readings in Economics, 1907 [bk]
  • "Methods of Teaching Elementary Economics at the University of Michigan", 1909, JPE (Dec), p.688 [js]
  • Principles of Economics, 1911 [bk, av] [1913 2nd ed, av; 1914 3rd ed, 1916 4th ed,  1918 5th ed, av, 1919 6th ed,1921 8th ed]
  • Key to Problems in Principles of Economics, 1921 [bk]
  • "The Guidance of Production in a Socialist State", 1929, AER  (v.19, Mar), p.1 [HET: pdf][1938 repr. in On the Economic Theory of Socialism,  with Oskar Lange].

 

HET

 
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Resources on Fred M. Taylor

  • "Review of FM Taylor's The Right of the State to Be", by WA Dunning:, 1892, PSQ (Mar) p.188 [js]
  • "Review of FM Taylor's The Right of the State to Be", by J.G.S. 1892 Philosophical Review, [js]
  • "Professor Fred M. Taylor Honored", 1925, Michigan Alumnus, p.815
  • "Fred M. Taylor's Views on Socialism", by Z.C. Dicksinson, 1960, Economica, p.42
  • Wikipedia

 

 
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