Education

Higher Education and Markets: Smith, Mill, Veblen, Riesman, and Buchanan

ABSTRACT

The idea for this particular conference was inspired by The Economic Institutions of Higher Education by J. Patrick Raines and Charles G. Leathers. The authors considered not only the purposes of higher education and curricular issues, but also how best to finance higher education and how alternative financing arrangements shape educational outcomes. Conferees read several chapters of this book along with selections from Smith, Mill, Veblen, Riesman, and Buchanan. 

READING LIST

From Liberty Fund

An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (vol. 2)

by By Adam Smith
Edited by R. H. Campbell and A. S. Skinner
William B. Todd, Textual Editor

First published in 1776, the year in which the American Revolution officially began, Smith’s Wealth of Nations sparked a revolution of its own. In it Smith analyzes the major elements of political economy, from market pricing and the division of labor to monetary, tax, trade, and other government policies that…

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Additional Readings

Buchanan, James and Nicos E. Devletoglou. Academia in Anarchy: An Economic Diagnosis. New York: Basic Books, 1970.

Greenberg, Milton. "A University is not a Business (and other fantasies)." Educause Review (March/April 2004): 10-15. http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/erm0420.pdf (accessed December 16, 2009).

Mill, John Stuart. The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill. Volume X - Essays on Ethics, Religion, and Society. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2006.

Mill, John Stuart. The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume I - Autobiography and Literary Essays [1824]. Edited by John M. Robson. Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1981. http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/mill-the-collected-works-of-john-stuart-mill-volume-i-autobiography-and-literary-essays (accessed October, 2009).

Mill, John Stuart. The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume XXI - Essays on Equality, Law, and Education. Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1984. http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=255&chapter=21681&layout=html&Itemid=27 (accessed July 13, 2009).

Mill, John Stuart. The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume II: Principles of Political Economy (Books I-II). Edited by J.M. Robson. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund Inc., 2006.

Raines, J. Patrick, and Charles G. Leathers . The Economic Institutions of Higher Education. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2003.

Thorstein Veblen. The Higher Learning in America. Cheltenham, UK: Dodo Press, 2009 [1918].