risk uncertainty and profit英文版

1、Risk, Uncertainty, and Profit by Frank H. Knight, Ph.D. First edition, 1921. Hart, Schaffner Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, The Riverside Press, Cambridge. Preface Author's Preface Part I Introductory I.I The

2、 Place of Profit and Uncertainty in Economic Theory I.II Theories of Profit; Change and Risk in Relation to Profit Part II Perfect Competition II.III Theory of Choice and of Exchange II.IV Joint Production and Capita

3、lization II.V Change and Progress with Uncertainty Absent II.VI Minor Prerequisites for Perfect Competition Part III Imperfect Competition through Risk and Uncertainty III.VII The Meaning of Risk and Uncertainty III

4、.VIII Structures and Methods for Meeting Uncertainty III.IX Enterprise and Profit III.X Enterprise and Profit (continued)The Salaried Manager III.XI Uncertainty and Social Progress III.XII Social Aspects of Uncertain

5、ty and Profit Footnotes About the Book and Author Author's PrefaceThere is little that is fundamentally new in this book. It represents an attempt to state the essential principles of the conventional economic doc

6、trine more accurately, and to show their implications more clearly, than has previously been done. That is, its object is refinement, not reconstruction; it is a study in “pure theory.“ The motive back of its presentatio

7、n is twofold. In the first place, the writer cherishes, in the face of the pragmatic, philistine tendencies of the present age, especially characteristic of the thought of our own country, the hope that careful, rigorous

8、 thinking in the field of social problems does after all have some significance for human weal and woe. In the second place, he has a feeling that the “practicalism“ of the times is a passing phase, even to some extent a

9、 pose; that there is a strong undercurrent of discontent with loose and superficial thinking and a real desire, out of sheer intellectual self-respect, to reach a clearer understanding of the meaning of terms and dogmas

10、which pass current as representing ideas. For the first of these assumptions a few words of elaboration or defense may be in place, in anticipation of the essay itself. AP.1 The “practical“ justification for the study of

11、 general economics is a belief in the possibility of improving the quality of human life through changes in the form of organization of want-satisfying activity. More specifically, most projects of social betterment invo

12、lve the substitution of some more consciously social or political form of control for private property and individual freedom of contract. The assumption underlying such studies as the present is that changes of this cha

13、racter will offer greater prospect of producing real improvement if they are carried out in the light of a clear understanding of the nature and tendencies of the system which it is proposed to modify or displace. The es

14、say, therefore, endeavors to isolate and define the essential characteristics of free enterprise as a system or method of securing and directing co 鰋 perative effort in a social group. As a necessary condition of success

15、 in this endeavor it is assumed that the description and explanation of phenomena must be radically separated from all questions of defense or criticism of the system under examination. By means of first showing what the

16、 system is, it is hoped that advance may be made toward discovering what such a system can, and what it cannot, accomplish. A closely related aim is that of formulating the data of the problem of economic organization, t

17、he unchangeable materials with which, and conditions under which, any machinery of organization has to work. A sharp and clear conception of these fundamentals is viewed as a necessary foundation for answering the questi

18、on as to what is reasonably to be expected of a method of organization, and hence of whether the system as such is to be blamed for the failure to achieve ideal results, of where if at all it is at fault, and the sort of

19、 change or substitution which offers sufficient chance for improvement to justify experimentation. AP.2 The net result of the inquiry is by no means a defense of the existing order. On the contrary, it is probably to emp