Marginal utility school

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The Marginal Utility School is a theory of economics that emerged almost simultaneously in England, Austria and Switzerland at the beginning of the 1870s, focusing on the concept of utility . It seeks to solve the classic paradox of values ​​by applying the microeconomic marginal principle (also known as the border principle ) to the usefulness of a good . The marginal principle is one of the core building blocks of the currently prevailing neoclassical theory in economics.

Basic principle

The central concept of marginal utility is to be understood as the utility of the last available unit of a good that covers needs, the value of a good is thus determined by the subjective appreciation of its last unit (“boundary unit”). With this basic principle of economic decision theory , the influence of small ( marginal ) changes in action on target variables such as benefits or costs is considered. Mathematically, the marginal principle is based on partial differentials of the cost or benefit functions , differentiated according to the quantities used or consumed. The marginal principle originally goes back to the German economist Johann Heinrich von Thünen , who applied differential calculus to economic questions and provided the first solution to the classic value paradox. The French economic theorist Antoine-Augustin Cournot used the principle as a basis for developing the price-sales function and determining the profit maximum of a supply monopoly ( Cournot point ), while the German economist Hermann Heinrich Gossen used it for research into the satisfaction of needs and thus for the development of the Gossen people Laws took advantage. Since the end of the 19th century, the neoclassical theory, which was based on the marginal utility schools and whose considerations were the trigger of the “marginalist revolution”, has predominated in microeconomics ; in modern economics, the advanced considerations are essential.

In contrast to the forerunners in classical economics (and the analyzes of Marxism derived from it), the value of a commodity (or a factor) in the marginal utility analysis is subjective (hence a "subjective" value theory) insofar as the individual expected value for utility (and productivity) flow into the decision, and is opposed to the competing labor theory of value, which is particularly relevant in Marxism ("objective value theory"), according to which the value of a commodity (not to be confused with the " use value " according to Marx, the other side or the way of looking at a commodity) results from the socially necessary labor (not labor ) required for production or, more precisely: for reproduction ; that means in the end - abstractly - measurable in working hours; namely in the time that a company producing under socially necessary conditions needs on average to produce a commodity. In the Marxist labor theory of value, this implies the real exchange / sale / export etc. (exchange value). In the logic of objective value theory there is no value without exchange. The use value corresponds roughly to the concept of utility or marginal utility according to HH Gossen, Carl Menger or Léon Walras. For Marx, use value (in the sense of utility for the - average - buyer) is a prerequisite for value to be created and reproduced. According to the objective theory of value, the price fluctuates around the abstract value, depending on supply and demand, so it normally deviates from it.

The different schools

literature