Testimonials
From The White House
Dear Jim: On December 12, I signed into law the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985. This historic legislation will apply the brakes to runaway spending by the Federal government and force deficits onto a declining path to a balanced budget by 1991. If allowed to continue, deficits would pose a threat to the very fiber of our Republic – sapping the strength of the free enterprise system and threatening the future for generations of Americans. This law will forever change the way government arranges its spending priorities. The American people have waited a long time for just such a change. In signing the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings bill, I want to commend you for your hard work in helping draft and pass such landmark legislation. Your efforts will stand as testament to the spirit of shared objectives so important to the enactment of good public policy.
From Stanford University
In these two papers he managed to resolve a central conundrum that had plagued discussions in economic theory since the emergence of the idea of “imperfect competition” in the 1930’s, i.e. the question whether the observed existence of differential profit rates among firms could be consistent with the idea of competition among firms. He showed that there was no necessary inconsistency by mounting a rigorous analysis of the issues based on both a careful marshalling of the empirical data and on subtle theoretical arguments. These two papers remain a landmark work on this issue, well received by the economics profession and still widely quoted today. I have remained in regular personal contact with him ever since we worked together and have kept up with his professional career as he moved through various stages and institutional settings (both non-profit and for profit). Throughout this process of evolution, he has remained thoroughly professional, with a steady hand and sure-footed approach to maintaining high standards of work and a strong sense of integrity and respect for others, unstinting in his effort to keep up with new ideas, policy issues and evolving technologies for analysis of data and presentation. His varied work experience and wide range of contacts in both government and private industry provide him now with highly valuable assets that he would bring to the service of any company or institution that employs him. Professor of Economics Emeritus
From Harvard Business School
Many thanks for sending me a copy of your paper “’Missing Link’ in the Debate on Industrial Competitiveness?”. I found it extremely interesting. What was particularly valuable to me was the theoretical background – the intellectual history of the economists concepts of competition and the role of the firm in competition. As soon as I have a moment I will go over the article with care. If I have any comments, I will send them on to you. Let me say that I totally agree with your concluding remarks. Keep up the good work! I look forward to any comments you may have on the two chapters from Scale and Scope. Sincerely,
From Harris Corporation
Dear Jim: I have finally had a chance to review your report to SIA on the Sematech project. I was much impressed. I think this is the best overall presentation I have seen, not only because it is comprehensive and brings in some new materials from writings on economics but also because you make your points emphatically, clearly and concisely. I hope those responsible for the Sematech effort in Washington will make much use of this report. Best regards. Sincerely yours, Vice President Senior Legal Avisor
From Cambridge University
Like all great ideas, the central thesis is simple, and in retrospect, obvious: that the process of competition has been enhanced, not diminished, by the development of the modern corporation. Jim’s demonstration of the verity of this proposition was not simply asserted, but instead embedded in a sophisticated analysis of the development and use of the concept of competition in economic analysis, and powerful assessment of the empirical relevance of the relevant constructs. He begins from Piero Sraffa’s famous critique of competition in the Economic Journal of 1926, a critique that led to the development of models of imperfect competition in the 1930s. But Jim argued successfully that imperfect competition was not only a theoretical dead end (confined to partial equilibrium analysis), but also a serious mis-interpretation of Sraffa’s argument. Sraffa had argued for a new general approach that recognized that perfect competition had been a mathematical construct of Walrasian general equilibrium theory (a necessary assumption in the aggregation of individual actions from “price-taking” behavior as was beautifully demonstrated by Robert Aumann, Econometrica, 1964), and that competition as manifest in market reality was something completely different. And the something completely different was the capital mobility embodied in the modern corporation – capital mobility that is enhanced not diminished by the corporate form. Incidentally, Jim was not only able to persuade me that imperfect competition was dead end. He persuaded Joan Robinson too. The President Professor Lord Eatwell Queens’ College Cambridge, CB3 9ET.