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The last word on Giffen goods?

Author

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  • John H. Nachbar

    (Department of Economics, Box 1208, Washington University, St. Louis, MO 63130, USA)

Abstract

Giffen goods have long been a minor embarrassment to economics. While it is customary to dismiss them as empirically irrelevant, this essay argues that a more fundamental difficulty with Giffen goods has somehow been overlooked.

Suggested Citation

  • John H. Nachbar, 1998. "The last word on Giffen goods?," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 11(2), pages 403-412.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:joecth:v:11:y:1998:i:2:p:403-412
    Note: Received: March 20, 1996; revised version: February 3, 1997
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. George J. Stigler, 1947. "Notes on the History of the Giffen Paradox," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 55, pages 152-152.
    2. Dougan, William R, 1982. "Giffen Goods and the Law of Demand," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(4), pages 809-815, August.
    3. Xavier Vives, 1987. "Small Income Effects: A Marshallian Theory of Consumer Surplus and Downward Sloping Demand," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 54(1), pages 87-103.
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    Cited by:

    1. Di Vita, Giuseppe, 2001. "Are the outputs derived from secondary materials giffen goods?," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 255-260, December.
    2. Daniel Friedman & József Sákovics, 2015. "Tractable consumer choice," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 79(2), pages 333-358, September.
    3. W D A Bryant, 2009. "General Equilibrium:Theory and Evidence," World Scientific Books, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., number 6875, January.
    4. Le Van, Cuong & Pham, Ngoc-Sang, 2020. "Demand and equilibrium with inferior and Giffen behaviors," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 45-50.
    5. Sproule, Robert A., 2020. "The delimitation of Giffenity for the Wold-Juréen (1953) utility function using relative prices: A note," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 14, pages 1-8.
    6. Franks, Edwin & Bryant, William D.A., 2018. "The Uncompensated Law of Demand in an exchange economy," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 168(C), pages 127-131.
    7. Zhu, Drew, 2016. "The Mechanism of Giffen Behaviour," MPRA Paper 75707, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Olli Salmensuu, 2021. "Potato Importance for Development Focusing on Prices," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 14(3), pages 1-14, March.
    9. Felix Kubler & Larry Selden & Xiao Wei, 2014. "When Is a Risky Asset "Urgently Needed"?," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(2), pages 131-162, May.
    10. Peter Sørensen, 2007. "Simple Utility Functions with Giffen Demand," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 31(2), pages 367-370, May.
    11. Junko Doi & Kazumichi Iwasa & Koji Shimomura, 2012. "Giffen Behavior Independent of the Wealth Level," Lecture Notes in Economics and Mathematical Systems, in: Wim Heijman & Pierre Mouche (ed.), New Insights into the Theory of Giffen Goods, pages 105-126, Springer.
    12. Paul Oslington, 2012. "General Equilibrium: Theory and Evidence," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 88(282), pages 446-448, September.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • B4 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Economic Methodology
    • D5 - Microeconomics - - General Equilibrium and Disequilibrium

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