Dutot, ?-?.
A cashier at the French Compagnie des Indes about whom nothing is
known. Even his first name is uncertain, and older
references customarily refer to him simply as "Dutot". Although some
recent researchers have taken to calling him "Charles de Ferrare Dutot", it
remains only a guess, and it is unclear that it refers to the same person.
Dutot's fame rests on his 1738 book defended the doctrines of John Law
and criticized the monetary theories of his associate
Jean-François Melon.
He looked upon commercial expansion as the key to economic growth.
Dutot recommended an abundant money supply to lower interest to encourage both
economic activity and population growth.
Dutot is generally
credited for being the first to use the "arithmetic mean" to
compute index numbers.
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Major Works of Dutot
- Réflexions politiques sur les finance et le commerce. Où l’on examine quelles
on été sur les revenus, les denrées, le change étranger, et le conséquemment sur notre commerce, les
influences des augmentations et des deminuations des valeurs numéraires des
monnoyes, 1738
v.1,
v.2,
- 1740 ed.,
v.1,
v.2]
- 1754 ed.,
v.1,
v.2
- 1851 Guillaumin ed, Économistes financiers du XVIIIe siècle,
p.785
- English 1739
transl,
Political Reflections on the Finances &
Commerce of France, shewing the causes which formerly obstructed the
advancement of her trade; on how much better footing it stands now than
it did under Lewis XIV. with several expedients for raising it still to
a greater height
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Resources on Dutot
- Voltaire (1738) "Observations
sur MM. Jean Law, Melon et Dutot, sure le commerce, le luxe, les monnaies et
les impots" [repr. in 1839 Oeuvres de Voltaire, v.1,
p.9]
- Voltaire (1738) "Lettre
a M. Thiriot sur l'ouvrage de M. Melon et sur celui de M. Dutot", [repr.
in 1842 Oeuvres Completes de Voltaire, v.1
p.157]
- "Notice historique sur la vie et les travaux de Dutot", in Guillaumin,
1851 Économistes financiers du XVIIIe siècle, 2nd ed.,
p.781
- "Dutot"in L.B.
Say
and J. Chailley-Bert, editors, Nouveau Dictionnaire de l'économie politique
[1900 ed.]
- "Dutot"
in R.H. Inglis Palgrave, editor,
1894-1901 Dictionary of Political Economy
[1901 ed.]
- "Dutot's Method" by C. Moylan Walsh, 1901, The Measurement of General
Exchange-Value, App. C,
p.534
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