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Sir Arthur L. Bowley, 1869-1957

Photo of A.L.Bowley from Econometrica

English economist and statistician.  Arthur Lyon Bowley was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, during the tenure of Alfred Marshall, Bowley went on to become a lecturer at the newly-founded London School of Economics in 1895.  He would remain at L.S.E  for much of the remainder of his career.

Sir Arthur Bowley is best known for his active role in furthering the use of quantitative methods in economics. His famous Mathematical Groundwork (1924) resurrected the work of Francis Edgeworth, analyzed his theory of bargaining and popularized the famous "Edgeworth-Bowley" box.  His prominent position at the London School of Economics  made him an important ally of Lionel Robbins in his attempts to recast that institution away from its Fabian roots.

Bowley's penchant for quantitative methods are rooted in his early training as a mathematician and statistician - his 1893 and 1900 studies being largely viewed by him as exercises in applied statistics rather than economic history. His 1900 study, in particular, was later used by A.W. Phillips to develop his (in)famous "Phillips Curve". Bowley's work included a brave attempt in 1927 to estimate the British national income which, although not very successful, nonetheless launched further attempts by others to compile national income accounts. The so-called "Bowley's Law", i.e. constancy of wage share in national income, was presumably derived in that book. With R.G.D. Allen, Bowley also conducted one of the first empirical studies of consumption behavior (1935).

All this concentration on quantitative work should be unsurprising as Bowley's main career appointments were as a statistician and his most successful book was in fact his Elements of Statistics (1901) - incidentally, the first such textbook in the English language.

 

  

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Major Works of Arthur L. Bowley

  • A Short Account of England's Foreign Trade in the Nineteenth Century, 1893.[bk]
  • "Die Thätigkeit der Arbeitsabteilung (Labour Department) im englischen Handelsministerium" 1897, AfGSG,  p.298
  • "Review of Charles Booth's Life and Labour in London", 1898, AfGSG, p.805
  • Wages and Income in the United Kingdom Since 1860, 1900.
  • Wages in the United Kingdom in the Nineteenth Century: Notes for the use of students of social and economic questions, 1900 [bk]
  • Elements of Statistics, 1901.[bk]
  • The Measurement of Groups and Series, 1903 [bk]
  • Statistical Studies relating to National Progress in Wealth and Trade since 1882: A plea for further inquiry. 1904 [bk]
  • An Elementary Manual of Statistics, 1910 [1915 ed].
  • Livelihood and Poverty: a study in the economic conditions of working-class households, with A.R. Bennett-Hurst, 1915.
  • Prices and Earnings in Times of War, 1915 [bk]
  • The Division of the Product of Industry, 1919
  • The Change in the Distribution of the National Income, 1880-1913, 1920
  • Prices and Wages in the United Kingdom, 1914-1920, 1921 [bk]
  • Official Statistics: What they contain and how to use them. 1921 [bk]
  • The Division of the Product of Industry: An analysis of national income before the war, 1921 [bk]
  • The Mathematical Groundwork of Economics, 1924.
  • Has Poverty Diminished?, with M.Hogg, 1925.
  • The National Income 1924, with J. Stamp, 1927.
  • "Bilateral Monopoly", 1928, EJ
  • New Survey of London Life and Labour, 1930-35
  • Family Expenditure with R.G.D. Allen, 1935.
  • Wages and Income in the United Kingdom since 1860, 1937
  • Three Studies in National Income, 1939.
  • Studies in the National Income 1929–1934, 1942
HET
  • HET Pages: Monopoly Pricing and Bargaining

 
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