Knut Wicksell on Knapp’s “State Theory of Money”

For some reason, Amazon.com was selling the “Selected Essays in Economics” of Knut Wicksell and edited by Bo Sandelin (two volumes) for €7.51 per volume, so I had them shipped over to Germany. They arrived this morning and I went to read the book review of “The State Theory of Money” in volume II on pages 210-219 (Some pages are readable at Google Books, btw). It was originally published in Ekonomisk Tidskrift in 1907, two years after Knapp’s book.

Wicksell, very much concerned with the connection between the state of credit and the interest rate and, very importantly, the changes in the level of (consumer goods) prices, does not like that Knapp aims to have a fixed exchange rate as the ultimate goal. This is one of the instances of the debate of what anchors a currency: a fixed exchange rate or a stable domestic price level.

Nevertheless, Wicksell agrees with Knapp and ends with this: “it can probably be said that in terms both of its content and its form – though most of all its form, its refined dialectical style, the elegance which the brief account given above has only been able to hint at dimly – it is to be counted among the pearls of economics literature.”

There is more on Wicksell and MMT in my working paper – written with Nicolas Barbaroux – published here.