No Wealth but Life
Welfare Economics and the Welfare State in Britain, 1880–1945

This book re-examines early twentieth-century British welfare economics in the context of the emergence of the welfare state.

Roger E. Backhouse (Edited by), Tamotsu Nishizawa (Edited by)

9781107569430, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 8 October 2015

258 pages
23 x 15.2 x 1.5 cm, 0.38 kg

'The papers in No Wealth but Life provide a wide-ranging historical and philosophical discussion of welfare economics during the period when the British welfare state was being established. The book is a very important contribution to the literature on this underexamined topic in the history of economics and public policy.' D. Wade Hands, University of Puget Sound

This book re-examines early twentieth-century British welfare economics in the context of the emergence of the welfare state. There are fresh views of the well-known Cambridge School of Sidgwick, Marshall, Pigou, and Keynes, by Peter Groenewegen, Steven G. Medema, and Martin Daunton. This is placed against a less well-known Oxford approach to welfare: Yuichi Shionoya explores its foundations in the idealist philosophy of T. H. Green; Roger E. Backhouse considers the work of its leading exponent, J. A. Hobson; and Tamotsu Nishizawa discusses the spread of this approach in Britain. Finally, the book covers welfare economics in the policy arena: Maria Cristina Marcuzzo and Atsushi Komine discuss Keynes and Beveridge, and Richard Toye points to the possible influence of H. G. Wells on Churchill and Lloyd George. A substantial introduction frames the discussion, and a postscript relates these ideas to the work of Robbins and subsequent developments in welfare economics.

1. Introduction: towards a reinterpretation of the history of welfare economics Roger E. Backhouse and Tamotsu Nishizawa
Part I. Cambridge Welfare Economics and the Welfare State: 2. Marshall on welfare economics and the welfare state Peter Groenewegen
3. Pigou's 'prima facie case': market failure in theory and practice Steven G. Medema
4. Welfare, taxation and social justice: reflections on Cambridge economists from Marshall to Keynes Martin Daunton
Part II. Oxford Ethics and the Problem of Welfare: 5. The Oxford approach to the philosophical foundations of the welfare state Yuichi Shionoya
6. J. A. Hobson as a welfare economist Roger E. Backhouse
7. The ethico-historical approach abroad: the case of Fukuda Tamotsu Nishizawa
Part III. Welfare Economics in the Policy Arena: 8. 'The great educator of unlikely people': H. G. Wells and the origins of the welfare state Richard Toye
9. Whose welfare state? Beveridge versus Keynes Maria Cristina Marcuzzo
10. Beveridge on a welfare society: an integration of his trilogy Atsushi Komine
Part IV. Postscript: 11. Welfare economics, old and new Roger E. Backhouse and Tamotsu Nishizawa.

Subject Areas: Economic history [KCZ], Political economy [KCP], Sociology [JHB], 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000 [HBLW]