Educated at the University of Vienna where he studied law, Bohm-Bawerk read Carl Menger's Principles of Economics and quickly became a staunch follower of his theories. He worked for the Austrian ministry of finance for a time after receiving his doctorate in 1875. In 1881, he took a teaching position at the University of Innsbruck. During his tenure there, he published the first two volumes of his economic masterpiece, Capital and Interest. In 1889, he worked on tax reform for the ministry and in 1895 became the Austrian Minister of Finance. A firm adherent of a balanced budget and the strict maintenance of the gold standard, he resigned from his third term as minister in 1904 when demands from the military establishment threatened his balanced budget. He returned to the University of Vienna where he held the chair of Political Economy until his death in 1914. Bohm-Bawerk possessed a brilliant mind and was an important contributor to modern economic theory. He was also one of the first economists to discuss the views of Karl Marx seriously, publishing Karl Marx and the Close of His System in 1896 as a strong rebuttal of Marxian theory. |
Chrysoma Associates Limited
