In the years following its publication, F. A. Hayek's pioneering work on business cycles was regarded as an important challenge to what was later known as Keynesian macroeconomics. Today, as debates rage on over the monetary origins of the current economic and financial crisis, economists are once again paying heed to Hayek's thoughts on the repercussions of excessive central bank interventions. The latest editions in Routledge's ongoing series The Collected Works of F. A. Hayek, these volumes bring together Hayek's work on what causes periods of boom and bust in the economy. Moving away from the classical emphasis on equilibrium, Hayek demonstrates that business cycles are generated by the adaptation of the structure of production to changes in relative demand. Thus, when central banks artificially lower interest rates, the result is a misallocation of capital and the creation of asset bubbles and additional instability. Business Cycles: Part I contains Hayek's two major monographs on the topic: Monetary Theory and the Trade Cycle and Prices and Production. Reproducing the text of the original 1933 translation of the former, this edition also draws on the original German, as well as more recent translations. For Prices and Production, a variorum edition is presented, incorporating the 1931 first edition and its 1935 revision. Business Cycles: Part II assembles a series of Hayek's shorter papers on the topic, ranging from the 1920s to 1981. In addition to bringing together Hayek's work on the evolution of business cycles, the two volumes of Business Cycles also include extensive introductions by Hansjoerg Klausinger, placing the writings in intellectual context, including their reception and the theoretical debates to which they contributed, and providing background on the evolution of Hayek's thought.

"Is the business cycle obsolete?" This often cited title of a book edited by Bronfenbren ner with the implicit affirmation of the question reflected the attitude of mainstream macroeconomics in the Sixties regarding the empirical relevance of cyclic motions of an economy. The successful income policies, theoretically grounded in Keynesian macroec onomics, seemed to have eased or even abolished the fluctuations in West,ern economies which motivated studies of many classical and neoclassical economists for more than 100 years. The reasoning behind the conviction that business cycles would increasingly become irrelevant was rather simple: if an economy fluctuates for whatever reason, then it is almost always possible to neutralize these cyclic motions by means of anti-cyclic demand policies. From the 1950's until the mid-Sixties business cycle theory had often been consid ered either as an appendix to growth theory or as an academic exercise in dynamical economics. The common business cycle models were essentially multiplier-accelerator models whose sensitive dependence on parameter values (in order to be called busi ness cycle models) suggested a rather improbable occurrence of continuing oscillations. The obvious success in compensating business cycles in those days prevented intensive concern with the occurrence of cycles. Rather, business cycle theory turned into sta bilization theory which investigated theoretical possibilities of stabilizing a fluctuating economy. Many macroeconomic textbooks appeared in the Sixties which consequently identified business cycle theory with inquiries on the possibilities to stabilize economies 2 Introduction by means of active fiscal or monetary policies.

This introduction to modern business cycle theory uses a neoclassical growth framework to study the economic fluctuations associated with the business cycle. Presenting advances in dynamic economic theory and computational methods, it applies concepts to t

In the mid-19th century, the business cycle was increasingly recognized as a recurrent phenomenon. This edition contains key texts from the range of literature in the field. It covers many Anglo-Saxon writers as well as contributions from the French, German, Italian, Russian and Swedish debates.

This volume presents the most complete collection available of the work of Victor Zarnowitz, a leader in the study of business cycles, growth, inflation, and forecasting.. With characteristic insight, Zarnowitz examines theories of the business cycle, including Keynesian and monetary theories and more recent rational expectation and real business cycle theories. He also measures trends and cycles in economic activity; evaluates the performance of leading indicators and their composite measures; surveys forecasting tools and performance of business and academic economists; discusses historical changes in the nature and sources of business cycles; and analyzes how successfully forecasting firms and economists predict such key economic variables as interest rates and inflation.

Business cycle theory has been one of the fastest growing fields in modern nonlinear economic dynamics. This book presents new mathematical methods for global analysis which have not previously been available in this easily accessible form. In addition it contains a presentation of full analyses of several models left open in the 1950s when the tools then available did not permit more systematic analysis.

An academic colleague has called Lucas "the dominant figure in Americanmacroeconomics." And another refers to this group of 14 essays, nearly all of which were firstpublished during the 1970s, as the most influential contribution to macroeconomics in thatdecade.