The Economics of Progress
Is institutional economics an economics of progress? And if so what bearing, if any, does the identification of it as such have upon its claims to indeterminacy? The quotations from the works of Thorstein Veblen and Clarence Ayres used as a lead-in to this article seem to indicate the existence of a certain ambivalence within the school in regard to this issue. I will be contending that there exists more than a little ambiguity about the topic in the work of institutional economists. As a foundational matter, and as is well understood, a defining characteristic of institutional economics, is its apprehension that all human thought and action is simultaneously governed by two sets of influences. These influences variously are designated as ceremonial and instrumental, institutional and technological, honorific and matter-of-