Gerhard Tintner, “Auspitz, Rudolf, and Lieben, Richard” (1968)

Gerhard Tintner’s biographical encyclopedia entry presents Rudolf Auspitz and Richard Lieben as pioneering mathematical economists whose importance exceeded their influence within the Austrian school. Its central argument is that their Untersuchungen über die Theorie des Preises (1889) occupies a major place in the development of price theory, despite the methodological resistance it encountered at home. Tintner moves from social biography through analytical contributions to intellectual reception, concluding with a strong historical reassessment.

The work of Rudolf Auspitz (1837-1906) and Richard Lieben (1842-1919) constitutes the sole mathematical contribution of the early Austrian school.

This opening establishes the tension governing the entry: Auspitz and Lieben belong to early Austrian economics, yet their mathematical method sets them apart from its dominant orientation. Tintner ranks their joint book as the most important early German-language mathematical contribution to economics after von Thünen. He situates both authors among the Jewish upper middle class of the Austro-Hungarian Empire: Auspitz was a sugar magnate and parliamentarian, Lieben a banker. Their combination of practical commercial experience and analytical ability prompts a comparison with Ricardo. Biography thus supplies a concise context for their theoretical achievement without becoming an explanation of its specific results.

The entry’s analytical center is their contribution to partial-equilibrium price theory. General equilibrium appears in an appendix to their book, while the principal exposition employs diagrams and total and marginal curves, without average curves. Tintner emphasizes that they independently originated the concept of indifference curves, used consumers’ surplus, and shared Jevons’s conception of the disutility of labor. These claims locate their importance in the development of tools for analyzing individual consumers and firms, rather than in a single comprehensive system.

In their discussion of production they indicate certain dynamic problems connected with the holding of stocks, expectations, and speculation.

This sentence broadens the significance of their work beyond static price relationships. Tintner credits them with identifying problems involving inventories and expectations, while cautiously describing these as indications rather than a completed dynamic theory. He similarly treats their analysis of monopoly and intermediate market situations as anticipating Pareto and later theories of imperfect or monopolistic competition. The entry’s conceptual move is to recover early formulations of questions that became central to subsequent economics, without claiming that Auspitz and Lieben supplied every later solution.

Their reception reveals a divide between local school allegiance and international analytical influence. Tintner reports Menger’s sharp criticism and connects their limited Austrian following to the school’s hostility toward mathematical methods. Against that limited reception, he places their influence on Pareto, Edgeworth, and Irving Fisher.

Auspitz and Lieben also had an interesting discussion with Walras about the merits and limitations of partial analysis (Walras 1890; [1874-1877], pp. 483-487 in the 1900 edition).

The exchange with Walras makes the scope of partial analysis an explicit methodological issue. Tintner’s comparison with Marshall further locates their work within a wider development of price theory. He closes by invoking Schumpeter’s recognition and Hutchison’s exceptionally favorable assessment of their precise, original contributions to consumer and firm analysis and to the clarification of its assumptions. The accompanying bibliographies support this recovery by identifying their writings and the literature documenting their reception. The entry’s lasting relevance lies in separating intellectual importance from immediate school influence: a methodological exception within Austrian economics could nonetheless help shape the international development of mathematical economic analysis.