Schumpeter’s biographical encyclopedia entry presents Auspitz as an industrialist and legislator whose lasting theoretical importance rests on mathematical economics. It moves from his public career to an assessment of the Untersuchungen über die Theorie des Preises, written with Richard Lieben.
The political portrait joins provincial development and parliamentary achievement, particularly the financial reform of 1896 introducing a modern income tax, to a consistent liberal commitment:
A man of great public spirit and energy, he remained throughout his life an unflinching advocate of classical economic liberalism, strongly opposing the sugar cartel and various protectionist measures.
This opposition is especially significant in Schumpeter’s account because Auspitz was himself a leading sugar manufacturer. Economic interests and political convictions are distinguished rather than simply equated.
The theoretical assessment emphasizes the book’s geometrical methods, its initially limited German reception, and its subsequent prominence through Edgeworth and Fisher. Schumpeter’s judgment is also prospective:
Even now it offers to the student a wealth of ideas and suggestions as yet but partially utilized.
The entry closes by making chronology essential to evaluating originality: the book preceded Marshall’s Principles. Its symmetry between cost and utility and its apparatus of curves therefore deserve recognition as pioneering contributions, not merely as familiar elements of later theory.
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