Roy Harrod and the Oxford Economists' Research Group's inquiry on prices and interest, 1936-39

Abstract

In 1936–39, a group of Oxford tutors inquired, by means of interviews with entrepreneurs, on price policy and investment decisions. A chronology of the inquiry is outlined, based on the surviving documents found in various archives, focusing on the choice of the subject, on the attempts to provide a theoretical interpretation of the phenomena that were discovered, and on the publication of the results. The role of Harrod is highlighted: it is assessed how far his theoretical approach to the cycle influenced the inquiry, and to what extent he modified his view as a consequence of the group's findings. ‘Our group…best represents the collective mind of economists in Oxford’ (Harrod to the other members of the OERG, 21 April 1939, in ABP 45 and 170).

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