Edward Hastings Chamberlin (May 181899-1967) was an American economist. He was born in La Conner, Washington.

Chamberlin studied first at the University of Iowa (where he was influenced by Frank H. Knight), then pursued graduate-level studies at the University of Michigan, eventually receiving his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1927.

For most of his career Edward Chamberlin taught economics at Harvard (1937-1967). He made significant contributions to microeconomics, particularly on competition theory and consumer choice, and their connection to prices. Edward Chamberlin coined the term "product differentiation" to describe how a supplier may be able to charge a greater amount for a product than perfect competition would allow.

His most significant contribution was the theory of monopolistic competition. Chamberlin published his book The Theory of Monopolistic Competition in 1933, the same year that Joan Robinson published her book on the same topic: The Economics of Imperfect Competition, so these two economists can be regarded as the parents of the modern study of imperfect competition.

Chamberlin's theory of monopolisitic competition is used by sociologist Harrison White in his "markets from networks" model of market structure and competition.

Major Works

• "Duopoly: Values where sellers are few", 1929, QJE
• Theory of Monopolistic Competition, 1933
• "Advertising Costs and Equilibrium", 1944, RES
• "Proportionality, Divisibility and Economics of Scale", 1948, QJE
• "An Experimental Imperfect Market", 1948, JPE
• "Product Heterogeneity and Public Policy", 1950, AER
• Monopolistic Competition Revisited, 1951
• "Impact of Recent Monopoly Theory on the Schumpeterian System", 1951, REStat
• "Full Cost and Monopolistic Competition", 1952, EJ
• "The Product as an Economic Variable", 1953, QJE
• "Some Aspects of Nonprice Competition", 1954, in Huegy, editor, Role and Nature of Competition
• "Measuring the Degree of Monopoly and Competition", 1954, in Chamberlin, editor, Monopoly and Competition and their Regulation
• "The Monopoly Power of Labor", 1957, in Wright, editor, Impact of the Union
• "On the Origin of Oligopoly", 1957, EJ
• Towards a More General Theory of Value, 1957
• The Theory of Monopolistic Competition: A Reorientation of the Theory of Value, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1962

External links

• A brief bio of Chamberlin

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