S. Jevons, harvest fluctuations and business cycle

Abstract

Explanations of cyclical fluctuations are among the most diverse, being included in a wide range of psychological, demographic, political, monetary, investment or under consumption theories. The aim of our work is the presentation of the theory developed in the second half of the nineteenth century by Stanley Jevons who explained economic fluctuations based on agriculture fluctuations. The sunspots were considered responsible for a cycle of approximately 11 years, fluctuations in agricultural crops being the ones that regularly altered the commercial “moods”. This commercial alteration and its effect on investment further multiplied crops fluctuations and determined a complete business cycle. Although we can not accept the explanation of a phenomenon as complex as the business cycle only through the solar influence on crops, approach otherwise extensively criticized, we consider presenting the analysis of Jevons at least one incursion into the theoretical, methodological, political and economic framework of the nineteenth century.