The Economics of Henry George History's Rehabilitation of America's Greatest Early Economist

Henry George was the greatest, most famous and most rejected of early American economists. Without formal education he trained himself in classical economics and developed a theory of a "single tax" suggestive of the work of the earlier French economistes. Academic economists of his day rejected his work, but it enjoyed great public popularity in the United States, Europe, Australia and other places. He was more widely read than any other early American economist. History has seen his rehabilitation at the hand of modern economists who have reviewed and analyzed his work in great detail. There is much specialized literature on many specific facets and aspects of George's work, but we lack a book which provides an overview of George's economics and of this historic rehabilitation. This brief book attempts to fill that gap.

Phillip J. Bryson is Professor of Economics Emeritus at Brigham Young University. He has published several books and numerous articles on economics and comparative economic systems, with recent research focusing on fiscal decentralization in the Czech and Slovak Republics, the Chinese economy, the information economy, and Henry George in contemporary economics.