12 Facts About Edward Chamberlin

Edward Hastings Chamberlin was an American economist.

Edward Chamberlin was born in La Conner, Washington, and died in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

For most of his career Edward Chamberlin taught economics at Harvard.

Edward Chamberlin made significant contributions to microeconomics, particularly on competition theory and consumer choice, and their connection to prices.

Edward Chamberlin published his book The Theory of Monopolistic Competition in 1933, the same year that Joan Robinson published hers 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.

Edward Chamberlin's book is often compared to Robinson's in which she coined the term "monopsony" to describe the buyer converse of a seller monopoly.

Edward Chamberlin advocated for the differentiation of product to explain how a firm distinguishes itself from other sellers.

Edward Chamberlin suggested that a monopolistic form of differentiation could present itself in the form of a patent or copyright.

Edward Chamberlin is informally credited as the founder of Industrial Organization, which is a field of economics that pertains to the ways by which firms compete with one another.

Edward Chamberlin is considered one of the first theorists who applied the marginal revenue idea, which is implicit on Cournot's monopoly theory in the late 1920s and early 1930s.

Edward Chamberlin is thought to have conducted "not only the first market experiment, but the first economic experiment of any kind," with experiments he used in the classroom to illustrate how prices do not necessarily reach equilibrium.

Edward Chamberlin concludes that most market prices are determined by both monopolistic and competitive aspects.