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The theory which follows is entirely based on a calculus of pleasure and pain and the object of economics is to maximize happiness by purchasing pleasure, as it were, at the lowest cost of pain.

William Stanley Jevons

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William Stanley Jevons
Age: 46 †
Born: 1835
Born: September 1
Died: 1882
Died: August 13
Economist
Philosopher
Photographer
Statistician
City of Liverpool
Jevons
William Stanley
Object
Based
Maximize
Cost
Purchasing
Objects
Calculus
Theory
Lowest
Pleasure
Follows
Happiness
Entirely
Pain
Economics

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One of the first and most difficult steps in a science is to conceive clearly the nature of the magnitudes about which we are arguing.
William Stanley Jevons
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It is clear that economics, if it is to be a science at all, must be a mathematical science.
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A little experience is worth much argument a few facts are better than any theory.
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The difficulties of economics are mainly the difficulties of conceiving clearly and fully the conditions of utility.
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The whole result of continued labour is not often consumed and enjoyed in a moment the result generally lasts for a certain length of time. We must then conceive the capital as being progressively uninvested.
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There are a multitude of allied branches of knowledge connected with mans condition the relation of these to political economy is analogous to the connexion of mechanics, astronomy, optics, sound, heat, and every other branch more or less of physical science, with pure mathematics.
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The point of equilibrium will be known by the criterion that an infinitely small amount of commodity exchanged in addition, at the same rate, will bring neither gain nor loss of utility.
William Stanley Jevons
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In short, I do not write for mathematicians, nor as a mathematician, but as an economist wishing to convince other economists that their science can only be satisfactorily treated on an explicitly mathematical basis.
William Stanley Jevons
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It is clear that Economics, if it is to be a science at all, must be a mathematical science ... simply because it deals with quantities... As the complete theory of almost every other science involves the use of calculus, so we cannot have a true theory of Economics without its aid.
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You will perceive that economy, scientifically speaking, is a very contracted science it is in fact a sort of vague mathematics which calculates the causes and effects of man's industry, and shows how it may be best applied.
William Stanley Jevons
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By a commodity we shall understand any object, substance, action or service, which can afford pleasure or ward off pain.
William Stanley Jevons
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We shall never have a science of economics unless we learn to discern the operation of law even among the most perplexing complications and apparent interruptions.
William Stanley Jevons
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I consider that interest is determined by the increment of produce which it enables a labourer to obtain, and is altogether independent of the total return which he receives for this labour.
William Stanley Jevons
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There is no such thing as absolute cost of labour it is all a matter of comparison. Every one gets the most which he can for his exertions some can get little or nothing, because they have not sufficient strength, knowledge or ingenuity others get much, because they have, comparatively speaking, a monopoly of certain powers.
William Stanley Jevons
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One pound invested for five years gives the same result as five pounds invested for one year, the product being five pound years.
William Stanley Jevons
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The whole value of science consists in the power which it confers upon us of applying to one object the knowledge acquired from like objects and it is only so far, therefore, as we can discover and register resemblances that we can turn our observations to account.
William Stanley Jevons
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Repeated reflection and inquiry have led me to the somewhat novel opinion, that value depends entirely upon utility.
William Stanley Jevons
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There are many portions of economical doctrine which appear to me as scientific in form as they are consonant with facts.
William Stanley Jevons
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A spade may be made of any size, and if the same number of strokes be made in the hour, the requisite exertion will vary nearly as the cube of the length of the blade.
William Stanley Jevons
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Capital simply allows us to expend labour in advance.
William Stanley Jevons