The Economics of the Big Deal: The Bulls, the Bears and the Farm

Abstract

One of the fundamentals of economics is the study of supply and demand. There are different ways to approach this subject. Adam Smith outlined in Wealth of Nations (1776), the concept of a free market with lack of intervention and a laissez-faire approach to the economy. John Maynard Keynes in his book, General Theory of Employment Interest and Money (1936), pointed out that markets tend to react very slowly to changes in the equilibrium (especially with price changes) and intervention is sometimes the best method to get the economy back on track. We seem to be in somewhat of a standstill with Big Deal journal packages. I would argue that libraries and the publishing world have been too focused on a free market approach and that we are quickly approaching a need to depart from the classical school of economics and swing our focus for a movement to a more Keynesian approach.

Disciplines

Business | Library and Information Science

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