Karl Brunner, un maestro e un amico

A Scholar and a Friend Has Died: In Memoriam of Karl Brunner

Abstract disponibile solo in lingua inglese

In this paper, the author traces the intellectual and academic life of Karl Brunner, of whom he was a pupil and friend: his studies in Switzerland, his first university teaching posts, his move to the United States and his partnership with Allan Meltzer, which gave rise to the abandonment of Keynesianism, his "return to his roots" with his lectureship at the University of Constance and later at Berne, his organisational activity. In the second part of the paper, the author reconstructs the most important economic theories elaborated by Brunner in the fields of monetary supply, monetary policy and the role of institutions, transmission mechanisms, information, monetary policy shocks and regimes. Finally, he assesses Brunner's contribution to monetarism and economic theory in general, with references to the issues of moral philosophy to which Brunner devoted his analysis in the last years of his life.