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MERCATUS STUDIES IN
POLITICAL AND SOCIAL ECONOMY

Entrepreneurship
and the Market Process
Edited by Arielle John · Diana W. Thomas
Mercatus Studies in Political and Social Economy

Series Editors
Virgil Henry Storr
Mercatus Center
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA, USA

Stefanie Haeffele
Mercatus Center
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA, USA
Political economy is a robust field of study that examines the economic
and political institutions that shape our interactions with one another.
Likewise, social economy focuses on the social interactions, networks,
and communities that embody our daily lives. Together, these fields of
study seek to understand the historical and contemporary world around
us by examining market, political, and social institutions. Through these
sectors of life, people come together to exchange goods and services, solve
collective problems, and build communities to live better together.
Scholarship in this tradition is alive and thriving today. By using the lens
of political and social economy, books in this series will examine complex
social problems, the institutions that attempt to solve these problems, and
the consequences of action within such institutions. Further, this approach
lends itself to a variety of methods, including fieldwork, case studies, and
experimental economics. Such analysis allows for deeper understanding of
social phenomena, detailing the context, incentives, and interactions that
shape our lives. This series provides a much-needed space for interdisci-
plinary research on contemporary topics on political and social economy.
In much of academia today, scholars are encouraged to work indepen-
dently and within the strict boundaries of their disciplines. However, the
pursuit of understanding our society requires social scientists to collabo-
rate across disciplines, using multiple methods. This series provides such
an opportunity for scholars interested in breaking down the boundaries
of disciplines in order to better understand the world around us.

More information about this series at


http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/15998
Arielle John · Diana W. Thomas
Editors

Entrepreneurship
and the Market
Process
Editors
Arielle John Diana W. Thomas
Mercatus Center Institute of Economic Inquiry
George Mason University Creighton University
Fairfax, VA, USA Omaha, NE, USA

Mercatus Studies in Political and Social Economy


ISBN 978-3-030-42407-7 ISBN 978-3-030-42408-4 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42408-4

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer
Nature Switzerland AG 2021
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights
of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on
microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and
retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology
now known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc.
in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such
names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for
general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and informa-
tion in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither
the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with
respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been
made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps
and institutional affiliations.

Cover illustration: © bernie_photo

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature
Switzerland AG
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
Contents

1 Entrepreneurship and the Market Process 1


Diana W. Thomas and Arielle John

Part I Entrepreneurship in Theory

2 Diverted Attention During Recessions 13


Simon Bilo

3 Entrepreneurship as Complex, Bundled Decisions:


An Inframarginal Analysis 27
Keith Jakee and Stephen M. Jones-Young

4 Conceptualization of a Kirznerian-Ethnic Entrepreneur


in Market Sociology 67
Stephane Kouassi

5 Non-Market Competition as a Discovery Procedure 97


David S. Lucas

v
vi CONTENTS

Part II Entrepreneurship in Practice

6 The Comparative Liberty-Dignity Context


of Innovative Immigrant Entrepreneurship 123
Olga Nicoara

7 Economic Development Incentives: Fostering


Productive or Unproductive Entrepreneurship? 151
John A. Dove

8 Silicon Valley vs. Main Street: Regulatory Impact


on Entrepreneurial Ventures 171
Liya Palagashvili

Index 203
Notes on Contributors

Simon Bilo is Independent Economist in the USA. His current research


centers on questions of monetary non-neutrality, also known as “Cantillon
Effects” after the eighteenth-century economist Richard Cantillon. Bilo
is interested in Business Cycle Theory, History of Economic Thought,
International Economics, Austrian Economics, and Monetary Economics.
John A. Dove is Manuel H. Johnson Professor of Economics in the
Sorrell College of Business at Troy University, USA. He received his
Ph.D. from West Virginia University in 2012. Prior to joining the faculty
at Troy University, Dove was an Assistant Professor of Economics at
Mercer University. His main areas of research include public economics
and political economy. Dove’s academic work has appeared in such schol-
arly outlets as The Journal of Comparative Economics, The Journal of
Macroeconomics, Public Choice, Economics of Governance, Business &
Politics, and The Journal of Institutional Economics, among others.
Keith Jakee is Associate Professor at the Wilkes Honors College of
Florida Atlantic University, USA. His research tends to fall into one of
three areas, political economy, industrial organization, and entrepreneur-
ship. Before coming to the Honors College, he held tenured appoint-
ments at Monash University and in the Business School of the
Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT University), both in
Melbourne, Australia. Jakee received his Ph.D. and MA at George
Mason University, where his dissertation research was supervised by Tyler

vii
viii NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS

Cowen, Richard Wagner, Tom R. Burns, and the Nobel Laureate, James
Buchanan.
Arielle John is Senior Research Fellow, Associate Director of Academic
and Student Programs, and Senior Fellow for the F. A. Hayek Program
for Advanced Study in Philosophy, Politics and Economics at the Mercatus
Center at George Mason University, USA. Prior to joining the Mercatus
Center, she was an Assistant Professor of Economics at Beloit College
from 2014–2015, and then worked as the advisor to the Minister of Public
Administration and Communications in the Government of the Republic
of Trinidad and Tobago.
Stephen M. Jones-Young is Economist at the Coast Guard, USA. Prior
to joining the Coast Guard, Jones-Young earned his MA in Economics at
George Mason University and a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics at the
Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College at Florida Atlantic University.
Stephane Kouassi is Graduate Student in sociology at Goethe Univer-
sity, Germany. Kouassi is also an Adam Smith Fellow with the Mercatus
Center at George Mason University.
David S. Lucas is Assistant Professor in the Department of
Entrepreneurship and Emerging Enterprises at the Whitman School
of Management at Syracuse University, USA. His research interests
include entrepreneurship, institutions, organizations, and strategy, with
an emphasis on social issues like poverty and homelessness.
Olga Nicoara is Assistant Professor of Economics in the Department
of Business and Economics at Ursinus College, USA. She earned her
Ph.D. and MA degrees in economics from George Mason University
and her BSc degree in International Economics and Business from
Bucharest University of Economics. Nicoara’s scholarly interests are in the
fields of Economic Development, Political Economy, Austrian Economics,
Cultural Economics, Institutional Economics, and Entrepreneurship
Economics.
Liya Palagashvili is Assistant Professor of Economics at State Univer-
sity of New York—Purchase, USA. She is also a research fellow with
NYU Law. For the 2018–2019 academic year, she was a Visiting Scholar
in the Department of Political Economy at King’s College London. Pala-
gashvili’s research is on political economy and applied public policy.
She focuses on two main research areas: investigating the regulatory
NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS ix

and public policy environment for technology startups and questions of


governance, polycentricity, and the role of external influence and aid on
institutions.
Diana W. Thomas is Associate Professor of Economics at Creighton
University’s Heider College of Business, USA. She is also Director of the
Institute for Economic Inquiry at Creighton University. She was previ-
ously an Assistant Professor of economics at the Jon M. Huntsman School
of Business at Utah State University.
List of Figures

Fig. 2.1 The initial equilibrium, E1 , shows the allocation


of entrepreneurial alertness between new investment
and restructuring of the existing factors of production
(Source Author’s creation) 20
Fig. 2.2 The new equilibrium, E2 , illustrates a change
in the allocation of entrepreneurial alertness from new
investment toward restructuring the existing factors
of production (Source Author’s creation) 21
Fig. 2.3 The allocation of entrepreneurial alertness into the three
types of activities: new investment (NI), fixing
the allocations of existing factors of production (Fix),
and rent-seeking (RS) (Source Author’s creation) 22
Fig. 2.4 The allocation of entrepreneurship into the three types
of activities with an increase in the demand for rent-seeking
(Source Author’s creation) 23
Fig. 2.5 The allocation of entrepreneurship into the three
types of activities with an increase in the demand
for rent-seeking and fixing the allocations of the existing
factors of production during recession (Source Author’s
creation) 24
Fig. 6.1 A two-dimensional representation of the direction
of the flows of innovative immigrant entrepreneurs based
on our Comparative Liberty-Dignity Framework 132

xi
xii LIST OF FIGURES

Fig. 6.2 Net migration rates and quality of economic institutions


across top 15 and bottom 15 countries by net migration
flows (2010–2015) (Source Chart and calculations are
based on data from The World Bank’s World Development
Indicators [The World Bank 2019], and Hugo Montesinos
[2019]) 136
Fig. 6.3 Net migration rates (2010–2015), economic freedom
of the world (2016), and cultural and social norms
towards entrepreneurship (2017) (Source Calculations
and illustration are based on data from The World Bank
[2019], The Fraser Institute [Gwartney et al. 2016],
and The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor [2018]) 142
Fig. 7.1 Productive entrepreneurship and economic development
incentives (Note Entrepreneurship measure from Sobel
[2008], Incentives index from Patrick [2014a]. Source
Author’s creation) 158
Fig. 7.2 Unproductive entrepreneurship and economic development
incentives (Note Entrepreneurship measure from Sobel
[2008], Incentives index from Patrick [2014a]. Source
Author’s creation) 159
Fig. 7.3 NEP and economic development incentives (Note
Entrepreneurship measure from Sobel [2008], Incentives
index from Patrick [2014a]. Source Author’s creation) 159
List of Tables

Table 5.1 The context of human action 99


Table 5.2 Nonmarket entrepreneurship and the institutional
hierarchy 103
Table 6.1 Net migration, population, net migration rate per 1000
people, economic freedom over the past 30 years, top
and bottom countries (2010–2015) 135
Table 6.2 High status to successful entrepreneurs, and perception
of entrepreneurship as a good career choice, top 15
and bottom 15 countries (2017) 139
Table 6.3 Innovation, and cultural and social norms based on GEM
survey data. Top 15 and bottom 15 countries (2017) 141
Table 7.1 Summary statistics 160
Table 7.2 Productive, unproductive, and net entrepreneurial activity 162
Table 7.3 Productive, unproductive, and net entrepreneurial activity
(1990) 164
Table 7.4 Productive, unproductive, and net entrepreneurial activity
(1980) 166

xiii
CHAPTER 1

Entrepreneurship and the Market Process

Diana W. Thomas and Arielle John

Why Entrepreneurship Is Important


In his 1964 presidential address to the Southern Economic Association
membership, James Buchanan famously asked the provocative question
“What should economists do?” Buchanan’s question was explicitly moti-
vated by his assessment that the discipline had gotten lost in doing “what
economists do” without consideration of what would constitute scien-
tific progress. More specifically, James Buchanan was advocating for an
economics that would place the “theory of markets” rather than the
“‘theory of resource allocation’ at center stage” (1964, p. 13) and return
to Adam Smith’s observation that there is a propensity in human nature to
“truck, barter, and exchange one thing for another” (Smith 1776, p. 25).
The orthodoxy Buchanan was constructively critiquing was neoclassical
price theory, which examines the patterns of equilibrium prices, costs,

D. W. Thomas (B)
Institute of Economic Inquiry, Creighton University, Omaha, NE, USA
e-mail: dianathomas@creighton.edu
A. John
Mercatus Center, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA, USA
e-mail: ajohn@mercatus.gmu.edu

© The Author(s) 2021 1


A. John and D. W. Thomas (eds.), Entrepreneurship and the Market
Process, Mercatus Studies in Political and Social Economy,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42408-4_1
2 D. W. THOMAS AND A. JOHN

and output in different markets with specific emphasis on the allocation


of resources in equilibrium. The goal of the price theoretical apparatus
is to understand the requirements of general equilibrium, identify the
paths toward equilibrium that price and quantity may take, and state the
price and quantity combinations that will satisfy equilibrium conditions
across different markets. In investigating the effects of government policy,
price theory focuses on the changes in equilibrium price and quantity that
changes in policy will bring about.
Lacking from orthodox price theory, in Buchanan’s assessment, was a
focus on “man’s behavior in the market relationship […] and the mani-
fold variations in the structure that this relationship can take” (Buchanan
1964, p. 214). The alternative approach to studying economic behavior
he proposed was explicitly focused on exchange relationships and the
various forms they could take in both markets and politics. Buchanan’s
extension of this analytical focus to include spheres other than markets,
and specifically politics, always assumed that individual behavior and
cooperative relationships individuals engaged in depend on the rules of
the game or the institutional structure in place to constrain individual
behavior.
Buchanan was, of course, not alone in his critique of the path modern
economics had taken throughout the beginning of the twentieth century.
Israel Kirzner similarly argued that price theory was missing a descrip-
tion of how the actions of individual market participants interact to bring
about changes in prices, quantities, and in the manner resources are
allocated to competing uses (Kirzner 1973, p. 6). Price theory notori-
ously stresses that there are but three factors of production—land, labor,
capital—to be optimized when making production decisions, but seems to
take for granted who exactly is meant to do the optimizing. In Kirzner’s
own words, an analytical framework devoid of entrepreneurs “completely
lacks the power to explain how prices, quantities and qualities of inputs
and outputs are systematically changed during the market process” (1973,
p. 42) and so cannot explain how the market equilibrates. Kirzner argued
that in order for such considerations to enter the analysis, the analyst
would have to shift her focus toward the competitive process and the role
of the entrepreneur in perpetuating the competitive process. Crucially,
entrepreneurship was the fourth factor of production missing from the
neoclassical price theory.
Put differently and using the language of orthodox price theory, rather
than focusing on the slope of the production possibilities frontier and
1 ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND THE MARKET PROCESS 3

its intersection with individual indifference curves, this market process


perspective advocated by Buchanan and Kirzner (among others) analyzes
how movements of the curve and pivots in its slope come about over
time, what the institutional determinants of human action in markets and
in politics are, and how exchange relationships change when institutions
evolve.
Israel Kirzner specifically contributed to market process theory by
introducing a theory of entrepreneurship that accounts for the differ-
ential alertness and awareness of entrepreneurs. More specifically, in
Kirzner’s model, entrepreneurs bring about the process of equilibra-
tion of market relationships by acquiring “more and more accurate and
complete mutual knowledge of potential demand and supply attitudes”
through entrepreneurial discovery (Kirzner 1997, p. 62). This discovery
of information is the essential function entrepreneurs supply in the market
process. They are alert to opportunities for arbitrage across space—as is
the more traditional understanding of arbitrage—and time, and by acting
upon those opportunities bring about changes in existing exchange rela-
tionships in the market. In doing so, they can, of course, commit errors,
but the insistence upon the integration of an entrepreneurial perspective
into the analysis of market relationships ensures a description of systemic
adjustments to new and ever-changing information and constraints.
For Kirzner, incomplete and imperfect knowledge are facts of human
life that lead to errors in decision-making in the market context all
the time. For example, an entrepreneur may believe that her poten-
tial customers want to purchase her red shoes for $20 each, when in
fact for the quantity she is producing, price should be closer to $30.
Therefore, she may erroneously under charge for her shoes. However,
alert market participants are able to recognize these sorts of errors with
time. According to Kirzner, another person would likely notice the profit
opportunity that emerges from the discrepancy between what she is
charging and what her customers are willing to pay. That person may
buy her shoes at the lower price she is charging and sell them at the
higher price somewhere else. Processes like these drive markets toward
equilibrium prices and quantities. In Kirzner’s own words, writes, “the
entrepreneurial element in the economic behavior of market partici-
pants consists … in their alertness to previously unnoticed changes in
circumstances which may make it possible to get far more in exchange
for whatever they have to offer than was hitherto possible” (1973,
pp. 15–16).
4 D. W. THOMAS AND A. JOHN

While Kirzner develops his theory of entrepreneurship in the context


of markets, the individual entrepreneur’s alertness to differential oppor-
tunities for profit is essential in driving the process of entrepreneurial
discovery not only in markets, but across different institutional settings.
All cooperative and collective human endeavors, whether in the context
of markets, politics, or society more generally require adjustment to
and incorporation of new information into the institutional context in
order to allow individuals that operate within this context to coop-
erate with each other successfully and go about the satisfaction of their
individual wants and desires more effectively. The existing literature on
entrepreneurship in politics and social organization more generally is
multi-faceted and vast, but an entrepreneurial perspective has been applied
to culture (Storr 2008; Storr and John 2011; John and Storr 2018),
policy change and rent-seeking activities (Simmons et al. 2011; Coyne
et al. 2010; DiLorenzo 1988; Holcombe 2002) institutional change
in politics (Martin and Thomas 2013), non-profits (Haeffele and Storr
2019), how communities rebuild and revive following natural disasters
(Chamlee-Wright and Storr 2010; Storr et al. 2016), and economic
development (Chamlee-Wright 2002; Haeffele and Hobson 2019).
Economists of the Austrian school in particular have advanced Kirzne-
rian ideas of entrepreneurship into studies of culture, community
recovery, and politics. The driving question provided by Kirzner in many
of these treatments is: What types of opportunities will entrepreneurs in
various contexts be alert to? For example, Storr and John (2011), use
Kirznerian theory to demonstrate how culture can shape entrepreneurial
gaze. They posit that “culture will direct an entrepreneur’s gaze as
well as her ability to recognize certain opportunities as in fact oppor-
tunities” (p. 89). To demonstrate how entrepreneurs with different
cultural backgrounds can be alert to different opportunities, the authors
provide accounts of different of flavors entrepreneurship in Bahamas and
in Trinidad and Tobago, and they connect these different flavors of
contemporary entrepreneurship to each island’s economic history. Based
on prior experiences under slavery and colonial rule, today’s Bahamian
entrepreneurs have a “master pirate” side that is ever ready to hustle, trick,
and swindle to make money, but also an “enterprising slave” side, that
words diligently and honestly to attract business. In Trinidad and Tobago,
where different ethnic groups had dissimilar experiences in the economy
1 ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND THE MARKET PROCESS 5

pre-and post-independence, some appear to be more alert to opportuni-


ties for commercial enterprise, while others tend to look to politics and
the bureaucracy for economic advancement.
John and Storr (2018) also consider the role of culture through
another popular notion of entrepreneurship discussed in Austrian
theory—the Schumpeterian view. They argue that while alertness
to/identification of a profit opportunity is the essential moment of
entrepreneurship for Kirzner, for Schumpeter, it is the actual acting upon
the opportunity that constitutes entrepreneurship. According to Schum-
peter (1961, p. 66), the crucial entrepreneurial role is the carrying out
of new “combinations” of the means of production, that is: creating
new goods, improving the quality of existing goods, creating new
methods of production, opening new markets, finding new supplies of
resources, or discovering new ways to organize an industry. The authors
contend that focusing on both the Kirznerian (seeing) and Schumpete-
rian (doing) views of entrepreneurship enables more fine-grained analysis
of entrepreneurship. They observe that certain aspects of the cultural
context and institutional environment in Trinidad and Tobago promote
people’s alertness to entrepreneurial opportunities there, while other
cultural and institutional aspects dampen this alertness. The same is true
for opportunity exploitation.
Regarding community recovery, again, a focus on the entrepreneur
helps us to understand who will take up the charge of rebuilding
communities, and what methods will or will not work for them. Chamlee-
Wright and Storr (2010) examined the Vietnamese community in New
Orleans following the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, finding that
social entrepreneurship played an integral part in that community’s ability
to recover following the hurricane. Entrepreneurs steeped in the local
context needed to be alert to needs of their fellow community members
in order to “coordinate recovery efforts, lobby for essential government
assistance and provide key information and services to help displaced resi-
dents return and rebuild their communities” (p. 154). One such social
entrepreneur was the pastor of the Mary Queen of Vietnam Catholic
Church, Father Vien, who provided leadership by continuing to hold
mass, checking up on his congregants at evacuation sites, persuading them
to return to the community, and facilitating their return.
An important question in political economy is whether the political
domain is like the market domain in terms of its ability to use and
generate knowledge, and to coordinate productive activity with efficiency.
6 D. W. THOMAS AND A. JOHN

Thomas and Thomas (2014) consider the limits of the application of


insights from entrepreneurial process theory to politics, arguing that the
absence of price signals in politics prevents the entrepreneurship theory
from being fully applicable. However, the authors harness insights from
James Buchanan to demonstrate that at the constitutional level of poli-
tics, where general rules of the political game must be selected, political
entrepreneurship is certainly possible and may even be efficient. Salter
and Wagner (2018) argue that one way in which political entrepreneur-
ship may manifest is through competition or contestation over alternative
interpretations of constitutional rules.

Applied Research in Political


Economy: Entrepreneurship
The contributions to this edited volume all share in common a focus
on this Kirznerian market process perspective. Contributions in Part
I focus on theoretical extensions and critiques. Simon Bilo offers an
extension of the Kirznerian theory of entrepreneurship, with particular
application to conditions of economic recessions. Bilo argues that the
systematic re-valuation of previously malinvested capital during a recession
has significant effects on the relative alertness of entrepreneurs to different
productive and unproductive investment entrepreneurial ventures and
can result in either a re-allocation of the re-valued assets of a focus on
relatively unproductive entrepreneurial opportunities in case of political
intervention and targeted stimulus spending.
Keith Jakee and Stephen Jones provide a critique of the Kirznerian
conception of entrepreneurship based on its reliance on neoclassical,
marginal analysis, which, as they argue, is founded on several unreal-
istic assumptions and therefore not representative of true entrepreneurial
choice. Jakee and Jones suggest that rather than using marginal anal-
ysis based on twice-differentiable isoquant and isocost curves, the study
of entrepreneurial decision-making requires a focus on total costs and
corner-solutions to adequately deal with the problems of indivisibility,
static knowledge problems, radical uncertainty, and transaction costs.
Stephane Kouassi’s chapter titled Conceptualization of a Kirznerian-
Ethnic-Entrepreneur in Market Sociology offers an extension of the
Kirznerian framework of entrepreneurship into the domain of culture,
taking into consideration insights from contemporary sociology regarding
the “cultural determinants of the process of identification, evaluation and
1 ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND THE MARKET PROCESS 7

exploitation of entrepreneurial opportunities.” Kouassi’s chapter offers a


theoretical model for how cultural factors may systematically promote or
hinder certain types of entrepreneurial discovery.
In his chapter titled Non-market Competition as a Discovery Proce-
dure, David Lucas synthesizes the existing literature applying Austrian
market process theory to non-market contexts. In doing so, Lucas is
able to identify shared theoretical insights and shortcomings in this liter-
ature and point to potential areas for fruitful future inquiry, as well as
potential stumbling blocks for the systematic application of the market
process perspective to non-market contexts like politics, institutional
development, cultural norms, and crime.
Part II offers various applied perspectives on entrepreneurship. Olga
Nicoara provides an analysis of how an understanding of the quality of
formal institutions along with cultural attitudes toward entrepreneurship
influence the entrepreneurial decisions of immigrants. She argues that
immigrants from countries with lower overall institutional quality and
cultural attitudes that are less supportive of entrepreneurial ventures will
be more likely to become innovative entrepreneurs once they migrate
to countries with institutions and cultural attitudes more supportive of
entrepreneurship generally.
John Dove’s chapter, “Productive Entrepreneurship, Unproductive
Entrepreneurship, and Public Sector Economic Development Restric-
tions: Understanding the Connections”, offers an empirical analysis of
Baumol’s (1990) prediction of the institutional variability of the rela-
tive prevalence of the types of entrepreneurship that can be observed in
a particular society at a given point in time. Baumol famously suggests
that institutions can change the relative profitability and therefore the
relative prevalence of productive market entrepreneurship as compared
to unproductive and even destructive types of extractive political (rent-
seeking) entrepreneurship. Dove’s analysis uses several indices measuring
the relative profitability of productive and unproductive entrepreneurship
in different states from Sobel (2008) as well as an index measuring the
extent to which states provide non-tax economic development incen-
tives from Patrick (2014). His results confirm Baumol’s theoretical
prediction that institutional environments that offer greater rewards
for non-productive entrepreneurship will generate more unproductive
entrepreneurial activity.
Finally, examining the impact of regulatory policy on entrepreneur-
ship, Liya Palagashvili, provides a potential theoretical explanation for
8 D. W. THOMAS AND A. JOHN

the variability in new business starts across different industries, and


more specifically for the concurrent empirical decline in new firm starts
among main-street businesses and increase in new business starts among
tech-startups.
Across and between the different contributions to this edited volume,
the authors provide a rigorous and thorough assessment of both the limi-
tations and the benefits of the entrepreneurial perspective to analysis of
markets. We are grateful for their work and the synergies and overlaps
that have developed across the different chapters over the last two years
since they were first presented at a conference sponsored and organized
by the Mercatus Center at George Mason University.

References
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Destructive. Journal of Political Economy 98 (5): 893–921.
Buchanan, James M. 1964. What Should Economists Do? Southern Economic
Journal 30 (3): 213–222.
Chamlee-Wright, Emily. 2002. The Cultural Foundations of Economic Develop-
ment: Urban Female Entrepreneurship in Ghana. New York: Routledge.
Chamlee-Wright, E., and V. Storr. 2010. The Role of Social Entrepreneurship
in Post-Katrina Community Recovery. In The Political Economy of Hurricane
Katrina and Community Rebound, ed. E. Chamlee-Wright and V. Storr, 87–
106. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar.
Coyne, Christopher J., Russell S. Sobel, and John A. Dove. 2010. The Non-
Productive Entrepreneurial Process. Review of Austrian Economics 23 (4):
333–346.
DiLorenzo, Thomas J. 1988. Competition and Political Entrepreneurship:
Austrian Insights into Public-Choice Theory. The Review of Austrian
Economics 2 (1): 59–71.
Haeffele, Stefanie, and Anne Hobson. 2019. The Role of Entrepreneurs in
Facilitating Remittances in Cuba. In Lessons on Foreign Aid and Economic
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Haeffele, Stefanie, and Virgil H. Storr. 2019. Understanding Nonprofit Social
Enterprises: Lessons from Austrian Economics. The Review of Austrian
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Holcombe, Randall G. 2002. Political Entrepreneurship and the Democratic
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(2–3): 143–159.
1 ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND THE MARKET PROCESS 9

John, Arielle, and Virgil Henry Storr. 2018. Kirznerian and Schumpeterian
Entrepreneurship in Trinidad and Tobago. Journal of Enterprising Communi-
ties: People and Places in the Global Economy 12 (5): 582–610.
Kirzner, Israel. 1973. Competition and Entrepreneurship. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.
Kirzner, Israel. 1997. Entrepreneurial Discovery and the Competitive Market
Process: An Austrian Approach. Journal of Economic Literature 35 (1): 60–85.
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PART I

Entrepreneurship in Theory
CHAPTER 2

Diverted Attention During Recessions

Simon Bilo

Introduction
Human attention has limits, and people, at least to some extent, choose
what they pay attention to. I explore how limited, or scarce, atten-
tion might matter during recessions, when entrepreneurs suddenly face
a cluster of opportunities resulting from previous misallocations of factors
of production. Entrepreneurs’ alertness is, at that point, suddenly divided
between the profit opportunities from fixing the existing production
processes and the opportunities for brand-new investment projects. As
a result, entrepreneurs decide to postpone or discard some of the possible
new projects. This discussion of the limits of entrepreneurial alertness
is useful for two reasons. First, it provides an additional—and to my
knowledge novel—framework to understand the procyclical character of
aggregate investment that, for example, Stock and Watson (1998, 13)
document. Of course, the framework is a complement to rather than a
substitute for the existing theories that account for that procyclical char-
acter because the procyclicality is a generally accepted stylized fact. In one
way or another, business cycle models therefore incorporate this fact as,

S. Bilo (B)
Arlington, VA, USA

© The Author(s) 2021 13


A. John and D. W. Thomas (eds.), Entrepreneurship and the Market
Process, Mercatus Studies in Political and Social Economy,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42408-4_2
14 S. BILO

for example, Plosser (1989) exemplifies for real business cycle theory and
Lucas (1977) for new classical theory.
Second, it leads to an analytic framework that captures the allocation
of entrepreneurship during recessions. I later enhance the baseline frame-
work with an extension that includes unproductive entrepreneurship, such
as rent-seeking associated with fiscal expansion, as such entrepreneurship
can aggravate recessions.
My discussion of the allocation of entrepreneurship during a recession
lies at the intersection of three sets of literature. First, it builds on the
stylized fact that recessions tend to reveal clusters of errors, as suggested
by Hayek in his Copenhagen lecture ([1939] 1975, 141), meaning that
recessions are associated with a large number of entrepreneurs real-
izing that their projects are unprofitable. This fact can be observed
indirectly—for example, through increases in the number of bankrupt-
cies during recessions, as documented by Altman (1983) and Platt and
Platt (1994), through procyclical employment and countercyclical unem-
ployment (Stock and Watson 1998, 15), or through higher dispersion
of total-factor-productivity growth rates across industries (Eisfeldt and
Rampini 2006). I link the first two observations with what seems to be
a reasonable assumption: that companies usually do not plan to go out
of business and people usually do not plan to become unemployed. The
dispersion of total-factor-productivity growth is also consistent with the
existence of suddenly revealed mistakes that slow output growth in certain
industries.
The higher incidence of recognized errors during the recession matters
because it implies that the existing allocations of factors of production—
both capital and labor—might be inefficient, requiring their repurposing,
which is costly and requires imagination. In other words, investments are
to some extent irreversible because of the specificity and heterogeneity of
factors of production, which connects my discussion with a second stream
of literature. Some of the works on the irreversibility of investment under
uncertainty—including Bernanke (1983), Majd and Pindyck (1987), and
Pindyck (1993)—emphasize the irreversibility of deployed factors of
production from an ex ante perspective (that is, before investment). My
discussion instead focuses on what to do with already-existing capital
goods ex post, as emphasized by the Austrians, including Hayek ([1935]
1967), Mises ([1949] 1966, 503–514), Lachmann ([1956] 1978), and
Garrison (2001). The ex post emphasis is the appropriate one in the
context of recessions: during recessions entrepreneurs face the problem
2 DIVERTED ATTENTION DURING RECESSIONS 15

of the misallocation of existing irreversible investment. Witnessing a


large number of specific factors of production employed in unprofitable
production processes, they have to decide which ones to repurpose and
which ones to discard. The rearranging of such factors is not a trivial
problem; it resembles that of a five-thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle that was
designed to portray the painting of Mona Lisa and has to be reassembled
into a picture of Mickey Mouse after some kids lost or disfigured many
of the pieces. Such reassembly is costly, and for the same reason is that of
factors of production. While reassembling the factors of production repre-
sents new possible profit opportunities, it also imposes a demand on the
limited attention, or alertness, of entrepreneurs. Their attention is more
diverted than it otherwise would be and thereby must be spread more
thinly across other competing demands.
My discussion on how these limits on entrepreneurs’ alertness play
out during the recession builds on a third stream of literature: the
works of Kirzner, Baumol, and Gifford, where Kirzner ([1973] 1978)
represents the methodological base for thinking about entrepreneur-
ship, Gifford (1992) highlights the importance of limited attention of
entrepreneurs, and Baumol (1990) illustrates how changing incentives
change entrepreneurial outcomes. Kirzner’s ([1973] 1978) key insight is
that entrepreneurial alertness, which can be described as “knowing where
to look for knowledge” (68), is an essential part of the market process.
Markets cannot work unless people are alert to and perceive profit oppor-
tunities. This means, Kirzner [1973] 1978, 225–231) argues, that even
the absence of transactions costs, which include information costs, is not
enough for markets to equilibrate. Entrepreneurs, according to Kirzner,
also have to perceive the importance of available information regarding
potential profit opportunities.
I continue with what hopefully is a reasonable assumption: that Kirzne-
rian alertness has limits and that if entrepreneurs ponder a certain set
of information, they are not able to do so with some other informa-
tion set. This follows along the lines of Gifford (1992), who recognizes
the limited attention of entrepreneurs, although, unlike Gifford, I do not
distinguish between the attention entrepreneurs give to “current opera-
tions” and that given to “prospective projects,” because such a distinction
does not fully capture the decisions entrepreneurs have to make about
misallocated factors of production during recessions. Under the assump-
tion of alertness with limits, I turn to Baumol’s (1968, 1990) general
idea that different structures of incentives determine the “allocation of
16 S. BILO

entrepreneurial inputs” (1990, 897), understanding the term “input” as


Kirzner’s “alertness.”
Using this connection of Baumol’s, Gifford’s, and Kirzner’s ideas, I
apply Baumol’s conceptual description to a framework with microfounda-
tions. However, unlike Baumol (1990), I do not consider the allocation
of entrepreneurship in the context of long-run economic growth, but,
instead, in the context of a recession, when it turns out that many factors
of production, both capital and labor, cannot remain employed as initially
intended. Entrepreneurs’ production costs (in the case of capital) and
costs of acquiring human capital, hiring, and training (in the case of labor)
are already sunk and do not matter when considering factor reallocation.
Remaining quasi-rents associated with the factors then represent potential
new profit opportunities, thereby incentivizing the entrepreneurs to turn
their alertness from investing in brand-new production processes toward
salvaging existing factors of production. The necessary assumption is that
the existing factors of production are substitutes for rather than comple-
ments to new investments. Accordingly, the resulting decrease in new
investment is in line with the stylized fact of procyclical investment.
As I suggested before, this model of allocation between the two
types of entrepreneurial activities—new investment and fixing the old
allocations of capital and labor—can also be extended to include the real-
location of entrepreneurial alertness into unproductive and destructive
activities, as Baumol (1990) explores in the context of economic growth.
This extension makes it possible to analyze the consequences of a possible
fiscal-stimulus response to a recession, where new, unproductive rent-
seeking opportunities associated with the stimulus divert entrepreneurial
alertness from productive activities, including new investment. Such
diversion then makes aggregate investment even more procyclical. This
extension relates to Takii (2008), who also discusses the interrelation-
ship of entrepreneurship and fiscal policy, although in a different context,
in which fiscal expansion tends to crowd out private consumption. As
government then plays a larger role in the market and it is, by assump-
tion, less capable of identifying changes in the tastes of consumers than
entrepreneurial firms, overall output decreases.

Alertness and the Metaphor of Allocative Choice


Whenever one talks about an allocation, one tends to think of stan-
dardized factors of production with well-defined units. The production
2 DIVERTED ATTENTION DURING RECESSIONS 17

decision regarding the factors is then a technological problem that


Kirzner ([1973] 1978) somewhat pejoratively calls Robbinsian maxi-
mizing because it is mechanical and therefore does not encapsulate the
discovery aspect of the market process. Talking about the allocation
of entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial alertness, as I do, thus raises
red flags, particularly if one at the same time claims to be building on
Kirzner’s insights. These concerns become even more pressing with the
realization that Kirzner [1973] 1978, 66) does not view entrepreneurship
as a factor of production. After all, entrepreneurship is not an ingre-
dient that one simply adds to a well-defined production function to get
predictable output levels. It might be for this reason that there is no
market for entrepreneurial alertness, while, at the same time, markets
work because of the alertness.
To reconcile my representation of entrepreneurship with Kirzner’s, I
follow the approach outlined by Storr and John (2011), who consider
Kirzner’s model of entrepreneurship in light of the objection that it
does not account for a number of important factors possibly impacting
entrepreneurship, including cultural and psychological factors. Storr and
John (Storr and John 2011, 88–89) argue that one does not necessarily
have to view Kirzner’s model as deficient; instead, it should be viewed as a
baseline model pinpointing the nature of entrepreneurship, which invites
additional extensions, such as cultural influences.
My own extension starts with the consideration that it would be unrea-
sonable to say that entrepreneurial alertness manifests at random and that
entrepreneurs have no say over the industries and types of products on
which they want to focus. As long as we accept that people have some
freedom to choose, it is reasonable to say that they choose, even though
not entirely, what to think about. This is not just a philosophical insight,
but also practical one: if our attention is limited, being able to focus on
priorities is a matter of evolutionary survival.
Of course, as long as the matter of limited attention is not impor-
tant for an analytic framework, it is reasonable to assume it away. Such
assuming is not appropriate in the present case, however. The attention of
entrepreneurs during a recession might get overwhelmed with competing
demands, forcing them to choose what to pay attention to. It is the
need to capture such a choice that constitutes my rationale for looking
at entrepreneurial alertness as if it was a factor of production.
This emphasis on the incentives of entrepreneurs is very much in line
with Baumol’s (1968, 69–70) view on how economists should approach
18 S. BILO

the topic of entrepreneurship. He points out that it is perhaps impos-


sible to have a full understanding of the determinants of the supply of
entrepreneurship and its quality, but it might be possible to analyze the
incentives shaping entrepreneurs’ activity. For example, he suggests that
different tax structures might have an effect on entrepreneurs’ risk-taking
and their involvement with research and development.
The metaphor of allocation of alertness can take one only so far,
however. It does convey both the limits to alertness and the profit-
motivated choice over what one is alert to, but it cannot capture all
aspects of entrepreneurship, notably acting in an uncertain world. It is
with this caveat that I approach the discussion that follows.

Quasi-Rents and Profit Opportunities


When entrepreneurs allocate their alertness during a recession, their
choice has some specific characteristics. Recessions reveal many previous
mistakes, embodied in misallocated factors of production. This might, for
example, mean that factories built and equipped during the boom are
unprofitable in their intended uses, that they have to be shut down, and
that the workers who were trained to operate the factory equipment have
to find new employments. Awareness of these factors allows entrepreneurs
to see new, related profit opportunities, channeling their alertness toward
corresponding factor reallocations.
The argument that entrepreneurs shift alertness during the recession,
however, rests on the assumption that reallocation of the existing factors
is more profitable than, let’s say, creation of brand-new factors of produc-
tion. This higher profitability comes with the sunk-cost character of the
previously misallocated factors. While the factors employed in unprof-
itable production processes do not make enough revenues to cover their
own amortization, they are still useful, even though it does not pay to
replace them once they wear out (in the case of capital) or to train new
workers (in the case of labor). What matters is whether the difference
between the return of the factors and the variable cost is sufficient to
attract an owner or employer. This difference is also known as quasi-rent,
which Alchian (2006, 577) defines as “the portion of the revenue from
the use of some equipment in excess of current operating cost and which
covers at least some of the initial, past investment cost of having produced
that equipment.”
2 DIVERTED ATTENTION DURING RECESSIONS 19

How much of this quasi-rent the prospective owner or employer has to


pay for a capital good or for hiring labor is, of course, negotiable, and it
is somewhere between zero and the quasi-rent. But the negotiability also
means that the profit coming from hiring the labor or owning the capital
is also flexible and might stretch—within the given quasi-rent constraint—
enough for the project to compete with the alternative entrepreneurial
projects. It is this flexibility that incentivizes entrepreneurs during a reces-
sion to be more alert to exploring new uses of the existing misallocated
factors rather than to producing new factors of production.1
Let me illustrate with an example of a machine that makes rubber soles
for shoes. Assume the same machine can be repurposed to make chewing
gum. Let’s say the owner built the machine at a cost of $1000, expecting
the present value of the variable costs to be $100 and the present value
of the revenues to be $1100. While he could use the machine for making
chewing gum, the fixed and variable costs would be the same but the
present value of the revenues would drop to $500.
Let’s say that contrary to the owner’s expectations, nobody wants new
shoes and the expected revenues from selling shoes drop to zero. The
owner goes out of business and puts the machine up for sale. Since it
can still produce chewing gum and the expected demand for the gum is
unchanged, the machine is going to sell at a positive price. The quasi-rent
associated with chewing gum production is $400, and the price of the
machine can thus range between one cent and $400. It will end up being
low enough within the range to attract an entrepreneur with sufficient
profit to divert her attention from other activities.
Can one say that all entrepreneurial attention will be diverted from
starting new projects that include brand-new factors of production during
the recession? Of course not, but entrepreneurs have an incentive to
divert their attention more than they otherwise would have. Again, the
necessary underlying assumption is that the existing capital goods and
existing employees with their human capital are substitutes for rather than
complements to new investments.

1 Note that the repurposing of the factors can happen within a company, though the
repurposing is less visible to external observers.
20 S. BILO

$ PNI*MPENI PFix*MPEFix

0NI E1 0Fix

Fig. 2.1 The initial equilibrium, E1 , shows the allocation of entrepreneurial


alertness between new investment and restructuring of the existing factors of
production (Source Author’s creation)

Allocation of Alertness During


Recession: The Baseline Model
My model is a metaphor that conveys the idea of entrepreneurs choosing
the focus of their alertness. The expected relative profitability of the
different opportunities is the criterion of such choice, and more profitable
opportunities therefore tend to attract more alertness.
Entrepreneurial alertness in my model2 is a factor of production whose
production function has the standard property of diminishing marginal
returns. I assume that there is a fixed amount of alertness and that this
alertness can be allocated to two types of projects. One type predom-
inantly pertains to new investment, for which I use the corresponding
subscript of “NI.” The projects associated with subscript “Fix” pertain
to rearranging the existing factors of production into more efficient
allocations.
Figure 2.1 shows an initial equilibrium, in which the product of the
price (P) of output and the marginal product of entrepreneurial alert-
ness (MPE) is the same for the two types of projects. Note that the
amount of entrepreneurial alertness is in this model given, which is
why the horizontal axis is boxed in from both sides. The more to the

2 This model is inspired by Feenstra and Taylor’s (2014, 69) model, which they use in
the context of the labor market’s responses to international trade shocks.
2 DIVERTED ATTENTION DURING RECESSIONS 21

right the equilibrium point (E) moves along the axis, the more alertness
entrepreneurs direct toward new investment projects.
Now the recessionary shock hits the economy. To keep things simple,
I assume that the profitability of the prospective new projects does
not change. The rearranging of the existing factors of production will
compete for entrepreneurs’ attention, and portions of the quasi-rents
are in this competition offered to the entrepreneurs to incentivize them
to use the existing factors of production instead of focusing on other
projects. The higher profitability of rearranging does not mean there are
new possibilities for using the existing factors, so the marginal product of
the entrepreneurial input itself does not change. Instead, it is the price of
the given marginal product that increases thanks to the higher fraction
of the quasi-rent captured by the entrepreneurs. Figure 2.2 illustrates
my reasoning and shows how the recessionary shock and related need
to reallocate existing factors of production also changes the allocation
of entrepreneurial alertness. Of course, if less alertness goes toward new
investment, the amount of new investment decreases, alertness being one
of the inputs.

Fig. 2.2 The new equilibrium, E2 , illustrates a change in the allocation of


entrepreneurial alertness from new investment toward restructuring the existing
factors of production (Source Author’s creation)
22 S. BILO

Allocation of Alertness During


Recession: An Extension
I now extend my model to account for the government’s fiscal expansion,
which is often characteristic of governments facing recessions. I treat the
fiscal expansion as a shock, or an unanticipated event, as with the recession
itself.
The additional government expenditures are potential rents that people
compete for, along the lines discussed by Tullock (1967) and Krueger
(1974). Rents are therefore profit opportunities that incentivize rent-
seeking and distract entrepreneurs from other activities—in this model,
investing in new projects or reconfiguring existing factors. Entrepreneurs
then have another reason to divert alertness from possible new invest-
ment, which tends to drop even further compared to the previous
model.
My revised model reflects the increase in the number of possible
allocations of entrepreneurial alertness to three possible sectors. Instead
of a two-dimensional box diagram with the total amount of alertness
unchanged, the updated model therefore shows the tendencies of the
allocations of alertness in response to shocks. I proceed in three steps:
After starting in equilibrium (step one), step two shows how the higher
rents associated with the stimulus affect the allocation of alertness. Step
three combines the effects of these new rents with the insights about the
allocation of entrepreneurship during the recession from the prior section.
The initial equilibrium in Fig. 2.3 represents the allocation of
entrepreneurial alertness among the three types of activities: creating new

$ PNI*MPENI $ PFix*MPEFix $ PRS*MPERS

0NI E1, NI 0F E1, F 0RS E1, RS

Fig. 2.3 The allocation of entrepreneurial alertness into the three types of activ-
ities: new investment (NI), fixing the allocations of existing factors of production
(Fix), and rent-seeking (RS) (Source Author’s creation)
2 DIVERTED ATTENTION DURING RECESSIONS 23

investment (“NI” subscript), fixing the allocations of existing factors of


production (“Fix” subscript), and securing profits through rent-seeking
(“RS” subscript). Entrepreneurs are in equilibrium when a marginal unit
of entrepreneurial alertness in each of the three activities leads to an equal
dollar reward.
In the next step of the analysis, I assume a positive shock in the
form of government expenditures that increases the rents available to
entrepreneurs through the policy arena. In the model, the shock likely
increases both the marginal product of entrepreneurship and the price of
the marginal product. The marginal product increases because the addi-
tional government expenditures likely pertain to new projects and lead
to brand-new rent-seeking opportunities. But additional resources also
likely flow into the already-existing rent-seeking opportunities and there-
fore increase the price rewarding entrepreneurial alertness in the political
arena.
As Fig. 2.4 illustrates, increases of the two variables—the marginal
product and the price—pushes the PRS *MPERS curve up and to the
right. This increase in the demand for rent-seeking alertness increases
the opportunity cost for entrepreneurs in the other two allocations. In
the resulting equilibrium, the return on entrepreneurship in all three
possible allocations then has to increase. The equilibration also means
that the allocation of entrepreneurial alertness to rent-seeking increases
and it decreases in the other two sectors, keeping in mind the ceteris
paribus assumption. The sector that matters here is, of course, that of
the new investment projects. With the decline in alertness toward new
investment projects, the number of such projects will decline and so will
the investment, making (new) investment procyclical. The reallocation of

PRS*MPERS
$ PNewInv*MPENewInv $ PFix*MPEFix $

0NI E2, NI E1, NI 0F E2, F E1, F 0RS E1, RS E2, RS

Fig. 2.4 The allocation of entrepreneurship into the three types of activities
with an increase in the demand for rent-seeking (Source Author’s creation)
24 S. BILO

$ $ $
PNI*MPENI

PFix*MPEFix PRS*MPERS
0NI E2, NI E1, NI 0F E1, F E2, F 0RS E1, RS E2, RS

Fig. 2.5 The allocation of entrepreneurship into the three types of activities
with an increase in the demand for rent-seeking and fixing the allocations of the
existing factors of production during recession (Source Author’s creation)

entrepreneurship to rent-seeking is analogous to Baumol’s (1990) unpro-


ductive entrepreneurship, just applied to the context of business cycles
rather than to that of economic growth.
The recession causes the allocation of entrepreneurial alertness into
rent-seeking projects and the repurposing of previously misallocated
factors of production to more highly valued uses. The alertness allocated
to new investment projects then declines, leading to a decline in new
investment, which, together with other causes not included in the anal-
ysis, makes aggregate investment procyclical. What happens to alertness
to profit opportunities from rent-seeking and from reallocation of factors
depends on the specific data. Even though the demand for alertness shifts
out in both, it might be the case that only one of the two attracts more
overall entrepreneurial alertness. Figure 2.5 illustrates the example where
both see increased alertness.

Conclusion
The topic of the dynamics of recessions, discussed here, relates to a funda-
mental methodological question of how economies equilibrate. While
under normal circumstances it seems reasonable to simply assume equi-
librium, as economists routinely tend to do, this is not a plausible
assumption for a situation, such as a recession, in which it is hard to
ignore pervasive disequilibria. If equilibrium is not re-established imme-
diately, it makes sense to look for the reasons, and it seems reasonable
to assume, as I did in this paper, that equilibration itself is subject to the
2 DIVERTED ATTENTION DURING RECESSIONS 25

scarcity of resources—not because such scarcity is present only in reces-


sions, but because it is more binding during recessions than under normal
circumstances.
Even though my discussion focuses on recessions, its conclusions are
applicable, although empirically less visible, outside of recessions, and
it addresses the methodological question of the mechanism of equi-
libration from the perspective of Kirznerian entrepreneurial alertness.
Entrepreneurial alertness has its limits, and this is more evident when
the demands on alertness suddenly increase. Entrepreneurs under such
circumstances cannot be figuratively at two places at once, and they tend
to focus on the activities they expect to be more profitable.

Acknowledgements I would like to thank Harry David, John Golden, Arielle


John, Diana Thomas, and participants in the Applied Research in Political
Economy Colloquium that took place in June 2018 in Fairfax, VA, for valu-
able comments and suggestions on earlier drafts of the present paper. I gratefully
acknowledge the financial help that I received from Mercatus Center while
working on this paper. I am responsible for all errors.

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CHAPTER 3

Entrepreneurship as Complex, Bundled


Decisions: An Inframarginal Analysis

Keith Jakee and Stephen M. Jones-Young

Introduction
The “theory of the firm” in modern economics is essentially an opti-
mization exercise within an equilibrium framework. It suggests a firm’s
decisions concerning inputs depend exclusively upon a given production
function and the given relative prices of those inputs. This approach has
allowed the widespread application of the familiar tools of marginal anal-
ysis and, as such, has yielded a number of insights into aspects of firm
input choices, particularly as input parameters are changed exogenously.
It does, however, have an important shortcoming: it largely assumes away
more fundamental production decisions, such as which inputs to use or
even which good to produce in the first place. Its simplicity also tends
to require an elementary production function (typically Cobb–Douglas)

K. Jakee (B)
Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, FL, USA
e-mail: kjakee@fau.edu
S. M. Jones-Young
United States Coast Guard, Department of Homeland Security, Washington,
DC, USA

© The Author(s) 2021 27


A. John and D. W. Thomas (eds.), Entrepreneurship and the Market
Process, Mercatus Studies in Political and Social Economy,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42408-4_3
28 K. JAKEE AND S. M. JONES-YOUNG

and technology that is given and monolithic; the latter assumption rules
out problems of deciding which one of potentially multiple technologies
would be optimal. In other words, even though the moniker “theory
of the firm” evokes a predictive framework of considerable generality, it
largely ignores choices associated with the notion of “entrepreneurship,”
including firm creation, innovation of products and production processes,
and even what the firm should produce in the first place.
In contrast to the standard maximizing approach, we contend that
entrepreneurial choices are, first, choices over bundles of subsidiary or co-
requisite decisions that are not easily disentangled. Effectively, then, the
entrepreneur commits resources to one imagined “big-picture” state-of
the world when she makes her entrepreneurial choice, to the exclusion of
other, imagined states-of-the world. We assert these big-picture decisions
are discrete, nonmarginal choices.
The second aspect of entrepreneurial decision-making follows from the
first: entrepreneurial choices necessarily involve significant computational
complexity because they subsume many other underlying choices. It is, in
other words, difficult to determine the bundled decision that represents
the very best decision possible. In sum, if entrepreneurial decisions—
including what types of goods to produce, what production process
to use, where to locate and so on—are highly complex bundles, then
the standard microeconomic framework based on marginal conditions is
inadequate for the task.
While we contend the lumpiness and multidimensional nature of
entrepreneurial decisions make marginal tools maladapted to the task of
analyzing them, marginal analysis can be valuable in other applications. Its
usefulness can be appreciated if we divide firm decision-making into two
stages, one involving entrepreneurial decisions and the other involving the
day-to-day running of the firm. It is the second stage, when basic deci-
sions about what to produce and how to do it have already been made,
that constitutes the traditional “theory of the firm.” In this second stage,
the “mere manager”—the term used by Schumpeter ([1912] 1983, 83)—
fine-tunes a production process already in place. Such fine-tuning cannot,
by definition, change the production function, but can change the input
mix into the production function. The well-known marginal conditions
might therefore be helpful in this second stage.
The first stage, by contrast, involves an agent creating some new
production process or transforming an existing one. Since the agent
does not have a production process already in place, she must decide
3 ENTREPRENEURSHIP AS COMPLEX, BUNDLED DECISIONS … 29

“what” and “how” to produce in discrete, mutually exclusive ways. In


other words, deciding to produce one good forecloses the possibility of
producing other goods. Similarly, deciding upon a method of produc-
tion forecloses other potential methods of production. Consistent with
Schumpeter ([1912] 1983), Buchanan and Vanberg (1991), Jakee and
Spong (2003a, b, 2011), and O’Driscoll and Rizzo (2015), we char-
acterize these kinds of “big picture” entrepreneurial choices—involving
highly complex bundles of interrelated decisions—as creative leaps. And,
such a creative leap necessarily means deviating from the status quo since
the agent must confront the world in novel ways. Indeed, by rejecting the
status quo, the agent must be rejecting its implied marginal conditions,
a point consistent with Buchanan and Vanberg’s (1991) insistence that
true, creative entrepreneurship must be understood as a nondeterministic
process.
In fact, while this paper largely focuses on two dimensions—bundled
decisions and the inherent complexity of those bundled decisions—we
want to acknowledge that our approach is consistent with a nondeter-
ministic, dynamic process of creative entrepreneurship. Furthermore, it
is important to recognize that nondeterministic processes are intrinsi-
cally tied to the notion of “radical uncertainty.” Radical uncertainty is an
epistemic position that claims individuals necessarily make decisions and
carry out tasks without knowing, ex ante, all the precise consequences of
those decisions (see, i.e., Shackle 1958, 1972; Lachmann 1986). Radical
uncertainty is implied in models that take the passage of time seriously, or
what O’Driscoll and Rizzo (2015, 106) call “real time.” Real time is best
understood in contrast to what they call “Newtonian time.” The problem
with the latter concept is that it “spatializes” time, meaning it repre-
sents the flow of time as mere “‘movements’ along a line” (106). This
view, which they argue has been “uncritically adopted” across neoclassical
theory, implies the flow of time can be treated, mechanistically, like any
other parameter.
In contrast, real time suggests that, as time passes, the physical world
changes, but more importantly the social world does too: individuals—
both inside and outside of firms—pose competitive challenges, change
course in their purchases, adapt to changing circumstances, improve their
performance on tasks, reformulate mental models of the world, and
work out creative solutions to an untold number of problems; in other
words, their subjective view of the world, which informs their decision-
making framework, changes (see O’Driscoll and Rizzo, 2015, 110–118).
Exploring the Variety of Random
Documents with Different Content
Hoe treurig ik vertrok, wanneer ik van u scheidde,
Te meer omdat ik aan het hof zo lang verbeidde;
Eén dag scheen my een maand, één uur een gansche dag;
Om dat ik daar myn lief Quiteria niet zag.
Ik was afkeerig van ’t vermaak der hovelingen,
En hoorde ik in ’t zalet een Juffer konstig zingen,
Dagt ik aan uwe stem, die zonder wedergaâ
Myn zinnen streelen kon. Voorts quam uw ongenâ,
Door ’t lang vertoeven, my te binnen. Gy hebt reden
Om met Kamacho in den echten staat te treeden.
My zy de schuld alleen. Maar ach! hoe beeft myn hart!
Gy zult dan trouwen? my verlaaten? ach! wat smart!
Quit. Ja myn Bazilius, ik kan het niet beletten,
’t Is my onmoogelyk myn’ vader te verzetten.
Ik word gedwongen, Lief. Baz. ’k Ben nog niet buiten raad,
Indien gy myn verzoek, zo billyk, niet versmaadt.
Gy kunt die trouw ontgaan, wanneer we t’zamen vlugten.
Maar ach! gy zwygt, myn lief! en antwoordt my door zuchten.
Quit. Daar ’s volk. Wy zyn bespied. Vaarwel.
Baz. Waar vlucht ge heen,
Quiteria! ei hoor myn’ klachten en gebeên.

VYFDE TOONEEL.

Don Quichot te paerd, Sanche op een ezel, schielyk uit.

Don Quichot. Staa Ridder, wat heeft die.... San. Ja oele hy gaat
fluiten.
Wou jy die veugel in zyn vlucht zo makk’lijk stuiten?
Dat ’s miskoot. Maer myn Heer, wat zellen wy nou doen?
Don Qu. Zo ras als ’t moog’lyk is, naar Saragossa spoên,
Op hoop van nog in tyds het steekspel by te woonen.
San. Wat waar ik ook een gek, dat ik me meê liet troonen!
Sanche zegt tegen den ezel.
Myn lieve Graeuwtje wat heb ik al deurgestaan;
Wat hebben, jy en ik, al menig droeve traen
Op deezen tocht ’estort! myn hart! myn lust! myn leeven!
Myn zeun! myn graeuwtje! jy bent in myn hart ’eschreven.
Wat zyn we trouwe broêrs, in lief, in leet, in nood!
’k Zal jou in goud beslaen myn keuning, nae jou dood.
Don Qu. Laat myne Ronsinant, met Graeuwtje ginder weiên.
San. Ik zel ze gunter, daar het beste gras groeijt, leîen.
Sanche brengt de beesten weg.
Don Qu. Gaa allereêlste beest, getrouwe Ronzinant,
Gaa opperpronkjuweel der paerden van dit Land.
Uw naam zal in het kort met grooter luister pralen,
Gy zult nog meerder roem als Bucefal behaalen.
Die groote Bucefal, held Alexanders paerd,
Daar gy in trouwheid en grootmoedigheid naar aard,
Heeft door zyns meesters arm nooit grooter roem verkregen,
Als gy verwachten kunt, door myn’ gevreesden degen;
Myn degen, dien ik heb aan myn Princes gewyd,
Myn lief Dulcinea, het pronkbeeld van deez’ tyd,
De zoetste roofster van myn’ zinnen en gedachten,
Om wie ik eenzaam dool, by dagen en by nachten.
Wanneer, ô schoone! zal ’t gelukkig uurtje zyn,
Dat gy uw’ Don Quichot zult helpen uit de pyn!
Wanneer, ô wreede! zult ge ophouden my te plaagen?
Of moet ik doolen om uw’ liefde al myne dagen?
Heb ik vergeefs gestreên met menig’ kloeken held?
Sloeg ik vergeefs dan den Biskaijer uit het veld?
En heeft u Passamont, met ketenen belaaden,
En and’re boeven, niets verhaald van myne daaden?
’t Is zeker! Maar gy blyft, ô wreede! nog versteend,
En lacht, helaas! wanneer uw droeve ridder weent.
Ik zal, indien ’t u lust, de bekkeneelen kneuzen,
Van schelmse tovenaars en schrikkelyke reuzen;
Al quam hier Sakripant, een reus van d’ ouden tyd,
Hy moest bekennen dat gy de allerschoonste zyt,
Het pronkstuk der natuur, de paerel aller vrouwen;
Of ’k zou hem met myn zwaerd den kop van ’t lichaam houwen.
San. Och Ridder Don Quichot, ’k verlang al weer naer huis!
Don Qu. Geduld, myn zoon, geduld.
San. Ja ’k zie vast munt, noch kruis,
Won ik nog geld, met al dat hongerige doolen.
Don Qu. ô Sanche! Sanche! gy begind al weêr te toolen;
Waar heeft een Schildknaap van een doolend Ridder geld
Tot loon van dienst geëischt? Zeg eens wat boek vermeldt,
Dat Roeland, Amadis of Palmeryn de Olyven,
Geld gaven, zeg? San. Ik kan niet leezen, noch niet schryven,
Wat bruid me Roeland, met jou hiele ridderschap,
Als ik gien geld heb. Don Qu. Schelm! ik dagt u op den trap
Van eer, en hoog geluk, door mynen arm te zetten
Loop naar uw wyf, loop heen, ik zal ’t u niet beletten
Gaa werken om de kost, gy zyt myn gunst niet waard.
Zo ik een koninkrijk kan winnen, door myn swaard,
Zal ik een ander, u ten spyt, tot koning maaken;
Bedenk dan, Sanche, hoe die euvel u zal smaaken.
San. Och, och, vergeef het my, ’k en hebt zo niet ’emiend.
Myn heer, ik hebje met men Graeuwtje lang ’ediend,
En overal gevolgd. Beloofje nog te geeven
Een eiland veur myn loon: ik zel jou al myn leeven
Daar veur bedanken? Don Qu. Ja, het eerste dat ik win.
San. In ’t admirantschap, heb ik ook al vry wat zin
Of maek me maer zo ’n graef, of prins, ’t ken jou niet scheelen,
Al wierd ik Keuning; als je tog bent an het deelen,
Zo leg me maer wat toe, van d’eenen brui, of d’aêr
Hy kan ligt knippen die een lap heit met een schaer.
Maer ’k wou dat ik het zag gebeuren, zei de blinde.
Don Qu. ’k Moet lachen, Sanche.
San. Zie myn heer, zie door de linde:
Loop daer gien kaerel? Don Qu. Geef myn schild en myn geweer:
Het is een Ridder. San. Neen, het is een boer, myn heer.
Don Qu. ’k Zeg ’t is een Ridder: haal myn lancie, niet te draalen.
San. Het is een boer, heer of de drommel moet me haelen.
Don Qu. Ik ken hem aan de veer, die op zyn helmtop zit.
Is ’t Ridder Splandor, zoon van Medor. San. Ei ik bid,
Maek tog gien questie, je bend zekerlyk bedrogen.
Merlyn de Tovenaer draeijt weer een rad voor je oogen.

ZESDE TOONEEL.

Don Quichot, Sanche, Kamacho, met een veer op zyn boeremuts.

Kamacho. „Dat wangd’len van myn bruid in ’t bosch staet my niet


an;
„De boeren zeggen datze met dien edelman,
„Die zy bemint heit, stond op deeze plek te praeten;
„En dat verstae ik niet; dat zal ze moeten laeten....
„Smit Justus wie is dat! Don Qu. ô Splandor, braave held,
En doolend Ridder, daar Turpinus pen van meldt;
Aanschouw hier Don Quichot, den ridder van de leeuwen.
Kam. Gans bloet, wat vent is dat! och, och! ik moet iens schreeuwen,
Of hy vermoord me hier! Help! help! Wat ziet hy fel!
’t Is Symen langdarm, of de pikken uit de hel.
Och sinte langdarm, of hoedat je naem mag weezen,
’k Zel alle daegen, drie van je amerietjes leezen,
Voor al de songden, die je in ’t leeven hebt ’edaen.
Ei laat me leeven, en zo lang naer huis toe gaan;
Tot ik men testemengt ’emaakt heb. ’k Laet me hangen,
Zoo ’k niet weêrom kom, op parool, als krygsgevangen.
Don Qu. Heer Ridder, hoe, gy spreekt of gy betoverd waart,
Dat zyn geen blyken van uw’ ouden heldenaard
Gy zyt het, die wel eer het Turksche heir verheerde,
En in Stoelweissenburg zo heerlyk triumfeerde.
Kam. Och ja heer langdarm, ’k bin betoverd! ’k bin bedrild!
Ik bin bezeeten, ik bin al wat datje wilt.
Och myn gesuikerde sinjeurtje! laet me loopen!
Daer is myn beurs. San. Geef hier! maer bloed! ik zou niet hoopen
Dat hy betoverd was, en dat hy iens uit klucht,
Als ik er geld uit kreeg, zou vliegen naar de lucht.
Don Qu. Heer Splandor, hou uw geld, ik ben geen dief of roover.
’t Za, Sanche, geef het weêr. San. Wel dat komt zeker pover,
Zo ’n schoone beurs, en die ’k zoo mak’lyk houwen kan!
En dat regtvaerdig; want ik krygze van den man.
Don Qu. Wat draalje! geef terstond.
San. Het zinne spaense matten.
Don Qu. Geef over of... San. Ei lieve, één greepje.
Don Qu. Ik kan bevatten,
Dat u de rug wat jeukt. San. Hou daer dan, tovenaer.
Kam. Ik dankje. San. Holla, broêr. Don Qu. Ha, schelm.
San. Daer is het, daer.
Don Qu. Heer Ridder, zyt gerust; ik staa niet naar uw leeven;
Maar wil dat gy me uw’ helm tot dankbaarheid zult geeven.
Kam. Och jonker, ’k heb gien helm ooit op myn kop ’ehad,
’t Is maer een boere muts, met veeren, dat je ’t vat;
Wil jy hem hebben? ’k wil hem gaeren’ an je schenken.
Don Qu. Heer Splandor, groote held, ik kan my niet bedenken,
Hoe uw’ doorlugte geest, en groote schranderheid,
Van ’t spoor der reden, door de tov’naars is geleid,
Dat gy dien zwarten helm, dien Roeland plag te draagen,
Een boere muts noemt.
Kamacho geeft hem zyn muts.
„Och hy zoekt me wat te plaegen!
Hou daer, daer is myn helm, ast dan een helm moet zyn.
Don Qu. ’k Ben dankbaer, groote held.
Kam. Die karel piert me fyn.
Don Qu. Wat zegt zyn edelheid? Kam. Of ik nou mag vertrekken?
Don Qu. Hoe vaart Angelika? wil my ’t geheim ontdekken:
Waar zy zich nu onthoud. Leeft uw heer vader nog?
Het moortje Medor, dat held Roeland met bedrog
De schoone Angelika, uit minnenliefde ontschaakte?
Waar door die groote held, uit spyt, aan ’t razen raakte?
Meld alles maar aan my, den dapp’ren Don Quichot.
Kam. Ik heb gien Vaer noch Moêr, heer Ridder dronke zot.
Don Qu. Is dan de schoone Moor, uw vader reeds gesturven?
Kam. Myn vaertje was geen moor. Och, och! ik ben bedurven,
Hy zietme veur een Turk, of voor een Heijen aen.
Zo hier gien volk en koomt, zel ’t mit me slegt vergaen.
Don Qu. Is dan Angelika, uw moeder, reeds ter aarde?
Die zulken braaven held, als u, ô Splandor, baarde?
Kam. Ik heb Jan Geeleslae men leeven niet ’ekent,
Ik hiet geen plankoor, en we bennen niet ’ewent
De kei’ren in ongs dorp mit zukken naem te doopen.
Ei Ridder, dronke zot, ik bidje laetme loopen.
Je heb me muts al weg, zeg maer, wat wilje meer,
Men wammes, en men broek.
Don Qu. Neen, neen, verdwaalde heer
Dien schoonen wapenrok zal ik u niet ontrooven;
’k Wil liever voor uw’ helm een koninkryk belooven;
Indien gy ’t maar begeert. Kam. Och, och, ’et is de droes,
Is dat geen paerdevoet? neen, maer een karrepoes!
Nou merk ik ’t eerst, och zo ’n hiel keuninkryk, sint felten!
Je bent een dubbelduw! San. Zen kop die rydt op stelten.
Kamacho schrijft een streep.
’k Bezweerje by den geest, van houte sint Michiel
Al waarje nou de droes, of Steven zongder ziel,
Nagtmerri, bietebauw, of ongeboore heintje
Al wierje nou zo klein, datje in een tinne pijntje
Kon kruipen, zo je nu gien mensch bent, ken je nou
Niet over deuze striep.
Don Quichot over de streep trappende.
Ik voel myn hart vol rouw;
ô Eedle Splandor, om het missen van uw’ zinnen;
’t Verstand schynt u van ’t spoor, door ’t al te hevig minnen.
’k Omhels u, als myn vrind. Kam. Dat maekme wat gerust.
Ik loof werentig, dat je lui wat kortswil lust.
Maar alle gekken op een stokje, laet me wangdelen....
Daer’s Vetlasoep, de Kok, wat of die wil verhangdelen.

ZEVENDE TOONEEL.

Don Quichot, Sanche, Kamacho, Vetlasoepe.

Vetlasoepe. Monsieur Kamakko, ha! ze eb jou al lang kezoek.


Ze wist niet waar hum stak, ze wist niet van dit hoek.
Wat’s dat feur folke?
Kam. Dat? dat zin al raere snaeken,
Kortswillig volk, bequaem de bruiloft te vermaeken.
We leyen in ’et ierst ’eweldig overhoop.
Maer, waer’s men bruiloftsvolk?
Vetl. Hum’eb de palm keknoop,
Hum’eb de kroon kemaak, hum doet nou niet as zingen,
Hum dans nou seer kurieus, ensemble ronde kringen.
De folke is opkeskikt, zo mooij kelyk de droes.
Ze skreeuw tout allemaal, à vous! à vous! à vous!
Ze heb jou lang kewak, ze is bly, en ’t is wel koete,
Dat hum jou na lang zoek, hier in de bosch ontmoete.
Kam. Heb jy zo lang ’ewagt? ’et is me seper leet.
Maer heb jy al ’eweest om Jochem de poejeet?
En Roel de muizekand? laet vraegen waer ze blyven.
Vetl. Fort bien Monsieur, ze zel.
Sanche, tegen Don Quichot.
Maer seldrement! gansch vyven!
Wat is dat veur een vent? Don Qu. Dat is een Indiaan,
Of Hottentotsche Prins. San. Ik ken ’m niet verstaen,
Als hier en daer ien woord. Vetl. Wat sekze, Hottentotte?
Ha! ha! ze lakker om, ze lyk warak wel zotte.
Hum is een Kok, ma foi. San. Hy ruikt braef na gebraed.
Bin jy de Kok, ik hou jou veur men beste maet,
Je hebt een lucht die ik bezonder graag mag leijen:
Me dunkt je ruikt ook wat na korsten van pasteijen?
Vetl. Oui, pastey, Monsieur, keen beter in de land,
Als hum kan maak. San. Dan ben je een kaerel van verstand.
Vetl. Je suis vôt serviteur. Kam. Hoor hier iens Vetlasoepje.
Vetl. Que ditez vous Monsieur? Kam. Maek dat’er ook een troepje
Dangsmiesters by komt. Vetl. Bon, ze zel ze jou beskik.
Kam. Toebak van volkje. Vetl. Oui, die dans ken op een prik.
Zingende binnen.

ACHSTE TOONEEL.

Don Quichot, Sanche, Kamacho.

Sanche. Dat lykt een raere haen, die Prins van de Indiaenen,
Een Kok en Prins mit ien!
Don Qu. Hoe Sanche, zoudt gy waanen
Dat zulks niet meer geschied? San. Wel neen, ik lach ’er om.
Kam. Kom geef me muts nou weer.
Don Qu. Zyt gy de bruidegom?
Met wie myn waarde vrind?
Kam. Ik mien van daeg te trouwen;
Hier zel et zelschip zyn, ’k zel hier de bruiloft houwen.
Don Qu. Wie zal uw Ega zyn, ô Splandor, wat Princes?
Kam. Ei scheer de gek niet meer.
Don Qu. Uw waerde zielsvoogdes
Is wis van Prins’lyk bloed, of koningklyke looten?
Kam. Een halleve boerin, uit d’ adel voort’esproten,
Heur Vaertje boert zo wat: maer hy’s van adel.
Don Qu. Zoon,
Wat is uw eêl verstand betoverd! groote Goôn!
Hoe is haar naam; hoe wordt de Infante toch geheeten.
Kam. Ze is gien Infangte: maer ze is mooij, dat motje weeten,
Zo blank als schaepenmelk. Heur wangetjes zyn rood,
Ze is niet te dik, te dun, te klein, noch niet te groot;
Heur veurhoofd blinkt puur, puur, gelyk een barbiersbekken.
’Er hiele bakus is vol van wongerlike trekken.
Don Qu. Maer nu, haer naam?
San. Ze’et nooit misschien geen naem ’ehadt.
Kam. Ze hiet Quiteria, heer Ridder, dat je ’t vat.
Maer zie, verstae je wel, daer quam er nog ien vreijen.
Die hiet Bazillius. Zy mocht hem vry wel leijen,
Maer ’t hulp niet: wangt hy is een arme kaele neet,
Zo’n edelmannetje, dat graeg wat lekkers eet,
Patrysjes, hoendertjes, kon hy ze maer betaelen.
Hy krygtze wel: maer moetze eerst op de jagt gaen haelen:
Daer leeft hy miest van; maer ’t is al een raere vent,
Hy ken latyn as een pastoor; ’t is een student,
Dat jy het vat Sinjeur. ô Hy kan wongdre zaeken.
Ik heb ’em van een aeij een kaerteblad zien maeken;
En hy kan dangsen als een ekster op het veld;
Hy kan ook sling’ren mit’et vaendel als een held.
En hy kan schermen, en ook kaetzen, mit de boeren;
En mit verkeeren kan hy elk zyn geld afloeren;
Hy kan ook speulen op de veel, en de schalmy.
De blind’mans zeun is maer een botterik er by.
Hy is wel gaeuw,... maar ik heb geld, om van te kluiven.
Hy niet; en daerom zel hy ’an de veest niet snuiven.
Ik kryg de bruid, en ’t is zijn neusje effen mis.
Maer appropo, Sinjeur, weet je ook hoe laet of ’t is?
’Et was ezaid, dat ik precies te zeuven uuren
Most by de vrinden zyn, en deur je malle kuuren
Is ’t laet ’eworden, geef men muts me maer weêrom,
En gae mit my, Sinjeur; ik hiet je wellekom,
’k Noô jou te Brulloft; wangt jy lykt een snaek der snaeken,
Je kent de boeren op de Brulloft wat vermaeken.
San. Te brulloft broertje? gaet dat zeker? wel is ’t waer?
Je bent een man as spek, dat lyktme, zoete vaer.
Ik heb (och harm) lang uit men knapzak moeten blikken.
Te Brulloft, weetje ’t wel? gut kaerel, ’k ken zo slikken
Stae vast nou hoendertjes, en snipjes met je drek.
Stae frikkedilletjes. Kam. ’t is tyd dat ik vertrek:
Ei geef me muts weêrom, je kent’em niet gebruiken.
San. Gut Splandor, ik begin ’t gebraed alriets te ruiken.
Kam. Ik hiet gien plankoor, broêr, Kamacho is myn naem.
Men vaertje sageles, was Lopes Pedro daam,
In Lombrigje men moer, ’ebooren te Bregance....
Maer hoe is jou naem, broêr? San. Die is don Sanche Pance.
’k Bin deur dien goejen heer, puur uit den drek ’eraekt.
Hy heit me van een boer een Gouverneur ’emaakt.
Kam. Een Gormandeur, wel zo, wie drumpel zou het denken!
Een Gormandeurschap kan jou Heer dat an jou schenken?
San. Ja, van een Eiland, en ’k kreeg zeuven ezels toe.
Kam. Heb jy die al? San. Wel neen: ’k heb de ezels nog te goê,
En ’t Eiland zel men Heer in korte dagen winnen.
Kam. De vent is zeker gek, wie drommel zou ’t verzinnen?
Hoe hiet dat ailand, en waar laitet? an wat kangt?
San. ’t Leit in Jaerabien, digt by het heilig land,
’t Hiet mikrosko.pi.pi.pium.... ’t is me al vergeeten,
Daer weunde een groote Reus, de mallenbrui geheeten,
Zo groot gelyk een boom. Maer hy ’s al lang kapot;
Men Heer die potste hem. Kam. Een reus! wel dat’s niet rot.
Een Reus? hoe vindt men nou nog reuzen? hoe ken’t weezen?
San. Ja Broertje, mien je dat wy veur de Reuzen vreezen?
Veur twintig Reuzen, zou men Heer staen als een pael.
Kam. Ik word waratjes aêrs van zulk een vreemd verhael.
San. Ja Reuzen alzoo groot als meulens mit vier armen,
Die steekt men Heer maer mit zyn lansie in de darmen.
In al de Legers daer hy komt, daer maekt hy schrik:
’t Is kip ik hebje! steek! slae, in een oogenblik
Is ’t hiele veld bezaeid, mit armen, en mit beenen:
Hy slaet terstongt maer deur een hiel slagorden heenen.
Kam. Gangs ligters, is dat waer! heb jy het zelfs ’ezien?
San. Ja ’k; ’t is omtrent ’eleen, nae ’k gis een maend, of tien,
Toen heit hy teugen een hiel leger nog ’evochten;
Ze vlugtten al; maer juist die beesten, die gedrochten,
Van schelmse Tovenaars, die quaemen op ’et mat.
Ze gooijden al ’er best mit steenen naer ons gat,
En maekten van ’er volk een hiele kudde schaepen!
Kam. Wel langsje, viel daer niet wat buit veur jou te raepen?
San. Ja steenen op ons bast, dat’s tovenaersmanier.
Men Heer verloor dien tyd ook wel een tand drie vier.
Kam. Je heer lykt wel bedroefd: hy is diep in gedachten.
San. Men Heer? ja die’s verliefd, hy klaegt gehiele nachten;
Je hoort niet anders als: ô schoone ondankbaerheid!
Dulcinea, princes, ô noordstar die me leid!
Wanneer zel jy me veur men trouwe dienst beloonen!
Dan zucht hy weer, en roept: ô schoonste van de schoonen,
Wanneer genaekt den tyd, dat ik.... exceterae,
’t Is al Dulcinea ondankbaer veur en nae.
Kam. Is die Dulcinea dan veur zo mooy te houwen?
Ik wed ze mooijer is, die ik van daeg zel trouwen.
Don Qu. Wat zegt gy Splandor? ha dat liegt gy, door uw’ hals.
’t Za, vat uw’ lancie. Kam. Och heer Ridder, ’et is vals,
Jou liefste is mooijer: maar wie pikken sou et droomen!
Had ik ’eweeten dat je ’t qualyk had ’enomen,
Dat ik myn Bruid wat prees, ’k had ’et wel ’emyd.
Don Qu. Neen ik wil vechten, ’t za berei u tot den stryd,
Ik geef u keur van grond. Kam. ’k Hou niet een brui van vechten.
Och! Ridder wees te vreên!
Don Qu. Zeg hoe gy ’t wilt beslechten,
’k Geef keur, te paerd, te voet, met lancie, of het zwaerd.
Kam. Gena: genade, och! och! ik zweer je by myn baerd,
Dat ik niet vechten kan.... Och! och! hoe zel ’t hier daegen?
Moord! brangd! moord! brangd! help! help! ô ongehoorde
plaegen,....
Daer’s Vetlasoep met volk!
Don Qu. ’t Za, ’t za, waar ’s uw geweer?
Kam. Help Mannen! mannen! help!
Don Qu. Hoe schreeuwt gy zo myn Heer?

NEGENDE TOONEEL.

Vetlasoepe met eenige boeren, Kamacho, Don Quichot, Sanche.

Kamacho. ’t Sa, lustig jongens, pas nou louter wat te raeken!


Don Qu. Kanailje! Tovenaars! San. Wel brui er’r veur’er kaeken.
Kam. Sla toe maer mannen! pas te raeken mannen! t’ sa.
Don Quichot en Sanche krygen stokslagen, waar op zy vallen.
San. Oei! oei! men billen, en myn kop, gena! gena!
Och! sinte Tovenaers, ’k heb niemendal bedreven.
Kam. Ei zie dien Gormandeur, dien reekel, nou iens beeven.
Hoe smaektje deuze koek? scheer nog de gek erais.
San. Genade, ô Splandor. Kam. Wel de pikken op je vlais!
Daar Plankoor, Plankoor, daar! je zelt van Plankoor heugen.
San. Myn lieve Splandertje ik en mag ’er gansch niet teugen,
Ei slae niet meer.
Kamacho slaat Sanche.
Wel dat’s een drommel van een vent.
Nog scheert de beest de gek.
San. Och! och! och! seldrement!
Is dat ook kloppen. Don Qu. Och! Princesse van Toboze!
Kroondraagster van myn hart, ô verse ontlooken’ rooze!
Hier legt uw Ridder van de Tovenaars gewond!
Vetl. Wat sekse rek’le? zyn hum Tovenaars, jou hond?
Wat opstinaater folk! terwyl dat s’hum zo kloppen,
Zo scheer ze nok de gek, en durven ons nok foppen.
Kam. ’k Zal heur betaelen, laet men nou maer iens betien.
Kamacho neemt zyn muts wederom.

TIENDE TOONEEL.

Bazilius, Valasko, Vetlasoepe, boeren, Don Quichot, Sanche.

Bazilius. Hou op Kamacho! zeg, wat is ’t dat wij hier zien?


Hoe komen deze twee zo bont en blaauw geslaagen?
Kam. ’t Zyn fielen allebai, wie drumpel zou ’t verdraegen.
Die, met het harnas, noemt zich ridder dronke zot,
En de aêre gormandeur; ze noemde my uit spot,
Heer Ridder Plankoor, zeun van Geelesla; geen smeeken,
Of bidden hulp; die Guit wou me op ’t lest deursteeken;
Had ik dat volk hier niet, ik was ’r al om koud.
Bazilius tegen Don Quichot.
Dat ’s al een vreemde zaak. Zeg, wat maakt u zo stout,
In ’t harnas op den weg de menschen aan te randen?
Wie zyt gy? spreek; of ’k geef ’t terstont ’t geregt in handen.
Don Qu. Een Ridder voor wiens arm het alles beeven moet,
Gelyk een Amadis in ’t harnas opgevoed.
San. Och, jy lykt noch een mensch. Ei word mit ongs bewogen;
We zyn onnozel van die tovenaers bedrogen!
Den vroomsten ridder, voor wiens arm de Turk zo vreest,
Den trouwsten schildknaep, die in Spanje ooit is ’eweest,
Zie jy hier liggen. Baz. „Heer Valasko, ’t zijn die menschen,
Daar gy me flus van spraakt. Myn heer, ik zou wel wenschen
Dat gy me uw naam ontdekte. Don Qu. Ik ben de Ridder van
De leeuwen, Don Quichot. San. Ja ’t is de zelve man.
Baz. Zo zyt gy Don Quichot! wees welkom roem der helden,
De faam quam ons al lang uw groote daden melden.
ô Doolend ridder, voor wiens arm en kloek gelaat,
’t Gespuis der tovenaars als ach en rook vergaat.
Koom, doe my de eer aan en vernacht in myne wooning.
Don Qu. Zyt gy ’t Arsipanpan? ô mededoogend koning,
Die my verlost hebt uit ’t geweld der Tovenaars?
Wat ben ik u verplicht! Kam. Wel dat is al wat raers,
Hy noemt Bazilius een Keuning, watte streeken!
Baz. Verzorg de heeren van al wat hen mag ontbreeken
Valasko, zo ’t u b’lieft, ik volg u zo terstond.
Kam. Die knevels zinnen ’t eens, ô bloed! ’et is een vond
Van de edelliên, om ons wat schrik op ’t lyf te zenden.
Ze hebben ’t opgestemd. San. Och! och! men ouwe lenden,
Wat bin je braef ’esmeerd! ô vrinden ’k zweer et jou,
Dat ik niet veul van zulk een tov’naers bruiloft hou.
Valasko tegen Don Quichot.
Kom Ridder laat ons gaan.
San. ’k Mot eerst men Graeuwtje haelen
Mit Rosinant. Val. ’t Is wel: maar niet te lang te draalen,
’k Gaa met uw’ Heer vooruit.

ELFDE TOONEEL.

Bazilius, Kamacho.
Bazilius. Kamacho, schaam u, hoe?
Zo’n edel man te slaan; zeg waar by koomt dat toe?
Kam. Ei lieve zie, hoe mal dat hy ’em an kan stellen,
Puur of hy ’t niet en wist. Hoor, wil ik ’t je eens vertellen?
’t Is ien van jou konsoort, jy hebt ’em op’emaekt
Om my te bruyen. Heb ik ’t op zyn kop ’eraekt?
Baz. Ik heb hem nooit gezien; maar van zyn dapper leeven,
En wonderlyk bedryf is korts een boek geschreven,
Valasko heeft het, en vindt groote smaak daar in.
Kam. Wat is dat veur een boek? wat heit ’et veur een zin?
Baz. Van vechten en van slaan, en reuzen overwinnen,
Jonkvrouwen by te staan, getrouw’lyk te beminnen,
En honderd dingen meer die hy nog dag’lyks doet.
Hy is een Ridder van een groot verstand en moed.
Kam. Maer komje hier ook om de Bruiloft te verstooren?
Baz. Wat wisje wasjes, neen.
Kam. Ik wou wel graeg iens hooren,
Hoe ’tjou al ’an staet, dat de Bruid jou is ontvryd.
Baz. ’k Hoop dat die zwaarigheid zal slyten door den tyd.
Ik wensch u veel geluk dewyl ’t nu zo moet wezen.
Kam. Je bent bylo een borst uit duizend uitgelezen.
Hou daer, daer is myn hangd, ’k denk ummers dat je ’t mient?
Baz. Voorzeker; ’k hou u voor myn’ allerbesten vriend.
Kam. Kom meê te bruiloft, ’k zel je helder doen trakteeren;
Gut jonker, doet ’et. Baz. ’k Moet juist gaan by zek’re heeren.
Kam. Gut snaekje doet ’et.
Baz. Zo ik tyd vind, zal ik ’t doen.
Kam. Hadie dan, dat gaet na myn liefstentje om een zoen.

TWAALFDE TOONEEL.

Bazilius, alleen.
O hemel! zal die lompe Boer erlangen
Een schoone Maegd, wiens aangenaam gezicht
Myn noordstar is, myn eenig levens licht,
En die ik dagt voor myne Bruid te ontvangen.
Quiteria, hoe vaak hebt gy beloofd
Met hand en mond, my nimmer te begeeven:
Maar steeds met my in zoete min te leeven!
Heeft dan het goud uw trouwe min verdoofd?
Neen ’t was geveinsd, gy doet my eeuwig treuren,
’k Zink in een poel van jammer, en verdriet!
’k Zal sterven: want my lust het leeven niet,
Nu my ’t bezit van u niet mag gebeuren.
’t Is ydel met myn zuchten, en geween;
Ik strooij vergeefs myn’ klagten voor de winden.
Daar is geen trouw ter waereld meer te vinden:
Men mint om ’t goud, ’t geld is de liefde alleen.
Men agt verstand, noch aangenaame zeden,
Men vraagt naar konst, noch eêlheid van gemoed:
Maar naar ’t genot van schatten, geld, en goed.
’t Geld maakt een dwaas behaag’lyk in zyn reden.
Vaar wel, vaar wel, ô overschoone maagd!
Mogt ik voor ’t laatst van u dien troost verwerven,
Dat gy bedenkt wat minnaar gy doet sterven;
Een minnaar, dien u eertyds heeft behaagd.
Waar loop ik heen? waar vliegen myn gedachten?
Behaagde ik u? neen, gy behaagde my.
Myn min was ernst: maar de uwe veinzery.
Ach, kon ik dit van u, van u verwachten!
Rampzal’ge min, gy hebt my, laas! verleid;
Quiteria was voor my niet gebooren.
ô Min! gy laat my in hun strikken smooren!
Quiteria vaar wel in eeuwigheid!
Maar ach! zy koomt.
DERTIENDE TOONEEL.

Bazilius, Quiteria, Laura.

Quiteria. Ach Lief, ’k koom u nog eens


aanschouwen;
Hoe wendt gy ’t aangezicht...
Baz. Ondankbaarste aller vrouwen,
Hebt gy myn zuchten en myn klagten aangehoord?
Of zyt gy doof voor my, die door de min versmoort?
Quit. Myn Lief!
Baz. Neen zwyg Cireen; gy zoudt het vonnis geeven
Van mynen dood. Quit. Neen, leef.
Baz. ’k Zal zonder u niet leeven,
Bruid van Kamacho; neen, blyf, blyf by uwe keur;
Trouw met dien ryken gek, terwyl ik eenzaam treur:
Maar denk in uwe vreugd, wat minnaar gy doet quynen.
Quit. Ach Lief laat deze wolk van jaloezy verdwynen.
Baz. Wat jaloezy? gy treedt van daag met hem in d’echt.
Quit. ’t Zal nimmermeer geschiên; ’k beminne u al te oprecht.
Baz. Hoe ver verschilt uw hart, van ’t geen ge u mond doet spreken,
Quit. ’k Zal om Kamacho nooit myn’ trouwbelofte breeken;
Ik walg van zyne min. Baz. Hoe zal ik dit verstaan?
Deez dag neemt gy hem voor uw’ Man en Huisvoogd aan,
’t Is alles op de been, de boeren quinkeleeren,
De bruiloft is gereed. Quit. Die vreugd kon wel verkeeren.
Ik zal Kamacho nooit aannemen tot myn man.
Ik gaf hem nooit myn hart, gy zyt ’er meester van.
Scherp uw vernuft, myn lief, en wilt een list bedenken,
Om ons van hem te ontslaan: doch zo ’t myne eer zou krenken,
Staa ik het nimmer toe. Baz. De vlucht?
Quit. Die ’s vol gevaar.
Baz. ’k Zal uw beschermer zyn, we zullen met malkaêr
Naar Saragossa vliên. Quit. Neen lief, dat koomt my duister,
En gansch ondoenlyk voor; ik krenk myn eer en luister,
Indien ik ’t onderneem. Baz. Myn Schoone, zyt gerust:
Het is noodzaaklyk, ’k zal u leiden waar ’t u lust:
En wat uw eer belangt, hoeft gy daar voor te schroomen?
Myn liefde staat gevest op deugd.
Quit. Hoe zal ik komen
Uit myn verdriet, helaas! Baz. Myn Lief, men raakt den tyd,
Die kort is, door al die vergeefsche klagten quyt,
En wierd gy hier by my ontdekt, het waar te duchten,
Dat ons ’t geluk niet diende om onzen ramp te ontvluchten.
Lau. Het is noodzaakelyk. Quit. Ik vrees.
Baz. Daar ’s geen gevaar;
Indien wy schikken dat we hier omtrent malkaêr
Weer vinden, in een uur, ’k zal rytuig klaar doen maaken.
Quit. Helaas! wat doe ik al om uit den dwang te raaken.

Einde van het eerste Bedryf.


TWEEDE BEDRYF.
EERSTE TOONEEL.

Kamacho, tegen iemant van binnen.

Slae jy dien weg maer in, en doe gelyk ik zeg;


Ik zel eens zien of ik ’er vind, op deuzen weg.
Kamacho, alleen. Ja wel, ik zeg noch iens, daer moet wat gaende
weezen.
ô! Al dat wandelen met Laura doet me vreezen.
’t Is koddig van de Bruid! zy is geduurig zoek.
’k Loof dat Bazilius (want hy is gaeuw en kloek)
Men bruid verleien wil. Hy zel me parten speulen!
Ik vrees warentig dat ’er iets is in de meulen!
De boeren zeggen dat hy hier staag met heur praet.
Alleenig om een hoek, wie weet hoe dat het gaat!
Ik zel hier wachten, en me zelven wat versteeken.
Zacht daar komt Jochem de Poejeet, die lykt te preeken.
De loeris ziet me niet, zo leutert hem ’t verstand.

TWEEDE TOONEEL.

Meester Jochem, Kamacho.

„Puf nou Poëetjes, ’k ben de baas van ’t gantsche land!


„Puf Salamanka, met uw alma akkademi.
„Ik Miester Jochem, hoofdpoëet van sante Remi,
„In ’t landschap Mancha, maak myn rymen aanstonds weg.
„Sonnetten in een uur. Zeg Rederykers, zeg,
„Wie zou ’t my nadoen? En myn beste referynen,
„Wel honderd regels lang, (het zal wat wonders schynen)
„Doe ’k in een halven dag: maar ’k heb natuur te baat.
„Daar Lope Vegaas, en Quevédos geest voor staat,
„Help ik ’er deur, ja ’k weet ’er fouten aan te wyzen.
„Dat ik prys, zullen al de boeren met my pryzen.
„Die my te vrind houd, maak ik een volmaakt Poëet.
„Ik rym terwyl ik slaap, ik rym terwyl ik eet;
„En op de brillekiek bedenk ik myn rondeelen.
„’t Is alles geest, een aâr moet uit de boeken steelen;
„Ik niet, schyt boeken, ’k heb de kunst hier in myn kop,
„Ik ben geheel doorwiekt van zuiver hengste sop;
„Ja ’k ben poëet zelfs in myn moeders lyf gebooren.
Sinjoor de Bruidegom, koomt gy my hier te vooren!
Kam. Wel Miester Jochem heb jy ook myn Bruid gezien?
Jochem. Ze is by de Muzen op Parnassus berg misschien.
Kam. Wat is dat voor een berg? wat of je al uit zult stooten.
Jochem. Die Muzen en dien Berg zyn in myn brein besloten.
Kam. ’k Verstae dat niet: ik vraeg of jy myn Bruid niet weet.
Jochem. Gy vraagt my als een gek: ik andwoord als Poëet.
Kam. Wat schort je Jochem? benje dol? of benje dronken?
Jochem. Met uw verlof, jy hebt my niet een zier geschonken.
Kam. Ho ho! nou merk ik ’t al; je zelt licht moeij’lyk zyn?
Jochem. Wel ja, jou Kok, die Waal, zei dat men hier den wyn
Als water schenken zou, en nou ik ben gekomen,
Heb ik noch wyn noch Waal, noch niet een brui vernomen.
Ik zal dien rotzak weer betaalen voor dien trek.
Kam. Hy heit zyn boodschap dan niet wel gedaen, die gek.
’t Is nog te vroeg.
Jochem. Ik denk je zelt my ook tracteeren?
Kam. Wel zou ik niet? je zelt je keel ook helder smeeren.
Maar zeg, is jou myn bruid met Laura niet ontmoet?
Jochem. Ja tog, ik heb de Bruid daar even nog gegroet.
Kam. Wie was ’er by?
Jochem. Zy had haar Speelnood Laura by ’er.
Kam. Zag jy Bazilius dan niet, haar ouwe vryer?
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