“PLEASURE and pain are undoubtedly the ultimate objects of the calculus of economics. To satisfy our wants to the utmost with the least effort - to procure the greatest amount of what is desirable at the expense of the least that is undesirable - in other words, to maximize pleasure, is the problem of economics.”

— William Stanley Jevons, The Theory of Political Economy

Source: The Theory of Political Economy (1871), Chapter III, Theory of Utility, p. 61.

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William Stanley Jevons69

English economist and logician 1835–1882

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William Stanley Jevons69

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