Background
THÜNEN, Johann Heinrich von was born in 1783 in Oldenburg, Germany.
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Johann Heinrich von THÜNEN
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Founder of location theory, mathematical economist and econometrician whose work, though little appreciated in his own time, has since been re-evaluated as one of the outstanding early contributions to economics. The ‘isolated state’ refers to an abstract spatial model which he used to develop theories of rent, location, wages and interest. His ideas were built on the meticulous accumulation of data from farming experiments on his estate.
He expressed his ideas verbally, arithmetically and in algebraic terms, also making some use of calculus.
He developed an exact theory of marginal productivity and applied the theory to questions of production and distribution. The Isolated State. was not a systematic treatise, and his very great number of achievements have to be disinterred from amongst much other material, such as practical discussions of agricultural economics.
Despite this it is one of the great economic classics. Landowner and farmer.
