“经济学分析”近来成了一块膏药,被贴到许多文章标题上。但对于什么是经济学?经济学分析究竟应包括那些内容?如何认识经济学分析?却是一个有待回答的问题。 经济学分析是一个极为宽泛的概念,J·熊彼特从经济分析史的角度,将它定义为“人类为了认识经济现象在心智方面所作的努力”。从现代经济学的角度看,这种“心智方面所作的努力”主要包括三种大的范式:马克思主义经济学、新古典主义经济学和凯恩斯主义经济学。由于近来文章中所使用的经济学分析主要源于新古典主义经济学,所以,本文也将经济学分析限于此。 在经济学这个工具箱中,装有经济学的基本假定、核心概念、特定范围、问题、理论和检验方法。但由于经济学家们研究范围、回答问题的特殊性,从而形成不同的经济理论。所以,经济学分析最根本的工具始终是基本假定和核心概念。贝克尔把它们归结为“最大化行为、市场均衡和偏好稳定的综合假定及其不拆不扣地运用”。罗伯特·考特和托马斯·尤伦在他们合著的《法和经济学》中,则将它们总结为最大化,均衡和效率,其中,最大化和均衡是经济学分析的“两个基本概念”,他们认为“经济学家的任何一 Economic Analysis has recently become a patch, affixed to many article titles. But what is economics? What should be included in economic analysis? How to understand economic analysis? It is an issue to be answered. Economic analysis is a very broad concept. From the point of view of economic analysis, J. Schumpeter defines it as “the mental effort of humankind to understand economic phenomena.” From the perspective of modern economics, this “mental effort” consists of three major paradigms: Marxist economics, neoclassical economics and Keynesian economics. Since the economic analysis used in recent articles is mainly derived from neoclassical economics, this article also limits economic analysis to this. In economics, this toolbox holds the basic assumptions, core concepts, specific scopes, problems, theories, and test methods of economics. However, because economists study the scope and answer the particularity of the problems, different economic theories are formed. Therefore, the most fundamental tool of economic analysis is always the basic assumption and core concept. Becker attributes them to “comprehensive assumptions that maximize behavior, market equilibrium and preference stability, and that they are used without any compromise.” In their book Law and Economics, Robert Corte and Thomas Ullens summarize them as maximization, equilibrium and efficiency, of which the maximization and equilibrium are the two basic concepts of economic analysis “They think” any one economist