Alertness, Local Knowledge, and Johnny Appleseed

15 Pages Posted: 25 Jul 2011

See all articles by David Skarbek

David Skarbek

Brown University - Department of Political Science

Abstract

Anderson and Hill argue that property rights entrepreneurs, driven by non-replicable Kirznerian alertness, identify unowned and unpriced attributes of a resource and capture rents to those resources by limiting access to them. I argue that alertness is non-replicable, but it is also not random. Kirzner's analytical framework emphasizes an individual's local knowledge and subjective interpretative schema. Incorporating these concepts and emphasizing two types of local knowledge, about social and commercial conditions, explains why some people are alert to profit opportunities and others are not. This implies that economic restrictions are more detrimental to entrepreneurship than previously understood. I provide evidence by examining Johnny Appleseed's successful nursery business.

Keywords: Property Rights Entrepreneurship, Alertness, Local Knowledge

JEL Classification: D23, L26

Suggested Citation

Skarbek, David, Alertness, Local Knowledge, and Johnny Appleseed. Review of Austrian Economics, Vol. 22, No. 7, 2009, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1112183

David Skarbek (Contact Author)

Brown University - Department of Political Science ( email )

Box 1844
Providence, RI 02912
United States