Dana Simmons

Vital Minimum: Need, Science, and Politics in Modern France Dana Simmons

Marc Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.; What constitutes a need? Who gets to decide what people do or do not need? In modern France, scientists, both amateur and professional, were engaged in defining and measuring human needs. These scientists did not trust in a providential economy to distribute the fruits of labour and uphold the social order. Rather, they believed that social organization should be directed according to scientific principles. They grounded their study of human needs on quantifiable foundations: agricultural and physiological experiments, demographic studies, and statistics. The result was the concept of the 'vital minimum' - the living wage, a measure of physical and social needs. In this book, Dana Simmons traces the history of this concept, revealing the intersections between technologies of measurement, such as calorimeters and social surveys, and technologies of wages and welfare. Biographical Note: Dana Simmons is associate professor of history at the University of California, Riverside. Table of Contents: 1 Introduction 2 Subsistence Pigs on a balance Scarcity Bread and meat Recycling and reproduction 3 Social Reform Scale balances Air rations Maintenance rations 4 Family, Race, Type Welfare and comparative zoology Family and race Socialism and statistics 5 Citizens Useless mouths, get out! Meat or bread 6 Vital Wages Socialism, statistics, and the iron law The fever of needs Vital wages 7 Science of Man Biosocial economics Rationing The vital minimum wage The science of man after 1945 8 Human Persons Incompressible needs and the SMIG Human persons An impossible standard 9 Need, Nature, and Society Acknowledgments Notes Bibliography Index"

Contributor Bio:  Simmons, Dana Dana Simmons is associate professor of history at the University of California, Riverside.