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PONTIFICIAE ACADEMIAE SCIENTIARVM SCRIPTA VARA - 25 
been led to look at the whole of economic reality through the 
lens of a scarcity scheme, and thus to magnify or shrink the 
various aspects of reality according as to whether they do or 
do not fit into the pattern of a world of scarce goods. 
I have thought it may not be altogether useless — after a 
century of marginal economic analysis — to go back to explore 
the possibilities, which may have remained unexploited, inher- 
ent into the other approach to economic reality, which has been 
left into oblivion since the time of the Classics. 
3. A pure production model 
It is my purpose to develop, in the following pages, 
a theoretical model of economic growth for an industrial eco- 
nomic system. In the whole theory, a central rôle will be 
played by the learning process of human beings, in its twofold 
aspects of technical improvements and of consumers’ preference 
evolution. Scarce resources will not be considered, although 
of course this does not mean that they do not exist. It only 
means that the theory will be developed independently of any 
rational problem concerning their best utilization. All com- 
modities considered are produced, and can be made practically 
in whatever quantity may be wanted, provided that they are 
devoted to the amount of efforts they technically require. Li- 
mitations of course exist, but not in the material world: they 
only reside in the knowledge and power of activity of Men. 
As will be realised, this means adopting a procedure which 
is exactly opposite, though symmetrical, to the one followed 
by marginal analysis. The scheme itself might be called a pure 
production model, as against the pure exchange model of mar- 
ginal economics. It will refer to a certain type of commodities 
(this time the commodities of the production type), will centre 
around a definite problem (the problem of production), and will 
L10] Pasinetti - pag. 8