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JAKOB, LUDWIG HEINRICH VON (1759—1827), German economist, was born at Wettin on the 26th of February 1759. In 1777 he entered the university of Halle. In 178o he was appointed teacher at the gymnasium, and in 1791 professor of philosophy at the university. The suppression of the university of Halle having been decreed by Napoleon, Jakob betook himself to Russia, where in 1807 he was appointed professor of political economy at Kharkoff, and in 18o9 a member of the government commission to inquire into the finances of the empire. In the following year he became president of the commission for the revision of criminal law, and he at the same time obtained an important office in the finance department, with the rank of counsellor of state; but in 1816 he returned to Halle to occupy the chair of political economy. He died at Lauchstadt on the 22nd of July 1827.
Shortly after his first appointment to a professorship in Halle Jakob had begun to turn his attention rather to the practical than the speculative side of philosophy, and in 1805 he published at Halle Lehrbuch der Nationalokonomie, in which he was the first to
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advocate in Germany the necessity of a distinct science dealing specially with the subject of national wealth. His principal other works are Grundriss der all gemeinen Logik (Halle, 1788) ; Grundsatze der Polizeigesetzgebung and Polizeianstalten (Leipzig, 18o9); Einleitung in des Studium der Staalswissenschaften (Halle, 1819) ; Entwurf eines Criminalgesetzbuchs fur das russische Reich (Halle, 1818) and Staatsfinanzwissenschaft (2 vols., Halle, 1821).