“Mr Keynes and the ‘Classics’” Again: A Methodological Enquiry

Keynes is usually interpreted as proposing, or intending to propose an original theory of employment and income. However, this paper shows that Keynes was actually proposing more than a theoretical alternative. He saw himself breaking away from the ‘Classics’ at the connected levels of theory and methodology. This paper thus argues that modern economists going back to the old story of the relation between Mr. Keynes and the ‘Classics’ can learn something about several controversial issues in macroeconomics and methodology like for instance the role of experiments and formal arguments in economics.The paper is the development of a chapter in my Ph.D. thesis and has greatly benefited from discussion with Mark Blaug, Anna Carabelli, Bill Gerrard, Marc Lavoie, Tony Lawson, Roy Rotheim, and especially Geoff Harcourt and Malcolm Sawyer. Errors and omissions are, of course, solely my responsibility. A first draft of the paper was presented at the UK Autumn HET Conference (Glasgow Caledonian University, September 1999) and the AISPE Conference (University of Florence, September 1999). Finally, the paper was completed when I was visiting Research Professor at the Economics Department and C-FEPS, University of Missouri Kansas City (UMKC), Kansas City (USA) and Visiting Fellow at Clare Hall College and CCEPP, University of Cambridge, Cambridge (UK). I would like to express appreciation to members of those institutions for providing a stimulating and pleasant working environment.     

Aggregate demand and supply

This paper is part of a broader project that provides a microfoundation to the General Theory of J. M. Keynes. I call this project "old Keynesian economics" to distinguish it from new-Keynesian economics, a theory that is based on the idea that to make sense of Keynes we must assume that prices are sticky. I describe a multi-good model in which I interpret the definitions of aggregate demand and supply found in the General Theory through the lens of a search theory of the labor market. I argue that Keynes' aggregate supply curve can be interpreted as the aggregate of a set of first-order conditions for the optimal choice of labor and, using this interpretation, I reintroduce a diagram that was central to the textbook teaching of Keynesian economics in the immediate post-war period.     

Der streit um keynes im lichte unserer erfahrungen

Summary The Keynes Controversy in the Light of Our Experience. — In 1953, Erich Schneider in an important paper tried to “solve” the Keynes controversy in Germany. He defended Keynes against attacks by R?pke, Hahn, Meyer, and others, who pretend that an application of his theory inevitably leads to permanent inflation, and he maintained, logically arguing, that Keynes’s theory is “general” in the sense that it leads to certain results in depression as well as inflation. In the present paper it is suggested that the Keynesian revolution changed the attitudes of entrepreneurs, trade unions and politicians considerably so that today the government is expected to run a full employment policy, the result of which is a tendency towards creeping inflation. Though in theory applicable to both depression and inflation, employment of Keynesian tools to control overall monetary demand is really successful in depressions only. Thus, given the above-mentioned expectations of trade unions and entrepreneurs, Keynesian policies have to be sustained by policies on the microeconomic level to allow for steady growth of national incomes and a stable price level.

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Résumé La controverse sur Keynes à la lumière de nótres expériences. -En 1953, Erich Schneider entreprit de ?résoudre?, en un article important, la controverse en Allemagne sur Keynes. Il y défend Keynes contre les attaques de R?pke, Hahn, Meyer, et d’autres, qui disent que le Keynesianisme aboutit nécessairement en une inflation permanente; et il appuie sur la Symmetrie logique des analyses Keynes pour la dépression et l’inflation. Dans l’article que voici, l’auteur maintient que la révolution Keynesienne, tout en avan?ant la théorie, a modifié considérablement les attitudes des entrepreneurs, des syndicats, et des politiciens, de sorte qu’on exige actuellement que le gouvernement adopte toujours une politique de plein emploi, ce qui, à son tour, crée une tendance vers l’inflation lente. Quoi que théoriquement applicables à l’inflation aussi bien qu’à la dépression, les instruments Keynesiens pour le contróle de la demande totale d’argent ne s’appliquent avec le succès désiré qu’à la dépression. Plus on s’approche du plein emploi, plus il est nécessaire d’ajouter aux mesures macroéconomiques Keynesiennes des mesures microéconomiques afin d’assurer un accroissement économique constant avec un niveau stable des prix.

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Resumen La controversia por Keynes vista a través de nuestras experiencias. -En un artfculo publicado en 1953 bajo el titulo ?La controversia por Keynes? Erich Schneider trat? de reducir la teoria económica de Keynes a su justo valor, con el fin de objetivizar las discusiones a que dicha teoria habia dado lugar en Alemania. Defendió a Keynes contra la critica de R?pke, Hahn, Meyer y otros, segün la cual el keynesianismo produciria inevitablemente una inflation permanente, demostrando que la teoria keynesiana era aplicable no solo en situaciones de depresi?n sino también, anàlogamente, en situaciones de inflation. En el présente articulo el autor opina que la ?Teoria General? de Keynes, además de hacer progresar la teoria económica, ha influido en la actitud de empresarios, sindicatos y politicos, por cuanto prédomina la idea de que el gobierno se encargará siempre de asegurar el pleno empleo. Esta expectatita y el comportamiento correspondiente del gobierno producen una tendencia permanente de inflation. A pesar de que la teoria keynesiana es lógicamente simétrica, cabe esperar que la adoption de medidas keynesianas para controlar la demanda total monetaria solo tendràn éxito en fases de depresión. Habiendo pleno empleo, las medidas keynesianas, macroecon?micas, necesitan ser complementadas por medidas microecon?micas con el fin de hacer factible un crecimiento económico adecuado, manteniendo a la vez la estabilidad del nivel de precios.

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Riassunto La controversia su Keynes alla luce délie nostre esperienze. -In un articolo ?La controversia su Keynes?, Erich Schneider nel 1953 ha tentato di ricondurre la discussione sulla teoria economica di Keynes alla sua vera origine. Egli difende quindi Keynes dal rimprovero di R?pke, Hahn, Meyer e di altri che il keynesianesimo conduca inevitabilmente ad una permanente inflazione mettendo in evidenza la simmetria logica dell’analisi di Keynes per depressione ed inflazione. Qui viene supposto che la ?General Theory? di Keynes oltre ai progressi délia teoria produsse anche modificazioni délie opinioni di imprenditori, sindacati e politici che condueono all’attesa che il governo si preoccupi sempre délia piena occupazione. Questa attesa e il corrispondente comportamento del governo producono una permanente tendenza d’inflazione. Sebbene la teoria lógicamente sia simmetrica, i modi di procedere dei soggetti economici condurrebbero a questo che l’applicazione di misure di Keynes per il controllo dell’intera domanda monetaria abbiano il successo desiderato soltanto in depressione. Con alta occupazione, misure macroeconomiche di Keynes devono essere integrate con intervenu sul micropiano per rendere possibile una sufficiente crescenza economica in stabilità di prezzi.

     

Relevance of recent developments in monetary theory for developing economies: A sceptical note

Recent contributions to the theory of money claim derivation from Keynes' General Theory, but come to conclusions different from the latter. This paper analyses how their claim to Keynesian lineage is wrong in substance, for the essence of the Keynesian contribution on money lies in the special position which money occupies vis-à-vis goods, and the uncertainty elements in the functioning of a money economy. It then analyses how equilibrium analysis (which Keynes sought to unseat), has reasserted itself, due partly to the neoclassical methodology of analysis through comparative statics and the concept of thriftiness cast in personal rather than corporate terms.Following on from this, this paper refers to the great deficiency of the Keynesian approach as being reliance on analysis confined to the level of the market and inadequately linked with the institutional features of the capitalist system, which the Kaleckian version of the General Theory of Employment emphasizes. This aspect is then used by the author to analyse the political economy of a developing economy.     

It is Time for National Action to Reach the Lisbon Goals

Summary During the second half of 2004, the Netherlands held the Presidency of the European Union. One of the conferences during the Presidency was titled ‘More people at work: Policies to activate Europe’s labour potential’. It was organised on October 25 and 26, 2004 at the Beurs van Berlage in Amsterdam. The conference focused on four particular areas: the reconciliation of work and family life, activating social security systems, mobility and training. As a starting point for the discussions during the conference, academics who are experts in the specific policy areas were asked to write a paper. In this special edition of ‘De economist’ you will find a presentation of three of their papers. In my contribution I will explain why I have put the focus of this conference on increasing labour supply and more in particular why these four themes have been chosen as relevant for Member States and the Union. As time has not stopped after the Netherlands’ Presidency I will also take this opportunity to show that the conclusions of the conference have become an integrated part of the revitalised Lisbon strategy.     

Negative nominal interest rates: history and current proposals

Given the renewed interest in negative interest rates on base money—or equivalently ‘taxing money’—as a means for overcoming the zero bound on short-term nominal interest rates, this article reviews the history of negative nominal interest rates starting from the ‘taxing money’ proposal of Silvio Gesell up to current proposals that received popular attention in the wake of the financial crisis of 2007/2008. It is demonstrated that ‘taxing money’ proposals have a long intellectual history and that instead of being the conjecture of a monetary crank, they are a serious policy proposal. In a second step, the article points out that besides the more popular debate on a Gesell tax as a means to remove the zero bound on nominal interest rates, there is a class of neoclassical search models that advocates a negative tax on money as efficiency enhancing. This strand of the literature has so far been largely ignored by the policy debate on negative interest rates.     

An Evaluation of Friedman's Monetary Instability Hypothesis

In this article, I examine what I call Milton Friedman's Monetary Instability Hypothesis. Drawing on Friedman's work, I argue that there are two main components to this view. The first component is the idea that deviations between the public's demand for money and the supply of money are an important source of economic fluctuations. The second component of this view is that these deviations are primarily caused by fluctuations in the supply of money rather than the demand for money. Each of these components can be tested independently. To do so, I estimate an otherwise standard New Keynesian model, amended to include a money demand function consistent with Friedman's work and a money growth rule, for a period from 1875 to 1963. This structural model allows me to separately identify shocks to the money supply and shocks to money demand. I then use variance decompositions to assess the relative importance of shocks to the supply and demand for money. I find that shocks to the monetary base can account for up to 28% of the fluctuations in output whereas money demand shocks can account for less than 1% of such fluctuations. This provides support for Friedman's view.     

Microfoundations and Hicksian monetary theory

Summary John Hicks was the first economist to use a general equilibrium framework as a foundation for a dynamic macroeconomic analysis. A critical assessment of his work in this area is used to evaluate the contributions of the ‘micro-foundations’ discussions of the 1970’s. It is noted that Hicks’s starting point, the question of the role of money in a general equilibrium framework, is precisely where the current debate has arrived some fifty years later. This delay, and the foundations debate, were due in large part to Hicks’s own attempts to interpret Keynes’s theory in terms of his own, original framework. Suggestions and comments from P. Davidson, O. Steiger, and the editor, as well as the participants of seminars in the University of Bremen and the Economics Institute of the Faculty of Statistics of the University of Rome are acknowledged without implication of responsibility.     

Aspirations,reference groups and the consumer

Summary In this article it has been possible to give an explanation for the existence of nonsymmetrical Slutsky matrices and nonhomogeneous demand functions. For this purpose a relation was made with a number of sociopsychological theories regarding reference groups and aspiration levels. Following the approach of Lakatos, a ‘hard core’ was chosen from within the traditional theory concerning the market behavior of consumers. In particular, this article used the maximization process. The newly constructed theory, based on this ‘core’, appeared to have more content than the traditional theory. With this result an important requirement of Lakatos' approach was met. I should like to thank Professor A. Bosman for his valuable advice and stimulating criticism. Thanks are also due to Mr. R.E. Vercruijsse who translated this paper and to Mr. R.A. Meyer who checked the mathematics. I also benefited from the comments of an anonymous referee.     

Is there an Anglo-American corporate governance model?

This paper questions the existence of an Anglo-American model of corporate governance and capitalism. Significant differences between the UK and US models of corporate governance are identified. The UK is a principles orientated system based more on voluntary codes operated on a ‘comply or explain’ basis, whilst the US system is more rules based and litigious. The UK focuses more on ex ante protection of ‘outside’ shareholders, whilst the US focuses on ex post protection of share traders. Institutional investors are expected to play a more prominent and wide ranging role in corporate governance in the UK than the US, though the evidence on their voting behaviour and wider ‘engagement’ activity is not readily available. The explosion of private equity led leveraged buy-out activity in the mid 2000s challenges the efficiency of both models and could be a harbinger of a ‘new capitalism’; relying more on incentive compatible remuneration packages and less on public disclosure and market discipline. Alternatively, it could simply be driven by the tax advantages currently enjoyed by debt over equity, the special deferred capital gains (‘carried interest’) tax treatment enjoyed by private equity, low (long as well as short term) real interest rates (‘cheap money’), and rising equity prices.     

Decomposition of GDP Growth in Some European Countries and the United States

Summary  The composition of economic growth can be analyzed in two different ways. In the ‘traditional method’ for the decomposition of GDP growth, total imports are deducted from exports. This approach underestimates the importance of exports for the growth in GDP, and overestimates the importance of domestic expenditure categories. In the alternative methodology proposed in this paper, imports are allocated to all expenditure categories. Although this ‘import-adjusted method’ is more complex than the ‘traditional method’, it has the considerable advantage that the contributions of the expenditure categories to GDP growth provide a better understanding of why GDP growth decelerates or accelerates. The methodology and data requirements for calculating the import content of final demand, and the implications for the decomposition of real GDP growth, are discussed. For six European countries and the United States, the paper shows that applying the alternative methodology provides rather a different economic story.      

The evolution of the monetary system: Future possibilities

Summary This article discusses in the first place the functioning of floating exchange rates; the tendency to volatility and to unnecessary fluctuations is explained. The conclusion is drawn that the authorities of the main countries should cooperate in exchange rate policies that would bring about a greater stability in exchange rate movements. The article then sketches the historical development which brought us to the present multiple reserve currency system. The functioning of this system is analysed and some suggestions are presented for a more satisfactory management of this system by central banks, possibly along guidelines tobe developed in the IMF. Finally some possibilities are outlined to develop a stabler and better system in the future by creating a more attractive market-oriented SDR-substitution account in the IMF. This article is based on important parts of two speeches which I have given recently: ‘The changing monetary system; evolution and reform’ (20 years' anniversary Central Bank of Malaysia, Feb. 1979) ‘Managing reserves in the 1980s’ (Second International Monetary Conference, Philadelphia, Nov. 1980).     

How Influential is Economics?

Economists often claim that their discipline has a great influence on the economy. An analysis of the existing literature reveals, however, that little convincing empirical evidence exists. The two approaches used are subject to major shortcomings. The ‘Economics Production Function’ relating the input of economic ideas to economic outcomes, is faced with major estimation problems. The ‘Revealed Behaviour Approach’ of choosing to study economics is based on very restrictive assumptions. It is argued that the ‘Case Study Approach’ analysing specific policy instances constitutes a more promising avenue and should be undertaken to identify more general patterns of influence.     

An Activating Social Security System

Convergence to the Lisbon employment targets requires absorbing large pools of long-term jobseekers, increasing labour force participation and dealing with a sizeable informal sector, composed for the most of low-productivity jobs. The purpose of this paper is to review the main design features of an activating social security strategy reconciling shifts of these three margins with the redistributive institutions characterising the European landscape. Evidence of experimental studies is reviewed. It is argued that EU supra-national authorities should confine themselves to promoting the exchange of information about best practices in welfare-to-work policies as implementation of this approach should be done at a decentralised level. Issues related to the implementation of this activating strategy in the countries that are more distant from the Lisbon targets are also discussed. A first draft of this paper was prepared for the Dutch Presidency Conference on ‘More People at Work’, Amsterdam, 25–26 October, 2004. I am grateful to participants in that conference, Henk Don and two anonymous referees for valuable comments.     

Over de beheersbaarheid van de geldhoeveelheid in Nederland

Summary The well-known multiplier approach to money supply processes is extended to the case of the open economy of the Netherlands. It was found, first, that the Dutch banking system serves as an important buffer in the Dutch money supply process. Second, the short-run elasticities of money supply and money demand with respect to the call-money rate were found to be +0.23 and −0.09 respectively. Third, the impact multiplier of money with respect to the open market policy variable turned out to be 0.52. The conclusion is that the Dutch central bank is capable, in principle, to control the stock of money in the short run.

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Rede, uitgesproken bij de aanvaarding van het ambt van gewoon hoogleraar in de staathuishoudkunde aan de Rijksuniversiteit te Rotterdam op donderdag 22 maart 1973.     

Rational spirits and the post Keynesian macrotheory of microeconomics

Summary The argument that post Keynesian theory rejects rationality and maximization as a basis of agent behaviour and is thus non-rational and lacking micro-foundations is contrasted by reference to Keynes' use of his early work on probability in the General Theory. Instead of presuming rational choice over perfectly known events, post Keynesian theory builds on Keynes' explanation of agents' rational beliefs in uncertain propositions about their knowledge of the world. These rational spirits lead to the recognition of the macro constraints to individual action or a macrofoundations of microeconomics linked to the role of money and to the role of liquidity preference as both a measure of rational belief and a determinant of money prices which equate the rates of return on all existing and newly produced goods. In this equilibrium prices will generally diverge from costs of production, in contrast to perfect competition but in concordance with the post Keynesian microeconomic theories of mark-up pricing.Comments by L. Hoogduin are gratefully acknowledged. He is relieved from any responsibility for my impressionistic presentation of Keynes' views on probability.     

A re-examination of the demand for money in Nigeria

Summary and Conclusion This paper reexamines the demand for money in Nigeria and finds the real income and the expected rate of inflation to be important independent variables that explain over 80 percent of the variation in the real cash balance. The study shows that, in view of the low per capita income of Nigerians, permanent income and measure income are largely the same. An important finding of this study is that, because their price level is (in large part) exogenously determined, the monetary authorities in Nigeria should be more desirous of following the constant growth rate rule. A very substantial part of the country's export (that is, oil) is especially prone to inflationary pressures due to the ease with which international inflation can be transmitted. Since the authorities can control money stock, this ‘rule’ is indicated from both the theoretical and the empirical standpoint.     

Consumption,income distribution and taxation: Keynes' fiscal policy

The General Theory argued that income distribution affected consumption. Greater income equality put more money into the hands of people with higher MPCs, leading to increased consumption; and greater inequality had the reverse impact. Yet, of the six objective factors that Keynes identified as affecting consumption, only distribution has failed to become part of mainstream consumption theory. This paper examines the reasons why this is so, and then develops a model incorporating the after-tax distribution into a Keynesian consumption function. Empirical tests of this model find that after-tax income distribution is a significant determinant of consumption.     

Energy sanctions and the global economy: mandated vs unilateral sanctions

International Economics and Economic Policy - The world is witnessing an unprecedented episode of ‘economic warfare’, with more than 30% of global GDP (the G7’s share) pitched...     

Een dynamisch duopoliemodel II

Summary This paper is a continuation of ‘A Dynamic Duopoly Model’ (De Economist, 1970, pp. 458–490). According to the argument given in that paper, each duopolist changes his price twice in each period: first, there is an autonomous change, and, secondly, an induced one to neutralize the effect of the autonomous price change of the other duopolist. In the present paper, however, it is assumed that both duopolists change their prices only once a period. These ‘combined’ price changes are partly autonomous and partly induced; only the duopolist himself could tell in how far they are autonomous or induced. The steady state solution of this model corresponds with the endogenously determined duopoly solution of the earlier investigations.