Do Educational Attainments Influence Attitudes Toward Gender Equality in Sub-Saharan Africa?

Abstract

Although there is a plethora of literature on gender equality and women empowerment, studies on whether (and to what extent) educational attainments affect people’s attitudes toward gender equality are lacking. This is particularly true for Africa, a mostly male-dominated continent. In this article, we use data from the Wave 6 of the World Values Survey to empirically examine the relationship between educational attainments and attitudes toward gender equality among people in 5 countries in Africa–Ghana, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. Our results, based on different measures of gender equality and econometric specifications, consistently reveal that the higher the level of education acquired, the more liberal and favorable the individual’s attitudes are toward gender equality.     

Keynes on the nature of capital: a note on the origin of The General Theory's chapter 16

In The General Theory, unlike Keynes's previous works, we find a chapter explicitly devoted to a discussion of capital. It's title, however, does not accurately reflect the actual content of the chapter itself; and the text, which contains a discussion of the concept of roundaboutness, may leave the reader uncertain about Keynes' attitude towards that concept and on the actual focus of the chapter. In this paper a study of the surviving drafts of The General Theory and of other sources relevant to the purpose of elucidating the process of composition of the chapter allows us to show how and why those peculiarities emerged and helps to cast light on their meaning.     

Foreign investment, reparations and the proposal for an international bank: notes on the lectures of J M Keynes in Geneva, July 1929

Keynes's lectures to the Geneva School of International Studiesprovide substance to the intellectual linkages between the Cambridgedon and economists working in international economic agenciesduring the inter-war period. Keynes was keenly sought afteras a policy adviser; as the notes to these lectures indicate,he provided his audience with theoretical insights into thepressing issues of the day - reparations and the transfer problem,the economic foundations of the Dawes and Young Plans, and proposalsfor an international bank.     

Whither Keynesian probability? Impolite techniques for decision-making

The critical literature on Keynes has provided extensive analysis of why individual agents may find convenient to adopt a “conventional judgement”, and what he meant by “polite techniques” used to save their faces as “rational, economic men.” This paper concentrates instead on impolite techniques of thought suited to deal with Keynesian uncertainty. The paper suggests that the thread going from Keynes's Treatise on Probability to the General Theory and its defence provides a positive analysis of decision-making under uncertainty, and that placing emphasis on this positive analysis simply means adhering to Keynes's long-standing commitment to a (surely peculiar) probabilistic set-up.     

Knowledge Questions: Hayek,Keynes and Beyond

This paper discusses the knowledge problem in terms of both the use and generation of knowledge. This is analyzed in the context of Hayek's failure to respond to the Keynes Challenge—the claim that markets fail to produce relevant knowledge—by suggesting that in the aftermath of The General Theory he was not well-positioned to address that problem. Ironically, his post-World War II work in cognitive psychology, The Sensory Order, offers a theory of the generation of knowledge which can provide a useful analogy for understanding the generation of market-level knowledge.     

论凯恩斯宏观经济理论的现实主义取向及借鉴价值

宏观经济理论发展至今已历七十余载.在此期间,宏观经济理论研究范式已经发生了重大转变,而导因仍在凯恩斯革命.本文结合对目前宏观经济理论发展所面临的困惑和盲区的剖析,回顾凯恩斯经济理论中所蕴含的现实主义取向和方法论特色,以期对宏观经济理论研究的发展尤其是对基于中国现实的科学发展经济学研究有借鉴和参考意义.     

Comment: Lucas on involuntary unemployment

Keynes distinguishes three concepts: voluntary, frictional and(Keynesian) involuntary unemployment. Frictional unemploymentis a Classical form of involuntary unemployment (not voluntary,as Lucas suggests), and reflects the Marshallian, rather thanWalrasian, treatment of time and equilibrium. Lucas contradictsboth Keynes and Pigou in asserting that there are always immediatevacancies for unskilled labour, and abstracts from the veryproblem that Keynes seeks to address. If voluntary unemploymentis re-defined appropriately, as De Vroey helpfully suggestselsewhere, the prefix ‘involuntary’ is dispensable,not because all unemployment is voluntary, as Lucas would haveit, but because it is all involuntary.     

Lucas on involuntary unemployment

The aim of this paper is to examine critically Lucas' argumentsagainst Keynes's General Theory and in particular against Keynes'sconcept of involuntary unemployment. It comprises two main parts.In the first part of the paper, the author questions Lucas'sclaim that Keynes betrayed the equilibrium discipline by freeinghimself from the postulates of optimising behaviour and marketclearing. In the second part, Lucas’ three arguments againstthe involuntary unemployment concept are discussed—first,that there is no rationale for drawing a distinction betweentwo sorts of unemployment; second, that every economic outcomefeatures the voluntary and the involuntary jointly; and third,that alternatives to unemployment are always present.     

Keynes, Lucas and involuntary unemployment: a reply to Hayes

In this response to Mark Hayes's criticism of his article, ‘Lucason involuntary unemployment’, the author insists on theneed to draw a distinction between labour rationing (a marketoutcome) and unemployment (the activity of job seeking). Economictheory is mainly concerned with the former. Yet the issue ofthe voluntarity versus the involuntarity of unemployment pertainsto unemployment as an activity. Failing to make this distinctioncannot but lead to semantic confusion.     

The Italian theories of progressive taxation∗

In this paper I evaluate the logical consistency of Patinkin's claim that involuntary unemployment can result from slow speed of adjustment. I argue that Patinkin's argument is flawed because of an unjustified breach of continuity in the trade technology assumption between the microeconomic and the macroeconomic parts of Money, Interest, and Prices. Finally, I claim that the issue of flexibility versus rigidity should be linked to the trade technology assumption. As soon as a centralized trade technology is assumed, flexibility automatically comes in.     

The Piketty-Kaldor paradox of growth: Reply to Medlen

Despite the yawning gap between their time horizons, there are a few interesting similarities between Piketty and Keynes. A graph of the Piketty-Kaldor paradox of growth (where a lower growth rate leads to a higher saving rate) is similar to the familiar graph of the Keynesian paradox of thrift (where a lower saving rate leads to higher investment). Keynes showed that cautious spending can lead to recession, and Piketty showed that cautious growth can lead to maldistribution.     

Keynes,Ricardo and the classical theory of interest

Keynes made harsh and repeated attacks on the work of Ricardo, blaming him particulary for what Keynes called the ‘classical theory’ of interest. Garegnani and others argue that Keynes' criticisms of the classical theory of interest apply to later neoclassical writers, but not to Ricardo. This paper re-examines Keynes' criticisms. It argues that Keynes attacked Ricardoapos;s theory of interest despite his awareness that Ricardo did not hold the ‘classical theory’. Moreover, Keynes not only expressed sympathy for Ricardo's understanding of interest, but his criticisms which do apply to Ricardo do not address Ricardo's theory of interest.     

Hayek and the Great Depression of 1929: Did he really change his mind?

The aim of this research is to establish whether, and if so in what way, Hayek changed his mind about the Great Depression of 1929.The work is divided into two parts. In the first part, I present the ‘early’ Hayek of the 1930s. Hayek was the great rival of Keynes. Both explained the Great Depression, applying opposing business cycle theories. For Keynes, the crisis was caused by an excess of saving over investment; for Hayek, on the contrary, by an excess of investment over saving. In the early 1930s, Röpke attempted a synthesis, positing that a recession due to overinvestment can degenerate, as in 1929, into a depression caused by oversaving. Hayek examined and rejected Röpke's theory. In the second part, I present the ‘later’ Hayek of the 1970s. After years of silence and solitude, Hayek was unexpectedly awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics, precisely for the contribution he made in the 1930s to the theory of the business cycle. Hayek returned to his pursuit of the ghost of Keynes, debated with his friend and rival Friedman, re-examined Röpke's special case and, according to Haberler, changed his mind. In my conclusion, I attempt to resolve the dilemma.     

Keynes, uncertainty and interest rates

Uncertainty plays an important role in The General Theory, particularlyin the theory of interest rates. Keynes did not provide a theoryof uncertainty, but he did make some enlightening remarks aboutthe direction he thought such a theory should take. I arguethat some modern innovations in the theory of probability allowus to build a theory which captures these Keynesian insights.If this is the right theory, however, uncertainty cannot carryits weight in Keynes's arguments. This does not mean that theconclusions of these arguments are necessarily mistaken; intheir best formulation they may succeed with merely an appealto risk.     

Formalism, logic and reality: a Keynesian analysis

It is the purpose of this paper to elaborate on the argumentthat formalism is non-neutral; analyses which today would bedescribed as informal turn into something quite different whenformalised. The reasons for non-neutrality refer to the choiceof assumptions or axioms, the choice of method, the type oflogic employed and closure. Focusing on the last three of these,the paper addresses the question of how to move from resultsobtained with formal methods under conditions of closure tothe reality one is attempting to model. We explore the needfor provisional closure to analyse open systems and for a rangeof methods to complement formal modelling in the attempt tounderstand the complex reality of an economic system.     

Keynes and a post-Keynesian controversy over the effect of debt on income expansion

The paper considers arguments of Robertson (1938) and Asimakopulos (1983) that the Keynesian multiplier expansion of output may be constrained by debt implicitly incurred in the financing of autonomous investment necessary to start the multiplier process. The task of this essay is to show that within the ‘short-period’ and static analytical framework of Keynes, this line of reasoning regarding the adverse effects of debt on multiplier-induced expansions of output is unwarranted. Nevertheless it is concluded that if the Keynesian framework is abandoned in favour of a dynamic framework in the manner of a steady trend rate of growth - a choice dependent on how one conceives of the economy, as inherently static or dynamic - then such arguments have troubling implications. In particular, the dependence of Keynes's approach on credit and hence debt forges links between ‘short-periods' whose distinctness from one another is crucial to Keynes's result.     

Keynes’ Preface to the German Edition of the General Theory: Nazi Sympathies or Methodological Empathies?

In the (1936) preface to the German edition of The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, Keynes contrasts his methodology with that of Classical laissez-faire economics. He also compares and contrasts his methodology with German economics, which members of the German Historical School had heavily influenced. Unfortunately, some view Keynes as arguing in this Preface that his theory could more deductively apply to fascism than to laissez-faire economies. This would suggest an endorsement of Nazism. Of course, any support offered for Nazism should be condemned. However, instead of displaying Nazi sympathies, this paper argues that the Preface more likely supports the widespread methodological rejection in German economics of deducing laissez-faire outcomes from Classical postulates. Furthermore, Keynes criticizes the more inductive approach of many German economists, and states that he provides them with the theoretical framework which they could deductively apply to their totalitarian economy. Keynes should be read as arguing that his theoretical framework would prove more applicable to a totalitarian system than would a theory based on Classical laissez-faire economics. Comments in the Preface which seem to some to support Nazism should be taken, then, as support for the applicability of his theory to such a system. Keynes’ methodological arguments in the prefaces to the other editions, which reflect his overall methodological approach in the General Theory, his familiarity with German economics, his support for liberal economic and political institutions, and his anti-Nazism, all support this alternative interpretation. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Midwest Economics Association Meetings in Chicago on March 16, 2008.     

The Economic Problem of Happiness: Keynes on Happiness and Economics

By stressing the substantial continuity of vision between John Maynard Keynes’s early unpublished essays and his more mature writings, the paper discusses Keynes’s ethics and focuses on his thoughts about happiness. In particular, we emphasize the anti-utilitarianism of Keynes’s vision and his belief that material wealth is but a precondition to enjoy the possibilities of a good life, and direct attention to problems of incommensurability raised by the multidimensional nature of happiness as considered by Keynes. We then argue that the rediscovery of Keynes’s legacy in this respect may be a precious counterweight to the most controversial aspects of today’s happiness research.