Keynesian Job Program / Stimulus Plan

[Taco John]

[Chiefshrink]

Originally Posted by banyon

But keep imagining anyone who disagrees with you as some cartoonish strawman that is easy for you to knock down if it makes you feel better.

Which is precisely what OMarxist and the Mainstream Marxist Media do EVERYDAY especially in this campaign season

[BucEyedPea]

I just looked up where Keynes criticizes debauching the currency which is from The Economic Consequences of the Peace at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. That was his earlier view that it was bad. Keynes still said it and it originally comes from Lenin. Keyne's policies have resulted in what Lenin said. Two peas-in-a-pod.

[banyon]

Originally Posted by BucEyedPea

I just looked up where Keynes criticizes debauching the currency which is from The Economic Consequences of the Peace at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. That was his earlier view that it was bad. Keynes still said it and it originally comes from Lenin. Keyne's policies have resulted in what Lenin said. Two peas-in-a-pod.

Really?

Ok, BEP's quote standards:


"BEP said the best way to destroy the capitalist system was to debauch the currency. By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens."

You're a closet socialist? OMG who would have thunk it? Now it makes perfect sense. Why else would you promote such ridiculously poor critical thinking skills, unless it was a double-agent plot to make the Austrian School look silly? It all fits together now!

You still said it!

How transparently ridiculous. You got caught with your hand in the cookie jar.

[BucEyedPea]

Keynes was a SOCIALIST! His ideas have resulted in SOCIALISM!

[banyon]

Originally Posted by BucEyedPea

Keynes was a SOCIALIST! His ideas have resulted in SOCIALISM!

Really? Society own the means of production in this country?

When did that happen? When did Keynes advocate elimination of private ownership and public ownership of the means of production? (Hint: It didn't happen).

I guess we can close up the NYSE, as there are no more profits to be made.

Mitt Romney's obviously lying about having made money as a private entrepreneur, because he didn't even own the means of production. All of his profits went to society! Who knew?

But, put it in big, bold letters. It won't change the deceptive nature of your distorted quote.

[BucEyedPea]

pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/jep.23.2.213

According to this .pdf Lenin didn't exactly say it either; that Keynes gleaned it from an interview of Lenin.

So, banyon, you need to visit the grave of Keynes and pin a correction on him. That is after you write to Brainy Quote.

[banyon]

Originally Posted by BucEyedPea

pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/jep.23.2.213

According to this .pdf Lenin didn't exactly say it either; that Keynes gleaned it from an interview of Lenin.

So, banyon, you need to visit the grave of Keynes and pin a correction on him. That is after you write to Brainy Quote.

Uh, did you read any of the article? Because it just echoes exactly what I said. Keynes was quoting Lenin to take issue with him, not as a secret handshake socialist.

It simply explores the question of whether or not Keynes was accurately quoting him, NOT whether Keynes himself was secretly advocating for debauching the currency.

FROM YOUR ARTICLE:

Keynes was, however, a vehement supporter of the increases in interest rates the Bank of England implemented in November 1919 and April 1920 (Moggridge, 1992, pp. 354–60). Indeed, when consulted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in February 1920, Keynes (1920 [1977], p. 184) argued for an even tighter monetary policy, on the ground that continuing high inflation would “strike at the whole basis of contract, of security, and of the capitalist system generally.”

Also, I'm unable to debunk your kooky "Keynes at Harvard" Austrian book due to the fact that all of his citations are from the same out-of-print book (The Life of John Maynard Keynes by Roy Harrod), but I wager if I had that book, I could show each and every one of them were a distortion. Exclusively doing a biography from one other source is not exactly the hallmark of rigorous academic writing. But the fact that it couldn't get published except by some fringe group in pamphlet form tells me what I need to know. No one who has seriously studied Keynes thinks he is a socialist.

[BucEyedPea]

The Disaster of Keynesian Economics
http://www.goodnessmovement.com/file...oad/keynes.pdf

Keynes knew where his ideas would lead, in fact, wanted it to lead.

The necessity of inflation in Keynesism is missed by many. In theory, loans made in bad times are repaid in good times, but Keynes was plenty shrewd enough to realize that the impulse of politicians to pander to the electorate would prove insurmountable, and on-going inflation to pay the debt unavoidable. This is, in fact, what has happened.

What Keynesian apologists never talk about is that the goal was not economic equilibrium in a condition of freedom, but an economic equilibrium that was in effect under the complete control of the government:

The State will have to exercise a guiding influence on the propensity to consume, partly through its scheme of taxation, partly by fixing the rate of interest, and partly, perhaps, in other ways [such as?]. Furthermore, it seems unlikely that the influence of banking policy on the rate of interest will be sufficient by itself to determine an optimum rate of investment. I conceive, therefore, that a somewhat comprehensive socialization of investment will prove the only means of securing an approximation to full employment. . .
It is not the ownership of the instruments of production which it is important for the State to assume. If the State is able to determine the aggregate amount of resources devoted to augmenting the instruments and the basic rate of reward to those who own them, it will have accomplished all that is necessary. Moreover, the necessary measures of socialization can be introduced gradually and without a break in the general traditions of society. (General Theory, 378)

What is he saying here? That if the State controls how companies get money, how much profit they make, and how much their employees earn, then it doesn’t have to actually OWN them. Further, that his system enables a gradual transition in that direction, without setting off any alarm bells.

This is socialism, plain and simple, of the Fabian variety.

To be clear, for a true Liberal, the role of government is to protect us from one another. For Keynes, it is to foster full employment at the expense of economic and—inevitably—political freedom. The two go hand in hand.

Don't give me any of this crap that the Federal Reserve isn't the state. It's an appendage of the state as a hybrid institution and is not as independent as claimed. It is the nation's central bank.

Lol he refers to taxation as a "scheme."

[JohnnyV13]

Banyon,

I would have thought you knew better than to argue against someone's religious beliefs.

[BucEyedPea]

Keynesianism = religion

Freedom = what the Revolution was fought for

If the latter is a religion, then I'll have me some of that as opposed to a religion of the state.

[banyon]

Originally Posted by BucEyedPea

The Disaster of Keynesian Economics
http://www.goodnessmovement.com/file...oad/keynes.pdf

Keynes knew where his ideas would lead, in fact, wanted it to lead.






Don't give me any of this crap that the Federal Reserve isn't the state. It's an appendage of the state as a hybrid institution and is not as independent as claimed. It is the nation's central bank.

Lol he refers to taxation as a "scheme."

Good God, your quotation truncation knows no shame. You do know how easy it is to look up the actual quote in widely published materials, don't you? :

BEP's Quote:

The State will have to exercise a guiding influence on the propensity to consume, partly through its scheme of taxation, partly by fixing the rate of interest, and partly, perhaps, in other ways [such as?]. Furthermore, it seems unlikely that the influence of banking policy on the rate of interest will be sufficient by itself to determine an optimum rate of investment. I conceive, therefore, that a somewhat comprehensive socialization of investment will prove the only means of securing an approximation to full employment. . .

ACTUAL QUOTE

In some other respects the foregoing theory is moderately conservative in its implications. For whilst it indicates the vital importance of establishing certain central controls in matters which are now left in the main to individual initiative, there are wide fields of activity which are unaffected. The State will have to exercise a guiding influence on the propensity to consume partly through its scheme of taxation, partly by fixing the rate of interest, and partly, perhaps, in other ways. Furthermore, it seems unlikely that the influence of banking policy on the rate of interest will be sufficient by itself to determine an optimum rate of investment. I conceive, therefore, that a somewhat comprehensive socialisation of investment will prove the only means of securing an approximation to full employment; though this need not exclude all manner of compromises and of devices by which public authority will co-operate with private initiative. But beyond this no obvious case is made out for a system of State Socialism which would embrace most of the economic life of the community. It is not the ownership of the instruments of production which it is important for the State to assume. If the State is able to determine the aggregate amount of resources devoted to augmenting the instruments and the basic rate of reward to those who own them, it will have accomplished all that is necessary. Moreover, the necessary measures of socialisation can be introduced gradually and without a break in the general traditions of society.

BEP's QUOTE:

It is not the ownership of the instruments of production which it is important for the State to assume. If the State is able to determine the aggregate amount of resources devoted to augmenting the instruments and the basic rate of reward to those who own them, it will have accomplished all that is necessary. Moreover, the necessary measures of socialization can be introduced gradually and without a break in the general traditions of society.

END OF PAGE ACTUAL QUOTE

Whilst, therefore, the enlargement of the functions of government, involved in the task of adjusting to one another the propensity to consume and the inducement to invest, would seem to a nineteenth-century publicist or to a contemporary American financier to be a terrific encroachment on individualism. I defend it, on the contrary, both as the only practicable means of avoiding the destruction of existing economic forms in their entirety and as the condition of the successful functioning of individual initiative.

For if effective demand is deficient, not only is the public scandal of wasted resources intolerable, but the individual enterpriser who seeks to bring these resources into action is operating with the odds loaded against him. The game of hazard which he plays is furnished with many zeros, so that the players as a whole will lose if they have the energy and hope to deal all the cards. Hitherto the increment of the world’s wealth has fallen short of the aggregate of positive individual savings; and the difference has been made up by the losses of those whose courage and initiative have not been supplemented by exceptional skill or unusual good fortune. But if effective demand is adequate, average skill and average good fortune will be enough.

The authoritarian state systems of today seem to solve the problem of unemployment at the expense of efficiency and of freedom. It is certain that the world will not much longer tolerate the unemployment which, apart from brief intervals of excitement, is associated and in my opinion, inevitably associated with present-day capitalistic individualism. But it may be possible by a right analysis of the problem to cure the disease whilst preserving efficiency and freedom.

[banyon]

Originally Posted by JohnnyV13

Banyon,

I would have thought you knew better than to argue against someone's religious beliefs.

You are right, but I just couldn't let the blatantly dishonest quote just lie there like it was somehow accurate.

I guess the rigorousness of my academic knowledge on economics went beyond the 2 week course at the Vienna Upstairs school of kookery where they read mostly from brainyquote.com.

[BucEyedPea]

Originally Posted by BucEyedPea

pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/jep.23.2.213

According to this .pdf Lenin didn't exactly say it either; that Keynes gleaned it from an interview of Lenin.

So, banyon, you need to visit the grave of Keynes and pin a correction on him. That is after you write to Brainy Quote.

From this .pdf

Fetter doubted, however, that Keynes was really quoting Lenin. After extensive inquiries, Fetter reported that no such statement could be found in Lenin’s published writings and that the “first attribution in English, and probably in any language,” was by Keynes. Fetter suggested that Keynes had heard the story at the Paris peace conference of 1919, convened by the World War I Allies to address the main issues arising from their victory. Having arrived in Paris in January as the principal Treasury representative in the British delegation, Keynes had resigned by early June in despair over the hard measures the Allies were prepared to impose on Germany.

Fetter and other writers were unable to trace the quotation because they sought the source in Lenin’s collected published writings. It is now possible to show that Keynes based his remark on a report of an interview with Lenin published by London and New York newspapers in April 1919. Keynes’ discussion of inflation in the Economic Consequences can then be read as an extended commentary on the remarks attributed to Lenin in the interview.

Keynes’ phrase “Lenin is said to have declared” may have been an acknowledgement that the author of the article and the source for the interview were anonymous. However, the congruence of the language and the arguments indicate that the article was Keynes’s source for the digression in Chapter 6 of The Economic Consequences of the Peace. The article quoted Lenin as using the word “debauch” with regard to government financial policies and, like Keynes, Lenin noted the destabilizing effects high inflation had on confidence, as profiteers gained at the expense of the rest of the population. Indeed, much of Keynes’s digression reads as a commentary on Lenin’s statements. [If this was Keyne's commentary or own digression based on what Lenin was claimed to have said, then that makes these the words of Keyne's. This has been done in a clever but deceiving manner.]

Lenin (1920 [1966], pp. 220, 227) approved of Keynes’s proposals for settling intergovernmental debt, sardonically suggesting that they were equivalent to the Soviet government’s:

“As you know . . . these [Russian] debts do not disturb us, because we followed Keynes’s excellent advice just a little before his book appeared—we annulled all our debts (Stormy applause.)”

[Lenin also said regarding Keynes:]

“He has arrived at conclusions which are more weighty, more striking and more instructive than any a Communist revolutionary could draw, because they are the conclusions of a well– known bourgeois and implacable enemy of Bolshevism, which he, like the British philistine he is, imagines as something monstrous, ferocious, and bestial.”

The context of Keynes’s statement in The Economic Consequences of the Peace was he immediate danger of postwar hyperinflations in Europe.
the immediate danger of postwar hyperinflations in Europe.

[BucEyedPea]

Keynes at Harvard

The first thing Keynes did was to disclaim any connection with marxism. This was an elementary Fabian socialist diversionary move to distract the public from noting Karl Marx’s projection of a “mixed economy” in the Communist Manifesto of 1847.

In spite of his public record as a socialist, Keynes was appointed as an aid to Prime Minister David Lloyd George during the Paris peace talks with Germany in 1919. During this period he was asked by the Fabian socialists to head their London School of Economics.(11) As mentioned previously, Keynes quit the peace conference along with Walter Lippmann because their leftist proposals were not accepted.

At the end of 1919, Keynes wrote The Economic Consequences of the Peace of which a special edition was published bearing the imprint of the British Fabian Society. This special edition was distributed among socialists both in England and the United States. It was at this time that the Fabian socialists began to pass off Keynes as a “capitalist economist.” At the same time the identical process was applied to Frankfurter and Lippmann in America.

[Privately Keynes wrote to his mother:]

" Well, the only course open to me is to be bouyantly bolshevik;"

The plan to refashion Keynes as a capitalist authority who would play the role of ‘admitting’ the dastardly deeds of his ‘class’ was not confined to the socialists in England. The Bolsheviks pursued the same line. In 1919 Nicolai Lenin issued a wildly enthusiastic panegyric on Keynes book, The Economic Consequences of the Peace. He declared, “Nowhere has the Versailles Treaty been described so well as in the book by Keynes.”(14) The fat was in the fire and Keynes’ pro-bolshevism was in danger of being publicly established. Keynes as a covert leftist partisan posing as a defender of capitalism was in jeopardy.

Lenin later manipulated one of his adroit propaganda side-steps by quoting Keynes and utilizing his material and at the same time damning him as, “a ruthless opponent of Bolshevism.” This saved Keynes for the role as an anti-bolshevik figure among influential circles in Great Britain. It was a brilliant deception and indicated a skillful close-order drill in left-wing political cover-up. Lenin, of course, was well apprised of Keynes bolshevik sympathies. The red cells at Cambridge University were in close contact with the Fabians and a full dossier on Keynes was available to the Soviet leaders.

Lenin managed to exploit Keynes’ leftist slant in the Fabian Society’s edition of the Economic Consequences and at the same time sufficiently damn him so as to safeguard his role as a ‘plant’ in conservative economic circles.

Lenin formalized this Keynesian posture at the Second Congress of the Communist International addressing red delegates from every country in the world on July 19, 1920 with the declaration; “I will quote another economic source which assumes particularly great significance, the British diplomat Keynes, the author of The Economic Consequences of the Peace, who on the instructions of his government, took part in the Versailles peace negotiations, watched them directly from the purely bourgeois point of view, studied the subject step by step, and took part in the conference as an economist. He arrived at conclusions which are stronger, more striking and more instructive than any a Communist revolutionary could advance, because they are conclusions drawn by an acknowledged bourgeois, a ruthless opponent of Bolshevism, which he, like an English philistine, pictures to himself in a monstrous, savage and brutal form. Keynes arrived at the conclusion that Europe and the whole world, with the Versailles Peace, is heading for bankruptcy. Keynes resigned; he threw his book in the face of the government and said: ‘You are committing acts of madness.’ ”(15)

In this case when Lenin engaged in name calling he obviously furnished Keynes with political defenses that could be employed to further infiltrate the more respectable British institutions. This was and is a common Bolshevik device to cover their ‘respectable’ agents.

This “ruthless opponent of Bolshevism” was allowed to move freely throughout the Soviet Union in 1925 and again in 1928 with his Russian born wife. If Lenin’s accusation had any serious intent then Keynes and his wife would have naturally been barred at the red frontier. Otherwise they would have been shot since these were the years of the Red Terror where even menshevik socialists were being executed by the thousands.(16) Keynes had to be a pro-bolshevik in order to receive these special privileges. Keynes was not the only one since thousands of so-called reform socialists were flitting in and out of communist organizations at that time. In the United States the Fabians even applied to the Russian Bolsheviks for admission into the Communist International, with headquarters in Moscow.(17)

In 1926 Keynes emphasized his pro-bolshevik position by writing that he was on the “extreme left” as compared to Sidney Webb the head of the Fabian socialists in Britain.(18) Keynes’ subsequent organization of the International Monetary Fund in cooperation with Soviet representatives and American Soviet spies (1945-46) demonstrates his continuing Soviet associations even towards the end of his life.

[JohnnyV13]

Originally Posted by BucEyedPea

Keynesianism = religion

Freedom = what the Revolution was fought for

If the latter is a religion, then I'll have me some of that as opposed to a religion of the state.

You are such a pathetic loser for neg repping me because I pointed out what is so obviously true. Something that is ENTIRELY obvious if you read Rothbard, Mises, Mises.org and LewRockwell.com

1) Rothbard, as you well know, brags about how he has fused ethics, economics, sociology and poly-sci into a unified discipline. THe mises site also lauds Rothbard as a intellectual pioneer for this "achievement".

2) Multiple Austrian writers also brag about their "a priori" method as the only intellectually sound method for economic analysis. The keystone of "a priori" analysis are initial premises that are indisputibly true...e.g Mises' concept of "Human Action" premised with "Man Acts" as its point of departure.

If your school of thought includes both ethics and a priori analysis, you have a religion.

That is why talking to an Austrian is like talking to someone who believes in Papal Infallibility. Whatever they say is simply not falsifiable by any method.

That is why Keynsianism is a social science while Austrian economics is a religion. Keynesianism is at least (theoretically) falsifiable because it uses statistical analysis. In practice, given the limitations on social experimentation, data collection, and the difficulty of economic modelling, Keynsians CAN almost justify any of their theories with existing data (even to the point where their theories lack falsifiability. But, at least they recognize the possibility that they could be wrong).

Yet, Austrian analysis crosses the line because once someone accepts an indisputably true premise, you cannot argue with them. Their arguments are simply a matter of faith. This reality is buttressed by an Austrian's absolute insistence that economic data does not matter with respect to the truth of their analysis (unless, of course, the data validates their analysis, in which case it becomes wonderful data). When push comes to shove, an Austrian will discount the data if it challenges one of their infallible truths.

To put it in the most simple terms, with Austrianism: Theory --> data --> hypothesis. In social science, you have a 3 step process....Hypothesis --> data collection --> theory


Austrianism is a philosophy. But, I suppose, that is too much self-knowlege for you. However, I should not have expected anything different from a person of low character.