'Professor Robin Marris, who almost thirty years ago made pioneering contributions on the theory of managerial capitalism, has now written a fascinating and highly unusual book on Keynesian macroeconomics.' - Amitava Krishna Dutt, Review of Social Economy '. . . the book provides many valuable insights for macroeconomists on both sides of the Atlantic.' - Stephen McCafferty, Journal of Economic Literature This path-breaking book - written by a leading economist - is certain to create controversy and will lead to a fundamental reassessment of Keynesian economics. Building on his previous work on modern capitalism, Robin Marris has made an important theoretical advance which will have a major impact on the economics profession.
Back to the future: a heterodox economist rewrites Keynes's General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money to serve as the basis for a macroeconomics for the twenty-first century. John Maynard Keynes's General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money was the most influential economic idea of the twentieth century. But, argues Stephen Marglin, its radical implications were obscured by Keynes's lack of the mathematical tools necessary to argue convincingly that the problem was the market itself, as distinct from myriad sources of friction around its margins. Marglin fills in the theoretical gaps, revealing the deeper meaning of the General Theory. Drawing on eight decades of discussion and debate since the General Theory was published, as well as on his own research, Marglin substantiates Keynes's intuition that there is no mechanism within a capitalist economy that ensures full employment. Even if deregulating the economy could make it more like the textbook ideal of perfect competition, this would not address the problem that Keynes identified: the potential inadequacy of aggregate demand. Ordinary citizens have paid a steep price for the distortion of Keynes's message. Fiscal policy has been relegated to emergencies like the Great Recession. Monetary policy has focused unduly on inflation. In both cases the underlying rationale is the false premise that in the long run at least the economy is self-regulating so that fiscal policy is unnecessary and inflation beyond a modest 2 percent serves no useful purpose. Fleshing out Keynes's intuition that the problem is not the warts on the body of capitalism but capitalism itself, Raising Keynes provides the foundation for a twenty-first-century macroeconomics that can both respond to crises and guide long-run policy.
This book retraces the history of macroeconomics from Keynes's General Theory to the present. Central to it is the contrast between a Keynesian era and a Lucasian - or dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) - era, each ruled by distinct methodological standards. In the Keynesian era, the book studies the following theories: Keynesian macroeconomics, monetarism, disequilibrium macro (Patinkin, Leijongufvud, and Clower) non-Walrasian equilibrium models, and first-generation new Keynesian models. Three stages are identified in the DSGE era: new classical macro (Lucas), RBC modelling, and second-generation new Keynesian modeling. The book also examines a few selected works aimed at presenting alternatives to Lucasian macro. While not eschewing analytical content, Michel De Vroey focuses on substantive assessments, and the models studied are presented in a pedagogical and vivid yet critical way.
This second volume contains essays which relate to developments in Keynes' scholarship and theorizing in the years since his death and demonstrates the ongoing validity of the Keynesian tradition.
Political Economy and the New Capitalism examines the relevance of Sam Aaronovitch's pioneering empirical studies of British capitalism in the light of modern developments. A wide range of problems are reviewed from industrial concentration today to the co-ordination of economic policies in Europe. Aaronovitch's work on the role of finance in the British economy is the subject sustained reflection. Individual chapters examine orthodox and left-wing criticisms of finance, exchange rate instability, and employment, growth and regions in the context of European Union. This work concludes with a bibliography of the published writings of Sam Aaronovitch and collects the reflections of some of the most distinguished thinkers in economics today including: Meghnad Desai, G.C. Harcourt, Pat Devine, Egon Matzner, Malcolm Sawyer, Sir Alan Budd, Jan Toporowski, Philip Arestis, Eleni Paliginis, Victoria Chick and Ben Fine.
Heinz Kurz is recognised internationally as a leading economic theorist and a foremost historian of economic thought. This book pays tribute to his outstanding contributions by bringing together a unique collection of new essays by distinguished economists from around the world. Classical Political Economy and Modern Theory comprises twenty essays, grouped thematically into five sections. Part I examines political economy and its critique, Part II looks at entrepreneurship, evolution and income distribution, Part III discusses Cambridge, Keynes and macroeconomics, Part IV explores crisis and cycles, whilst Part V is dedicated to personal reminiscences. The essays in this book will be an invaluable source of inspiration for economists interested in economic theory and in the evolution of economic thought. They will also be of interest to postgraduate and research students specialising in economic theory and in the history of economic thought.
Kalecki was one of an important generation of Cambridge economists. Here, Tracy Mott's impressive book examines the relationship of Kalecki's economics to different economic areas and its relationship to major alternative schools, such as Keynes and Marx. Mott looks at Kalecki's 'principle of increasing risk' and how it gives the way in which the reproduction and expansion of wealth can bring a coherent unity to economic analysis. In so doing, it makes sense out of the fundamental conclusions of Keynesian economics on the underemployment of labour and capital.
Since the publication of Keynes's General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money in 1936, macroeconomic theory has altered considerably. Each author in this volume focuses on an issue which either preceded, accompanied or followed the 'Keynesian Revolution' and helped to shape economics in subsequent years. Contributors reconsider some of the major concepts of the "General Theory": unemployment and the identity of income and output. They also highlight some of the controversies in macroeconomic theory and review the macroeconomic policy implications and consequences.
