Tag Archives: Galbraith

Presenting the Lecture Here is the audio file of Jamie Galbraith inaugural Godley-Tobin Lecture. Due to the weather he recorded the lecture before hand. The paper will appear in the Review of Keynesian Economics (ROKE) soon. Jamie presents a macro discussion of income distribution, which he correctly points out has been absent from most discussion of inequality in recent times.Further, he connects his concern with the data (the UNIDO data that his team at UTIP has worked on for years...

The inaugural Godley – Tobin Memorial Lecture at the Eastern Economic Association meetings in Boston on Saturday March 3, 11.30am – 12.50pm. The lecture pays tribute to both Godley and Tobin's emphasis on being non-hyphenated Keynesians (more on that for a later post).The lecture is sponsored by the Review of Keynesian Economics (ROKE) and will be delivered by Professor James K. Galbraith, whose talk is titled “A global macroeconomics – Yes, macroeconomics damn it – of inequality and...

James k. Galbraith on inequality at the EEA in Boston. Don't miss it!

Rick Holt edited a superb book with John Kenneth Galbraith's letters from the 1930s until his death in 2006. He wrote to everybody, friend and foe, and displays his usual wit. Here I reproduce parts of his letter to Joan Robinson, that he wrote after having invited her to give the Ely Lecture (subscription required).The letter is from January 12, 1972. It says:Dear Joan: Many thanks for your note. If the meetings were slightly less stuffy and neoclassical than usual, it was owing more...

The Review of Keynesian Economics (ROKE) is honored to announce the creation of the Godley-Tobin Lectures, an annual lecture to be delivered at the Eastern Economic Association meetings.Wynne Godley and James Tobin represent the best among Keynesian economists. Both scholars insisted they were non-hyphenated Keynesians, meaning Keynesianism transcends the political disputes that often accompany economics. There is a deeper scientific validity to Keynesianism, something we reaffirmed in our...

Deficit vultures A few days ago, Trump announced South Carolina Rep. Mick Mulvaney to be the director of the Office of Management and Budget. He is a Tea Party nut (he was for Rand Paul, and might have libertarian tendencies), and more importantly a fiscal hawk, and for a balanced budget amendment. Mulvaney is really for cutting spending, including, somewhat surprisingly, military spending, even if he thinks that defense is the first priority of the federal government. So this has...

[embedded content] EPS Symposium: Policy Challenges for the New US President: Global Security: Russia, China, Europe and Latin America from Thea Harvey on Vimeo.

Terry Jones documentary Boom Bust Boom has been out for a while. Worth watching too. The Economist gave it a reasonable review. And there are Minsky and Galbraith puppets. [embedded content] Above a brief, and simple discussion of the South Sea Bubble. I think role of trade with Spanish America is exaggerated. The most relevant part of the scheme was the public debt swap. Dale's The First Crash provides an interesting account of it.

So Krugman continues to argue that Friedman's calculations are implausible. Well sure. But that's the point to some extent as Galbraith discussed here. The Plan involves huge (read yuge; wink, wink, nudge, nudge) spending, and it should have almost by definition implausible results looking from the perspective of recent history. Imagine the implausible effect that Social Security had on old age poverty. Or the incredible reduction in inequality that the New Deal policies had.If you were in...

There has been a debate following the NYTimes piece on left of center economists against Bernie Sanders. Doug Henwood replied here and Dean Baker here. Henwood does not discuss the Gerald Friedman paper that led to the whole discussion. Now Jamie Galbraith provided a nice reply to the left of center economists that suggested that Bernie's plans are not realistic. He says: "What the Friedman paper shows, is that under conventional assumptions, the projected impact of Senator Sanders'...