GM Ambrosi wrote:
> This thread is about a putative "Keynes quotation" and not about what
> Robertson said about Keynes. List members showed that in fact the
> putative quote is from Patinkin. The thread could have stopped there.
> It continued because the question was put whether in the present
> context enquires about "copyright" are not a waste of energy. It was
> agreed that in a HET context they are worth the while if they clarify
> questions of authorship of analysis. Since the initial quote was about
> "dynamic theory", a thread-related question was how Keynes _did_
> relate to economic dynamics. Keynes states that in the GT there is
> _always_ I=S. That is true in an accounting context. Accounting is "ex
> post". Hence, in Keynes's analysis intertemporal comparisons of
> alternative levels of (un)employment are about alternative "ex post"
> outcomes of an economy during different time periods. A statement
> about a policy-induced level of future employment is hence,
> methodically speaking, "anticipated ex-post analysis". Whether some of
> Keynes's definitions do involve "verbal monstrosities" (James quoting
> Robertson), or whether Robertson's "induced dis-lacking" is a good
> example for a monstrous definition may be left undiscussed in the
> present context. The fact that modern macroeconomic accounting prefers
> to resort to Keynes-type taxonomies of income and expenditure seems to
> me to be an indication that his use of terms is often considered to be
> useful for empirical economic analysis.
> Michael Ambrosi
>
May I reiterate the relevance of my points on Keynes's new definitions
to the thread about the authorship of a quote. Michael introduced the
point that Keynes in GT, p. 63, claims that investment is always equal
to saving, and that such a claim amounts to an "anticipated ex-post"
analysis of a dynamic phenomenon. Well, it turns out that on the same
page 63, Keynes also claims that his definitions were what "the great
majority of economists" also used. That was what prompted me to point
out that Keynes wasn't being truthful in his claim: he was making the
wrong attribution of definitions. I went on to explain the difference
between Keynes's understanding of saving and investment and those of the
classicals, or the majority of economists of his day. Michael chose not
to deal with the point.
It is also the case that when one is interested in the dynamics of an
economy, the accounting (ex-post) taxonomies that Michael is so fond of
are not helpful. They are backward looking rather than forward looking:
an economy moves forward through time. And it is precisely because of
Keynes's (new) definitions that he was unable to recognize that
investment can exceed savings, as I earlier explained in the context of
forced saving. It is also because of Keynes's new definitions of
saving and investment that he couldn't appreciate that the rate of
interest coordinates savings and investment (spending), as the classics
explained. Keynes then had to turn the Quantity theory of money into a
theory of interest rates. The fact that, through the work of J.R. Hicks
(and Simon Kuznets), modern macroeconomics employs Keynes's accounting
taxonomies should not blind us to recognizing their defects, especially
historians of economic thought, who more easily -- I would think --
should appreciate the roots of the problem.
James Ahiakpor
> 2015-12-30 19:23 GMT+01:00 James Ahiakpor
> <[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>>:
>
> GM Ambrosi wrote:
> > Dear James Ahiakpor and Mason Gaffney,
> > good to have some agreement.
> >
> > As far as Keynes's accounting definitions are concerned, I think
> that
> > he did not treat the alternative ones unfairly. As far as the
> > practicality of accounting taxonomies is concerned, modern practice
> > does side with Keynes (and precursors).
> >
>
> I agree that "modern practice does side with Keynes" regarding
> "accounting taxonomies." But this is only because modern
> macroeconomics
> has been dominated by Keynes's ideas, which are distortions of the
> classical concepts of saving, capital, investment, and money, thanks
> mainly to J.R. Hicks (1937).
>
> But I don't know how Michael comes by the view that Keynes did not
> treat
> the alternative accounting definitions "unfairly." The reviews of
> Keynes's GT by Dennis Robertson (1936), Jacob Viner (1936), and Frank
> Knight (1937) all point to Keynes's creation of new concepts in
> place of
> the traditional ones -- "a new language," Viner (1936, 147) calls
> them.
> Even John Hicks (1936) describes Keynes's definitions of saving and
> investment as "new". Robertson (1937) subsequently calls Keynes's
> definition of saving "paradoxical" and his definitions of
> "finance" and
> "liquidity" "verbal monstrosities." I have collected these
> differences
> in definition between Keynes and the "classicals" in chapter 2 of
> /Keynes and the Classics Reconsidered/ (1998). My puzzle then is,
> what
> does it take to get people to recognize Keynes's distortions of
> classical concepts?
>
> > As far as removing the time dimension from economics is
> concerned, at
> > least after E=mc^2 we should all be aware that time is a dimension
> > which our universe cannot do without since "c" must be measured in
> > terms of distance per time unit. But it is indeed a lasting
> challenge
> > in economics how to take account of time in an analytically
> fruitful way.
>
> Mason Gaffney claimed incorrectly that Keynes put time back into
> economics, and Michael agrees. In the first place, Keynes was not
> addressing J.B. Clark and Frank Knight, who allegedly tried to
> take time
> our of economic analysis. Rather, Keynes was addressing directly
> followers of "Ricardian economics," including "J.S. Mill, Marshall,
> Edgeworth and Prof. Pigou" (1936, 3n). Secondly, don't people avail
> themselves of Marshall's /Principles/ (1920) and his treatment of the
> problem of time (period) in economic analysis anymore? Even the
> analysis of forced saving, a concept Keynes failed to grasp, involves
> changes in interest rates, prices, wage rates, output and employment
> overtime, following a change in the quantity of money (currency). I
> also think Keynes would be embarrassed with the praise being heaped on
> him for having, allegedly, introduced time into economic analysis.
> After all, wasn't it Keynes who complained that economists set
> themselves "too easy" a task of explaining what happens to the economy
> in the long run, because "I/n the long run/ we are all dead"
> (1923, 88)?
> How could the "classicals" get to the long run in their analysis
> without
> traversing from the short run?
>
> >
> > Best wishes to all and thanks for the wealth of information coming
> > forth in this group.
> > Michael Ambrosi
> >
>
> Best wishes in return. I hope there will be more willingness to read
> the classical definitions in their original (in the new year; I'm not
> holding my breath, though) so more people get to see their way out of
> the Keynesian fog.
>
> James Ahiakpor
> > 2015-12-30 0:50 GMT+01:00 Mason Gaffney
> <[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
> > <mailto:[log in to unmask]
> <mailto:[log in to unmask]>>>:
> >
> > Dear GM Ambrosi,
> >
> > Thanks for clarifying your view. I would not put it the way
> you do
> > – this “at least conceptually the static moment of pause”
> is too
> > forced for my taste - but you are driving at something with
> > substance, and do not give the impression of musty
> antiquarianism
> > that provoked my complaint.
> >
> > We may be talking past each other, but in my view J.B. Clark and
> > Frank Knight and their allies sought to remove any time
> dimension
> > from economics. To a great extent they succeeded, leaving
> much of
> > the profession disarmed from facing or analyzing the reality of
> > the great crash. This left a vacuum into which Keynes
> rushed. I
> > join others in hailing him for that. In his rush he and his
> > followers lost a lot, too, so our task is not finished.
> >
> > Mason Gaffney
> >
> > *From:*Societies for the History of Economics
> > [mailto:[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
> <mailto:[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>>] *On Behalf Of *GM
> > Ambrosi
> > *Sent:* Tuesday, December 29, 2015 8:44 AM
> > *To:* [log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
> <mailto:[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>>
> > *Subject:* Re: [SHOE] Keynes quotatation
> >
> > @Mason Gaffney wondering about the "concern over who said it
> first".
> >
> > I think it is important to establish that there is no quote from
> > Keynes stating that he interpreted the GT "as a dynamic
> theory of
> > unemployment." Discussing this is not a question of "copyright"
> > but one of analysis.
> >
> > Briefly elaborating my view of the matter, I maintain that the
> > crucial point of Keynes's analysis is his claim that
> investment is
> > "necessarily" equal to savings (GT, p. xxxii, p. 63 and
> passim).
> > As a theory of macroeconomic (un)employment this implies a
> > comparative-static "anticipated ex-post analysis" (Ambrosi,
> 2003,
> > ch. 26.2, pp. 397-403). The static aspect comes from the fact
> > that there must be at least conceptually the static moment of
> > pause in which the income expenditure accounts for a given
> period
> > of income generation are matched with the income production
> > accounts as described on p.63 GT.
> >
> > Michael Ambrosi
> >
> > (Ambrosi, G.M. 2003, Keynes, Pigou and Cambridge Keynesians,
> > palgrave macmillan)
> >
> > 2015-12-29 1:57 GMT+01:00 Mason Gaffney
> <[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
> > <mailto:[log in to unmask]
> <mailto:[log in to unmask]>>>:
> >
> > If we were judges in a high-stakes copyright case I could
> > understand this deep concern over who said it first.
> However,
> > since we aren’t, I wonder if the time and talent of the many
> > learned and distinguished participants are being put to
> their
> > highest and best uses?
> >
> > For example, it would really be useful to trace the
> history of
> > copyright laws, and the positions of those who favored and
> > opposed them. Mill allowed a cheap “worker’s edition”
> of his
> > Principles (which I have used for years). Henry George
> > refused to copyright Progress and Poverty, saying he
> wanted to
> > maximize distribution. (Ironically, one of his contemporary
> > critics attacked him for plagiarizing Mill and Ricardo.)
> > Upton Sinclair shrugged off plagiarists of his own books by
> > quipping that the purpose of publishing is to have one’s
> ideas
> > stolen. Does Dickens’ estate charge royalties for every
> > production of “A Christmas Carol”?
> >
> > I wonder if we are not unconsciously absorbing the values of
> > monopolists and rent-seekers to encourage writing for money?
> > Exploring THAT would be worth our time and talent.
> >
> > Mason Gaffney
> >
> >
> > --
> > Prof. em. Dr. Dr.h.c. G.M. Ambrosi
> > Jean Monnet Professor "ad personam"
> > University of Trier, FB IV VWL
> > D-54286 Trier
> > mobil: 0049-178-286 2703
>
>
> --
> James C.W. Ahiakpor, Ph.D.
> Professor
> Department of Economics
> California State University, East Bay
> Hayward, CA 94542
> 510-885-3137
> 510-885-7175 (Fax; Not Private)
>
>
>
>
> --
> Prof. em. Dr. Dr.h.c. G.M. Ambrosi
> Jean Monnet Professor "ad personam"
> University of Trier, FB IV VWL
> D-54286 Trier
> mobil: 0049-178-286 2703
--
James C.W. Ahiakpor, Ph.D.
Professor
Department of Economics
California State University, East Bay
Hayward, CA 94542
510-885-3137
510-885-7175 (Fax; Not Private)
|
