Re: Marx and Keynes on Unemployment

[Steve.Keen@xxxxxxxxxxx (PMDF V4.3-13 #6323) id <01HPV87QZ6808X205V@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; Fri, 28 Apr 1995 09:17:01 +1000]

In response to my comment that Marx's observation on cycles
"is part of a trend to Marx's thinking which makes
him far more a Post Keynesian than a Marxian", Jim asks:

|How could this be? You mean that Post Keynesianism should
|be seen as having a large Marxian component!
|Of course, Marx wasn't a Marxist in the sense of being a
|dogmatic applyer of his own formulas (this was what he meant
|when he said he wasn't a Marxist).  But it's ridiculous to
|say that he belonged to a different school than the one he
|founded. That's like saying that Smith was more of a
|Post Keynesian than a Smithian.

That is exactly what I meant, Jim: when Marx was told what
being a Marxian meant by one of his key followers (I've
forgotten whom for the moment), he replied "Then I am not
a Marxist". That was precisely the gist of my comment: that
I expect that if Marx could see what was built in his name in
the 20th century, and compare that to Post Keynesianism, he
might well reply "Then I am not a Marxist, but I'm thinking
of becoming a Post Keynesian" (with nudge-nudge to any Monty
Python fans out there...).

Of course there is a twist of time in the above; but there's
no error in saying that a founder may look at the school he
started, and some years later reflect (if he/she were lucky
enough to be alive) "This is not what I believed!". Aren't
we all (well, almost all) of that opinion concering Keynes
and "bastard" Keynesianism?

Cheers,
Steve
PS continuing the Monty Python theme above, when I went to
transfer this to my terminal program, I found the noise which
had popped those nonsense characters into my post to PD had
this time written "Spag" on the command line. Not quite
"Spam", but close enough for me.

Pardon all the humor references; but I am SURE this is
the right room for an argument...