Re: Why nobody listens to Keynesians

[Paul Henry Rosenberg <rad@xxxxxxx>]

Harry Veeder wrote:

> On Tue, 28 Oct 1997, Bruce R. McFarling wrote:
>
> > The
> > exception is the comfort of belonging -- of social acceptance -- and if
> > society is organised so that the discomfort of lack of social acceptance
> > is alleviated by acquisition and display of positional status goods,
> > then the demand for these positional goods need not be satiable, since
> > an increased abundance of a positional status good simply increases the
> > amount that must be displayed as a marker of a given position.
>
> I feel Keynesian economic philosophly is inappropriate for those societies
> and communities which do not make a strong positive link between social
> comfort and the acquisition and display of positional status goods. Or to
> put it another way,  Keynesian economic policy enjoys popular support
> among those cultures where a significant fraction of social esteem is
> dependent on the acquisition and display of positional goods. The current
> unpopularity of Keynesianism is due, in part, to a general shift in social
> values which make the pursuit, possession and therefore production of such
> positional goods less necessary for an individual to feel "social comfort."

So, Keynes is unpopular now because we're so much less materialistic and
status-conscious than we were in the 60s or the the 30s???

Nice try! <G>

--
Paul Rosenberg
Reason and Democracy
rad@xxxxxxx

"Let's put the information BACK into the information age!"