Really Thinking Long Run: Keynes’s Other Masterpiece
Really Thinking Long Run: Keynes’s Other Masterpiece
This chapter argues that, although Keynes’s predictions are riddled with outright errors, his observations about the distant past are so remarkable—and the poor predictions that emerged from his clouded telescope so illuminating—that we must forgive him his many sins, not only for his outright errors but even his then-fashionable anti-Semitism. Pointing out the root of Keynes’s errors or presenting an alternative forecast is not the goal here; the aim, rather, is to present some of Keynes’s observations that will lead us to reevaluate standard conclusions that are usually taken to be nearly self-evident and largely beyond dispute. It is assumed here that the standard conclusions remain valid, but that they must be regarded with a certain amount of modesty, i.e. with less than absolute confidence.
Keywords: outright errors, distant past, anti-Semitism, standard conclusions, modesty, absolute confidence
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