2009 August 19 « The Long Run Blog

Keynes wasn’t all wrong. He just wasn’t all right.

Keynes’ General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money revolutionized economic thought in 1936 and ignited a debate that continues to this day. Prior to Keynes, classical economists correctly believed that economies have self-correcting mechanisms that maintained prosperity and full employment. Keynes argued that the propensity of firms to invest could be too low compared with that of household savings, leading to recurring depressions. Keynes believed that through government fiscal policy, i.e. lower taxes and higher spending, that the government could help the private sector and restore full employment. Politicians seem to have forgotten the part of the policy about lower taxes for the most part. Read more »

August 19, 2009 Posted by Julio | Econ Policy, Economics, Education, Theory | | No Comments Yet

The Great Long Run Blog Debate #2: Keynesian Economics

Keynes has been a popular topic lately. By Keynes I mean both John Maynard and his economic theory of government intervention into the free market. To quote wiki: Read more »

August 19, 2009 Posted by kamamer | Credit Crisis, Theory | | No Comments Yet

About

Brett Spurr has been on and around Wall Street since the age of 19, nearly half a lifetime ago. He helped make investment decisions for a $15 billion mutual fund complex. While locking horns with CEOs was fun, he now runs a personal financial planning firm helping individuals navigate their financial lives. Brett is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER ™ certificant and investment manager by day and a full-time geek who delights in debating all things financial or economic.

Karl Mamer is host of The Conspiracy Skeptic podcast, a 12-part look at conspiracies of today and the not too distant past. Karl is also the world’s greatest living proponent of Franglais. He also likes to bait Nigerian Bank Scammers and hosted his own podcast about teaching English in Seoul, South Korea. Karl lives in Toronto, Canada and works as a senior technical writer to pay the bills.

Julio Guardado is a former tech CEO who after surviving a tech start-up during the dot com bust decided to join the dark side and become an investment banker. While wining and dining CEO’s (we call it “locking horns”) is great, he enjoys getting inside their heads and companies even more. Julio also runs RV Investor, a web site that specializes in the recreational vehicle industry. Julio lives in Silicon Valley.

Jon Blumenfeld has been on and around Wall Street since 1989, as a trader and researcher in interest rates and their associated financial products. Most recently he was an Interest Rate Strategist at Bear Stearns and Co., where he was named to Institutional Investor Magazine’s All-America Fixed Income Research team for Interest Rate Derivatives in 2007.

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