The Liberal Party
Throughout the 1920s Keynes was an active member of the Liberal Party, reaching a peak in the run-up to the 1929 election. He wrote We Can Conquer Unemployment (not reproduced in the Collected Writings) and Can Lloyd George Do It? (Keynes [1929] 1972), the latter with Hubert Henderson.
These spelled out a programme of public works to alleviate unemployment, with due attention to the financing of the programme. Emphasis was laid on the second and further rounds of expenditure, which would result in what there was called “indirect employment” - what we now know as multiplier effects. In unpublished notes for a speech on the hustings in support of a candidate, even a rudimentary formal multiplier had been found (Kent 2008). The multiplier would be developed, but the idea came too late to be included in his next book, which after six years’ work was about to be published.
More on the topic The Liberal Party:
- The Liberal Party
- A detailed analysis of the institutions to be used by the state to regulate capital accumulation in pursuit of full employment under Liberal Socialism
- The real Keynesian revolution begins
- Destructive competition, corporatism, industrial policy, and the new economic role of the state: 1927-1928
- Notes
- Notes
- Keynes's radical policy views in The General Theory
- Three important “essays in persuasion” on the proper economic role of the state: 1925-1926
- Index
- Life