Keynes' "Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren" is taken literally by all references I found, see "Revisiting Keynes: Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren, Lorenzo Pecchi & Gustavo Piga: https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt5hhftz.
But if this is so then Keynes is bigot by claiming: "We already have a little experience of what I mean -a nervous breakdown of the sort which is already common enough in England and the United States amongst the wives of the well-to-do classes, unfortunate women, many of them, who have been deprived by their wealth of their traditional tasks and occupations--who cannot find it sufficiently amusing, when deprived of the spur of economic necessity, to cook and clean and mend, yet are quite unable to find anything more amusing."
And ignorant: "From the earliest times of which we have record-back, say, to two thousand years before Christ-down to the beginning of the eighteenth century, there was no very great change in the standard of life of the average man living in the civilised centres of the earth. Ups and downs certainly. Visitations of plague, famine, and war. Golden intervals. But no progressive, violent change. Some periods perhaps So per cent better than othersat the utmost 1 00 per cent better-in the four thousand years which ended (say) in A. D. 1700."
When I first read the paper I actually thought that Keynes might really means that self-interest capitalism leads to efficiency, but somehow his wording of the claim, and the whole paper seemed to be written in sarcastic approach. It seems that what Keynes wanted to express is that most economists deals with nonsenses, like how many hours a week workers are going to work in 2030.
In the preference and in other chapters of the "Essayes in Persuation", where the paper is the last chapter, Keynes claim that the economic problem (scarcity) is already solved in his time (relatively). The main problem he saw is distribution and disequilibrium that free markets creates (my wording). He expected governments to take more active role in the market, especially in creating cooperation. So when Keynes talk about women, he means that women can work as men. When he talks about preparing people to use their leisure time by educating them to use this time, he is actually arguing with Adam Smith. Smith had very limited trust in the government, especially in direct intervention in the market, he advocating educating the general population, especially teaching morality through life. It seems that Keynes main point was that educating people is good but government role is much larger, see , but in crises more direct approach is needed.
Is this means that Keynes' "Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren" is not read by most who quote the paper, like the libertarians who see Adam Smith "invisible hand" (unimportant term for him but very important to them) equal to the term "laissez-faire"?
A few words of advice:
1/ Your question is a good one. You broader explanation is not good. It's way too long. It's way too presumptive. To be very honest, it's irritating.
2/ You really shouldn't set other researchers reading tasks. They ain't got the time, and ain't that interested. Those who have already read the article of interest to you will respond if they find your question interesting. If not, they won't.
3/ You apply today's prejudices to condemn a relatively old piece of work, certainly one from a different era. And you use them to condemn one of the great minds of his generation. That seems to be okay in today's wider world (although I personally don't think it is) but it's not good practice in the academic world.
Keep the question. Lose the explanation. And try again!
Good luck.
Christopher NOCK
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