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Hans teori styr centralbankers penningpolitik globalt.   – Han sökte sig till striden, säger Lars Jonung. Han är professor emeritus vid Lunds universitet, där även Wicksell var professor. Friedmans idé om att styra penningmängden har övergetts av centralbankerna. Keynes syn på penningpolitiken som underordnad finanspolitiken, med full sysselsättning som mål, har inte heller segrat. Kärnan i Wicksells analys är en skillnad mellan två räntor: låneräntan, som sätts av centralbanken, och ”den naturliga räntan”.  Så fort den naturliga räntan avviker från den bankränta som är gällande får vi ett gap som antingen ger uppgång till en kreditexpansion eller en kreditåtstramning, säger Lars Jonung. Nu lyfter det amerikanska magasinet Fortune fram en ny tolkning av Wicksell, framförd av ekonomer på den tyska storbanken Deutsche Bank. Är tyskarna på rätt väg eller inte?  Jag tror att de tänker fel, säger Lars Jonung. Birgitta Forsberg SvD 2026-08-16 https://www.svd.se/a/Bxzyn7/ra...

 Books of 2026: Economics Titles selected by me RE. Money Beyond Borders: Global Currencies from Croesus to Crypto by Barry Eichengreen  The Doom Loop: Why the World Economic Order is Spiraling into Disorder by Eswar Prasad  Eswar Prasad argues that globalization and populism have entered a destructive feedback cycle https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/02/eswar-prasad-argues-that-globalization.html Keynes for Our Times by Robert Skidelsky Martin Wolf FT 17 June 2026 https://www.ft.com/content/96e24668-b203-4c78-92dd-99351fc04a09?syn-25a6b1a6=1

Är det något som mänskligheten borde ha lärt sig av de senaste hundra årens stora konflikter så är det att konflikterna har underbyggts och förstärkts av växande makroekonomiska obalanser – och kanske inte minst att alltför drastiska och oövertänkta åtgärder för att hantera dessa obalanser gör problemen ännu värre och i sista hand kan leda till krig. Sett genom en makroekonomisk lins var de växande ekonomiska spänningarna mellan det då ledande industriella och territoriella imperiet Storbritannien och den framväxande industriella giganten Tyskland en mycket viktig faktor bakom första världskriget. Andra världskriget blir ur ett ekonomiskt perspektiv då en fortsättning på det första. Depressionen på 1930-talet skapade ännu mer ekonomiska spänningar och missnöje, samtidigt som de upplevda oförrätterna blev ännu större.   John Maynard Keynes, som redan 1919 publicerade essän ”The economic consequences of peace”. Keynes konstaterade att den slutliga versionen av fredsavtalet skull...

Varför globala obalanser är viktiga Som jag noterade förra veckan  https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/05/martin-wolf-imbalances-are-back-on.html har konflikter om hur man ska justera externa obalanser återkommit ungefär vartannat decennium sedan 1980-talet. Varför är hanteringen av globala obalanser i betalningsbalansen både så svår och så viktig? Det korta svaret är att de ligger i skärningspunkten mellan nästan allt som är viktigt inom global ekonomi och politik: nationell makt, full sysselsättning, industriell styrka, finansiell stabilitet, finans- och penningpolitik och hantering av växelkurser. 1920- och 1930-talen var en lärdom i hur allt kan gå spektakulärt fel. Länder med strukturella överskott av sparande över investeringar och därmed externa överskott (som Kina, Tyskland och Japan) har byggt sina ekonomier kring ett överskott av omsättningsbara varor och tjänster. Att plötsligt förlora dessa kan orsaka en nedgång. Moralister i överskottsländer klagar över slöseriet i ...

Även om Trumps Magarörelse så småningom blir av med den politiska makten är det inte sannolikt att ett nytt styre under Demokraterna skulle rulla tillbaka handelspolitiken.  När de hade chansen under president Biden lät de Trumps tullar bestå. Rudolf Kjellén, statsvetarprofessor i Uppsala vid förra sekelskiftet, var bland de första att använda begreppet geopolitik. Under 1960- och 70-talen fick det diskrediterade konceptet en renässans. Globaliseringens historia kan delas in i sex faser. Första världskriget krossade den frihandelsinriktade världshandeln Efter att kanonerna tystnat såg den engelske ekonomen John Maynard Keynes tillbaka på en förlorad värld: ”Vilken enastående episod i människans ekonomiska framsteg den tid var som tog slut i augusti 1914! Bretton Woods-systemet fungerade ungefär som tänkt i 30 år. År 1971 upphävde president Nixon möjligheten att växla dollar mot guld. De tusenåriga banden mellan pengar och metall försvann över en natt. Trump får också vatten på sin ...

Keynes saw where AI might take us .Photographer: Tim Gidal/Picture Post/Hulton Archive/Getty Images In 1930, John Maynard Keynes took time out from thinking about the Great Depression, which was throwing millions out of work, to write a charming essay about the “economic possibilities for our grandchildren.”  Our grandchildren would be able to meet all their material needs by working 15 hours a week. But this would leave what Keynes called “the permanent problem of the human race.” How to use the resulting freedom from economic necessity to live a good life — or as Keynes put it “how to live wisely and agreeably and well.” AI may be about to prove Keynes spectacularly right just in time for his century deadline.  The AI revolution is beginning to do for knowledge work what the combine harvester did for agricultural jobs and the factory did for mechanical jobs — mechanizing routine tasks that were once reserved for human beings  Jobs provide people with a combination of ps...

When Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933, Germany’s economy was in dire straits. Under Chancellor Heinrich Brüningthe German government had clung dogmatically to economic orthodoxy in the face of the Great Depression, staying on the gold standard /fast växelkurs/ and imposing ever harsher fiscal austerity /den som är satt i skuld är inte fri/.  The result was economic devastation and extremely high unemployment. Hitler broke with the economic orthodoxy, enabling him to preside over a rapid economic recovery.  The popularity he gained from the economic revival allowed him to consolidate power. Paul Krugman Substack Feb 27, 2026 https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/the-economics-of-faltering-fascism There was hyperinflation during the Weimar era, and it did contribute to a general sense of chaos that undermined the fledgling republic.  But that peaked in 1923, the year Hitler botched a putsch and went to jail — a full decade before he seized power.  https://englundmacro.b...

England, som är mitt uppe i den stora depressionen, överger guldstandarden och väljer att försvaga pundet och satsa stora pengar på infrastruktur för att stimulera ekonomin DI 17 november 2025 https://www.di.se/podcast/en-rik-historia/professorn-som-slappte-ut-foretagarna-fran-guldburen/ The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money is a book by English economist John Maynard Keynes published in February 1936.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_General_Theory_of_Employment,_Interest_and_Money Hur det kom sig att England övergav guldmyntfoten 1931 https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2013/10/hur-det-kom-sig-att-england-overgav.html

Planen är att skapa begreppet Monetary Creation and Destruction - MCD, på svenska ungefär  Att skapa och förinta pengar. https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2025/01/monetary-creation-and-destruction-mcd.html 1. Banks create money when they lend. They also create money when they buy coffee machines https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2021/09/banks-create-money-when-they-lend-they.html Det fördes länge en debatt om vilket M som skulle vara bäst för att förutse framtiden. Själv har jag tänkt mig att hushåll och företag har en skattkista där överst finns kassa och bank, längre ner värdepapper, belåningsmöjligheter och fastigheter och längst ner "The Family Silver". https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2025/01/vad-ar-pengar-m1-m2-m3-osv-monetary.html Det betyder att M stiger när aktier och fastigheter stiger i värde. Och tvärtom. Hushållen i USA har det mesta i aktier; och i sina hus... Americans Have $35 Trillion in Housing Wealth 2. Non-banks get most of their money from banks. När en ...

Though he had his ups and downs, his failures as well as successes, he remains one of the most important and respected figures of the 20th Century. No human is super-human. Everyone makes mistakes. Nobody knows everything. Sometimes even the best screw up. I am personally a friend and advocate of the gold standard, but I believe that when Churchill attempted to restore the British pound’s connection to the yellow metal, he erred in a way that produced monumentally negative consequences for Britain and the world. Britain suspended the pound’s convertibility into gold during the calamity of World War I. Doing so allowed the government to print a volume of paper money its gold reserves wouldn’t otherwise permit. The value of the pound fell, and price inflation soared. In the early 1920s, a public debate began around whether Britain should return to the discipline of the gold standard. He became Chancellor of the Exchequer (the equivalent of Treasury Secretary) in 1924 The problem with the...

  Tooze is an economic historian at Columbia University, co-hosts the podcast “Ones and Tooze,” writes the brilliant Chartbook blog and is the author of “Crashed,” the single best history of the 2008 financial crisis.  He’s now out with a new book, “Shutdown: How Covid Shook the World’s Economy,” which tells the story of the unprecedented global economic response to the pandemic. “The world discovered that John Maynard Keynes was right when he declared during World War II that ‘anything we can actually do, we can afford,’” writes Adam Tooze.  “Budget constraints don’t seem to exist; money is a mere technicality. The hard limits of financial sustainability, policed, we used to think, by ferocious bond markets, were blurred by the 2008 financial crisis. In 2020, they were erased.” Ezra Klein New York Times 17 September 2021 https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/17/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-adam-tooze.html Covid Showed Us What Keynes Always Knew - Adam Tooze https://englundmacro....

is the old adage attributed, probably incorrectly, to the famed economist John Maynard Keynes While he doesn’t say the market is in a bubble — a noun he seldom uses — Asness says pretty much any measure finds the valuation ratio of expensive stocks to cheap stocks is historically high. He gives three reasons why markets are less rational.  Two factors, he says, probably have a small influence — the rise of index investing and the long duration of low interest rates. But the biggest reason for a less efficient stock market, he says, is social media and related advances in technology.  “I’m far more certain that social media, the overconfidence that come when people think all the world’s data is at their fingertips, and gamified, fake-free, instant, 24/7 trading has done so in a significant way,” he says. MarketWatch 3 september 2024 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-market-is-getting-less-efficient-copy-this-strategy-from-the-apes-says-a-veteran-fund-manager-fdea97a7 Buy th...

 From Keynes's 1936 "General Theory of Employment, Interest, & Money, chapter 12... Brad DeLong Aug 20, 2024 https://braddelong.substack.com/p/reading-john-maynard-keynes-on-why?utm_source=substack&publication_id=47874&post_id=147929033&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&utm_campaign=email-share&triggerShare=true&isFreemail=true&r=phhic&triedRedirect=true   ”Alla finansiella bubblor bygger i grund och botten på en bra idé. Folk tar den bara för långt”  Katrine Kielos-Marçal DN 17 augusti 2024 https://www.dn.se/ekonomi/katrine-kielos-marcal-kommer-ai-bubblan-tillatas-spricka/

Gone are the days when the political right and left could be distinguished by competing theories: free market, monetarist, or Keynesian.  Today, economic policy is mostly a grab bag from which policy interventions are found to address specific economic grievances. No overarching economic theory guides either party’s approach to policymaking. By the end of the 1990s all the talk was of the “Washington consensus,” an approach that argued prosperity and stability could be achieved via orthodox monetary and fiscal policies, alongside vigorous engagement in international trade. The Washington consensus, however, was never quite as widely fancied within the economics profession as it was amongst politicians.  It is not that economists disagreed with the merits of independent central banks tasked with keeping inflation low, deregulation, or increased globalization.  Rather, the economics profession noted that those pillars, while necessary for growth, shared prosperity, and stab...

A professor of philosophy—and occasional spy for Britain—sent back early warnings from his time in Germany after World  War I. After emerging from four years of largely genteel captivity in Germany, the young scholar was recruited in London by Britain’s nascent Secret Intelligence Service, or SIS (the department later known as MI6). As his biographer puts it: “In 1918, no Briton knew more about Germany than Bell.” SIS quickly dispatched Winthrop, under cover as a Reuters correspondent, back to Germany, which was attempting to reinvent itself as a liberal democracy.  Most of “Cracking the Nazi Code” focuses on the immediate aftermath of World War I, when Winthrop lobbied for the Allies to ease up on their rush to punish Germany.  He did so openly as a journalist filing impassioned stories about the threat of mass starvation and covertly in his SIS role.  Mr. Bell credits his subject with playing a major role in persuading the Allies to lift their food blockade of Germ...

 Adam Smith vars Wealth of Nations kom 1776 Adam Smiths gode vän David Hume i Of Money år 1752. Ett första steg i analysen var att formulera kvantitetsteorin  I flera av de industrialiserade länderna hade det förekommit återkommande kriser men det var den stora depressionen i början av 1930-talet som på allvar kom att påverka den ekonomiska teorin. Under 1930-talet kom Gunnar Myrdal och Bertil Ohlin att spela viktiga roller vid utvecklandet av makro- och konjunkturteorin inom den grupp som fått namnet “Stockholmsskolan”.  Det största genomslaget fick dock John Maynard Keynes arbete The General Theory of Employment Interest and Money från 1936.  Denna något korta beskrivning av nationalekonomiämnets utveckling fram till för 50 år sedan innehåller stora luckor. Claes-Henric Siven är professor emeritus vid Stockholms universitet.  Claes-Henric Siven Liberal Debatt 26 mars 2024 https://www.liberaldebatt.se/2024/03/en-snabbresa-genom-nationalekonomins-historia/ Svant...

She did mention there’s an alternative notion afoot: using those frozen Russian assets as collateral for borrowing.  It’s an idea pushed by Belgium.  According to RSM chief economist Joe Brusuelas, it would be the alternative that renowned economist John Maynard Keynes would’ve taken. Keynes, who in 1946 met his long-term forecast of dying, is obviously no longer around for consultation.  But Brusuelas noted that Keynes was tasked with helping to resolve the global financial crisis when the Bank of England lost two-thirds of its gold reserves in a week due to the outbreak of World War I. Keynes, noted Brusuelas, correctly predicted that the harsh conditions imposed on Germany after World War I would reverberate. Keynes would almost certainly be against the outright confiscation of Russian reserves or significant wartime reparations designed to cripple the Russian postwar economy,” he said.  “One of the major lessons learned during the 20th century was that the unrest...

As a society, we overinvest in real estate. We build (and buy) too many extra-big homes and strive to make almost everyone into a buyer. Robert J. Samuelson, July 26 2008 https://www.internetional.se/villains.htm#obs I’m almost 75. If I haven’t yet said what’s on my mind, I never will. So far as I can tell, nothing that I have written has ever had the slightest effect on what actually happened. But I’m resigned to this. No one elected me to anything. In our system, the people rule, not the pundits; and that’s how it should be. The truly big economic story of the past half-century has been the rise and fall of “macroeconomics.” This is economists’ fancy term for using interest rates, taxes and government spending to regulate the economy’s growth and stability. This once seemed doable. Now, less so. What happened?  Robert J. Samuelson Washington Post https://www.spokesman.com/stories/2020/sep/15/robert-j-samuelson-goodbye-readers-and-good-luck/ Robert J. Samuelson - Wikipedia

 The discipline, willingly or not, has inhaled his influence When he presented an early version, a young economist despaired: “You just explained why everything I’ve done in the last few years is worthless.”  Economists, he believed, “are basically storytellers, creators of make-believe economic systems”. So he and his colleagues built a fantastical new world for wonks to explore. Lucas adopted the “rational expectations hypothesis”. He assumed the actors in his models would expect what the model itself predicted. If an economist can foresee that extra tokens will raise ride prices, then operators should expect the same. With the assumption of rational expectations, Lucas felt he had “eliminated the main intellectual basis” for fiscal and monetary fine-tuning of demand. After all, cashiers could not systematically fool ride operators. “Keynesian economics is dead,” he reported in 1979.  That report proved exaggerated.  The Economist 18 May 2023 https://www.economist....

Robert skidelsky’s three-volume biography of John Maynard Keynes achieved something few histories of economic thought can do: it was well written, packed with interesting detail and offered enough—but not too much—theory.  Now Keynes’s great rival, Friedrich Hayek, is the subject of a biography comparable to Lord Skidelsky’s. It is certainly on a similar scale. The first volume is more than 800 pages, and a second is on the way. Bruce Caldwell’s and Hansjoerg Klausinger’s work also has the makings of something just as good. Both were born into respectable families. Both were too clever for school and so got bored. Both liked holidaying in Cornwall. Both, in their economic theorising, used little mathematics. And, in their personal interactions, there was tremendous mutual respect, even if not always warmth. Keynes arranged for Hayek to spend time with him at King’s College, Cambridge, during the second world war. The Economist 17 November 2022 https://www.economist.com/culture/2022...