Are you ready to be a Revolutionary?
In Chapter 2 of John Maynard Keynes book "The Economic Consequences of the Peace" he speaks of the "vanity of abstinence" and the selfishness of savings.
The book was written 90 years ago, but as Nixon said in the early 70's "We are all Keynesians now" and the economic philosophy first developed by Keynes is today the exclusive economic philosophy held by prominent economists as well as virtually all of our leaders and policymakers.
If you read the news at all, it is not difficult to see that those trying to centrally direct the economy in America right at this moment are struggling with the "Paradox of Thrift/Paradox of Savings" that Keynes laid out in his General Theory so many years ago.
How do we get people to stop saving and start spending? This is the question that is likely keeping Obama awake at night.
Saving, the theory goes is evil in a way because it "destroys" income. Somehow (its a very complicated argument- and a circular one in my opinion), according to the theory, that money just "disappears" from the overall economy.
There are so many ways to dispute this theory. I posted a link to an article that does just that much more eloquently than I can.
But the crux of all this is: if you are following the advice of guru's such as Dave Ramsey, or in other words if you are being a responsible human being and spending only within your means, paying off debt, etc.... then you are a REVOLUTIONARY. You are fighting against everything that our government is doing. You are a freedom-fighter. You are not listening to what you have been told to do.
Are you willing to embrace that?
The book was written 90 years ago, but as Nixon said in the early 70's "We are all Keynesians now" and the economic philosophy first developed by Keynes is today the exclusive economic philosophy held by prominent economists as well as virtually all of our leaders and policymakers.
If you read the news at all, it is not difficult to see that those trying to centrally direct the economy in America right at this moment are struggling with the "Paradox of Thrift/Paradox of Savings" that Keynes laid out in his General Theory so many years ago.
How do we get people to stop saving and start spending? This is the question that is likely keeping Obama awake at night.
Saving, the theory goes is evil in a way because it "destroys" income. Somehow (its a very complicated argument- and a circular one in my opinion), according to the theory, that money just "disappears" from the overall economy.
There are so many ways to dispute this theory. I posted a link to an article that does just that much more eloquently than I can.
But the crux of all this is: if you are following the advice of guru's such as Dave Ramsey, or in other words if you are being a responsible human being and spending only within your means, paying off debt, etc.... then you are a REVOLUTIONARY. You are fighting against everything that our government is doing. You are a freedom-fighter. You are not listening to what you have been told to do.
Are you willing to embrace that?
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