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Macroeconomic Conversion Déjà Vu

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 June 2009

Hans Brems
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Scope. Macroeconomic theory determines either an unemployment equilibrium or an inflation equilibrium. Consider an economy producing a single good. Unemployment theory determines the physical output of that good; inflation theory determines its price. Twice in the history of economic thought an unemployment equilibrium reversed itself into an inflation equilibrium. First, in the eighteenth century the unemployment equilibrium of William Petty (1662) and A. Yarranton (1677) reversed itself into the inflation equilibrium of David Hume (1752) and A. R. J. Turgot (1769–1770). Second, in our own century the unemployment equilibrium of J. M. Keynes (1936) reversed itself into the inflation equilibrium of Milton Friedman (1968).

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the History of Economic Thought , Volume 17 , Issue 1 , Spring 1995 , pp. 78 - 85
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995

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References

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