Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- General Introduction
- Editorial Foreword
- Preface
- Introduction to New Edition
- Notes on Further Reading
- Corrections to this Edition
- I THE TREATY OF PEACE
- II INFLATION AND DEFLATION
- 1 INFLATION (1919)
- 2 SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF CHANGES IN THE VALUE OF MONEY (1923)
- 3 THE FRENCH FRANC (1926, 1928)
- 4 CAN LLOYD GEORGE DO IT? (1929)
- 5 THE GREAT SLUMP OF 1930 (DECEMBER 1930)
- 6 ECONOMY (1931)
- 7 THE CONSEQUENCES TO THE BANKS OF THE COLLAPSE OF MONEY VALUES (AUGUST 1931)
- III THE RETURN TO THE GOLD STANDARD
- IV POLITICS
- V THE FUTURE
- VI LATER ESSAYS
- Index
5 - THE GREAT SLUMP OF 1930 (DECEMBER 1930)
from II - INFLATION AND DEFLATION
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 November 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- General Introduction
- Editorial Foreword
- Preface
- Introduction to New Edition
- Notes on Further Reading
- Corrections to this Edition
- I THE TREATY OF PEACE
- II INFLATION AND DEFLATION
- 1 INFLATION (1919)
- 2 SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF CHANGES IN THE VALUE OF MONEY (1923)
- 3 THE FRENCH FRANC (1926, 1928)
- 4 CAN LLOYD GEORGE DO IT? (1929)
- 5 THE GREAT SLUMP OF 1930 (DECEMBER 1930)
- 6 ECONOMY (1931)
- 7 THE CONSEQUENCES TO THE BANKS OF THE COLLAPSE OF MONEY VALUES (AUGUST 1931)
- III THE RETURN TO THE GOLD STANDARD
- IV POLITICS
- V THE FUTURE
- VI LATER ESSAYS
- Index
Summary
This essay originally appeared as two articles in the Nation and Athenaeum, 20 and 27 December 1930, under the same title.
The world has been slow to realise that we are living this year in the shadow of one of the greatest economic catastrophes of modern history. But now that the man in the street has become aware of what is happening, he, not knowing the why and wherefore, is as full today of what may prove excessive fears as, previously, when the trouble was first coming on, he was lacking in what would have been a reasonable anxiety. He begins to doubt the future. Is he now awakening from a pleasant dream to face the darkness of facts? Or dropping off into a nightmare which will pass away?
He need not be doubtful. The other was not a dream. This is a nightmare, which will pass away with the morning. For the resources of nature and men's devices are just as fertile and productive as they were. The rate of our progress towards solving the material problems of life is not less rapid. We are as capable as before of affording for every one a high standard of life—high, I mean, compared with, say, twenty years ago—and will soon learn to afford a standard higher still. We were not previously deceived. But today we have involved ourselves in a colossal muddle, having blundered in the control of a delicate machine, the working of which we do not understand. The result is that our possibilities of wealth may run to waste for a time—perhaps for a long time.
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- Information
- The Collected Writings of John Maynard Keynes , pp. 126 - 134Publisher: Royal Economic SocietyPrint publication year: 1978
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