Reinhart, Carmen, (2016), “The Perils of Debt Complacency”, Project Syndicate, 28 September
“What a government spends the public pays for. There is no such thing as an uncovered deficit.” So said John Maynard Keynes in A Tract on Monetary Reform. But Robert Skidelsky, the author of a magisterial three-volume biography of Keynes, disagrees. In a recent commentary entitled “The Scarecrow of National Debt,” Skidelsky offered a rather patronizing narrative, in a tone usually reserved for young children and pets, about his aged, old-fashioned, and financially illiterate friend’s baseless anxiety about the burden placed on future generations by the rising level of government debt.
Relevant Posts
- Crivelli, Ernesto, Gupta, Sanjeev, Mulas-Granados, Carlos, Correa-Caro, Carolina, (2016), “Fragmented Politics and Public Debt”, IMF, Working Paper No. 16/190, 19 September
- Hatchondo, Juan Carlos, Martinez, Leonardo, Sosa-Padilla, César, (2016), “Debt Dilution and Sovereign Default Risk”, Journal of Political Economy, 31 August