Monday, May 01, 2006

Farewell Mr. Galbraith

On Saturday, John Kenneth Galbraith, the architect of the new deal, social security, and the guy who instituted Keynsian economics in America, died at the age of 97.

Mr. Galbraith was an unabashed liberal who thought that the military industrial complex that made war profitable was a very bad thing and would prefer to see our economy to " respond to welfare, to a kindness, a humane need, not to sending soldiers into battle or, nowadays, sending airplanes to bomb innocent people".

While Hayek's ideas may currently rule the day, I can only hope that Galbraith is rediscovered as an economist who was capable of incorporating humanism into the discipline and gave us ideas for how society should be - so we know what to aspire to. Next time someone tells you that all progressives do is bitch about the problem, you can point to Galbraith as someone who gave solutions. And hopefully his son, James K. Galbraith, will continue the tradition.


No comments: