… is from page 19 of David McCord Wright’s May 1961 American Economic Review essay, “Discussion” (comments delivered on Harry G. Johnson’s lecture “The General Theory After Twenty-Five Years”):
But here we find the real weakness of Keynesianism. For in the sort of high relative-cost plus gold flow maladjustment we are experiencing now and England experienced in the twenties, the real need is for greater productivity, lower costs, social adaptation. But Keynes instead draws attention off into monetary blind alleys, and keeps us from realizing, or trying to remedy, the industrial, even cultural, arteriosclerosis that is the real source of the problem. In thus misdirecting attention, Keynesianism, as usually understood, is now, as it was then, not just a negative inadequacy, but a positive evil.
