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The Age of Keynes in the Great Society

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Macroeconomic Policy and a Living Wage

Abstract

This chapter will review Johnson’s economic policies by focusing on his Economic Reports of the President. The programs of the Great Society were featured in Johnson’s Economic Reports in the same way the Second Bill of Rights was displayed in Truman’s early Economic Reports. The aid to education and the training programs Johnson initiated were justified as a large investment in the human capital of low-wage workers and as enhancing the productive capacity of the USA. Johnson believed such an investment was essential to making sure that prosperity continued and was shared among all members of society, much as Roosevelt wanted in his Second Bill of Rights. Johnson’s programs, however, revealed the flaw in the hybrid system of redistributive economics when they resulted in the increased inflation that marked the last two years of his administration.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Kearns, 1976, pp. 296–297.

  2. 2.

    Woods, 2016, p. 240.

  3. 3.

    Wilentz, 2016, p. 79.

  4. 4.

    For a very capable review of these programs, see Woods, 2016.

  5. 5.

    Johnson, 1969, p. 5.

  6. 6.

    Johnson, 1964, pp. 8–10.

  7. 7.

    Johnson, 1964, pp. 14–18.

  8. 8.

    Woods, 2016, p. 10.

  9. 9.

    CEA, 1964, p. 42.

  10. 10.

    CEA, 1964, p. 73.

  11. 11.

    CEA, 1964, p. 112.

  12. 12.

    CEA, 1964, p. 118.

  13. 13.

    JEC, 1964, pp. 3 and 10.

  14. 14.

    JEC, 1964, pp. 8–9.

  15. 15.

    JEC, 1964, pp. 26–27.

  16. 16.

    JEC, 1964, p. 28.

  17. 17.

    JEC, 1964, p. 37.

  18. 18.

    Zelizer, 2015, pp. 76–80; Crouse, 2018, pp. 1245–1260.

  19. 19.

    Johnson, 1965, pp. 1, 2 and 5.

  20. 20.

    Johnson, 1965, p. 6.

  21. 21.

    Johnson, 1965, p. 8.

  22. 22.

    Johnson, 1965, pp. 16–17.

  23. 23.

    CEA, 1965, p. 31.

  24. 24.

    CEA, 1965, pp. 32–33.

  25. 25.

    CEA, 1965, p. 100.

  26. 26.

    CEA, 1965, p. 102.

  27. 27.

    CEA, 1965, p. 102.

  28. 28.

    Hansen, 1947b, p. 73.

  29. 29.

    JEC, 1965, pp. 7–8.

  30. 30.

    JEC, 1965, p. 18.

  31. 31.

    JEC, 1965, pp. 80–81.

  32. 32.

    Johnson, 1966, pp. 10–11.

  33. 33.

    Johnson, 1966, p. 12.

  34. 34.

    Woods, 2016, pp. 210–212; Stein, 1994, p. 121.

  35. 35.

    Phelps, 1948, p. 595.

  36. 36.

    Johnson, 1966, p. 17; Zelizer, 2015, pp. 167–168; Woods, 2016, pp. 132–133; Kearns, 1976, p. 105.

  37. 37.

    Johnson, 1966, p. 17.

  38. 38.

    Woods, 2016, p. 252.

  39. 39.

    JEC, 1966, p. 5.

  40. 40.

    JEC, 1966, p. 8.

  41. 41.

    JEC, 1966, p. 11.

  42. 42.

    JEC, 1966, p. 14.

  43. 43.

    JEC, 1966, pp. 35 and 45.

  44. 44.

    Johnson, 1967, p. 5.

  45. 45.

    Johnson, 1967, p. 6.

  46. 46.

    Johnson, 1967, p. 9.

  47. 47.

    Johnson, 1967, p. 13.

  48. 48.

    CEA, 1967, pp. 37–38.

  49. 49.

    CEA, 1967, pp. 81–82.

  50. 50.

    CEA, 1967, p. 99.

  51. 51.

    Phillips, 1958, pp. 283–289. For an early use of Phillips’ work by Keynesians, see Samuelson and Solow, 1960, pp. 177–194. Crouse offers a succinct discussion of the Phillips curve, Crouse, 2018, pp. 690–695.

  52. 52.

    CEA, 1967, pp. 123–124.

  53. 53.

    CEA, 1967, pp. 124–127.

  54. 54.

    CEA, 1967, p. 131.

  55. 55.

    CEA, 1967, p. 133.

  56. 56.

    JEC, 1967, pp. 17–22.

  57. 57.

    JEC, 1967, p. 65.

  58. 58.

    JEC, 1967, pp. 78–79.

  59. 59.

    Zelizer, 2015, p. 252.

  60. 60.

    Johnson, 1968, p. 4.

  61. 61.

    Johnson, 1968, pp. 19–20.

  62. 62.

    CEA, 1968, p. 97.

  63. 63.

    CEA, 1968, p. 119.

  64. 64.

    CEA, 1968, p. 121.

  65. 65.

    JEC, 1968, pp. 33–34.

  66. 66.

    JEC, 1968, p. 91.

  67. 67.

    Zelizer, 2015, pp. 279–301.

  68. 68.

    Johnson, 1969, p. 21.

  69. 69.

    CEA, 1969, p. 46.

  70. 70.

    CEA, 1969, p. 59.

  71. 71.

    CEA, 1969, pp. 102–103.

  72. 72.

    CEA, 1969, pp. 171–172.

  73. 73.

    Hansen, 1947a, p. 50.

  74. 74.

    Roosevelt, 1944, pp. 40–42.

  75. 75.

    JEC, 1969, p. 45.

  76. 76.

    JEC, 1969, pp. 123–124.

  77. 77.

    Rousseas, 1965, pp. 491 and 501.

  78. 78.

    Keyserling, 1965, pp. 11–12.

  79. 79.

    Tobin, 1966, pp. 9–14; Bronfenbrenner, 1967, pp. 637–649.

  80. 80.

    Stabile, 2008, pp. 275–295.

  81. 81.

    Seligman, 1968, pp. 216–217.

  82. 82.

    Seligman, 1968, pp. 138–139.

  83. 83.

    Seligman, 1968, p. 202.

  84. 84.

    Seligman, 1968, pp. 205–206.

  85. 85.

    Shelton, 1964a, pp. 1 and 6; American Federationist, 1964a, pp. 12–20; 1964b, pp. 21–24; 1964c, pp. 1–8; 1964e, pp. 14–17; Meany, 1964a, pp. 1–5; 1964b, pp. 19–20; Biemiller, 1964, pp. 1–5.

  86. 86.

    Biemiller, 1964, p. 4.

  87. 87.

    American Federationist, 1964d, pp. 8–12.

  88. 88.

    Woods, 2016, p. 28.

  89. 89.

    American Federationist, 1964f, pp. 17–18 and 21.

  90. 90.

    Meany, 1964c, p. 7.

  91. 91.

    Shelton, 1964b, p. 1.

  92. 92.

    American Federationist, 1965a, pp. 1–6.

  93. 93.

    Biemiller, 1965a, p. 2.

  94. 94.

    American Federationist, 1965b, p. 8.

  95. 95.

    Seidman, 1965, pp. 15 and 18.

  96. 96.

    Biemiller, 1965b, pp. 2 and 7.

  97. 97.

    American Federationist, 1966, p. 7.

  98. 98.

    Meany, 1965, p. 1.

  99. 99.

    Oswald, 1967, pp. 14 and 21.

  100. 100.

    Stein, 1994, p. 114.

  101. 101.

    Sowell, 1999, p. 11.

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  1. Department of Economics, St. Mary’s College of Maryland, St. Mary’s City, MD, USA

    Donald R. Stabile

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Stabile, D.R. (2018). The Age of Keynes in the Great Society. In: Macroeconomic Policy and a Living Wage. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01998-3_7

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