Center for Curatorial Studies/Bard College Ending Poverty: Jobs, Not Welfare

Interesting and informative.

This is a collection of Minsky's papers on job creation and welfare. The neat thing is that the papers are presented in chronological order so that you can observe how his philosophy evolved.The bad thing is that Minsky's thinking on these issues were quite muddled.Minksy constantly criticizes Keynesian stimulus policies, yet the fact is that the New Deal / Great Society era that he refers to had an economy that seems pretty good by modern standards.Minsky claims the War on Poverty failed, yet by the end of LBJ's term unemployment was 3.5% and the Gini coefficient reached its all time low.Minsky claims that construction workers were to blame for inequality, never mind the 1%.Minsky advocates repealing child labor laws and forcing children to work. He advocates getting rid of Social Security and forcing old people to work until the drop.Minsky advocates taking unemployed people as they are and creating jobs that fit their skills, but he never satisfactorily explains how he would create skilled jobs out of thin air.One is left with the impression that Minsky was motivated by a puritan work ethic and perhaps by some racism. There is very little sound economic reason behind his policy proposals.

Hyman Minsky provides here a great account on how and why free-market laissez-faire is simply too abstract to solve once and for all the problem of unemployment.Also a great insight on Keynes subtleness compared to many "keynesian" caricatures.