Keynes, Piketty, and Basic Income

Economic theory is traced through neo-classicism, Keynes, monetarism, and Thomas Piketty. I argue that Keynes achieved an established radical intellectual breakthrough, a consistent verifiable model, and successful policy implementation, whereas neo-classical economics and later monetarism offered only partial analyses. Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty First Century fails to match Keynes’s achievement on any of these criteria. Piketty’s thesis on inequality lacks an explanatory theory, a consistent model, and an implementable policy. The basic income proposal derives from and relies on the proven Keynesian diagnostic which retains relevance. Basic income is a form of Keynesian demand management, necessary in advanced technology high productivity economies in which the wage component of output declines. I supplement this with a virtual theory of money which renders deficit both inevitable and manageable.