In the following interview, the great Austrian economist Friedrich August von Hayek makes his comments on mainstream economic deity, John Maynard Keynes' knowledge of economics. Hayek has been a personal friend and an intellectual rival of JMK.
F. A Hayek opens with a strong criticism of Keynes who he says "knew very little of economics"(0:10), except that Keynes concentrated (or tunneled on) "Marshallian economics".
Hayek further says that despite being one of the most intelligent thinkers he has ever known "economics was just a sideline for him" (2:28). Hayek said that Keynes wanted "to recreate the subject".
Hayek further noted that Keynes "knew very little of 19th century economic history" (0:22) whose understanding had been guided by "aethestic appeal" although paradoxically Keynes "hated the 19th century".
Hayek also noted that Keynes was never interested in the theory of capital (4:28), was "very shaky on the theory of international trade" (4:32) although Keynes was "well informed on contemporary monetary theory but even there did not know such things are Henry Thornton or Wicksell" (4:37) and Keynes only read French where the "whole German literature was in accessible to him" (4:48)
Interesting.
(hat tip Mark Thornton Mises Blog)
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