Keynesian Economics

Keynesian economics is the view that in the misfortunate run, especially during recessions, economic end product is strongly influenced by core of coin demand . In the Keynesian view, aggregate demand does not necessarily equal the productive capacity of the parsimony instead, it is influenced by a host of factors and roughlytimes behaves erratically, affecting reckon, employment, and pretension The theories forming the basis of Keynesian economics were first presented by the British economist potty Maynard Keynes in his book, The General possibleness of Employment, Interest and Money, published in 1936, during the capacious Depression.Keynes contrasted his approach to the aggregate supply-focused Greco-Roman economics that preceded his book. The interpretations of Keynes that followed argon contentious and several shoals of economic thought claim his legacy. Keynesian economists a good deal argue that private sector decisions sometimes lead to inefficient macroecon omic outcomes which require brisk insurance rejoinders by the popular sector, in particular, monetary insurance actions by the central bank and monetary polity actions by the regime, in order to stabilize output over the business cycle.Keynesian economics advocates a composite economy predominantly private sector, unless with a role for government intervention during recessions. Keynesian economics served as the standard economic fashion model in the developed nations during the later part of the Great Depression, World War II, and the post-war economic expansion (19451973), though it lost some influence following the oil box and resulting stagflation of the 1970s. The advent of the global financial crisis in 2008 has caused a resurgence in Keynesian thought. OverviewPrior to the publication of Keyness General Theory, mainstream economic thought was that the economy existed in a give tongue to of planetary equilibrium, meaning that the economy naturally consumes whateve r it produces because the needs of consumers are always greater than the capacity of the economy to satisfy those needs. This perception is reflected in Says Law and in the writing of David Ricardo which is that individuals produce so that they derriere either consume what they have manufactured or sell their output so that they can buy someone elses output.This perception rests upon the assumption that if a surplus of goods or services exists, they would naturally drop in price to the point where they would be consumed. Keyness conjecture was significant because it over wrenched the mainstream thought of the time and brought about a greater awareness that problems such as unemployment are not a product of laziness, but the result of a structural inadequacy in the economic system. He argued that because at that place was no guarantee that the goods that individuals produce would be met with demand, unemployment was a natural consequence.He truism the economy as unable to maintai n itself at full employment and intendd that it was necessary for the government to step in and put under-utilised savings to work through and through government consumption. Thus, according to Keynesian opening, some individually rational microeconomic-level actions such as not investing savings in the goods and services produced by the economy, if taken collectively by a large proportion of individuals and firms, can lead to outcomes wherein the economy ope evaluate below its potential output and growth rate.Prior to Keynes, a situation in which aggregate demand for goods and services did not meet supply was referred to by classical economists as a general glut, although there was disagreement among them as to whether a general glut was possible. Keynes argued that when a glut occurred, it was the over-reaction of producers and the laying off of workers that led to a fall in demand and perpetuated the problem. Keynesians therefore advocate an active stabilization policy to re duce the amplitude of the business cycle, which they rank among the most serious of economic problems.According to the theory, government disbursement can be used to summation aggregate demand, thus increasing economic activity, reducing unemployment and deflation. Theory Keynes argued that the solution to the Great Depression was to throw off the economy (inducement to invest) through some conclave of deuce approaches 1. A reduction in engross rates (monetary policy), and 2. Government investment funds in root (fiscal policy). By reducing the interest rate at which the central bank lends bullion to commercial banks, the government sends a signal to commercial banks that they should do the same for their customers.Investment by government in infrastructure injects income into the economy by creating business opportunity, employment and demand and reversing the effects of the aforementioned imbalance. Governments source the funding for this expenditure by borrowing specie fr om the economy through the let go of of government bonds, and because government spending exceeds the amount of value income that the government receives, this creates a fiscal dearth. A central conclusion of Keynesian economics is that, in some situations, no strong automatic mechanism moves output and employment towards full employment levels.This conclusion conflicts with economic approaches that assume a strong general aim towards equilibrium. In the classic synthetic thinking, which combines Keynesian macro concepts with a micro foundation, the conditions of general equilibrium allow for price adjustment to eventually achieve this goal. More broadly, Keynes axiom his theory as a general theory, in which utilization of resources could be high or low, whereas previous economics focused on the particular solecism of full utilization.The new classical macroeconomics movement, which began in the late 1960s and archeozoic 1970s, criticized Keynesian theories, while New Keynes ian economics has sought to base Keyness ideas on more rigorous theoretical foundations. Some interpretations of Keynes have emphasised his stress on the international coordination of Keynesian policies, the need for international economic institutions, and the ways in which economic forces could lead to war or could promote peace. Concept Wages and spending During the Great Depression, the classical theory attributed mass unemployment to high and rigid legitimate wages.To Keynes, the determination of wages is more complicated. First, he argued that it is not real but nominal wages that are set in negotiations between employers and workers, as oppose to a barter relationship. Second, nominal wage cuts would be difficult to put into effect because of laws and wage contracts. Even classical economists admitted that these exist unlike Keynes, they advocated abolishing minimum wages, unions, and long contracts, increasing labour market flexibility. However, to Keynes, slew will res ist nominal wage reductions, even without unions, until they see other wages travel and a general fall of prices.Keynes rejected the idea that nifty wages would cure recessions. He examined the explanations for this idea and found them all faulty. He also considered the most likely consequences of solecism wages in recessions, under various several(predicate) circumstances. He concluded that such wage cutting would be more likely to make recessions worse rather than better. Further, if wages and prices were go, people would start to expect them to fall. This could make the economy spiral downward as those who had money would simply wait as falling prices made it more valuable rather than spending.As Irving Fisher argued in 1933, in his Debt-Deflation Theory of Great Depressions, deflation (falling prices) can make a depression deeper as falling prices and wages made pre-existing nominal debts more valuable in real terms. Excessive saving To Keynes, exuberant saving, i. e. sa ving beyond think investment, was a serious problem, encouraging recession or even depression. Excessive saving results if investment falls, perhaps due to falling consumer demand, over-investment in earlier years, or bearish business expectations, and if saving does not immediately fall in step, the economy would decline.The classical economists argued that interest rates would fall due to the excess supply of loanable funds. The first diagram, adapted from the only graph in The General Theory, shows this butt on. (For simplicity, other sources of the demand for or supply of funds are ignored here. ) Assume that indomitable investment in capital goods falls from hoary I to new I (step a). Second (step b), the resulting excess of saving causes interest-rate cuts, abolishing the excess supply so over again we have saving (S) equal to investment. The interest-rate (i) fall prevents that of production and employment.Keynes had a complex argument against this laissez-faire answer . The graph below summarizes his argument, assuming again that fixed investment falls (step A). First, saving does not fall much as interest rates fall, since the income and substitution effectsof falling rates go in conflicting directions. Second, since planned fixed investment in plant and equipment is based mostly on long-term expectations of future dineroability, that spending does not rise much as interest rates fall. So S and I are drawn as steep (inelastic) in the graph.Given the inelasticity of both demand and supply, a large interest-rate fall is inevitable to close the saving/investment gap. As drawn, this requires a negative interest rate at equilibrium (where the new I line would intersect the old S line). However, this negative interest rate is not necessary to Keyness argument. Third, Keynes argued that saving and investment are not the main determinants of interest rates, especially in the short run. Instead, the supply of and the demand for the stock of money deter mine interest rates in the short run. (This is not drawn in the graph.)Neither changes quickly in response to excessive saving to allow fast interest-rate adjustment. Finally, Keynes suggested that, because of fear of capital losses on assets besides money, there may be a liquidity confine setting a floor under which interest rates cannot fall. While in this trap, interest rates are so low that any increase in money supply will cause bond-holders (fearing rises in interest rates and hence capital losses on their bonds) to sell their bonds to attain money (liquidity). In the diagram, the equilibrium suggested by the new I line and the old S line cannot be reached, so that excess saving persists.Some (such as capital of Minnesota Krugman) see this latter kind of liquidity trap as prevailing in Japan in the 1990s. Most economists agree that nominal interest rates cannot fall below zero. However, some economists (particularly those from the Chicago school) reject the existence of a liq uidity trap. Even if the liquidity trap does not exist, there is a fourth part (perhaps most important) element to Keyness critique. Saving involves not spending all of ones income. Thus, it means insufficient demand for business output, unless it is balanced by other sources of demand, such as fixed investment.Therefore, excessive saving corresponds to an unwanted accumulation of inventories, or what classical economists called a general glut. This pile-up of unsold goods and materials encourages businesses to decrease both production and employment. This in turn lowers peoples incomes and saving, causing a leftward conjure up in the S line in the diagram (step B). For Keynes, the fall in income did most of the job by ending excessive saving and allowing the loanable funds market to attain equilibrium. Instead of interest-rate adjustment solving the problem, a recession does so.Thus in the diagram, the interest-rate change is small. Whereas the classical economists assumed that the level of output and income was constant and given at any one time (except for short-lived deviations), Keynes saw this as the key variable that adjusted to equate saving and investment. Finally, a recession undermines the business incentive to engage in fixed investment. With falling incomes and demand for products, the desired demand for factories and equipment (not to mention housing) will fall. This accelerator effect would shift the I line to the left again, a change not shown in the diagram above.This recreates the problem of excessive saving and encourages the recession to continue. In sum, to Keynes there is interaction between excess supplies in different markets, as unemployment in labour markets encourages excessive saving and vice-versa. Rather than prices adjusting to attain equilibrium, the main story is one of sum of money adjustment allowing recessions and possible attainment of underemployment equilibrium. Active fiscal policy unmixed economists have traditi onally yearned for balanced government budgets.Keynesians, on the other hand, believe this would infuriate the fundamental problem following either the expansionary policy or the contractionary policy would raise saving (broadly defined) and thus lower the demand for both products and labour. For example, Keynesians would advise tax cuts instead. 10 Keyness ideas influenced Franklin D. Roosevelts view that insufficient buying-power caused the Depression. During his presidency, Roosevelt adopted some aspects of Keynesian economics, especially after 1937, when, in the depths of the Depression, the United States suffered from recession yet again following fiscal contraction.But to many the true success of Keynesian policy can be seen at the onset of World War II, which provided a kick to the world economy, removed uncertainty, and labored the rebuilding of destroyed capital. Keynesian ideas became almost official in social-democratic Europe after the war and in the U. S. in the 1960s . Keynes developed a theory which suggested that active government policy could be effective in managing the economy.Rather than seeing unbalanced government budgets as wrong, Keynes advocated what has been called countercyclical fiscal policies, that is, policies that acted against the tide of the business cycle deficit spending when a nations economy suffers from recessionor when recovery is long-delayed and unemployment is persistently high and the suppression of inflation in dash times by either increasing taxes or cutting back on government outlays. He argued that governments should solve problems in the short run rather than waiting for market forces to do it in the long run, because, in the long run, we are all dead.This contrasted with the classical and neoclassical economic analysis of fiscal policy. Fiscal stimulus could actuate production. But, to these schools, there was no reason to believe that this stimulation would outrun the side-effects that crowd out private inv estment first, it would increase the demand for labour and raise wages, hurting profitability Second, a government deficit increases the stock of government bonds, reducing their market price and encouraging high interest rates, making it more expensive for business to finance fixed investment.Thus, efforts to stimulate the economy would be self-defeating. The Keynesian response is that such fiscal policy is appropriate only when unemployment is persistently high, above the non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment (NAIRU). In that case, herd out is minimal. Further, private investment can be crowded in Fiscal stimulus raises the market for business output, raising cash flow and profitability, goad business optimism. To Keynes, this accelerator effect meant that government and business could be complements rather than substitutes in this situation.Second, as the stimulus occurs, gross domestic product rises, raising the amount of saving, helping to finance the increase in fix ed investment. Finally, government outlays need not always be wasteful government investment in public goods that will not be provided by profit-seekers will encourage the private sectors growth. That is, government spending on such things as basic research, public health, education, and infrastructure could help the long-term growth of potential output. In Keyness theory, there must be significant slack in the labour market before fiscal expansion is justified.Contrary to some critical characterizations of it, Keynesianism does not consist solely of deficit spending. Keynesianism recommends counter-cyclical policies. An example of a counter-cyclical policy is raising taxes to cool the economy and to prevent inflation when there is abundant demand-side growth, and engaging in deficit spending on labour-intensive infrastructure projects to stimulate employment and stabilize wages during economic downturns. Classical economics, on the other hand, argues that one should cut taxes when there are budget surpluses, and cut spending or, less likely, increase taxes during economic downturns.Keynesian economists believe that adding to profits and incomes during boom cycles through tax cuts, and removing income and profits from the economy through cuts in spending during downturns, tends to exacerbate the negative effects of the business cycle. This effect is especially pronounced when the government controls a large fraction of the economy, as increased tax revenue may aid investment in state enterprises in downturns, and decreased state revenue and investment harm those enterprises. Multiplier effect and interest rates Main article Spending multiplier factorTwo aspects of Keyness model has implications for policy First, there is the Keynesian multiplier, first developed by Richard F. Kahn in 1931. Exogenous increases in spending, such as an increase in government outlays, increases total spending by a multiple of that increase. A government could stimulate a grea t deal of new production with a modest outlay if 1. The people who receive this money then spend most on consumption goods and save the rest. 2. This extra spending allows businesses to hire more people and pay them, which in turn allows a further increase in consumer spending.This process continues. At each step, the increase in spending is smaller than in the previous step, so that the multiplier process tapers off and allows the attainment of an equilibrium. This story is modified and moderated if we move beyond a closed economy and bring in the role of taxation The rise in imports and tax payments at each step reduces the amount of induced consumer spending and the size of the multiplier effect. Second, Keynes re-analyzed the effect of the interest rate on investment. In the classical model, the supply of funds (saving) determines the amount of fixed business investment.That is, under the classical model, since all savings are placed in banks, and all business investors in need of borrowed funds go to banks, the amount of savings determines the amount that is available to invest. Under Keyness model, the amount of investment is determined independently by long-term profit expectations and, to a lesser extent, the interest rate. The latter opens the possibility of regulating the economy through money supply changes, via monetary policy. Under conditions such as the Great Depression, Keynes argued that this approach would be relatively ineffective compared to fiscal policy.But, during more normal times, monetary expansion can stimulate the economy. IS/LM model The IS/LM model is n primeval as influential as Keyness original analysis in determining actual policy and economics education. It relates aggregate demand and employment to threesome exogenousquantities, i. e. , the amount of money in circulation, the government budget, and the state of business expectations. This model was very popular with economists after World War II because it could be dumb in terms of general equilibrium theory. This encouraged a much more static vision of macroeconomics than that described above.History Precursors Keyness work was part of a long-running flip over within economics over the existence and nature of general gluts. While a number of the policies Keynes advocated (the notable one being government deficit spending at times of low private investment or consumption) and the theoretical ideas he proposed (effective demand, the multiplier, the paradox of thrift) were advanced by various authors in the 19th and early 20th centuries, Keyness unique contribution was to provide a general theory of these, which proved acceptable to the political and economic establishments. naturalizes See also Underconsumption, Birmingham School (economics), and capital of Sweden school (economics) An intellectual precursor of Keynesian economics was underconsumption theory in classical economics, dating from such 19th-century economists as Thomas Malthus, the Birmin gham Schoolof Thomas Attwood, and the American economists William Trufant treasure and Waddill Catchings, who were influential in the 1920s and 1930s.Underconsumptionists were, like Keynes after them, matched with calamity of aggregate demand to attain potential output, calling this under consumption (focusing on the demand side), rather than overproduction (which would focus on the supply side), and advocating economic interventionism. Keynes specifically discussed under consumption (which he wrote under-consumption) in the General Theory, in Chapter 22, surgical incision IV and Chapter 23, Section VII.Numerous concepts were developed earlier and independently of Keynes by the capital of Sweden school during the 1930s these accomplishments were described in a 1937 article, published in response to the 1936 General Theory, sharing the Swedish discoveries. Concepts The multiplier dates to work in the 1890s by the Australian economist Alfred De Lissa, the Danish economist Julius Wu lff, and the German American economist Nicholas Johannsen,15 the latter being cited in a footnote of Keynes. 16 Nicholas Johannsen also proposed a theory of effective demand in the 1890s. The paradox of thrift was stated in 1892 by John M.Robertson in his The Fallacy of Savings, in earlier forms by mercantilist economists since the 16th century, and similar sentiments date to antiquity. 1718 Today these ideas, regardless of provenance, are referred to in academia under the rubric of Keynesian economics, due to Keyness role in consolidating, elaborating, and popularizing them. Keynes and the classicists Keynes sought to distinguish his theories from and oppose them to classical economics, by which he meant the economic theories of David Ricardo and his followers, including John Stuart Mill,Alfred Marshall, Francis Ysidro Edgeworth, and Arthur Cecil Pigou.A central tenet of the classical view, known as Says law, states that supply creates its own demand. Says Law can be interpreted in two ways. First, the claim that the total value of output is equal to the sum of income earned in production is a result of a national income accounting identity, and is therefore indisputable. A heartbeat and stronger claim, however, that the costs of output are always covered in the aggregate by the sale-proceeds resulting from demand depends on how consumption and saving are linked to production and investment.In particular, Keynes argued that the second, strong form of Says Law only holds if increases in individual savings exactly match an increase in aggregate investment. Keynes sought to develop a theory that would explain determinants of saving, consumption, investment and production. In that theory, the interaction of aggregate demand and aggregate supply determines the level of output and employment in the economy. Because of what he considered the failure of the Classical Theory in the 1930s, Keynes firmly objects to its main theory adjustments in prices would automat ically make demand tend to the full employment level.Neo-classical theory supports that the two main costs that shift demand and supply are labour and money. Through the distribution of the monetary policy, demand and supply can be adjusted. If there were more labour than demand for it, wages would fall until hiring began again. If there were too much saving, and not enough consumption, then interest rates would fall until people either cut their savings rate or started borrowing. Postwar KeynesianismMain articles Neo-Keynesian economics, New Keynesian economics, and Post-Keynesian economics Keyness ideas became widely accepted after World War II, and until the early 1970s, Keynesian economics provided the main inspiration for economic policy makers in Western industrialized countries. Governments prepared high quality economic statistics on an ongoing basis and tried to base their policies on the Keynesian theory that had become the norm. In the early era of new liberalism and soci al democracy, most western capitalistic countries enjoyed low, stable unemployment and modest inflation, an era called the Golden Age of Capitalism.In terms of policy, the twin tools of post-war Keynesian economics were fiscal policy and monetary policy. While these are ascribe to Keynes, others, such as economic historian David Colander, argue that they are, rather, due to the interpretation of Keynes by Abba Lerner in his theory of Functional Finance, and should instead be called Lernerian rather than Keynesian. Through the mid-fifties, moderate degrees of government demand leading industrial development, and use of fiscal and monetary counter-cyclical policies continued, and reached a peak in the go go 1960s, where it seemed to many Keynesians that prosperity was now permanent.In 1971, Republican US President Richard Nixon even proclaimed I am now a Keynesian in economics. However, with the oil daze of 1973, and the economic problems of the 1970s, modern liberal economics bega n to fall out of favor. During this time, many economies experienced high and rising unemployment, coupled with high and rising inflation, contradicting the Phillips curves prediction. This stagflation meant that the simultaneous application of expansionary (anti-recession) and contractionary(anti-inflation) policies appeared to be necessary. This dilemma led to the end of the Keynesian near-consensus of the 1960s, and the rise throughout the 1970s of ideas based upon more classical analysis, including monetarism, supply-side economics, and new classical economics. At the same time, Keynesians began during the period to reorganize their thinking (some becoming associated with New Keynesian economics).One strategy, utilized also as a critique of the notably high unemployment and potentially disappoint GNP growth rates associated with the latter two theories by the mid-1980s, was to emphasize low unemployment and maximal economic growth at the cost of somewhat higher(prenominal) inf lation (its consequences kept in check by indexing and other methods, and its overall rate kept lower and steadier by such potential policies as Martin Weitzmans share economy). 22 Multiple schools of economic thought that trace their legacy to Keynes currently exist, the notable ones being Neo-Keynesian economics, New Keynesian economics, and Post-Keynesian economics.Keyness biographer Robert Skidelsky writes that the post-Keynesian school has remained closest to the spirit of Keyness work in following his monetary theory and rejecting the neutrality of money. In the postwar era, Keynesian analysis was combined with neoclassical economics to produce what is generally termed the neoclassical synthesis, yielding Neo-Keynesian economics, which dominated mainstream macroeconomic thought. Though it was widely held that there was no strong automatic tendency to full employment, many believed that if government policy were used to ensure it, the economy would behave as neoclassical theory predicted.This post-war domination by Neo-Keynesian economics was broken during the stagflation of the 1970s. There was a lack of consensus among macroeconomists in the 1980s. However, the advent of New Keynesian economics in the 1990s, modified and provided microeconomic foundations for the neo-Keynesian theories. These modified models now dominate mainstream economics. Post-Keynesian economists, on the other hand, reject the neoclassical synthesis and, in general, neoclassical economics applied to the macroeconomy.Post-Keynesian economics is aheterodox school that holds that both Neo-Keynesian economics and New Keynesian economics are incorrect, and a misinterpretation of Keyness ideas. The Post-Keynesian school encompasses a variety of perspectives, but has been far less influential than the other more mainstream Keynesian schools. Relationship to other schools of economics The Keynesian schools of economics are situated alongside a number of other schools that have the same per spectives on what the economic issues are, but differ on what causes them and how to best resolve them Stockholm SchoolThe Stockholm School rose to prominence at about the same time that Keynes published his General Theory and shared a common concern in business cycles and unemployment. The second generation of Swedish economists also advocated government intervention through spending during economic downturns although opinions are divided over whether they conceived the shopping center of Keyness theory before he did. Monetarism There was debate between Monetarists and Keynesians in the 1960s over the role of government in stabilizing the economy.Both Monetarists and Keynesians are in agreement over the fact that issues such as business cycles, unemployment, inflation are caused by inadequate demand, and need to be addressed, but they had fundamentally different perspectives on the capacity of the economy to find its own equilibrium and as a consequence the degree of government in tervention that is required to create equilibrium. Keynesians emphasized the use of discretionary fiscal policy and monetary policy, while monetarists argued the primacy of monetary policy, and that it should be rules-based The debate was largely resolved in the 1980s.Since then, economists have largely concur that central banks should bear the primary responsibility for stabilizing the economy, and that monetary policy should largely follow the Taylor rule which many economists credit with the Great Moderation. The Global pecuniary Crisis, however, has convinced many economists and governments of the need for fiscal interventions and highlighted the difficulty in stimulating economies through monetary policy alone during a liquidity trap. Criticisms Austrian School criticisms Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek disagreed with some of Keynes views.Journalist and Austrian publicist Henry Hazlitt, wrote a detailed criticism of Keyness General Theory in The Failure of the New Economi cs. crowd M. Buchanan and Richard E. Wagner pile M. Buchanan and Richard E. Wagner, writing Democracy in Deficit The Political Legacy of Lord Keynes and The Consequences of Mr. Keynes with John Burton, criticize Keynesian economics. According to them, The implicit assumption underlying the Keynesian fiscal revolution was that economic policy would be made by wise men, acting without regard to political pressures or opportunities, and guided by disinterested economic technocrats.They insisted that the fundamental flaw of Keynesian economics was the unrealistic assumption about political, bureaucratic and electoral demeanour. Some economists such as James Tobin and Robert Barro commented about the thesis. They replied these comments New Classical Macroeconomics criticisms Another influential school of thought was based on the Lucas critique of Keynesian economics. This called for greater consistency with microeconomic theory and rationality, and in particular emphasized the idea of rational expectations.Lucas and others argued that Keynesian economics required remarkably foolish and short-sighted behavior from people, which totally contradicted the economic understanding of their behavior at a micro level. New classical economics introduced a set of macroeconomic theories that were based on optimising microeconomic behavior. These models have been developed into the factual Business Cycle Theory, which argues that business cycle fluctuations can to a large extent be accounted for by real (in contrast to nominal) shocks.Beginning in the late 1950s new classical macroeconomists began to disagree with the methodology employed by Keynes and his successors. Keynesians emphasized the dependence of consumption on disposable income and, also, of investment on current profits and current cash flow. In addition, Keynesians posited a Phillips curve that tied nominal wage inflation to unemployment rate. To support these theories, Keynesians typically traced the logical foundations of their model (using introspection) and supported their assumptions with statistical evidence.New classical theorists demanded that macroeconomics be groundedon the same foundations as microeconomic theory, profit-maximizing firms and rational, utility-maximizing consumers The result of this shift in methodology produced several important divergences from Keynesian Macroeconomics 1. freedom of Consumption and current Income (life-cycle permanent income hypothesis) 2. Irrelevance of Current Profits to Investment (Modigliani-Miller theorem) 3. Long run independence of inflation and unemployment (natural rate of unemployment) 4. The inability of monetary policy to stabilize output (rational expectations) 5. Irrelevance of Taxes and Budget Deficits to Consumption (Ricardian Equivalence)