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Once we allow ourselves to be disobedient to the test of an accountant’s profit, we have begun to change our civilization.

John Maynard Keynes

Whenever you save five shillings you put a man out of work for a day.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Day Save Work Yourself
The treasury could fill old bottles with banknotes and bury them, and leave it to private enterprises on well-tried principles of laissez-faire to dig the notes up again.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Bury Enterprise Principle Private Treasure
The Economic Problem, the problem of want and poverty and the economic struggle between classes and nations, is nothing but a frightful muddle, a transitory and unnecessary muddle.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Economics Nation Necessary Poverty Problem Struggle
The friends of gold will have to be extremely wise and moderate if they are to avoid a revolution.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Avoid Friendship Gold Revolution Wisdom
If we consistently act on the optimistic hypothesis, this hypothesis will tend to be realised; whilst by acting on the pessimistic hypothesis we can keep ourselves for ever in the pit of want.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Act Consistent Optimism Realize
The businessman is only tolerable so long as his gains can be held to bear some relation to what, roughly and in some sense, his activities have contributed to society.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Business Contribute Himself Man Society Tolerance
There is no intrinsic reason for the scarcity of capital.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Capital Reason Scarcity
All the political parties alike have their origins in past ideas and not in new ideas and none more conspicuously so than the Marxists .
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Ideas Origin Party Politics
In truth, the gold standard is already a barbarous relic.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Gold Standard Truth
It is a mistake to think that one limits one’s risk by spreading too much between enterprises about which one knows little and has no reason for special confidence.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Confidence Limitation Mistake Reason Special Thinking
I work for a Government I despise for ends I think criminal.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Crime End Government Myself Work
I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Ideas Interest Myself Power
The considerations upon which expectations of prospective yields are based are partly existing facts which we can assume to be known more or less for certain, and partly future events which can only be forecasted with more or less confidence.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Confidence Existence Expectation Forecast Known Prediction
The central principle of investment is to go contrary to the general opinion, on the grounds that if everyone agreed about its merits, the investment is inevitably too dear and therefore unattractive.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Attractive General Ground Investment Opinion Principle
Dangerous acts can be done safely in a community which thinks and feels rightly, which would be the way to hell if they were executed by those who think and feel wrongly.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Act Dangerous Feeling Hell Thinking Wrong
The outstanding faults of the economic society in which we live are its failure to provide for full employment and its arbitrary and inequitable distribution of wealth and incomes.
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES

Distribution Economy Income Mistake Outstanding Wealth

Once we allow ourselves to be disobedient to the test of an accountant’s profit, we have begun to change our civilization.

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Once we allow ourselves to be disobedient to the test of an accountant’s profit, we have begun to change our civilization.

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