John Nash admits in his own words he was using “hidden meaning” in order to safely convey the difficult and controversial subject Ideal Money in his 2012/2012 talks:
The script or plan for my talk linking the “ideal money” with the choices and actions of “thrift” or “savings” by persons or by “economic agents” was influenced by concerns that it would be wise not to speak too incautionsly of “the Keynesians” when the times are such that massive public opinions maybe supporting actions by which a state administration can act without going through the parliamentary processes to write new legislation.
So in the rush of political campaigns and elections (for example in the USA) it is difficult to sell a national monetary policy which, if followed consistently on a “long run” level, would result in the specific nation state existing as if on a higher level of economic civilization.
(For example, Sweden and Argentina might be usable, over a long time comparison, to represent comparable “economic civilizations”.)
Therefore, I had arranged for 2012 to talk more cautiously in relation to whatever would impact with “the Keynesians” and with the political interest relating also to the scholarly factions allied with (or forming) “the Keynesians”.
And this caution carries over naturally to 2013 also.
~public note from John Forbes Nash’s university homepage
Nash’s strange use of quotations is revealed when we replace the word “Keynesian” with the intended definition from a different version of Ideal Money:
The label “Keynesian” is convenient, but to be safe we should have a defined meaning for this as a party that can be criticized and contrasted with other parties.
So let us define “Keynesian” to be descriptive of a “school of thought” that originated at the time of the devaluations of the pound and the dollar in the early 30’s of the 20th century. Then, more specifically, a “Keynesian” would favor the existence of a “manipulative” state establishment of central bank and treasury which would continuously seek to achieve “economics welfare” objectives with comparatively little regard for the long term reputation of the national currency…~Ideal Money
Nash invites us to think beyond the Keynesian box while simultaneously alluding to the difficulty:
There can be Keynesians Neo-Keynesians New-Keynesians Post-Keynesians. Even the Post-Keynesians are still Keynesians~Lecture, Ideal Money
