Keynes' Green Cheese Metaphor
John Maynard Keynes made a mysterious reference to green cheese in his General Theory:
"Unemployment develops, that is to say, because people want the moon; -- men cannot be employed when the object of desire (i.e. money) is something which cannot be produced and the demand for which cannot be readily choked off. There is no remedy but to persuade the public that green cheese is practically the same thing and to have a green cheese factory (i.e. a central bank) under public control." —John Maynard Keynes, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, Ch. 17Exactly what Keynes meant is still a topic for discussion in economics.
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Famous quotes containing the words green, cheese and/or metaphor:
“Bring me my Bow of burning gold:
Bring me my Arrows of desire:
Bring me my Spear: O clouds unfold!
Bring me my Chariot of fire!
I will not cease from Mental Fight,
Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand,
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England’s green & pleasant Land.”
—William Blake (1757–1827)
“Apart from cheese and tulips, the main product of the country is advocaat, a drink made from lawyers.”
—Alan Coren (b. 1938)
“Without metaphor the handling of general concepts such as culture and civilization becomes impossible, and that of disease and disorder is the obvious one for the case in point. Is not crisis itself a concept we owe to Hippocrates? In the social and cultural domain no metaphor is more apt than the pathological one.”
—Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)