ABSTRACT
John Maynard Keynes' views were on the protection versus free trade issue. The message of the Means to Prosperity is not unlike that of Keynes' 1929 pamphlet. Keynes' theme is that the nations of the world must undertake extensive loan expenditure programs as a means of combatting unemployment and reflating prices. In making the observations, Keynes is very much influenced by the working of the multiplier and the consumption and income effects resulting from a loan-expenditure program. Keynes places the blame for the failure of previous British loan-expenditure efforts to raise the level of employment precisely on the fact that these outlays were completely offset by a deterioration of the foreign trade balance. Keynes takes exception with many of the restrictive trade devices which were fashioned for the purpose of achieving a favorable trade balance. According to Keynes, was "the policy of protecting the foreign balance and at the same time doing all in our power to stimulate loan-expenditures.
