ABSTRACT
John Maynard Keynes was opposed to the traditional gold standard for two reasons. It often achieved external balance at the expense of internal equilibrium, and it did not permit each nation to pursue an autonomous monetary policy attuned to its own domestic requirements. Keynes was further opposed to the traditional gold standard, because it did not permit a nation to follow an independent monetary policy. In the early phase of his career and for some time following World War I, Keynes was entirely orthodox in his thinking on the question of commercial policy. In the spring of 1931, Keynes came out even more strongly for protection by urging a revenue tariff for Great Britain. After Great Britain went off the gold standard, Keynes had little else to say respecting the question of foreign trade policy. In The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, Keynes confined himself chiefly to domestic economic problems.
