Name-dropping:
John (pronunciation: like the Baptist) Maynard (pronunciation: like a May nerd) Keynes (pronunciation: like canes) (1883–1946).
Arguably the greatest economist of the 20th century, Keynes is so famous that he has an -ian word. His, Keynesian, means using fiscal spending programs to stimulate business and increase employment.

When to Drop Your Knowledge:
Economists love sitting around and talking about Keynes, because he was the rarest of economists—he never lacked for company in bed. But knowledge of Keynes will also serve you well when amateurs discuss everything from the Fed’s interest rate to unemployment levels.

The Basics
Son of the economist John Neville Keynes, John Maynard quickly eclipsed his father’s fame. In 1919, he published The Economic Consequences of the Peace, which correctly predicted that the enormous burdens on postwar Germany would lead it to economic ruin and fierce nationalism. Sadly, his fellow Brits didn’t listen until the Nazis started dropping bombs on them, at which point the world collectively realized that this John Maynard Keynes fellow was either psychic or a really good economist.

In 1936, Keynes’s most influential work was published. Titled The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money, it argued that recessions don’t fix themselves—which had never occurred to anyone, even though they were all in the depths of the Great Depression. Keynes argued that the solution to recession was a proactive effort by governments to stimulate the world economy. It was on the strength of this book that Keynes became known as the father of macroeconomics, which is admittedly akin to being the father of a famously boring child, but still better than most of us will ever do. Keynes went on to participate in the conference that led to the creation of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, two institutions that would help to shape and stabilize the postwar global economy.

In addition to his hard work forever changing the history of economic policy, Keynes was something of a party animal. In his younger years, he had a number of romantic relationships with men—including a seven-year relationship with British painter Duncan Grant. Partly because of his standing in society (Keynes was a baron) and partly because homophobia had begun to lessen (a few decades before, the discovery of Oscar Wilde’s homosexuality led to his arrest and imprisonment), Keynes’s bisexuality was never that much of an issue. He married a prominent Russian ballerina named Lydia Lopokova in 1917, and although they were unable to have children, their marriage was by most accounts a happy one.

Although the fundamentals of Keynesian economics remain influential, macroeconomics has changed since Keynes left the scene. Today, economists focus more on increasing gross domestic product than Keynes did, and his notion that the government should sponsor full employment is particularly unpopular. (Many macroeconomists think some unemployment is good for an economy, though try telling that to the people without jobs.) Still, Keynes’s influence is felt widely: Every time a college kid falls asleep in a macroeconomics class, for instance, he has John Maynard Keynes to thank.

The Even Keel
Keynes’s ideas have been used by governments and fiscal policymakers to stabilize economies, keeping them from growing too fast or too slowly. Broadly, when the economy is growing quickly, Keynes suggested, governments ought to raise taxes and decrease spending in order to rein in inflation. When the economy is in recession, he recommended, governments should lower taxes and increase spending to kick-start the economy. This concept of balanced growth would have prevented the rampant inflation of 1930s’ Germany and softened the blow of the Great Depression elsewhere. And it continues to work well today—the Federal Reserve in America still raises and lowers interest rates to balance inflation with growth.

THE GENERAL THEORY OF BUSINESS
Some have speculated that part of the reason Keynes’s The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money made such a splash upon its publication in 1936 was that it was cheap. In the Great Depression, scholars couldn’t afford just any book, and at a price half that of most similar titles, General Theory was made accessible to a wider variety of politicians and economists.

Conversation Starters
◆ Keynes had a weakness for hack medicine. An oddball doctor (Keynes called him “the Ogre”) sought to treat Keynes’s generally poor health with bed rest and ice packs on the chest. Keynes died (while under the Ogre’s care) in 1946 at the age of 62. His last words were, “I should have drunk more champagne.” Sure, and covered your chest with fewer ice packs.

◆ Keynes was no stranger to contradiction. It’s often said that during his life Keynes professed every possible opinion at least once. His explanation for the inconsistency was, like Keynes himself, equal parts disarming and charming: “When the facts change, my opinions change.”

◆ Keynes ended up pretty rich, but not nearly as wealthy as Warren Buffett, the billionaire investment banking genius whose Berkshire Hathaway corporation has consistently beaten the stock market. Buffett has frequently cited Keynes as an inspiration for his investment strategies.

◆ An economics joke: Keynes and a friend from college took a trip to Africa in the 1920s. While there, the two had their shoes shined by some boys. Keynes gave his shoe-shiner a stingy tip, and when his friend suggested Keynes ought to give more, Keynes replied, “I will not be a party to debasing the currency.” Yowza! What a zinger! Of course, the joke was probably less funny to the unlucky sap who’d just shined Keynes’s shoes.