THE MOST INFLUENTIAL ECONOMIC TREATISE OF THE 20TH CENTURY, FIRST EDITION IN THE SCARCE ORIGINAL DUST JACKET

KEYNES, John Maynard. The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money. London: Macmillan, 1936. Octavo, original blue-green cloth, original dust jacket; housed in a custom half morocco clamshell box. $18,500.

First edition of Keynes' last major work, considered the most influential economic treatise of the 20th century, rarely found in the original dust jacket.

Keynes' General Theory ranks with Smith's Wealth of Nations as an intellectual event and with Malthus' Essay on Population as a guide for public policy. "The world-wide slump after 1929 prompted Keynes to attempt an explanation of, and new methods for controlling, the vagaries of the trade-cycle. First in A Treatise on Money, 1930, and later in his General Theory, he subjected the definitions and theories of the classical school of economics to a penetrating scrutiny and found them seriously inadequate and inaccurate" (PMM 423). "This work has been responsible for the development of a whole branch of economics (macroeconomics), and has been the most referenced and debated work in twentieth-century economics. The work itself is both an attack on the predecessors of Keynes, and a theory of what determines the amount of production and employment in a country. Although the book says very little about economic policy, it provided the theoretical foundation for government policy action to end the Depression that was plaguing virtually every country in the 1930s" (Presser, Fifty Major Economists, 101).

Book nearly fine with a few spots of light foxing, mostly to preliminaries and few few leaves, cloth fine; rare dust jacket with toning to spine and edges but crisp and fresh, entirely unrestored. A beautiful copy, rare and desirable in such nice condition.