Keynes on the Australian Wages System

Abstract

Keyne's General Theory briefly discusses the Australian wages system, as an example of a system in which an attempt was made to fix real wages by law. Keynes argues that such a system, strictly enforced, generates an unstable unemployment equilibrium or highly volatile money wages and prices. This paper clarifies Keynes's views on the Australian system, with a view to their wider relevance for the significance of real money and wage flexibility and inflexibility in Keynes's economics. The most striking finding is that money wage stickiness is a conclusion, not an assumption, of Keynes's theory of employment.