Johnson's Conversion from Keynesianism at Chicago

Abstract

Johnson's Conversion from Keynesianism at Chicago, Russell S. Boyer. Johnson arrived at Chicago in 1959 identifying himself as a Keynesian, but during his period there he began to speak in derogatory terms about Keynes and about Keynesians. This paper analyzes the role that Friedman and Mundell played in this conversion. Our argument is that Johnson moved towards the monetarist position, but he denied that this was due to Friedman's influence. Mundell's thinking followed a similar path, both in his economics and in his assertion of independence from their distinguished colleague. The effect of these claims is to hide the fact that Friedman's impact on their work was much greater than has generally been recognized. © 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.