Peter Cooper — Some Implications of the Expenditure Multiplier Process

A monetary economy needs spending for production and employment to occur. This is a truism. Spending equals income, by definition. One person’s purchase of a good or service is another person’s income. But it is also clear that causation, ultimately, runs from spending to income. More specifically, the creation of income requires a prior decision to spend. In a monetary economy, to paraphrase Michal Kalecki, each of us in isolation can decide how much to spend but we cannot choose the size of our income. Our personal income will depend not on our own spending but on the spending decisions of others acting somewhat independently of ourselves. Total income, of course, will depend on spending in aggregate – our own spending and the spending of others.…

heteconomist
Some Implications of the Expenditure Multiplier Process
Peter Cooper