In short, without full employment, the other elements of liberalism fall apart. Today unemployment is persistently high in all of the advanced countries. Employment is rising in the developing South, but often at the expense of wage levels in the North. Inequality is rising everywhere, as workers without advanced skills are thrown into competition with one another for a dwindling supply of routine jobs. Because of the turning away from Keynesian insight, governments address these problems with inadequate conceptual tools and limited policy remedies.
Budget balance is held sacred, which both slows growth and denies governments necessary resources.
In the United States, for example, the Clinton administration is placing great faith in the cheap money cure. Thanks to lower interest rates, unemployment has dropped somewhat. Millions more can find no jobs at all. Keynes was passionate about low interest rates. But he viewed low interest rates as necessary, not sufficient, since one could not count on private entrepreneurs to invest adequately.