Full Employment Abandoned
Full Employment Abandoned: Shifting Sands and Policy Failures is a book on macroeconomic issues, written by economists William Mitchell & Joan Muysken and first published in 2008. Authors. Australian William "Bill" Mitchell is currently professor of economics at the University of Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia, and an originator of Modern Monetary Theory. Dutch Joan Muysken is currently professor of economics at the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Maastricht University, Netherlands, where he teaches macroeconomics and labour economics. They are both post-Keynesian economists. Publishing. The book was first printed and distributed in hardcover by British publishers  Edward Elgar Publishing Inc. in 2008. There has been no paperback edition yet. Reception. Reviews were generally positive. Economist and fund manager Warren Mosler, reviewing "Full Employment Abandoned" on the Amazon.com website, wrote that "those...not all that interested in the details of unemployment "per se"" should turn to Part III, "which outlines the imperatives of non convertible currency." Philip Arestis, professor of economics at Cambridge University, UK, wrote that the book "argues persuasively that macroeconomic policy has been restrictive over the recent, and not so recent past, and has produced substantial open and disguised unemployment." L. Randall Wray, professor  of economics at the University of Missouri–Kansas City, USA, also a post-Keynesian economist, like Mosler, Arestis and the two authors, notes that while "orthodoxy only calls for greater market flexibility, less government intrusion, more individual responsibility, and —perhaps— a small role for positive action to promote education, training, and innovation," this book demonstrates "it wasn't always so." Wray writes that "Milton Friedman’s insertion of expectations overturned the textbook variety of Keynesianism, returning macroeconomics to its neoclassical, pre-Depression roots. What could be added is that Friedman cleverly reversed causality, from the Keynesian view that excess demand  causes inflation to the now dominant claim that inflation reduces aggregate activity below equilibrium." He claims that "Full Employment Abandoned" "demonstrates that neither empirical evidence nor rigorous theory supports the theologically-infused consensus about benefits of low inflation and of the possibility of using monetary policy to get there." Professor Philip Lawn, of Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia reviewed the book for the "International Journal of Environment, Workplace and Employment" and wrote that it "convincingly demonstrates that unemployment is both morally indefensible and unnecessary." Other reviewers and academics have argued against the notion of Job Guarantee advanced by the book. Malcolm  Sawyer, Professor Emeritus of Economics, Leeds University, pointed out that "should unemployment fall below some ‘natural’ level, inflation [would] accelerate," and disputes the JG costs estimates as "too modest."