The End of Laissez-Faire

The British economist John Maynard Keynes (1883 – 1946), one of the most influential of all time, if not the most, condemned laissez-faire economic policy on several occasions. In this brief book, The End of Laissez-faire (1926), one of the most famous of his critiques, Keynes argues that the doctrines of laissez-faire are dependent to some extent on improper deductive reasoning and says the question of whether a market solution or state intervention is better must be determined on a case-by-case basis, not by a general rule a priori.

It was first published by the Hogarth Press in July 1926, based on the Sidney Ball Lecture given by Keynes at Oxford in November 1924 and on a lecture given by him at the University of Berlin in June 1926.