Keynes and the reform of the capitalist social order

The ideas of Keynes have been appropriated by the political left in recent years. The condemnation of Keynes that was characteristic of critics speaking for the extreme right has become mainstream with the takeover of macroeconomic theory by schools such as new classical economics. But how radical was Keynes really? He pointedly distanced himself out of the Marxist left. However, Keynes saw himself as a radical reformer and never missed an opportunity to advance proposals to change capitalism to produce sustained full employment and to promote some redistribution of income and wealth. The paper discusses two of these opportunities, the first related to the debate around How to Pay for the War and the second around the Beveridge Plan.