The Keynesian Roots of Stock-flow Consistent Macroeconomic Models

This paper argues that institutionally rich stock-flow consistent models—that is, models in which economic agents are identified with the main social categories/institutional sectors of actual capitalist economies, the short period behavior of these agents is thoroughly described, and the “period by period” balance sheet dynamics implied by the latter is consistently modeled—are (1) perfectly compatible with John Maynard Keynes’s theoretical views, (2) the ideal tool for rigorous post-Keynesian analyses of the medium run, and (3) therefore crucial to the consolidation of the broad post-Keynesian research program.