Hyman Minsky’s Theory of Capitalist Development

During the last decade of his life, Hyman P. Minsky drew on insights acquired from Joseph Schumpeter in an effort to explore the long-term development of capitalism. He believed such an exploration would underscore the economic implications of postwar financial-system innovations and could encourage a broad discussion regarding the appropriate structure of the US economy. This paper focuses on the theory of capitalist development that Minsky produced during that decade.

After describing the purposes of Minsky’s exploration, his theory is outlined both in terms of its essential elements and as it applies to the US economy. In addition to emphasizing the relations between finance and business, Minsky identified a transition through at least five distinct stages of capitalism: from the merchant-capitalist era to a recent period dominated by money managers. A concluding section identifies a number of research directions suggested by Minsky’s analysis.