Annotation
Keynes feared that solving the economic problem would leave humanity purposeless, prone to 'nervous breakdown.' Anne Case and Angus Deaton's research on deaths of despair — rising suicide, overdose, and alcoholism among displaced American workers — reads like the dark footnote to this passage. Keynes imagined the crisis would come from too much leisure; instead it came from the loss of labor's dignity without any corresponding gain in freedom. He was right about the void, wrong about which end of the income ladder would fall into it.
What Actually Happened
Productivity rose enormously between 1930 and 1970, broadly in line with Keynes's expectations, but the economic problem was not 'solved' — inequality persisted, and most workers did not gain significant leisure. By the early twenty-first century, deaths of despair — suicide, overdose, alcoholism — rose sharply among displaced American workers, a crisis of purposelessness that echoed Keynes's fears. The void arrived not from too much leisure but from the loss of labor's dignity.