In the long run we are all dead

 Search: "long term" meaning (econ)

Long term refers to the extended period of time that an asset is held. Depending on the type of security, a long-term asset can be held for as little as one year or for as long as 30 years or more. Apr 7, 2020

Long Term Definition & Example - Investopedia

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The long-run is a period of time in which all factors of production and costs are variable. In the long run, firms are able to adjust all costs, whereas, in the short run, firms are only able to influence prices through adjustments made to production levels. May 14, 2019

Long Run: Overview - Investopedia

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Short run – where one factor of production (e.g. capital) is fixed. This is a time period of fewer than four-six months. Long run – where all factors of production of a firm are variable (e.g. a firm can build a bigger factory) A time period of greater than four-six months/one year.

Short-run, long-run, very long-run - Economics Help

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Short term growth is, as the name suggests, growth in the output of a country in terms of GDP over a given (short, usually a year) period of time. ... Long term growth however is when the country's productive potential is increased, the potential of the country's GDP is increased.

Explain the difference between short term growth and long ...

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The long run is generally anything from 5 to 25 miles and sometimes beyond. Typically if you are training for a marathon your long run may be up to 20 miles. If you're training for a half it may be 10 miles, and 5 miles for a 10k. Oct 18, 2019

The Long Run - How Long is Long? | Zwift

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Long run costs are accumulated when firms change production levels over time in response to expected economic profits or losses. In the long run there are no fixed factors of production. The land, labor, capital goods, and entrepreneurship all vary to reach the the long run cost of producing a good or service.

Production Cost | Boundless Economics - Lumen Learning

For my purposes...

• The long term is not so vague as "as little as one year or for as long as 30 years or more."
• It is "a period of time", but more specific.
• It is definitely greater than four-to-six months or a year.
• But it is not "when" anything.
• And it is not measured in miles.

Boundless Economics is pretty good, saying "In the long run there are no fixed factors of production." I think the idea of the short run is that it allows us to say "ceteris paribus, nothing else changes" except the change we happen to be considering, and the consequences of that change. By contrast, in the long run anything and everything may change. 

But that's not what Keynes had in mind when he said "In the long run we are all dead."

If "we" is a few old timers sitting around playing cards and bitchin, then "the long run" might be only a few years. But if "we" is "all" of us, as Keynes explicitly specified, then you have to count even newborn babies, some of whom may live near 100 years. So the long run might be a hundred years. 

But surely you also have to count their offspring.

Somebody once said that for economists the "long run" is 10 years. Okay, ordinarily. But for one moment, in one infamous sentence, Keynes didn't mean ten years. He meant a hundred years easy, and more. 

And maybe by "we ... all" he meant not only those not yet dead at the moment, but those, present and future, who make up this civilization. Or the civilization itself. 

For my purposes, this is the "long run" after which we are all dead: the run of civilization. 

 

Keynes was not a short-term thinker:

Asked whether there had ever been anything like the Great Depression before, John Maynard Keynes replied, "Yes, it was called the Dark Ages, and it lasted 400 years."
 -- Jon Meacham