Books: Tightwad Little Island

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THE SCOTCH by John Kenneth Galbraith. 145 pages. Houghton M/ffl/n. $3.95.

Harvard Economist John Kenneth Galbraith, author of The Affluent Society, may have at last explained himself. Plainly, his big-spending theories derive from a rebellion against his upbringing. For Galbraith, as he discloses in this amiable, slim volume of reminiscence, hails from a Scottish community in Ontario that seems today to have been a tightwad little island of frugality in a spendthrift continent, a budget balancer's paradise.

Galbraith has been away a long time, so now he can look back wryly and serenely on the frugal farmers who grew a cornucopia of crops, on the old Baptist church where no collection plate was passed, on the chaste, sober citizens who were chaste and sober largely because sin was expensive. Penny pinching was a way of life. If Galbraith's politicking father ever earned the disapprobation of his fellow citizens, it was not because he bought votes, but because he might have got them cheaper.

The .oiks back home must be mightily disturbed by Galbraith's advocacy of deficit spending. On the other hand, how could they possibly disapprove of a man who has devoted a lifetime to the study of money?