me: > > as one heterodox economist (old Karlos) wrote: >capital is not a > > thing, but a social relation between persons, established by the > > instrumentality of things.< > > > > since the instrumentality of things is crucial here, it makes sense > > for the heterodox to count "capital" (the stock of fixed capital > > goods).
John Vertegaal writes: > It would make sense only if one could actually do it; some prerequisites > being: 1. An economic structure wherein capital values are determinable at > every step of the way, on a linear (or chaotic) path from here to there; any > present always deemed to be complete. 2. A unit of account whose value is > inelastic over a significant amount of track. 3. The no-show of internal > contradictions (or paradoxes)from well established axioms, due to exogenous > impulses creating a null-set. This last one doesn't make any sense to me. But the other points simply say to me that the fixed capital can be measured only in terms of exchange value (using either current prices or historical prices) but cannot be measured as a use-value (as the Cambridge Critique says). > ... But in terms of a truly "free" enterprise economy, wherein demand > determines > the value of supply, IMHO Marxism has nothing to offer. And the question now > becomes, which is more efficient, command or demand? As there is no > difference in equitability. I don't know whether you're talking in normative or positive terms. In normative terms, Marxian economics provides nothing. It's true that, in general, Marxists prefer a democratically-controlled "command" economy rather than a private wealth-controlled "market" economy (capitalism). But Marx never sketched a model for how this would be organized. It's not part of his political economy. He studied capitalism, mostly in positive terms. (Of course, as a human being, he couldn't avoid normative judgments.) I don't know what your perspective on capitalism is, but I see the Marxian one (combined with some Keynesianism) as superior to the neoclassical and neo-Ricardian (Sraffian) ones. > > As for the "usurping of productive > > output" from the productive sector, that's standard Marx: there is a > > "transfer of surplus-value" going on: > I beg to differ. In my demand determinative model, whose ontology I believe > underlies our existing economic structure, there is no room for > surplus-value; at least not in the sense that Marxists understand the term. I don't know what you're talking about. what is your "demand determinative model"? It seems to me that both supply and demand play a role... > Any set profit rate is achievable, as it is the direct spending by profit > income earners (or the newly hired, as substitutes) that determines it; and > not some inherent, but mystic attribute of capital over labour cost. It's bad form to accuse others of believing in "mystic attributes" without first knowing what their perspective is. Your view _seems_ to be akin to the Cambridge Keynesian equation, in which (in its simplest form) the rate of profit is determined by investment and the rate of accumulation out of property income. I think that's quite an incomplete story. It only deals with the demand (realization) side and not the supply (production) side. Both play a role. > An > aggregate realized rate over the natural rate of growth however, is simply > inflationary. I don't understand what you're talking about. > The only existent surplus-value, comes into being as a result > of having learned by doing; which requires the setting of a margin over > cost, because such expanded output could not be distributed otherwise. this makes no sense to me. Please explain. -- Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
