"How Capitalists Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Crisis" by Shimshon Bichler and Jonathan Nitzan Research Note, November 22, 2013
ABSTRACT: Do capitalists really want a recovery? Can they afford it? On the face of it, the question sounds silly: of course capitalists want a recovery; how else can they prosper? According to the textbooks, both mainstream and heterodox, capital accumulation and economic growth are two sides of the same process. Accumulation generates growth and growth fuels accumulation, so it seems bootless to ask whether capitalists want growth. Growth is their lifeline, and the more of it, the better it is. Or is it?In the United States, rising unemployment – which hammers the well-being of workers, unincorporated businesses and the unemployed – serves not to undermine but to boost the overall income share of capitalists. And as employment growth decelerates, the income share of the Top 1% – which includes the capitalists as well as their protective power belt – soars. Under these circumstances, what reason do capitalists have to 'get the economy going'? Why worry about rising unemployment and zero job growth when these very processes serve to boost their income-share-read-power? FULL TEXT:http://bnarchives.yorku.ca/387/ *** Recent additions and updates to the Bichler & Nitzan Archives: http://bnarchives.yorku.ca/perl/latest To unsubscribe, reply to this email with "unsubscribe" in the subject field. -- Jonathan Nitzan Political Science || Social and Political Thought York University 4700 Keele St. Toronto, Ontario, M3J-1P3 Canada Voice: (416) 736-2100, ext. 88822 Fax: (416) 736-5686 Email: nitzan at yorku.ca The Bichler & Nitzan Archives:http://bnarchives.net Capital as Power:http://capitalaspower.com RECASP (journal):http://uow.edu.au/arts/research/recasp/index.html _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
