[PEN-L:5789] FROP cycles
Thanks to the several people who expressed interest in Falling Rate of Profit issues. Looks like there is a FROP closet out there. Another way to look at what myself and, I think Andrew have been trying to say about Okishio is that discussing FROP is legal between consenting adults. It's what happens, it's what Marx says, and its theoretically consistent. Once you know that, the heavy math is unnecessary. To be more precise, math comes in after the numbers, not before. So, just do it. Alan Freeman
[PEN-L:5792] really old data
Does anyone have available, or know of where I can get electronically, old GDP data (e.g., pre-1929 for the US, when the NIPAs began, European data from the 19th and early 20th century, etc.) A San Diego State web site promises the data, but when you click, all you get is an apology for it not yet being available. Doug -- Doug Henwood [[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Left Business Observer 250 W 85 St New York NY 10024-3217 USA +1-212-874-4020 voice +1-212-874-3137 fax
[PEN-L:5793] Found: Cournot Idiots
In the 70s and 80s (and maybe even now), mainstream economics textbooks presented the Cournot model of oligopoly as a game played out sequentially in real time. The problem with this interpretation of the model is that it requires the seemingly unreasonable assumption that the players are all myopic idiots, persistently acting as though their actions won't affect those of their competitors, even as it becomes increasingly obvious that such a belief is false (interestingly, the Cournot solution is identical to the Nash equilibrium for the related simultaneous-move game, which assumes perfect--though individualistic and consequently self-defeating-- rationality on the part of the players). However, I'm happy to report the existence of evidence which confirms the empirical relevance of the Myopic Idiot assumption of the Cournot model, providing some legitimation for the latter's use. Here it is, from today's N.Y. Times: "At a time when the New York City and State governments are cutting sharply into spending for schools and social services for the poor, they are providing hundreds of millions of dollars in tax breaks and other benefits to big businesses, including some of the nation's largest corporations. The Pataki and Giuliani administrations say the tax breaks, which have gone to such corporations as ABC and Donaldson, Lufkin Jenrette, the Wall Street brokerage concern, are part of a *long-term* strategy to shore up the local economy by keeping big employers from leaving New York. In other states, they say, *such enticements abound.*" [Emphases added.] Those of us interested in game-theoretic approaches to political economy are continually gratified by the growing evidence for the empirical relevance of its assumptions. Gil Skillman
[PEN-L:5794] Support free telecommunications:reference RM-8653 FCC
Received this from a list, asking support for setting aside a broadcast spectrum for public use for phone calls/messages. Sounds like a great idea to me. Marianne Hill [EMAIL PROTECTED] Have the FCC declare a tiny portion of what was once *understood* to be the public's broadcast spectrum to be - in fact - PUBLIC SPECTRUM (a range of frequencies available for free public use). The formal petition has ALREADY BEEN FILED with the FCC (note:supported by Apple!). The rule- making PROCESS HAS ALREADY BEGUN; public comments have already been solicited. Open that public spectrum to FREE use by EVERYONE, subject to NO restrictions at all except (1) broadcast power that will limit range to, typically, about 15 to 30 miles, and (2) require use of a given frequency for only a very brief time - seconds or even milliseconds (assumes use of well-developed, nonproprietary "spread spectrum" techniques, where an ongoing communication takes place on one frequency for tiny time, then moves to another frequency, then another and so on; the most efficient use and sharing of broadcast spectrum that is possible!). 24-megabits per second - that's 3 megabytes per second! NO phone bills! NO corporate owners! NO wires - just a teeny weeny antenna. At most. NO fees - just a one-time purchase of cheap home, office, car or beltloop transcievers, and whatever you wish to plug into them ... phones, data modems, video cameras, temperature monitors, etc. NO operator licensing - just type-licensed transceivers, exactly the same as police, cabbie and CB-band radios. NO eaves-droppers - since the spreading algorithms can be infinitely and dynamically varied (and communications can be further scrambled, to boot). NO censorship needed - since content is *inherently* "scrambled". METROPOLITAN area range (far beyond a single cell-phone site). REAL content competition - not the fake "competition" of government-created, government-licensed, government-protected conduit and content corporate cartels. Pollution-free, environmentally-sound, wire-free regional electronic public parks. WRITE AND FAX *NOW* - to the FCC *and* to your Congress-critters and the Clinton White House that has been so busy selling the public's spectrum to the few who can afford it. Or ... obediently wait and watch the cartels raise our rates. See the July 3rd issue of Interactive Age Magazine : COPYRIGHT CMP PUBLICATIONS JULY 1995. By Bill Frezza [via [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Dewayne Hendricks)] The visionaries at Apple Computer Inc. are at it again, pushing the envelope of technology, regulatory policy and business development. ..core mobile computing, Apple's recent petition to the FCC for an unlicensed"NII band" is this summer's best read. Check it out at http://www.apple.com/documents/fcc.html [Better still, use http://www.warpspeed.com/ , explained below. --= jim] [=3D=3D=3DIMPORTANT ACTION ITEM!=3D=3D=3D] Drop a letter or postcard referencing petition RM-8653 to: Office of the Secretary Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Washington DC 20554 or send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and offer your help. Feedback with Speed that Only the Net Can Provide - COMMENT DEADLINE IS JUL= Y 10!
[PEN-L:5795] Re: Question: Sources on Corproate Restructuring
Art, I would check out the International Journal of Health Services Research edited by Vicente Navarro. They have had a whole series of articles and debates on the corporatization of medicine from a Marxist perspective. Rudy = + Rudy Fichtenbaum+ Internet [EMAIL PROTECTED] + + Department of Economics + Internet [EMAIL PROTECTED] + + Rike Hall + Bitnet [EMAIL PROTECTED]+ + Wright State University + Telephone 513-873-3085 + + Dayton, OH 45435+ FAX 513-873-3545 + +
[PEN-L:5796] Re: a little more frop
Hi Ajit, I assume you want to know more what is the *point* of the whole exercise. The point is the following: the conclusion of the usual argument re. the max. rate of profit is the latter must fall with a rising c/v, hence so too must the actual rate. This conclusion seems to contradict the quite undeniable fact that for any c/v we can always just derive exactly the s/v which will make the profit-rate -- well, whatever we want it to be. The exercise is meant to show that this latter tautologically-true claim is not in fact inconsistent with the prior one. Which is a good thing for the FROP argument, since tautologically-true claims always win. Ajit might be wondering why I would post such a FROP-friendly exercise, since he knows that I've been working on a critique of the FROP approach. But actually it's not a critique of the FROP *argument*, which -- now, at any rate -- I regard as sound. I agree with Alan that it can stand up to pretty much all challenges. However, I do not believe that FROP provides an adequate basis for *crisis theory* and that's mostly what my present endeavors are on about. I'd be interested to discuss this more, but I'm going to have to sign-off now for a little while. Perhaps, when I'm back John [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:5797] Re: a little more frop
John R. writes: I agree with Alan that it (the FROP) can stand up to pretty much all challenges. However, I do not believe that FROP provides an adequate basis for *crisis theory* and that's mostly what my present endeavors are on about. I think that's a key issue. A lot of the FROP stories seem to have no connection with "actually-existing capitalism." The stories seem to hover at an extremely high level of abstraction, with the authors never getting to how the tendency manifests itself at the level of appearence. One problem is that the profit rate that falls may not be the profit rate that's relevant to capitalist accumulation. I'm agnostic about the FROP on the macro-level, perhaps because I don't understand it well enough, but I think that a micro- economic FROP story makes tremendous amounts of sense. This sees the FROP as part of the nature of capitalist competition (as distinct from the neoclassical theory of competition). A capitalist who doesn't change technology in production, management strategies, and/or marketing or political or pollution-emission strategies will suffer from a falling rate of profit. There are two main _structural tensions_ which cause this: the accumulate-to-compete of capitalists and the class antagonism in production. These tensions are not abolished by individual capitalist efforts, so the micro-FROP remains. In my 1980 dissertation, I had a diagram that looked somewhat similar to the following: On the one hand, there's the "classical sequence" of Marxian crisis theory: FROP tendency (or, for Baran Sweezy, the underconsumption tendency) -- crises, world-wide expansion of capitalism, etc. (in the absence of counteracting tendencies). To this I oppose my view of how things work: structural tensions (see above) -- micro-level FROP -- crises, world-wide expansion of capitalism, etc. Sometimes (as noted in my 1983 Review of Radical Political Economics and my 1994 Research in Political Economy articles), the structural tensions result in a macro-level FROP, but in other periods, such as the late 1920s, the rate of profit rose, which causes a crisis of a different kind (over-investment relative to consumption). We might be undergoing this kind of crisis at present. in pen-l solidarity, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] Econ. Dept., Loyola Marymount Univ., Los Angeles, CA 90045-2699 USA 310/338-2948 (daytime, during workweek); FAX: 310/338-1950 "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- K. Marx, paraphrasing Dante A.
[PEN-L:5798] Re: a little more frop
John wrote: Ajit might be wondering why I would post such a FROP-friendly exercise, since he knows that I've been working on a critique of the FROP approach. But actually it's not a critique of the FROP *argument*, which -- now, at any rate -- I regard as sound. I agree with Alan that it can stand up to pretty much all challenges. However, I do not believe that FROP provides an adequate basis for *crisis theory* and that's mostly what my present endeavors are on about. I'd be interested to discuss this more, but I'm going to have to sign-off now for a little while. Perhaps, when I'm back Jerry: Yes, let's discuss crisis theory some more. As you point out, FROP is not, by itself, a theory of capitalist crises. Let's get back to this issue as many Pen-Lers seem to be interested in developing the theory of crisis further. Perhaps a starting point could be a post on John's "present endeavors."
[PEN-L:5799] Re: a little more frop
Jim Devine wrote: I think that's a key issue. A lot of the FROP stories seem to have no connection with "actually-existing capitalism." The stories seem to hover at an extremely high level of abstraction, with the authors never getting to how the tendency manifests itself at the level of appearence. One problem is that the profit rate that falls may not be the profit rate that's relevant to capitalist accumulation. Agreed. Jim continues: I'm agnostic about the FROP on the macro-level, perhaps because I don't understand it well enough, but I think that a micro- economic FROP story makes tremendous amounts of sense. This sees the FROP as part of the nature of capitalist competition (as distinct from the neoclassical theory of competition). A capitalist who doesn't change technology in production, management strategies, and/or marketing or political or pollution-emission strategies will suffer from a falling rate of profit. There are two main _structural tensions_ which cause this: the accumulate-to-compete of capitalists and the class antagonism in production. These tensions are not abolished by individual capitalist efforts, so the micro-FROP remains. But, FROP concerns the "law of the tendency for the *general* rate of profit to decline" (emphasis added). It was never intended to be a micro theory that dealt with the causes of declining profitability in individual capitalist firms and branches of production, but rather a macro theory that concerned aggregate capital and the general rate of profit. The FROP theory, as a consequence, must stand or fall on the level of analysing "capitalist production as a whole." Jerry
[PEN-L:5800] Re[2]: Re: a little more frop
Jerry writes: But, FROP concerns the "law of the tendency for the *general* rate of profit to decline" (emphasis added). It was never intended to be a micro theory that dealt with the causes of declining profitability in individual capitalist firms and branches of production, but rather a macro theory that concerned aggregate capital and the general rate of profit. Yes, Marx's FROP is exactly that. But what I presented was _my_ FROP theory. It's something that's been around in one form or another for a long time, so I shouldn't take credit for it. But I hope that the opposition Marx vs. me makes what I'm talking about clearer. in pen-l solidarity, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] Econ. Dept., Loyola Marymount Univ., Los Angeles, CA 90045-2699 USA 310/338-2948 (daytime, during workweek); FAX: 310/338-1950 "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- K. Marx, paraphrasing Dante A.
