Re: Lenin Quote
Keynes said Lenin said it, but he did not. See Fetter, Frank Whitson (1977) 'Lenin, Keynes and Inflation', Economica, 44, 173 (February), pp. 77-80. Paul Burkett's wonderful book suggests that there might have been some truth to Keynes's words nonetheless. Burdekin, Richard C. K. and Paul Burkett. 1996. "Distributional Conflict and Inflation: Theoretical and Historical Perspectives (NY: St. Martins). 165: Lord Emmott recounted that a Soviet official said in 1920-1 "We want the exchange to fall, we want to get rid of the money , and we do not care twopence how much the exchange falls The exchange is falling in Germany as it did in Russia, and it will go on falling, and when has collapsed Germany will become Bolshevist." Emmott, Lord. 1927. "Proceedings of the Meeting." Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, Vol. 90, Pt. l, pp. 42-3, p. 43. Jay Hecht wrote: > Where, and in what year did Lenin say: > > "Debauching a currency is the surest way to ruin an economy." > > Also, did Marx or Lenin have any specific comment about inflation and its > causes? > > Thanks so much, > > jason -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 916-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Lenin Quote
William S. Lear wrote: >Well, it would have to be before Keynes wrote in the *Economic >Consequences fo the Peace*: > > Lenin was certainly right. There is no subtler, no surer means of > overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the > currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic > law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not > one man in a million is able to diagnose. > >I don't know if Lenin actually said this, or if it was just something >popularly attributed to him. Lenin didn't actually say that - it was a right wing canard that JMK picked up. Doug
Re: The Karl Marx Question
My personal favorite, quite appropriately captured on the insciption on Marx's grave at Highgate Cemetary and summing up Marx's life work--from his Theses on Feuerbach: "The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point, however, is to change it." Jim Craven 4 May 98 at 13:31, William S. Lear wrote: > On Mon, May 4, 1998 at 13:51:58 (-0400) Doug Henwood writes: > >... > >We need more on 1), I'd say. I put Verso's Manifesto poster up over my > >desk, with the Komar/Melamid flag on top, and "WORKERS OF THE WORLD UNITE, > >YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT YOUR CHAINS," all in caps below. ... > > Oooh, I want one! Where can I get it?? Hell, let's get some T-shirts > while we're at it. > > > Staring at > >it, I first thought that the language of chains didn't have much appeal to > >the people who were the likely targets of the poster. Sure, there are > >(mostly figuratively, some literally) chained proletarians in New York City > >and Juarez, but most First World workers wouldn't even want to see > >themselves as chained. Then I thought about those auto and steel workers > >who loved their 50+ hour weeks, so they could earn lots of overtime and > >pull down $80-100,000 a year. Killing themselves, killing any chance of a > >civilized home or social life, for what? SUVs? These are chains of a > >different sort, but people are so alienated that they can't even see them. > >So they turn to self-help books and Viagra. > > I second this, heartily. > > As Chomsky said, "we are entangled in webs of endless deceit". I was > feverishly thinking of sexuality, SUV's, suburban life, and > externalities the other day while driving home through Austin's now > poisoned, smog-laden air. I do think the notion of private goods is > also useful to consider with the morally precedent concern of > alienation. The bias for private consumption goods infects > everything. Sexuality, as usually produced, is consumable by the > individual; the images in popular culture of sexuality speak of an > anti-social, stripped-down, cheapened sensuality. The images are > consumed, they titillate, but no tendrils of social utility spring > forth from these tawdry substitutes of sensuality set within a richer > social context; the images are presented in a social vacuum, a space > in which only individual values are visible... the market filters this > and everything, just as it filters information and manufactures our > consent... > > This bias, and countless others, condition our preferences for them, > feed back into the production system to produce still more private > goods, and in turn our desires become part of the webs of deceit that > fasten us securely to a system that robs us of freedom, despoils our > environment, tears apart and stunts our non-market social relations, > etc. > > > Bill > James Craven Dept. of Economics,Clark College 1800 E. McLoughlin Blvd. Vancouver, WA. 98663 [EMAIL PROTECTED] (360)992-2283(Office),2863(fax) "This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof, AND ALL TREATIES MADE, OR WHICH SHALL BE MADE, under the authority of the United States, SHALL BE THE SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND; and the judges in every State SHALL BE BOUND THEREBY, ANYTHING IN THE CONSTITUTION OR LAWS OF ANY STATE TO THE CONTRARY NOTWITHSTANDING." (Article VI, Sec. 2) *My Employer has no association with My Private and Protected Opinion*
Re: The Karl Marx Question<19980503015526.29352.qmail@pathogen.ecst.csuchico.edu>
William S. Lear wrote: >I feel that there are (at least) two major flaws to capitalist >production: 1) Alienation, aka wage slavery; 2) Bias against public >goods and for private goods which generate negative externalities. We need more on 1), I'd say. I put Verso's Manifesto poster up over my desk, with the Komar/Melamid flag on top, and "WORKERS OF THE WORLD UNITE, YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT YOUR CHAINS," all in caps below. Staring at it, I first thought that the language of chains didn't have much appeal to the people who were the likely targets of the poster. Sure, there are (mostly figuratively, some literally) chained proletarians in New York City and Juarez, but most First World workers wouldn't even want to see themselves as chained. Then I thought about those auto and steel workers who loved their 50+ hour weeks, so they could earn lots of overtime and pull down $80-100,000 a year. Killing themselves, killing any chance of a civilized home or social life, for what? SUVs? These are chains of a different sort, but people are so alienated that they can't even see them. So they turn to self-help books and Viagra. Doug
Re: The Karl Marx Question
>I feel that there are (at least) two major flaws to capitalist >production: 1) Alienation, aka wage slavery; 2) Bias against public >goods and for private goods which generate negative externalities. > The two are closely related. If the government were to more supply public goods, it would make us less dependent on the bosses. The bias against public-good production is also linked to capitalism's bias toward destroying extrahumanic nature. (hey! what a cool neologism! maybe I will make it as an academic. ;-) Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Departments/ECON/jdevine.html "The only trouble with capitalism is capitalists. They're too damned greedy." -- Herbert Hoover
Re: sayles movie
At 10:44 PM 5/2/98 -0400, Mike Yates wrote: >>Sayles seems to put the soldiers and the guerillas on the same footing.<< I didn't find Sayles nearly as critical of the guerillas as of the military... There was at least some discussion of the motivation of the guerillas (starvation in the villages, peasants being pushed into wage slavery) and the truly horrific acts were committed by soldiers. Anyway, isn't one of the great tragedies of _some_ rural revolutionary movements, I think of the SP in Peru most particularly, that they also find themselves terrorizing elements of the population (whether out of desperation / bad strategy / or necessity)? I agree whole-heartedly that the movie was powerful. Alex Campbell Assistant to the President, National Center for Economic and Security Alternatives 2000 P Street, NW Suite 330 Washington, DC 20036 202 986 1373 (voice)/ 202 986 7938 (fax) [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: sayles movie
So much for hyping "real time" communications ... I might see the Sayles movie, if it EVER makes it here, but only long after this thread is extinguished ... same for the Harvey debate in MR, which only comes when my mother, bless her, remembers to forward my subs south ... at least I can follow the NBA playoffs on the net ... Tom Tom Kruse / Casilla 5812 / Cochabamba, Bolivia Tel/Fax: (591-42) 48242 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
RE: Jewish art, Jewish politics
> . . . > Perhaps the recent awakening in Jewish culture and the left-wing politics > of previous generations will reach a whole new generation of Jews. The > Israeli state has long ceased to act as a pole of attraction. It is high > time that Jews understood that their interests are with people like the > Palestinians and the Blackfeet, rather than the imperialists who fostered > the creation of exclusionary Israel. This would be a return to the genuine > traditions of the Jewish people. I appreciate this post, not least as a fellow Hebrew-school reject, though I didn't even make it as far as Bar Mitzvah. Seems I fooled around a bit too much. I do wonder about the point quoted above, however. Some time ago I read something in the New Republic which resonated: that the harkening for the 'progressive Jewish tradition' was sentimentalism. Prior to roughly a century ago, and obviously we go back quite a ways before that, there was no such tradition beyond a minority, cosmopolitan thread. Outside of such minority modernism, most religious Judaism observed by most Jews was pretty hard-assed. Not unlike modern Christian fundamentalism in some ways, except to its credit Judaism did not seek to impose itself on the world. I do agree that the Bund and Yiddisheit is a precious tradition. It was my father's, after all, but in the l-o-n-g view, isn't it a brief, albeit recent episode? It's hard to say whether neo-Bundism, so to speak, or fundamentalism has more sway among Jews today. Secularist Judaism in mixed marriages looks to be a one-generational affair. I don't see the kids I know of in such marriages turning out Jewish in hardly any respects. My hunch is they will look at us as lovable but quaint. They'll remember our jokes. MBS
US jail stats
Dear PEN-Lers: Since there has been recurring interest in prison populations in the US, I am attaching the results of a DOJ study just released on local jails. Doug: the summarized findings might be useful for your "Index". The study can be found at the at the What's New section of the ONDCP webiste at: http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/ Profile of Jail Inmates 1996 April 1998, NCJ-164620 U.S. Department of Justice Washington, D.C. By Caroline Wolf Harlow, Ph.D. BJS Statistician At midyear 1997, 567,079 persons were incarcerated in the Nation's jails. Since 1989, when the last survey of inmates in local jails was conducted, the population held in the 3,328 jails has increased an average 4.6% a year. Jails, unlike prisons, are locally administered, incarcerating unsentenced individuals and persons serving sentences of a year or less. Prisons typically hold inmates with sentences of more than a year. [...] As defined in this report, jails are locally operated correctional facilities that confine persons before or after adjudication. Inmates sentenced to jail usually have a sentence of a year or less, but jails also incarcerate persons in a wide variety of other categories. [...] Jails: * receive individuals pending arraignment and hold them awaiting trial, conviction, or sentencing; * readmit probation, parole, and bail-bond violators and absconders; * temporarily detain juveniles pending transfer to juvenile authorities; * hold inmates awaiting transfer to State, Federal, or other local authorities; * house inmates for Federal, State, or other authorities that have crowding in their facilities; * hold individuals for the military, for protective custody, for contempt, and for the courts as witnesses; * hold mentally ill persons pending their movement to appropriate mental health facilities. [Sumary of findings follows] Two-thirds of jail inmates were convicted on their arrest offense or still serving a prior sentence Jails held 12% of inmates for other authorities An increasing percentage of the jail population was female 6 in 10 jail inmates were racial or ethnic minorities Middle-aged inmates comprised a growing part of the jail population 1 in 3 jail inmates were not working before their arrest 1 in 5 jail inmates received government payments Unchanged from 1989, 22% were in jail for a drug offense Unconvicted inmates were more likely than convicted inmates to be in jail for serious offenses Offenses vary among men and women; blacks, whites, and Hispanics; and by age group 54% of jail inmates already had a criminal justice status when arrested Three-quarters of jail inmates had served prior sentences 44% of inmates had current or past violent offenses; 14% had only drug offenses Among sentenced jail inmates -- half would serve less than 6 months from admission Reported drug use rose sharply between 1989 and 1996 62% of convicted jail inmates reported they consumed alcohol regularly 6 in 10 convicted jail inmates were using alcohol or drugs at the time of the offense 6 in 10 jail inmates grew up living in homes without both parents Nearly half of all female inmates reported past physical or sexual abuse Over a third of jail inmates reported a physical or mental disability A quarter of inmates had received treatment for a mental or emotional problem 1 in 4 jail inmates had a work assignment 14% of inmates had been in a fight, hit, or punched since entering jail Tom Tom Kruse / Casilla 5812 / Cochabamba, Bolivia Tel/Fax: (591-42) 48242 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: The trance on campus
Maggie Coleman's comment that her student's come from upper-middle class, if not wealthy, families, is telling. When people talk about student apathy today, they're generally comparing the Harvard's and Yale's of the sixties to the Harvards and Yales of the nineties. Students at community colleges and state colleges were never terribly engaged in protests, since they were likely to work --even 30 years ago. So what's changed at the Ivies and other private liberal arts type schools? Well, the real cost of attending these places has soared; needs-blind admission policies have been curtailed or eliminated. So the proifle of the student body is increasingly upper-crust. The Harvards and Wellesleys and Princetons and Penns, after a brief (and disastrous)flirtation with meriticratic admissions in the 1960s, have reverted to their original function -- to educate the children of the ruling class to rule the capitalist economy. When I taught at Wellesley College, I was explaining the term "discouraged worker" and a student asked me how the BLS counts people who recieve money from a corporation but don't actually work for it. "You mean like a shareholder?" I asked. "Well, yeah, I guess so," she says. "Would they be considered unemployed?" Ellen Frank
I need help with a study
I am working on a study. I am hoping that some of you might have some expertise in this regard or know of similar studies. A program to convert land in Sacramento River floodplain from agricultural uses to riparian habitat is currently being funded from federal state and private sources. The long run plan includes levy removal, creation of a natural meander belt, and restoration of riparian vegetation. Local governments are concerned about revenue losses resulting from the reduction in agricultural activity. We are proposing a study that will focus on changes in property tax revenues to a single affected county. Current property tax revenues are based on private ownership. Future ownership will be a mix of federal state and private wth conservation easements. We are planning to estimate the changes in property tax revenue only at this time. Other revenue impacts beyond the scope of our study. We are interested in any studies that examined the tax revenue impacts of similar habitat restoration projects. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: The Karl Marx Question
On Sat, May 2, 1998 at 18:55:26 (-0700) [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: >Suppose that you were an impoverished refugee who wanted to learn the >weakness of capitalism so that social movements could best understand how >to create socialism. You would want to learn the weak spots of >capitalism, so that the masses could perform political jujitsu. > >This, I understand to be Marx's objective. How would you/he go about this >task today? It is the ugly truth which will set us free. I feel that there are (at least) two major flaws to capitalist production: 1) Alienation, aka wage slavery; 2) Bias against public goods and for private goods which generate negative externalities. The first is rooted in the trade-off that we are forced to make: give up your freedom and work, or retain your freedom and a) starve, b) work for yourself, c) work for yourself and force others to give up their freedom. I feel that forfeiting freedom can be done, but it must be justified. I simply don't feel that it is justified (i.e., if we were under attack by Martians, I might willingly, if temporarily, give up my freedoms to be bossed around by someone who knows how to fight). The second is rooted in the nature of the private production and pricing system itself, and is something I have recently become much more keenly aware of thanks to Robin Hahnel. I think that these two properties of capitalism are its weakest points. Capitalism requires forfeiture of freedom *and* it is inefficient (i.e., produces far too much negative-externality goods than is socially desirous, far too little public goods). What could be a greater pair of weaknesses than that? So, if I were the refugee, I'd consider taking Robin's outstanding online course, Intro to Political Economy, offered through LOLU (http://www.lolu.org) that I mentioned previously. Also, I'd read Marx's Pre-Capitalist Economic Formations, just to get the ol' blood boiling. Bill
Re: Jewish art, Jewish politics
At 11:02 AM 5/4/98 -0400, Lou Proyect wrote, inter alia: >A similar drive no doubt explains the Zionist enterprise. It is tragic that >such a campaign for economic and cultural survival took place at the >expense of another oppressed nationality. The Jews would have been much >better off after WWII if their struggle for national emancipation had >targeted the German soil instead of the Arab land. If the Zionists had >announced that their goal was to turn Saxony into a homeland for the >Jews--or even Texas or Pennsylvania--then the struggle would have had a >progressive rather than a reactionary dimension. I liked most of your posting, but on that one I must say, it's not the location, Lou, it is the nature of the state. Jewish culture achieved its unique identity largely because it was freeded from the institutional straitjacket of the state; and the formation of the state -- no matter where located -- robbed it of that identity. Regards, Wojtek
Rental Housing Assistance report avail f
This is a MIME message. If you are reading this text, you may want to consider changing to a mail reader or gateway that understands how to properly handle MIME multipart messages. --=_8BDFFDDF.CCADC293 Forwarded mail received from: CENTER1:City:City.smtp:"[EMAIL PROTECTED]" HUD report announcement states that housing assistance need has grown even as the supply of low rent units has declined and Congress has not increased housing assistance. Equals recipe for increased homelessness even in a booming economy... --=_8BDFFDDF.CCADC293 > "Rental Housing Assistance -- The Crisis Continues: The 1997 Report to > Congress on Worst Case Housing Needs" is now available from the HUD > USER website at: > > http://www.huduser.org/publications/hsgpolicy/worstcase/index.html > > Despite America's booming economy, this report shows a record 5.3 > million households with very low incomes - including growing numbers > of working poor and suburban as well as urban families - have a > desperate need for housing assistance because they face a crisis of > unaffordable rents and substandard living conditions. > > This report lists four major findings: > > * Economic prosperity has failed to ease the affordable housing > shortage. The number of American households with crisis-level rental > housing needs grew by nearly 400,000 from 1991 to 1993 to reach 5.3 > million, and held steady through 1995. > > * The supply of low-rent housing has decreased, but Congress has > rejected requests to give more people housing assistance. The number > of apartments affordable to families with very low incomes dropped by > 900,000 from 1993 to 1995. > > * There has been a sharp increase in the number of working poor > families needing housing assistance, with the total jumping by 265,000 > - 24 percent - from 1991 to 1995. > > * The affordable housing shortage, once concentrated principally in > the cities, is also affecting the suburbs. The number of suburban > households with critical housing needs jumped by 146,000 from 1991 to > 1995 - a 9 percent increase. > > > > You can order publications from HUD USER at: > > HUD USER > P.O. Box 6091 > Rockville, MD 20850 > 1-800-245-2691 > 1-800-483-2209(TDD) > (301)519-5767 (fax) > --=_8BDFFDDF.CCADC293--
Re: sayles movie
Magic realism or fantasy in one form or another has been a factor in most John Sayles films. The most obvious example was "Brother From Another Planet." It would be possible to bypass its role in "Men with Guns", but I think that would be a mistake. The device of the mother telling the story to her daughter that appears throughout the film and is wrapped up at the end reminds us periodically that something out of the ordinary is happening in this story. It seemed fairly clear that each of the characters is more or less an archetype. That said, they also have some very human and at times amusing interactions. The doctor's relationship with the American tourists is the best example of this. Their interactions reveal that the tourists -- for all their gauchery -- actually know more about what is really happening in the country than the highly insulated doctor. Other events make it fairly clear that the doctor is truly an alien in his own country. It also seemed to be a nice twist at the end to realise that the doctor was not the central character but merely a device to save and bring the central character to his destiny. There is a lot of ambiguity in the film - like life - so there's lots of room to discuss / argue its meaning and merits. Ellen Ellen J. Dannin California Western School of Law 225 Cedar Street San Diego, CA 92101 Phone: 619-525-1449 Fax:619-696-
Re: Shameless Promotion: intro to econ
Jason; I'm glad to hear an updated version of Economics Today is coming out. Is it going to be both macro and micro or just macro? The reason I ask is that I am teaching macro in the fall. maggie coleman [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Shameless Promotion: intro to econ
In a message dated 98-05-02 18:01:06 EDT, you write: << << I get questions like this all the time, and never know what to answer. Any advice? >I purchased your "Wall Street" and I find myself lacking substantially >enough economics background. I was wondering if you could recommend to me, >an introductory text on economics, preferably from the left perspective. >> There isn't (to my knowledge) a BASIC lefty text, especially one which incorporates issues of gender and race. However, Blau, Ferber and Winkler's "Men, Women, and Work" explains the neoclassical basics in a more palatable fashion than most. Anyone want to write a text? maggie coleman [EMAIL PROTECTED] Bob Carson, Wade Thomas, and myself just revised the 6th edition of "Economic Issues Today" which presents 14 economic issues from a "Conservative," "Liberal" and "Radical" perspective. ME Sharpe expects to have it avaialable by November 1. I think it is a fairly unique text, in that it approaches economics without the formalist baggage/jargon, but allows both logic and ideology to play a central role in explaining "economics" from three different paradigms. It is an intro-level text that requires no prior knowledge of anything, except an ability to read. BTW, I expect to include Doug's LBO and "Wall Street" under "Suggested Readings." Forgive the shameless promotion, but it is not without precedent on Pen-L. I will cease and desist if people are offended. Thanks, Jason
BLS Daily Reportboundary="---- =_NextPart_000_01BD776C.2E91B380"
This message is in MIME format. Since your mail reader does not understand this format, some or all of this message may not be legible. -- =_NextPart_000_01BD776C.2E91B380 charset="iso-8859-1" BLS DAILY REPORT, FRIDAY, MAY 1 1998 RELEASED TODAY: Sixty-seven percent of 1997 high school graduates were enrolled in colleges or universities in the fall. This proportion has risen by 5 percentage points over the last 2 years, after remaining steady from 1992-95 Among out-of-school youth, the unemployment rate for those who had not graduated from high school was 19.8 percent, compared with 11.1 percent for those with a high school diploma (no college) and 2.1 percent for college-degree holders Private industry wages rose 4 percent in the year ended in March, according to BLS. The first-quarter gains in wages and salaries were less sharp than most analysts expected. Economists' concerns that tight labor markets would drive up employment costs were not proven by the ECI. Private industry wages and salaries decelerated, rising 0.8 percent, seasonally adjusted, after a 1.1 percent increase in the final quarter of 1997 and a 1 percent advance in the third quarter (Daily Labor Report, page D-14). The U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 4.2 percent in the first three months of the year, boosted by strong consumer spending and a surge in business investment, the Commerce Department says (Daily Labor Report, page D-4). _Two government reports showed the U.S. economy operating in a near-ideal state, with continued strong growth but no upward pressure on the nation's extraordinarily low inflation rate (Washington Post, page F1). _The economy grew at a surprisingly strong pace this winter, and inflation remained unexpectedly subdued. Instead of slowing down as the Asian recession hit American manufacturers, the economy picked up speed. And, instead of drifting higher as Washington and Wall Street feared, the broadest measure of inflation dipped below 1 percent to its lowest rate since 1964 A Labor Department report suggested that wage inflation was not much of a problem despite a tight labor market For several years, the shift to managed health care and the rising stock market helped hold benefit cost increases to a minimum. Now, with insurers and managed care companies raising their rates, economists expect benefit costs to rise faster But, as BLS Commissioner Katharine Abraham pointed out, the rise was partly offset by smaller increases in the cost of legally required benefits, like unemployment insurance and workers' compensation (New York Times, page A1). _The economy exploded in the first quarter, while inflation fell to early 1950s levels. Not only were prices held in check, but price pressures also appeared to moderate. A separate Labor Department report showed labor costs decelerated in the first quarter (Wall Street Journal, page A2). Initial claims for unemployment insurance benefits filed with state agencies rose by 1,000 to a seasonally adjusted 319,000 for the week ended April 25, ETA reports (Daily Labor Report, page D-28). The Conference Board says its help-wanted index was unchanged in March at 92, indicating continued high demand for labor (Daily Labor Report, page A-3). An article in Business Week (May 4, page 40), "Alan Greenspan Meets Granny Smith," says that, for years, economists at BLS resisted calls to revise the way it compiles the consumer price index so as to better reflect changing pricing and purchasing trends in the economy. But now, BLS has gotten with the program -- big time. Starting with small adjustments in 1995, BLS has taken bolder and bolder steps to remake their models for today's reality. As a result of their new math, growth in the CPI is now running at 1.4 percent -- a half point below where it would have come in under its previous methodology, according to Business Week. Bigger changes are coming. Since February, BLS has revised scores of product categories to reduce the weight given to products that are used less ... and to emphasize high-tech gadgets ... whose prices have been plummeting On April 16, the agency disclosed that other revisions due to take effect next January will likely clip another two-tenths of a point off the index. These changes will reflect the fact that consumers seek substitutes for goods that jump in price The revisions in the CPI that have already been made, taken with those coming next year, will have a significant effect on the economy And BLS is changing its data gathering in ways that should enable it to toss new goods into its basket more quickly. "These aren't the last improvements we're going to make," says BLS economist Richard Bahr Who has the power to raise prices in this economy? Only an elite few can manage it even as inflation stays flat, says Business Week (May 4, page 38). Their secret: Products that customers
Lenin Quote
Where, and in what year did Lenin say: "Debauching a currency is the surest way to ruin an economy." Also, did Marx or Lenin have any specific comment about inflation and its causes? Thanks so much, jason
Re: the Karl Marx question
What are the ramifications for left politics of affirming that alienation -- capital's domination of labor such that labor produces exchange-values furthering its own subjection -- as one of the (if not _the_) major "problems" (to use the term lightly) of capitalist society ? (Even though I'm going to give make some provisional observations I'm not posing a rhetorical question here -- I'm trying to open up rather than close off discussion). Anarcho-communists (such as they are in the advanced capitalist societies) argue that the left should foster emancipation from alienated labor, not "the creation of new jobs" or "better wages and benefits" or "protections against arbitrary dismissal" or "participatory management" or other such objectives, which tend to comprise the ideological horizon of even the most progressive union activists and nominally left-wing political parties. Marxist humanists and non-sectarian Trotskyists and other radical Marxists may share the anarcho-communist vision of where they would like to push the unpredictable dialectic of history (toward the reduction of socially necessary labor time as capital defines it and the unfolding of free time for collective creativity and play and so on), but they believe that to reach this undefined end-state one has to get theoretically and practically involved with the real struggles of the moment (be it against IMF restructuring in South Korea or against U.S. arms sales to Latin American militaries and police), since defense of the material security of those social classes (be they workers or peasants) who have the latent potential to wage the struggle for non-alienated labor takes top priority. My terribly incomplete knowledge of anarcho-communists in the advanced capitalist countries informs me that their tactical focus is on trying to forge collective experiments which involve withdrawl from the capitalist economy and then militantly defending that sphere (squatting, welfare scams, petty theft, dumpster diving, barter, small worker-owned and -operated cooperatives, and so on). (Maybe I should say "anarchists" and not "anarcho-communists," but I'm trying to refer here to those anarchists whose collective experimentation is grounded in a conscious reading and appreciation of the early Marx, as well as a conscious rejection of the Third International and all the "Marxisms" that followed as bastardizations of Marxism). Ironically, squatters and dumpster divers and other assorted anarcho-types in the global cities of the imperialist countries adopt a lot of the same subsistence techniques as do the urban poor of the Third World, but under completely different conditions, and hence with a completely different political meaning. Anarcho-types in the advanced capitalist countries voluntarily opt out of the exchange-value economy (and of course this is made possible in many cases by the continuing existence, however paltry, of the welfare state in the advanced capitalist countries, such as France with its relatively cushy unemployment allowances). There are so few anarcho-types in the advanced capitalist countries taking over abandoned houses and rummaging through garbage and turning down the temptations of consumer society that they don't pose much of a direct threat to the rule of private property, even though in certain instances they may be met with belligerent police force (especially when it comes to appopriating and defending squats in cities with hot real estate markets, a la Tompkins Square). The urban poor in the cities of the global South build and defend their own housing, start up informal sector businesses, appropriate their own water for cooking and bathing, collectively share whatever meager amount of money is earned, and so on b/c they are structurally excluded from the formally capitalist sector of the economy (both in terms of production and means of consumption) -- and also b/c they "exclude themselves" from the alienation of wage labor and import certain practices of family- and kin-based sharing practiced in the less-commodified (though perhaps quite patriarchal) countryside. OK, so what's my point ? Basically, I'm just interested in opening up a discussion of what sort of political struggles Marxists who identify alienation as the root of all evil should be analyzing, supporting, engaging in. Anarcho-types in the advanced capitalist countries tend to be relatively privileged, way out the mainstream culturally, and marginal at best. Do the Marxist humanists and ecological Marxists and so on among us, given our sometimes Olympian predilections, really believe that in moments of social and political crisis salaried and waged laborers the world over will move against alienated labor (an especially pressing conundrum for non-vanguardists who refuse to partake in the authoritarian practice of "educating the masses") ? Do we stake our hopes in those segments of the population in the global South who have yet to be coerced into r
Re: The Karl Marx Question
At 06:55 PM 5/2/98 -0700, Michael Perelman wrote: >Suppose that you were an impoverished refugee who wanted to learn the >weakness of capitalism so that social movements could best understand how >to create socialism. You would want to learn the weak spots of >capitalism, so that the masses could perform political jujitsu. > >This, I understand to be Marx's objective. How would you/he go about this >task today? By studying complex organizations. They are the key how capitalists (take note of my emphasis on people not abstract ideas) maintain their grip on society. A good point to start is the book titled _Complex Organizations A Critical Essay_ by Charles Perrow. regards Wojtek Sokolowski
Re: Lenin Quote
Jason asks: > did Marx or Lenin have any specific comment about inflation and its causes?< If my reading of CAPITAL is correct, Marx's view of inflation is almost monetarist (except, that unlike the monetarists, the supply of money is endogenous to a large extent). If prices are measured in terms of gold or some other precious metal, then new discoveries of new mines can cause inflation, though not by increasing the supply of metal as much as lowering its value. On the other hand, if prices are measured in terms of convertible fiat money, inflation can occur as the supply of that money increases relative to the supply of gold. IMHO, the complete Marxist theory of inflation would see inflation as reflecting societal conflicts (cf. Burdekin and Burkett). I don't know what Lenin said about inflation, but I'm pretty sure he didn't spin that line about subverting society via destruction of its currency. My copy of THEY DIDN'T SAY THAT (a collected debunking of famous sayings allegedly by famous people) is at home. in pen-l solidarity, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Departments/ECON/jdevine.html "A society is rich when material goods, including capital, are cheap, and human beings dear." -- R.H. Tawney.
Re: Lenin Quote
On Mon, May 4, 1998 at 12:09:36 (EDT) Jay Hecht writes: >Where, and in what year did Lenin say: > >"Debauching a currency is the surest way to ruin an economy." > >Also, did Marx or Lenin have any specific comment about inflation and its >causes? Well, it would have to be before Keynes wrote in the *Economic Consequences fo the Peace*: Lenin was certainly right. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose. I don't know if Lenin actually said this, or if it was just something popularly attributed to him. Bill
Re: Rental Housing Assistance report avail f
At 03:58 PM 5/4/98 -0700, Tim Stroshane wrote: >Forwarded mail received from: >CENTER1:City:City.smtp:"[EMAIL PROTECTED]" > >HUD report announcement states that housing assistance need has >grown even as the supply of low rent units has declined and >Congress has not increased housing assistance. Equals recipe for >increased homelessness even in a booming economy... > >Attachment Converted: c:\program files\isk96\eudora\attach\Part.000 Tim, where I live (and apparently where you live) -- the Bay Area -- it seems to me that it _is_ the booming economy -- and _not_ declining direct and indirect federal provision -- which is to blame for this increasing plague of involuntary homelessness. Increasing rents and increasing evictions and displacements (which are the means and ends of one another, just like investment and profit in the productive circuit of K) are being driven by the Silicon Valley and financial and business service and theme park tourism booms -- commercial property values skyrocket and put upward pressure on land markets in general, and there are massive in-migrations of technical-professional workers with extraordinarily high incomes putting upward pressure on a tight housing market. I'm not sure even the "Asian flu" will necessarily cool off the market (although I know a lot of people who aren't directly employed by firms thrown into super-competition with devalued currency rivals who hope it does) -- after all, doesn't liquid capital switch from the productive circuit to the rentier circuit when a recession is approaching ? John Gulick Ph. D. Candidate Sociology Graduate Program University of California-Santa Cruz (415) 643-8568 [EMAIL PROTECTED] John Gulick Ph. D. Candidate Sociology Graduate Program University of California-Santa Cruz (415) 643-8568 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: The Karl Marx Question
Would you/we not do as Marx himself did and wanted others to do? -- to understand the world from the standpoint of the working class (and all oppressed groups) --to be involved in political acivities aimed at the expansion of democracy to every nook and cranny of our 'global society' -- democracy at home, at workplace, in the government, etc. Raju J Das Hist and Pol. Scienc Ohio N University ADA, Oh 45810 At 06:55 PM 5/2/98 -0700, you wrote: >Suppose that you were an impoverished refugee who wanted to learn the >weakness of capitalism so that social movements could best understand how >to create socialism. You would want to learn the weak spots of >capitalism, so that the masses could perform political jujitsu. > >This, I understand to be Marx's objective. How would you/he go about this >task today? > > -- >Michael Perelman >Economics Department >California State University >Chico, CA 95929 > >Tel. 530-898-5321 >E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >
Jewish art, Jewish politics
A couple of weeks ago radio shock-jock Howard Stern had me in stitches as
he made fun of rituals he saw at the Bas Mitzvah for an old friend's
daughter, especially a bit about the "tfillin" his friend wore. Tfillin are
leather straps that men--and only men--braid around their arms in a
carefully prescribed manner and which contain a tiny box at one end. In
this box is miniaturized Jewish scripture. When you are wearing tfillin,
you have to be very careful not to break any rules that are then in force.
The Talmud prescribes:
"On his head - And if he bears a burden on his arm at the place of the
tfillin, which are probably covered and there is no disgrace, then he does
not have to remove the hand-tfillin unless the burden is four kabs, as then
the tfillin are probably being crushed by this."
I wore tfillin briefly. I had just completed my Bar Mitzvah, a rite of
passage for Jewish boys when they reach the age of 13--just as the Bas
Mitzvah serves for girls. The following week my father instructed me to
start going to morning services, "Minyans," where I could now function as a
full-fledged Jewish man. So dutifully I went to morning services for a
week, where the old-timers tutored me in the art of putting tfillin on
properly. Words could not describe the feeling of alienation and
embarrassment I felt as the thongs were wrapped around my arm. Not only
would I now have to get up an hour earlier, I would have to take part in an
absolutely bizarre ritual. I had thought that once I got Bar Mitzvahed that
I could put the dreary synagogue world behind me, just as graduation would
finally end the torture of high school.
So I spoke up to my parents. I refused to go to these morning services and
that was that. In short order, I stopped going to synagogue altogether and
felt totally liberated. My only goal was to be fully assimilated into
American society. The idea of speaking Hebrew or Yiddish and taking part in
these esoteric rituals was disgusting. I read Philip Roth's "Goodbye
Columbus" and identified strongly with all the male characters roughly my
age who were struggling to cut loose from the Eastern European Jewish
identity their parents had brought with them to America.
This is generally the way I have felt for most of my adult life. I do make
certain exceptions. On Saturday night when I lay in bed reading some
Marxist journal or another, I often turn on WMCA, the all religious talk
radio station. I enjoy it for the raw, unfashionable quality of the
conversation, so much in contrast to the bland, commercial junk on the rest
of the radio band or, even worse, TV. On Saturday night, WMCA has all
Jewish programming. I enjoy in particular "Tonya," which consists of a
Chasidic Rabbi commenting in a peculiar mixture of Yiddish speech and song
on obscure passages of the Talmud. I don't understand a word he is saying,
but the sound of his voice--so remote and so antique--enchants me. I also
listen to "Mosiach is in the Air," in which Schmuel Butman finds all sorts
of evidence in numerology to support the immanent coming of the Messiah. I
often wonder if Louis Farrakhan got his inspirations from listening to Butman.
For some reason I don't fully understand, interest in Jewish culture has
been exploding lately. A lot of it is centered at the Knitting Factory in
NY, a famous night club where avant-garde musicians are featured. Jazz
Saxophonist John Zorn has pioneered much of this with his quartet Masada,
which synthesizes Hebrew folk melodies with the harmonic concepts of
Ornette Coleman. Zorn's group often performs with like-minded artists under
the general rubric Radical Jewish Culture. His web page www.tzadik.com has
interesting information on the movement's CD's.
The Knitting Factory also recently initiated a new series of CD's devoted
to this concept. (www.knittingfactory.com) It is called the Jewish
Alternative Movement (JAM). An inaugural CD anthology is titled "A guide
for the perplexed," which contains musical performances by groups like the
Hasidic New Wave ("Men Trinkt Mashke" -- People Drink Whiskey) and a
reading by left-wing performance artist Judith Sloan. In "Denial of the
Fittest." Sloan describes her training as an actor, which involved getting
rid of her Jewish speech inflection. She observes that "Did you ever notice
that actors sound like they come from nowhere?"
Last night the Knitting Factory had a "All Jewish House Party" to kick off
the new CD series. Sloan was there and so was Hasidic New Wave. In
addition, there was a showing of the work of young Jewish film-makers, most
of whom were NYU students. There was one work-in-progress called "Divan"
that has the makings of a masterpiece.
"Divan" is the story of the efforts of Hasidic Jews in Brooklyn to
transport a celebrated sofa from Hungary to their neighborhood. The
ornately decorated sofa was used by generations of famous rabbis who
visited the small Jewish town prior to the WWII genocide. The film director
is Pearl Gluck, an NYU student wh
Re: Women in the Economics Profession
In a message dated 98-05-04 14:21:01 EDT, you write: << 1. Name all women Nobel prize winners in Economics. Ans: none 2. In 110 years of existence, how many women Presidents have there been of the A.E.A.? Ans: One, but I can't remember her name 3. Name at least three female editors of any of the three journals published by the A.E.A. at any time in their history. Ans: ? 4. What percentage of economics doctorates in the United States were granted to women from 1920 to 1924? Ans: I believe the numbers were relatively high for this one brief period of time -- but I don't know exactly how high. However, the early AEA did have a significant minority of women economic historians who disappears with the removal of economics from historical reality. maggie coleman [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Women in the Economics Profession
I have received the Winter 1998 Newsletter of the Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession of the American Economics Association. Daphne A. Kenyon and Ana Kraviz review ECONOMICS AND FEMINISM: DISTURBANCES IN THE FIELD, by Randy Albelda, 1997. Now for a quiz: 1. Name all women Nobel prize winners in Economics. 2. In 110 years of existence, how many women Presidents have there been of the A.E.A.? 3. Name at least three female editors of any of the three journals published by the A.E.A. at any time in their history. 4. What percentage of economics doctorates in the United States were granted to women from 1920 to 1924? And now for a pop quiz to any economist living in Ireland (based on Willian Kern in the same Bulletin): Who corresponded from Ireland with David Ricardo about Ireland specializing in wheat versus potatoes and on which side did the two principals take? * Paul Zarembka, on OS/2 and supporting RESEARCH IN POLITICAL ECONOMY at ** http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/PZarembka
Re: Ganja
C. Coleman, Pot growing seems to have replaced moonshining in many rural counties in the south. Friends who do rock-climbing have told me that in some areas of West Virginia and Kentucky, locals admonish them to stay on the trails so they don't stray into someboby's patch and get shot. An interesting note: The first person condemned to die in accordance with the federal "drug kingpins" law is a southern pot grower/seller. peace
Re: Ganja II
Quoth boddhi: > > An interesting note: The first person condemned to die in > > accordance with the federal "drug kingpins" law is a southern pot > > grower/seller. > too bad, pot doesn't make you go blind the way moonshine does. maggie coleman > [EMAIL PROTECTED] Apparently it does if you're a legislator or the trained poodle fuzz that do his twisted election year bidding. And this blindness has lasted far too long; no one can any longer cop to ignorance about it. The American people will not remain gutless worms forever; something will wake them up and they will jump on the asses of these scum all at once. That day - and those to follow - is all I really live for. McVeigh is proof positive that it's counterproductive to be too angry. By bombing the big TV relay tower at Bartlesville (~50 miles north of Tulsa) instead of killing all those poor innocent kids and clueless Feddorks, he could have actually delivered the country from its collective trance for a few hours. Even a few minutes off that grid would make some significant contribution to freedom. valis Occupied America
Re: The Karl Marx Question
At 06:55 PM 5/2/98 -0700, you wrote: >Suppose that you were an impoverished refugee who wanted to learn the >weakness of capitalism so that social movements could best understand how >to create socialism. You would want to learn the weak spots of >capitalism, so that the masses could perform political jujitsu. > >This, I understand to be Marx's objective. How would you/he go about this >task today? > > -- >Michael Perelman >Economics Department >California State University >Chico, CA 95929 > >Tel. 530-898-5321 >E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] I have tried to do this through my analysis of the American Indians throughout the Western Hemisphere, which I described as a "fault line" somewhere else. George Breitman, a very creative Trotskyist thinker, took note of Black Nationalism in the mid 1960s in similar terms. He was a supporter of Malcolm X, even before Malcom had broken with the NOI. His analysis is found in the key pamphlet "How a Minority Can Change Society." The student movement of the 1960s was another movement that acted as a catalyst on broader forces in American society, as it did also in France, Germany and Italy in the same period. Unfortunately, Marxism has tended to fixate on the industrial working-class at the expense of "marginal" social formations. A revivified Marxism must overcome this tendency and evaluate the class struggle on its own terms, since it does not follow any recipe but unfolds dialectically. Louis Proyect
Re: The Karl Marx Question
On Mon, May 4, 1998 at 13:51:58 (-0400) Doug Henwood writes: >... >We need more on 1), I'd say. I put Verso's Manifesto poster up over my >desk, with the Komar/Melamid flag on top, and "WORKERS OF THE WORLD UNITE, >YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT YOUR CHAINS," all in caps below. ... Oooh, I want one! Where can I get it?? Hell, let's get some T-shirts while we're at it. > Staring at >it, I first thought that the language of chains didn't have much appeal to >the people who were the likely targets of the poster. Sure, there are >(mostly figuratively, some literally) chained proletarians in New York City >and Juarez, but most First World workers wouldn't even want to see >themselves as chained. Then I thought about those auto and steel workers >who loved their 50+ hour weeks, so they could earn lots of overtime and >pull down $80-100,000 a year. Killing themselves, killing any chance of a >civilized home or social life, for what? SUVs? These are chains of a >different sort, but people are so alienated that they can't even see them. >So they turn to self-help books and Viagra. I second this, heartily. As Chomsky said, "we are entangled in webs of endless deceit". I was feverishly thinking of sexuality, SUV's, suburban life, and externalities the other day while driving home through Austin's now poisoned, smog-laden air. I do think the notion of private goods is also useful to consider with the morally precedent concern of alienation. The bias for private consumption goods infects everything. Sexuality, as usually produced, is consumable by the individual; the images in popular culture of sexuality speak of an anti-social, stripped-down, cheapened sensuality. The images are consumed, they titillate, but no tendrils of social utility spring forth from these tawdry substitutes of sensuality set within a richer social context; the images are presented in a social vacuum, a space in which only individual values are visible... the market filters this and everything, just as it filters information and manufactures our consent... This bias, and countless others, condition our preferences for them, feed back into the production system to produce still more private goods, and in turn our desires become part of the webs of deceit that fasten us securely to a system that robs us of freedom, despoils our environment, tears apart and stunts our non-market social relations, etc. Bill
Re: Lenin Quote
>On Mon, May 4, 1998 at 12:09:36 (EDT) Jay Hecht writes: >>Where, and in what year did Lenin say: >> >>"Debauching a currency is the surest way to ruin an economy." Lenin never said that, but one of the theorists of "War Communism"--perhaps Bukharin and/or Preobrazhensky--compared the unlimited issue of inconvertible rubles to "a machine gun destroying the bourgeois economy from the rear." Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64
Re: Shameless Promotion: intro to econ
> >I get questions like this all the time, and never know what to answer. Any > >advice? > >I purchased your "Wall Street" and I find myself lacking substantially > >enough economics background. I was wondering if you could recommend to me, > >an introductory text on economics, preferably from the left perspective. > > Bob Carson, Wade Thomas, and myself just revised the 6th edition of "Economic > Issues Today" > Jason I was going to suggest above with note that I understood it to be out of print...good to hear of update...I used an earlier edition some years ago in a course for lower-division, non-economics majors with great success...Michael Hoover
Re: Ganja
In a message dated 98-05-04 12:43:00 EDT, you write: << Pot growing seems to have replaced moonshining in many rural counties in the south. Friends who do rock-climbing have told me that in some areas of West Virginia and Kentucky, locals admonish them to stay on the trails so they don't stray into someboby's patch and get shot. An interesting note: The first person condemned to die in accordance with the federal "drug kingpins" law is a southern pot grower/seller. >> too bad, pot doesn't make you go blind the way moonshine does. maggie coleman [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Ganja II
At 07:00 p.m. 5/4/98 -0500, valis wrote: >... this blindness has lasted far too long; no one can any longer cop to ignorance about it. The American people will not remain gutless worms forever; something will wake them up and they will jump on the asses of these scum all at once. That day - and those to follow - is all I really live for. >McVeigh is proof positive that it's counterproductive to be too angry. By bombing the big TV relay tower at Bartlesville (~50 miles north of Tulsa) instead of killing all those poor innocent kids and clueless Feddorks, he could have actually delivered the country from its collective trance for a few hours. Even a few minutes off that grid would make some significant contribution to freedom.< valis, who are you kidding? do you really think that "propaganda of the deed" (to use the old anarchist phrase) works? do you think that the media couldn't easily put a reactionary spin on the sabotage of a TV relay tower, especially since McVeigh is/was a reactionary of the worst sort? valis, old buddy, your conception of politics sounds like it hasn't progressed much since the Weatherman "days of rage." Unfortunately, it's not individual acts of violence that change history for the better. It's mass movements like the civil rights movement or the anti-war movement (to name two). No -- change the word at the start of this paragraph to "fortunately." If people like the Unabomber could have a big impact by sending letter bombs, you'd have everybody doing it. The "freedom" would be more of a Hobbesian war than socialism, a dictatorship of the violent rather than a democracy of the proletariat. in pen-l solidarity, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Departments/ECON/jdevine.html
