Has anyone read James Galbraith's new book *Inequality and Industrial
Change*, a collection of essays by Galbraith and a variety of
co-authors? Tom Ferguson gave me a copy of one of the chapters for
which he was co-author, The American Wage Structure: 1920-1947,
which I thought was excellent.
I would like to read it. One of the findings of Galbraith's work that
I find important--though I have not been able to convince any Marxist
whom I know here--is the centrality of US success in monopolizing key
technologies and thereby earning monopoly rents in improving the
American position in the world market (Ernest Mandel however may
jumped on this finding given his interest in surplus profits and
technological rents). For example, Brenner attributes the US
turnaround to post Plaza dollar devaluation and wage repression. It
seems to me that US control over technological monopolies (in
software, high end chip business, medical equipment, etc) has been
more important, and these industries can remain competitive with
wages which are high relative to the national and world average and
without steep currency devaluation.
Rakesh
