From: rakeshb@stanford.edu
Date: Wed Mar 12 2003 - 14:29:49 EST
Ok Jerry responds to little of my post in his 8581: Quoting gerald_a_levy <gerald_a_levy@msn.com>: > Re Rakesh's [8577]: > > > As far as I can tell, neither Fred nor Gary has cited evidence from > > > Marx against the TSS breaking of the input=output price > > assumption (Ernst, Carchedi, Freeman, Kliman). > > Fred is on sabbatical so it may be a while before he answers. As > for your assertion above, don't you remember the posts by Fred > on OPE-L where he cited textual evidence from Marx's writings > about what can cause a change in prices of production? Yes, I do. I pointed out then (and I think for the first time) that Marx takes this idea of two reasons for a change from PoP straight from the first chapter of Ricardo's Principles. Marx's language is remarkably similar to Ricardo's. While the changes in PoP from a change in the average rate of profit itself are only clear over the long term, changes in the PoP obtain due to a reduction in commodity value by way of ongoing techno-organizational change on "a daily basis" as Ricardo himself says. I find this textual evidence--to say nothing of the evidence from capitalist reality-- to be in strong support of TSS ideas about interperiodic, if not continuous, dynamic changes in prices of production. In that > discussion, Fred cited evidence from Marx contra the > Kliman-McGlone treatment of PoP in their transformation article. > Don't you remember what came to be called the "smoking gun > quotation" cited by Fred from Volume 3 about there being "only > two reasons" for a change of PoP (see 4908 from February, 2001)? Yes, and do not forget how Allin drew on the Keynesian idea of lagged adjustment to make sense of Andrew's ideas. By the way, I do not accept TSS ideas about the transformation problem because 1. I think Marx's problem is an inverse one and 2. I do not accept their (and Fred's) ideas about how the value transferred from the used up means of production is determined. > > Fred's paper on "long-run center-of-gravity prices" (subtitle), it > should > be recalled, is titled "Marx's Concept of Prices of Production" > ( http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~fmoseley/lrcgpric.html ). It does not > address the question of whether input prices do or do not > equal output prices outside of *that* context in Marx (e.g. it does > not > examine the issue of whether input prices are assumed to equal > output > prices at the level of concretion of the proposed "special study on > > competition" or at the level of concretion of "world market and > crises"). Yes but Fred does that say that Marx's prices of production have a long term equilibrium property which implies, contra Carchedi, that input prices should be equal to output prices. > or the "real world of capitalist dynamics". Yet, within the > context > of examining Marx's concept of PoP and whether input prices are > assumed to equal output prices in that context, I think Fred does > indeed present much textual evidence in support of his > interpretation. Again the textual evidence only shows that Marx believed that market prices adjust in such a way that most sectors will have enjoyed no more or less than the average rate of profit over the long term. The textual evidence does not say that market prices are converging on or gravitating towards equilibrium unit values which are somehow stable over the long term. Or that the blueprint does not change over the long term (30, 40 periods of iterations?) needed for market prices to have finally converged on the prices of production implied by that blueprint. Fred and Gary are trying to Marx a less dynamic thinker than Ricardo! > > But, I'm not going to speak further for Fred. If he has the time > and > inclination, he can speak for himself. And, of course, the same > goes > for Gary. > > In solidarity, Jerry > > > > > > >
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