Re Paul C's 4186 > >Paul C: >I agree that the examples used by Marx in his price of production >theory are not reproduction schemes. >On the other hand, if his tranformation technique were to be both >consistent and general, it would apply under conditions of >simple reproduction. Why exactly are unit output prices changing from unit input prices inconsistent? As for generality, this makes little sense to me. The equalisation of profit rates is very much the result of capitalist development. For Marx, the more capital develops, the more the average rate of profit becomes the form in which the law of value asserts itself. There is this crucial historical dimension to the so called transformation. Now it seems entirely inappropriate to me to analyze a highly developed and dynamic capitalist society in which capital markets are sufficiently sophisticated that they can actually enable a tendency towards the equalisation of profit rates in terms of simple reproduction or equilibrium. This is exactly not the kind of system in which there would be a tendency towards the equalisation of profit rates. In other words, why should a value based transformation be general enough to apply to cases in which the average rate of profit itself is an anachronism or non entity? Why should it have to conform to special assumptions (input prices=output prices) which cannot be generalized to a highly developed capitalist society in which the tendency towards the equalisation of profit rates actually does assert itself? >The temporalist arguements seem to me to involve finding special >cases where extended reproduction will cause Marx's transformation >technique to give the right answer. No the temporalist approach obviously involves exactly those cases which are typical of capitalist development. Remember Allin's simple reproduction scheme, reconfigured to allow for exactly a characteristic interperiodic increase in productivity. Such a system can be shown to exhibit exactly the small, if not statistically insignificant, interperiodic changes in unit prices of production, r, s/v that are typical of capitalist reality. This is a realistic time path for the system. Again, it is the invocation of the special, unrealistic, irrelevant and anachronistic assumptions of equilibrium or simple reproduction which cause Marx's transformation technique to give the wrong answer. > >Nobody will dispute that there are special cases where it works. Of course it is simple reproduction and equilbrium which are special cases where it does not work. Indeed they are cases of the same realistic force as the reconquest of the earth by dinosaurs computed from ancient DNA. It is similar to falsifying the universal generalisation of black ravens by pointing to the existence of an imagined non black raven in a science fiction story. Not the kind of imaginative falsification Popper had in mind. >One does not have to bring time into this, for example if all >organic compositions are the same it will work. But this would be an unreasonable assumption to maintain for a highly developed capitalist economy. Again, Marx is dropping the vol 2 assumptions--an economy wide VCC, exchange at value, constant value, annual turnover of fixed capital. These enables a closer approximation to the dynamic reality of capital accumulation. >The question >has always related to the generality of such solutions. >Those objecting to Marx's technique have produced examples >where they produce pathological results, positive profits >with negative surplus value in Steadman's examples. In the simultaneist method. > >It is not an adequate response to say that there are other >special cases where Marx's method produces good results. Again the power of projection. It is not an adequate response to point to the existence of bizarre, irrelevant conditions in which there would not even be the principle of the average rate of profit as cases where Marx's method produces bad results. It doesn't need to produce results in such conditions. > Fair >enough, but you need some response to the critique of lack >of generality. > >Such a critique would have to be based on some argument >either about the likelihood of certain classes of examples >occuring, or from actual empirical observations of how >often they occur. This is exactly how I responded to Allin. All the best, Rakesh
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue Oct 31 2000 - 00:00:10 EST