[OPE-L:6279] Re: Re: Re: recent science and society and Fred M's interpretation

From: Alejandro Ramos (aramos@btl.net)
Date: Fri Jan 11 2002 - 20:43:26 EST


Dear Rakesh:

>translated in capital and class in two parts in 1977 as marx, 
>classical economics and the problem of dynamics. the second half is a 
>concentrated attack on the methodology of comparative statics.

Thanks for the reference. I don't know this.

>in previous email exchange with allin, fred has agreed that in order 
>for his interpretation to hold marx had to have made a mistake in 
>writing that there are two reasons why the value of a commodity and 
>its price of production diverge.

I recall this is Fred position.

Mine, briefly stated, is on pp. 67-68 of my article in IJPE. A more
comprehensive presentation of what I think is the procedure Marx is
applying in what you call the "double divergence" passage is on pp. 65-72
of "The transformation of values into prices of production: a different
reading of Marx's text" by myself and A. Rodriguez, Marx & Non-Equilibrium
Economics, 1996.

I don't find cogent the interpretation of that passage as a restatment
Tugan/Bortkiewicz view (i.e. there are two completely separated "systems",
etc.) because, if Marx were thinking in that terms when he defines the
value and price of production of average commodities (*just 20 lines or so
after this passage* --Capital III, pp. 308-309, Penguin), he should have
written:

value = value of c + value of v + surplus value,
production price = price of c + price of v + profit.

Here you would have your "double divergence": 1. "value of c + v" is not
equal to "price of c + v" and 2. "surplus value" is not equal to "profit".

Instead, Marx writes:

value = k + surplus value,
production price = k + profit,

k = cost-*price*, a "transformed magnitude".

Therefore, no trace of "double divergence" in a passage which is logically
and textually the immediate continuation of that you mention. Is this
inconsistency possible in a thinker such Marx? I don't believe this because
I prefer to give some credit to the author. So, it seems interesting to me
to explore another possible meaning of the "double divergence" text,
instead of that one is inferred within the Tugan/Bortkiewicz tradition.

Abrazos,

A.R.



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