[OPE-L:7520] Re: Re: RE: Re: Naples on gold

From: Fred B. Moseley (fmoseley@mtholyoke.edu)
Date: Fri Aug 16 2002 - 14:27:58 EDT


On Mon, 12 Aug 2002, Rakesh Bhandari wrote:

> In regards to Gary's stimulating 7508, I have two very brief points.
> 
> 
> >Hi. Two points on this:
> >
> >(1) Sraffa's model can accommodate rents.  His chapter 11 is concerned with
> >non-reproducible scarce resources. Of course, Sraffa's treatment of rent is
> >different from both Marx's and Ricardo's, but as with his determination of the
> >profit rate, I would argue that the differences stem mainly from the fact that
> >Sraffa had more sophisticated tools at his disposal. The root question is
> >whether Sraffa, Marx and Ricardo are concerned with essentially the same
> >theoretical problems, at any rate in their discussions of value. In earlier
> >posts Fred has argued that M&R had much the same project and that Sraffa's
> >project was different from theirs. M&R were trying to articulate some very
> >complicated issues at a time when economic discourse did not have a unified
> >conceptual language. These difficulties have parallels in our own problems of
> >intertreting that earlier discourse. I would argue that when Marx, in striving
> >for a clarity he never achieved, expresses himself in a particular way that is
> >different from the way SRaffa or Ricardo poses a question, he may not in fact
> >be articulating a theoretical framework that is fundamentally different from
> >Sraffa's, but is instead trying to develop a language of discourse that was
> >not available at the time. That is to say, I think Fred is supposing that,
> >because Marx EXPRESSED himself in terms that are very different from those of
> >modern economics, he must have been TALKING ABOUT something different from the
> >issues we find in Sraffa.
> 
> Marx is certainly talking about something different in regards to 
> money than either Ricardo or Sraffa.

I certainly agree with this.

Fred



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