From: Martha Campbell (campbelm@POTSDAM.EDU)
Date: Tue Nov 23 2004 - 15:27:29 EST
Hi Jerry, Money with forced course (or currency) is state issued paper money (like the US Continentals). They are "coin" or value symbols. Mandel perhaps means Marx's argument that the overissue of paper causes the standard of value to be decreased (that is, a unit of paper money represents a smaller quantity of gold). This, at any rate, is a connection between state issued paper money and gold. Since paper money is inconvertible, when the standard of value changes, the amount of gold the standard represents is not visible. But the phenomena of the quantity theory -- decreases in the purchasing power of money resulting from increases in the quantity of money -- are made compatible with the theory of value (the quantity of paper money does not change the value of gold). If there is another connection between forced paper currency and gold I would like to know about it. Best, Martha At 07:28 AM 11/23/2004, you wrote: >Mandel wrote the following as a note to his article >"Gold, Money, and the Transformation Problem": > >"Throughout this contribution, I consider gold and paper >currencies (bank notes) as identical, assuming paper >currencies to be convertible into gold. The problem of >inconvertible, constantly depreciating, inflationary paper >currencies -- moneys with forced course as Marx called >them -- are outside the realm of this study, as they >were outside the realm of the third volume of _Capital_. >BUT THEY CAN BE EASILY REDUCED TO MARX'S >COMMODITY THEORY OF MONEY, ON THE BASIS >OF CHAPTER II OF _CONTRIBUTION TO A CRITIQUE >OF POLITICAL ECONOMY_." (Ernest Mandel and Alan >Freeman eds. _Ricardo, Marx, Sraffa_, London, Verso, >1984, p. 277, emphasis added). > >But, Mandel doesn't then tell us how this reduction can >be "easily" done on the basis of the 2nd ch. of the >_Contribution to a Critique_. What did he have in mind? >Which part of Ch. 2 was he thinking about? > >And, where exactly did Marx refer to monies with "forced >course"? > >In solidarity, Jerry > >
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