From: Paul Cockshott (wpc@DCS.GLA.AC.UK)
Date: Sat Jan 26 2008 - 14:28:46 EST
Can anyone help with the query I have been sent below about Steedmans paper of 2003. Paul Cockshott Dept of Computing Science University of Glasgow +44 141 330 1629 www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/~wpc/reports/ -----Original Message----- From: Fernando Martins [mailto:fernandoam@sapo.pt] Sent: Sat 1/26/2008 3:20 PM To: Paul Cockshott Subject: RE: Economic Calculation Dr. Paul Cockshott: Sorry. I.Do you know any answer (at least a beginning of, even bad ) to the best (? !) and last (? !) challenge / criticism of Ian Steedman : "... no theory - explanatory or normative - that works only for a closed economy is worthy the paper it is written down on ", in Marx After Sraffa and the Open Economy (Some Notes), 2002. II.If yes, can you give the reference(s), please ? Thank you very much in advance. With my best regards. -Fernando. -----Original Message----- From: Paul Cockshott [mailto:wpc@dcs.gla.ac.uk] Sent: sexta-feira, 25 de Janeiro de 2008 21:51 To: fernandoam@sapo.pt Subject: RE: Economic Calculation I have looked at Steves article now, and I think that the situations are different. In the case of Marx's criticism of Smith it relates to a recursive approximation procedure such that for any error epsilon in reducing C to Wages + Profit +rent there exists a finite depth of recursion R such that for all recursion >R the approximation error is < epsilon. Because approximation error declines exponentially with R, this limit will be quite small. But note that R is a variable that we are free to select by choosing how far back to go with our calculation. If we go back far enough we can select an R such that epsilon is the smallest coin in use, and so the monetary error will be zero. In the case that Steve is arguing about the number of firms n is fixed. We can not choose to increase the number of firms in an industry in order to make the fraction of the output produced by any one firm less than any given epsilon. Furthermore, the share of each firm in the output shrinks inversely with the number of firms which is a much slower rate of shrinkage than with a negative exponential function. Paul Cockshott Dept of Computing Science University of Glasgow +44 141 330 1629 www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/~wpc/reports/ -----Original Message----- From: Fernando Martins [mailto:fernandoam@sapo.pt] Sent: Fri 1/25/2008 4:37 PM To: Paul Cockshott Subject: RE: Economic Calculation Dr. Paul Cockshott: I'm talking about Steve Keen's well known paper : Why economics textbooks must stop teaching the standard theory of firm, particularly the reject of "horizontal" demand curves, where "the economic procedure is akin to saying that .n*1/n = 0 on the basis that lim n->inf 1/n=0" (Steve personal e-mail - 2004). We think, that the slope of the demand curve for the ith firm must equal the slope of the market demand curve. "A statistician may be able to claim that, with a large n, 1/n is "negligible". But a mathematician ( or any other theoretician ) can't then claim that it is zero without dire consequences for the theory" (Steve personal e-mail - 2004). With my best regards, Fernando. -----Original Message----- From: Paul Cockshott [mailto:wpc@dcs.gla.ac.uk] Sent: sexta-feira, 25 de Janeiro de 2008 15:56 To: fernandoam@sapo.pt Subject: Re: Economic Calculation I would agree with you about Ian Wrights non standard labour values, and have discussed this with him in the past. I am not sure what you are refering to with respect to steve keen though. Can you give me a reference? Fernando Martins wrote: > > Professor Paul Cockshott: > > I.I Knew already your excellent joint paper with Prof.Michaelson about > Cantor ... ,only. > > II.Maybe you are quite right, but then we must accept all the consequences. > For instance and to illustrate: > > 1.Steve Keen is wrong ,so the proposition that firms are "price takers" and > we can just assume dP/dq = 0 is correct ? > > 2.Ian Wright's Nonstandard Labour Values (NSLVs) are ill founded because > when the real wage rate is tending to zero NSLVs are tending to infinity, > even potential ? > > With my best regards, > -Fernando. > > >
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