Subject: [OPE-L:1732] Re: Re: is a crisis in the US economy immanent?
From: Fred B. Moseley (fmoseley@mtholyoke.edu)
Date: Tue Nov 23 1999 - 20:59:32 EST
This is a brief comment on one of Jerry's recent posts. Thanks, Jerry.
Jerry quoted me:
>> 3. The main point I want to emphasize in this post is that, in answer
>> to Nicky's crucial question in her first post, I don't think the
>> value-form interpretation can provide a quantitative theory of profit.
>> Without abstract labor as the substance of value, there is no surplus
>> labor that determines the amount of profit.
Then Jerry said:
> I understant (I think) why R/W aren't really concerned with developing
> a "quantitative theory of profit", but I agree that the grounding of
> the categories of suruplus value and surplus labor is rather weak
> (i.e. conceptually under-developed) in their book.
My comment:
My question is not so much whether or not R/W developed a quantitative
theory of profit in their book, but rather IS IT POSSIBLE to develop a
quantitative labor theory of profit without the concept of abstract labor
as the substance of value, as I outlined in my previous post. And if you
don't have a quantitative theory of profit, then you don't have a theory
of profit at all. Profit is a quantitative magnitude: the increment of
money that emerges at the end of the circulation of capital. The question
is: what determines this magnitude?
I look forward to further discussion.
Comradely,
Fred
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