Howard Sherman's research suggests persistent differences between profit rates between sectors, while Shaikh, Glick, and others see the differences as transitory. I think the latter research has been better (partly because it came later), but it's possible that there was a period during the 1950s and 1960s when there was a persistent difference in profit rates between sectors.
There is a sector which has persistently low profits (or rather zero profits, not even earning the "normal" profits seen in other sectors). This is the petty-bourgeois sector of the self-employed who are on the edge of becoming unemployed or employed by someone else. On Mon, Nov 19, 2012 at 7:54 AM, Julio Huato <[email protected]> wrote: > Jamil wrote: > >> In other words, even if competition appears to be "intense," >> profit rates in oligopolistic vs. competitive sectors tend to be highly >> skewed >> in favor of oligopolistic sector. At least all of the the evidence I've seen >> supports this view. If you have contrary evidence, I'd be interested in >> seeing >> it. > > Hi Jamil. This is interesting. To start with, would you mind sharing > the evidence that you have so far seen? > > Take this with a grain of salt (I haven't looked at the data > seriously), but IIRC Anwar Shaikh used to present in his lectures data > showing that, over the long run, companies with large shares in a > given market or industry didn't have consistently higher profit rates > than the rest. This made logical sense to me, although these are not > things one can decide on speculatively. > _______________________________________________ > pen-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l -- Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
