Clark Kerr -- martyr?
COMMENTARY/L.A. TIMES The Cautionary Tale of Clark Kerr By Seth Rosenfeld December 4, 2003 As president of the University of California during much of the tumultuous 1960s, Clark Kerr was confronted by students who reviled him as a symbol of the establishment and conservatives who vilified him for not cracking down on demonstrators. But he never suspected that his worst enemy was the FBI. Kerr, who died Monday at 92, seemed an unlikely target for FBI dirty tricks. He was a soft-spoken economist, an advisor to both Democratic and Republican presidents and an avowed anti-communist. He underwent repeated background investigations and, because of UC's participation in military research, held a top-level Q security clearance. But Kerr also was a staunch defender of academic freedom and individualism. He believed vigorous debate was crucial to the university's search for knowledge. And as a federal court later ruled in ordering the FBI to release its files on UC to me, the bureau mounted a covert campaign to destroy Kerr's career because FBI officials disagreed with his politics or his handling of administrative matters. In other words, J. Edgar Hoover's FBI abused its power by punishing one of the greatest educators of the 20th century for campus dissent. Kerr's case is a cautionary tale just last week members of Congress called for hearings into an FBI bulletin that urged authorities to keep an eye on peaceful antiwar protests and report any potentially illegal acts. Kerr came to Berkeley to teach labor economics in 1945, as World War II ended and the Cold War began. Russia seemed bent on world domination. Fear of nuclear war spread. The American Communist Party was seen as a Soviet tool. Operating in a crisis atmosphere with little oversight, the FBI began misusing its powers to target law-abiding citizens engaged in dissent. Kerr was soon on Hoover's radar. In 1949, the university Board of Regents voted to require all UC employees to sign an extra loyalty oath in addition to a state employee allegiance oath swearing they did not belong to any group advocating violent revolution. Kerr signed the oath and backed a university policy declaring Communist Party members too biased to teach. But he also defended professors who refused to sign on principle. Kerr made his priorities clear when he was appointed chancellor of Berkeley in 1952. I shall be eternally vigilant to preserve freedom of inquiry and freedom of expression for the students and for the faculty, he said in a campus speech. In 1958, Kerr was named UC president, prompting the head of the San Francisco FBI to report that Kerr has always given the impression that he is a 'liberal' in the education field and at best is a highly controversial figure in California education. Hoover's concern about Kerr turned to rage when he learned that UC's 1959 English aptitude test for high school seniors asked, What are the dangers to a democracy of a national police organization, like the FBI, which operates secretly and is unresponsive to public criticism? And when UC students joined a protest against the House Committee on Un-American Activities at San Francisco City Hall in May 1960, the San Francisco FBI chief wrote to Hoover: Undoubtedly of special interest to you, is the fact that much of the manpower was provided by students of the University of California at Berkeley. Since Clark Kerr has become president, the situation on all campuses has deteriorated to the point where the so-called academic freedom has become academic license. Kerr's refusal to block a 1961 student request to have HUAC opponent Frank Wilkinson speak on campus led Hoover to scrawl a note for the file: I know Kerr is no good. Then came Berkeley's Free Speech Movement in the fall of 1964, the first major campus protest of the era. Mario Savio and other FSM members portrayed Kerr as a hypocrite. Conservatives portrayed him as weak-kneed. And later that year, when President Johnson was considering Kerr as secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, the nation's most powerful education post, the FBI knowingly portrayed him falsely in a report to the White House as having disloyal associations. As a U.S. district court later ruled, Hoover used the background investigation process as a pretext to sabotage Kerr. Johnson withdrew the offer, and Kerr never got a White House appointment. As campus antiwar protests grew in 1965, Hoover secretly met with CIA head John McCone and agreed to leak FBI reports to Regent Edwin Pauley in what another court called an FBI campaign to have Kerr fired. But with Kerr's ally Gov. Pat Brown in office, Pauley couldn't muster the votes. Ronald Reagan was inaugurated as governor on Jan. 5, 1967. Within days, he requested a secret FBI briefing about the Berkeley situation, FBI memos show. On Jan. 20, at the first regents meeting attended by Reagan, Kerr
Re: mileage aka my irrelevant post for the day
I used to be on a diabetes list that had several HTML nannies that would chide anyone who sent anything other than plain text messages. There are still quite a few systems I guess that cant handle HTML etc... I also had a computer friend who used to go ballistic when I adorned messages with smileys etc. Cheers, Ken Hanly - Original Message - From: ravi [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, December 03, 2003 9:30 PM Subject: Re: mileage Carrol Cox wrote: My mail program for reasons I can't detrmine was acting up. All posts in html or mime came to me empty, except they would show up if I clicked reply then quote or if I fwd them. Plain Text posts came through. I think my fifth or sixth rebooting somehow corrected whatever was wrong. F*ing computers. nah! f*cking HTML email! f*cking users!! ;-) --ravi p.s: some of you are probably too young to even realize that 'user' (or 'luser' as some say) is a bad word. ;-) p.p.s to dan: just kidding... not referring to you!
Re: mileage aka my irrelevant post for the day
is there a way that the list-server could be set up to filter out all things that aren't in text format, while leaving attachments? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine -Original Message- From: k hanly [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 8:13 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [PEN-L] mileage aka my irrelevant post for the day I used to be on a diabetes list that had several HTML nannies that would chide anyone who sent anything other than plain text messages. There are still quite a few systems I guess that cant handle HTML etc... I also had a computer friend who used to go ballistic when I adorned messages with smileys etc. Cheers, Ken Hanly - Original Message - From: ravi [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, December 03, 2003 9:30 PM Subject: Re: mileage Carrol Cox wrote: My mail program for reasons I can't detrmine was acting up. All posts in html or mime came to me empty, except they would show up if I clicked reply then quote or if I fwd them. Plain Text posts came through. I think my fifth or sixth rebooting somehow corrected whatever was wrong. F*ing computers. nah! f*cking HTML email! f*cking users!! ;-) --ravi p.s: some of you are probably too young to even realize that 'user' (or 'luser' as some say) is a bad word. ;-) p.p.s to dan: just kidding... not referring to you!
Why Read Marx
One man's opinion: http://webapp.utexas.edu/blogs/archives/bleiter/000542.html
Re: mileage
Devine, James wrote: I'm partly still wishing I was using cp/m instead of either dos or windows! :-) hey, cp/m was cool. I used on my Osborne 1, the first portable computer. ;-) That was my first computer too (Tan Case). My second was the Osborne Executive -- about two months after I bought it, Osborne went bankrupt! Carrol
Iraq situation: Americans say they can't count the dead, and can't count the living
The NYT today stated: Iraqi census officials devised a detailed plan to count the country's entire population next summer and prepare a voter roll that would open the way to national elections in September. But American officials say they rejected the idea, and the Iraqi Governing Council members say they never saw the plan to consider it. Iraqi census officials devised a detailed plan to count the country's entire population next summer and prepare a voter roll that would open the way to national elections in September. But American officials say they rejected the idea, and the Iraqi Governing Council members say they never saw the plan to consider it. Objectivity and democracy seem to get in the way of the imperial masterplan - it's class logic, one seeks to reconcile contradictions in one's own favour. In the process, an important characteristic of commoditisation (commercialisation) is revealed: privatisation and primitive accumulation of capital under competitive conditions ultimately necessarily depend on secrets, you need to hide part of what you do, or your idea, whereas you want to know everything the other guys do, hardly an astounding discovery in itself, but something which has gigantic consequences for human life: absolutely crucial facets of the society we live in, are not allowed to be understood clearly and unambiguously by everybody. We can of course say apologetically that they could be understood, it is just that they cannot be understood now, only later, the time factor is crucial, a dollar appropriated through exploitation now is much more important than ten theoretical dollars that could be exploited in the future, future exploitation is best left to specialists. It is thus a functional requirement of capitalism that aspects of bourgeois society remain an eternal mystery, and ideologists will be pressed into the service of Capital to explain to us, that certain economic, ecological of social phenomena are impossible to understand as a matter of principle, even although human beings, and only human beings, created those phenomena in the first place. Our expectations of life must be limited, our horizons clearly defined, according to the imperatives of capital accumulation. This is quite different from, let's say, a community of Brazilian Indians, where what people do is transparent, there is nothing to hide from each other beyond the fact that they have a certain moral feeling, perhaps shame, perhaps guilt, perhaps decency or something else (I am not a professional anthropologist). There is no concept of intellectual private property rights. But in bourgeois morality, the private/public distinction is ultimately always defensive; one is dutibound to keep certain things secret from the point of view of private self-interests, it is ultimately not in one's self-interest to share things, private interest is counterposed to public interest in a competitive environment. In itself not an astounding discovery either, but again something with gigantic social consequences for human life. The learned George Soros aspires to an Open Society on the basis of a healthy market capitalism, but cannot achieve it, but why that is, remains an ultimate mystery, a kind of postmodernist detective story, where at the end of the story, the conclusion is left open as to whether the murderer was really the murderer, or whether he was the victim of murder, a kind of ultimate moral ambiguity which is a social-structural necessity of bourgeois life. Playfully we can also present this facet of bourgeois society as a kind of magic: we will help you out of your troubles, but why or how we do it, must remain an eternal mystery, just love us, say no more, some things must be left secret. You don't co-operate ? Then, well, we'll help you to the next world. I think Transparency International is a great idea myself, except that, the organisation seems to be founded on a blurry vision, such that transparency is in the eye of the beholder; i.e. the total amount of acts of corruption by public servants, whose accountability is much more transparent than the accountability of other people, and therefore easier to track, pales into insignificance to the total amount of crime there is. As for the theory of the leisure class, the game to play is of course who is transparent and who is not, and why/how that is. Sort of like, Eyes Wide Shut - when do I put my mask on, and when do I take it off ? A game of TV jokes and practical bloopers or a Pink Panther movie becomes an amusement, because what is funny about it to people, is the fact that somebody acts on the basis that he thinks he is hiding something, even although everybody else is completely aware of what he's doing. But the boundaries of what is funny, remain very clearly defined: those things which are hidden in according to bourgeois private interests must not be regarded as funny, but deadly serious. And in this way, you can develop a theory of class moralities, of
Re: Why Read Marx
Yep, I passed it, but as regards this blog you post, in my opinion is shows only the moral and scientific understanding of an ant. In which case you'd have to recommend a track from Adam and the Ants. J. - Original Message - From: Max B. Sawicky [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 5:32 PM Subject: [PEN-L] Why Read Marx One man's opinion: http://webapp.utexas.edu/blogs/archives/bleiter/000542.html
Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)
please scroll down for my comment on Paul's comment on Ahmet's comment E. Ahmet Tonak wrote: . . . snip Specifically and in order to point out how dramatic the empirical sense one may get based on these two different approaches I'd like to compare some preliminary estimates of the rate of surplus value (calculated by my student Kaan Parmaksiz based on ShaikhTonak methodology in 1998) with rate of economic surplus as reported in Cem's piece (Table 1). The rates start with approximately the same 1981 value, 1.29 and 1.20 for the rate of surplus value and that of economic surplus respectively. But, that point on until 1988 they behave very differently, i.e. the rate of surplus value increases by 103% while the rate of economic surplus decreases by 19%! This is the period which was characterized by Yeldan (1995) as surplus extraction through wage suppression. ... The interesting thing is that the dramatic difference in the behavior of the above-mentioned rates also existed between our US (s/v) and Stanfield's rate of economic surplus: during 1965-69 our rate declined by 4.2% as his increased by 9.7%! Paul wrote: This sounds interesting. Is it possible to give a bit more detail? For example can one generalize about the major categories or sectors accounting for the divergence (I realize this is hard given two different theoretical approaches)? Comment: Concerning the Somel - Parmaksiz (based on ShaikhTonak) difference of estimates about Turkey - dont know. But regarding estimates of SV USA, Moseleys book compares his estimates with those of other authors. All of these authors measured the same theoretical concept (SV). But the estimates diverged considerably. One of the reasons was that other authors stayed closer to the statistical categories of the GDP accounting system, whereas Moseley re-cast the data into authentic Marxian categories. Gert _ MSN 8 with e-mail virus protection service: 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/viruspgmarket=en-caRU=http%3a%2f%2fjoin.msn.com%2f%3fpage%3dmisc%2fspecialoffers%26pgmarket%3den-ca
Correction/addition
I wrote: ...future exploitation is best left to specialists. That should of course be ...future exploitation is best left to specialists, and what the specialists actually do, should be shrouded in ultimate mystery, authority must have its mystique. For example, a war is fought in Iraq. Why is this war being fought then ? Is it about oil ? Is it about the defence of the West ? Is it about an evil dictator ? Is it about something else ? Do we know why the war is being fought ? Is the war worth it ? Great terms of debate, great new detective story. In this regard, you're better of reading the words of Goldstein in Orwell's novel 1984: there must be a war, because it's class society, it's capitalism, it's bourgeois society, it's imperialism, and if you want to live you life in peace, you ought to be an artist or something - until art gets attacked, and soft eggs end up in the Hilton Hotel, and Herman Brood commits suicide by throwing himself out of the top of the Hilton Hotel. If all we are saying is give peace a chance, we are gambling with the future, because while we're being peaceful, we're being attacked. There's the limits of Capital, and then there's human limits. J.
WIPO does the Caribbean
http://www.wipo.int/edocs/prdocs/en/2003/wipo_upd_2003_213.htm Geneva, December 1, 2003 -- -- CARIBBEAN GOVERNMENTS COMMIT TO USING INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY AS A TOOL FOR ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT Governments of several Caribbean countries have committed to use intellectual property as a tool to promote sustainable economic development and social welfare in the region with the signature of a landmark multilateral agreement with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) last week. At the WIPO Ministeral Level Meeting on Intellectual Property for Caribbean Countries organized in cooperation with the Ministry of Justice and Legal Affairs of Antigua and Barbuda at St. John's on November 27 and 28, ministers signed a comprehensive cooperation agreement to promote the use of intellectual property (IP) as a tool for economic growth and social benefit. The meeting was opened by WIPO Director General Dr. Kamil Idris and the Prime Minister and Minister of Justice and Legal Affairs of Antigua and Barbuda, Mr. Lester B. Bird.. The governments of Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago were invited to participate in the meeting. The agreement establishes the terms of a project that is designed to support a more effective integration of the region into the global economy by fostering technological innovation, creativity and competitiveness through intensive and effective mobilization and use of intellectual property. The project will support on-going regional initiatives for economic development and integration of IP policies and strategies into government economic and social development plans at regional and national levels. It aims to create conditions for the development, protection, ownership, management and use of IP assets in the region, by fostering technological innovation and enterprise competitiveness, as well as cultural industries. The project will also promote technology transfer, strengthen regional research and development initiatives, encourage local invention and creativity, promote an IP culture and national and regional identity and branding. The participating governments so far include, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Guyana, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago. It is expected that other governments in the region will sign the agreement in the next three months. On the sidelines of the ministerial meeting, Dr. Idris held a round of bilateral discussions with a number of senior officials within the government of Antigua and Barbuda, including the Governor General of Antigua and Barbuda, Sir James B. Carlisle, the Speaker of the House, Dame Bridget Harris, President of the Senate, Ms. Millicent Percival, the Minister of Education, Dr. Rodney Williams, the Minister for Trade, Mr. Gaston Browne and the Minister of Tourism, Mr. Molwyn Joseph. The ministerial event followed a meeting of the heads of IP offices for Caribbean countries which met in Saint John's on November 25 and 26. At that meeting, participants reviewed progress made in establishing a set of independent, national organizations to manage intellectual property rights in the Caribbean region in line with the plan approved by Caribbean ministers in June 1999. Under the plan, it was agreed to incorporate a regional strategy for the development of a collective management system whereby national collective management organizations would be established and linked by standard internet facilities to a separate, jointly-owned-and-operated-organization (the Caribbean Copyright Link (CCL)) that would provide back-office services to the national offices. Participants noted that after two years of operation, all existing national collective management organizations (CMOs) in the region were fully operational and were making good overall progress both from a regional and a national perspective. It was noted that since 2001, the cumulative total gross royalty distributions have risen to USD1.879 million. The Caribbean regional database now includes documentation on more than 26,000 Caribbean works. This database enables Caribbean music to be identified and accounted for when it is performed in public in the Caribbean and foreign countries. Emphasis has been placed on entering the works documentation data and ensuring the necessary agreements are in place to allow export of the data in the standard international format to other CMOs worldwide for performance identification purposes. While the regional database comprising Caribbean works is beginning to generate royalties for Caribbean authors from performances in the region, Caribbean CMOs are engaged in the process of signing agreements with their counterparts in foreign
Re: mileage
cp/m was cool, but the Osborne 1 was not: mine had no fan, so it overheated and shut down regularly (which was especially disastrous because I used a RAM-disk add-on for my word processing). This had the positive effect of encouraging me to back up files _all the time_. Osborne drove itself into bankruptcy, by announcing that it was coming out with a DOS-based machine (the Executive?) a few months before it did so. This cause the sales of its cp/m machines to plummet. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine Devine, James wrote: I'm partly still wishing I was using cp/m instead of either dos or windows! :-) hey, cp/m was cool. I used on my Osborne 1, the first portable computer. ;-) That was my first computer too (Tan Case). My second was the Osborne Executive -- about two months after I bought it, Osborne went bankrupt! Carrol
Addition II
I wrote: But if you should win in the sphere of love, you might be able to take back everything that has been thieved from you, a sort of redemption,... I should add of course that this magnificently imaginative social vision is also predicated on the social-structural reality of competition: life is about winning or losing, and if we don't go forward in the competitive battle, we go backward, we cannot stand still in this. Thus, the meaning of sucksess is to win, the ultimate game in town. The hidden premiss is that somebody must lose or give up something, and being a (sore) loser is just as bad as being afraid to lose; if you want to win, don't talk about anything not conducive to winning. Winning is indeed conditional on not knowing stuff, a proof of innocence - we must always be able to say afterwards wir haben dass nicht gewusst, and the emphasis is on appropriating what somebody else knows, and keeping what you know partly hidden. As in the song by Bob Geldof, the reality of bourgeois justice inverts the formality of bourgeois justice: innocent till proven guilty, becomes guilty till proven innocent, and then with a spoof on catholic morality we can say guilty till proven guilty (Geldof's song is called Elephant's Graveyard). If you think this is all a joke, think of indebtedness. The whole thing is predicated on feelings of guilt, shame, remorse, obligation and a whole complex (to use Lukacs's ontological term) of emotionalisms defining master and servant. If financial transactions are not longer a means of objectivisation, then emotions must become a means of objectivisation, they must be extracted, externalised, made observable, until Capital is everything, owns everything, and human beings are nothing, everything is completely reified and dead, Capital manipulates the puppets. As regards love capitalism, the genial invention of market relations is, that it disconnects us more or less subtly from the moral consequences of our private actions, the freedom it provides is moral ambiguity and diversity. I can be in love with the most heavenly woman you ever saw, while elsewhere, outside my field of personal responsibility, humans die from privation, and then, to restore some sense of human morality to acts of love, we attach consequences to the failure to exhibit love of the appropriate kind, we force the love issue, a rape of some kind, maybe, The Rape of the Lock. In which case you need some sort of war against terrorism. But since love can only be understood or known, but not exhaustively and completely defined, all's fair in love, as well as in war. And then we're back with Winston and Big Brother. Love is war. Happiness is slavery. And so on, ad infinitum, in ultimately irresolvable dualisms arising from the disconnection of self-understanding and the understanding of the society in which one lives. Now to the housework. J.
Al Jazeera's Pound of Flesh story
(well normally a kidney weighs less than a pound) http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F064D8EE-4834-44A1-9B0C-29E88432E788. htm I have possess'd your grace of what I purpose; And by our holy Sabbath have I sworn To have the due and forfeit of my bond: If you deny it, let the danger light Upon your charter and your city's freedom. You'll ask me, why I rather choose to have A weight of carrion flesh than to receive Three thousand ducats: I'll not answer that: But, say, it is my humour: is it answer'd? What if my house be troubled with a rat And I be pleased to give ten thousand ducats To have it baned? What, are you answer'd yet? Some men there are love not a gaping pig; Some, that are mad if they behold a cat; And others, when the bagpipe sings i' the nose, Cannot contain their urine: for affection, Mistress of passion, sways it to the mood Of what it likes or loathes. Now, for your answer: As there is no firm reason to be render'd, Why he cannot abide a gaping pig; Why he, a harmless necessary cat; Why he, a woollen bagpipe; but of force Must yield to such inevitable shame As to offend, himself being offended; So can I give no reason, nor I will not, More than a lodged hate and a certain loathing I bear Antonio, that I follow thus A losing suit against him. Are you answer'd?
Re: Why Read Marx
I haven't read it, but Brian Leiter is a friend of mine - we went to grad school together -- and he is REALLY smart, very learned, and very sympathetic to sensible socialist projects. Blow him off at your peril. He's an _ally_. Cherish people like him! jks --- Jurriaan Bendien [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yep, I passed it, but as regards this blog you post, in my opinion is shows only the moral and scientific understanding of an ant. In which case you'd have to recommend a track from Adam and the Ants. J. - Original Message - From: Max B. Sawicky [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 5:32 PM Subject: [PEN-L] Why Read Marx One man's opinion: http://webapp.utexas.edu/blogs/archives/bleiter/000542.html __ Do you Yahoo!? Free Pop-Up Blocker - Get it now http://companion.yahoo.com/
Re: Why Read Marx
Of course. I was not referring to the person, but to what he wrote, stating explicitly as regards this blog you post, in my opinion it shows only the moral and scientific understanding of an ant. Criticism is targeted at a behaviour, not against the person. As a generalisation, qualification is meaningless without quantification. I do not know this person, and haven't interacted with him, what can I say except comment on the text ? All I can comment on is what he writes. Certainly, the human brain hosts what we call qualia but in order to do anything practically with that at all, immediately involves me in abstractions which depend upon quantification, even if only at a very primitive level. I could say, hypothetically, if a hundred people are killed, or a thousand people are killed, this difference does not matter, what matters is the total fact that people were killed at all. That's okay, it sounds very moral, until the choice is whether you are killed or I am killed, and then of course we can count up to two and compute 2-1=1 damn quick. That is the reality which people in Iraq experience as well. So in reality all this guy is saying, is that a focus on quality means not being a soldier. Well and good, until you are completely plastered with qualities and started to feel like a living palette in the hand of a painter you do not know, and want to sink to your knees and worship God. It is more honest to say, I am not going to concentrate on the explication of the laws of motion of bourgeois society now, because I want a life which is liveable for myself, even if it means that scientific truth must be shelved for now. I do not accept that anybody who cannot even understand the limits of pragmatism correctly, can understand Marx's theory of value, which traces its roots back to ancient Greek philosophy if not further. J. - Original Message - From: andie nachgeborenen [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 8:08 PM Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Why Read Marx I haven't read it, but Brian Leiter is a friend of mine - we went to grad school together -- and he is REALLY smart, very learned, and very sympathetic to sensible socialist projects. Blow him off at your peril. He's an _ally_. Cherish people like him! jks --- Jurriaan Bendien [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yep, I passed it, but as regards this blog you post, in my opinion is shows only the moral and scientific understanding of an ant. In which case you'd have to recommend a track from Adam and the Ants. J. - Original Message - From: Max B. Sawicky [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 5:32 PM Subject: [PEN-L] Why Read Marx One man's opinion: http://webapp.utexas.edu/blogs/archives/bleiter/000542.html __ Do you Yahoo!? Free Pop-Up Blocker - Get it now http://companion.yahoo.com/
Re: Why Read Marx
In a message dated 12/4/03 9:47:51 AM Pacific Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Yep, I passed it, but as regards this blog you post, in my opinion is showsonly the moral and scientific understanding of an ant. In which case you'dhave to recommend a track from Adam and the Ants.J. Comment I read the suggested post and have a different point of view, but so do all of us as individuals. The relevance of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels writings consist in their revolutionary obviousness or as it is called, the materialist conception of history. I regard Karl concept of value as an important observation of why products become exchangeable and why the role of socially necessary labor is important, as opposed to a model to measure price and exchange. Marx coining _expression_ like "mode of production" or the material power of the productive forces in the formation of classes and structures of human labor strike me as innovative. Also his concept of property and the components of the laboring process - organic composition of capital, have been useful in making sense of the world in which I live. There are perhaps a dozen more propositions Marx and Engels put forward that strike me as revealing of aspects of the human condition. I have always been impressed with their writings on the Civil War in America and the various prefaces to the Communist Manifesto. Melvin P.
Re: mileage
How is it better than Netscape 7.0? Not arguingjust want to know... Joanna good time for me to once again pitch mozilla, the open source browser: http://www.mozilla.org/ version 1.5 is now out and is pretty stable. has many useful features (tabbed browsing, cookie management, junk mail controls, etc) that you won't find in IE. as previously mentioned, i'll offer end-user help for anyone who wants to make the switch. and iirc, it can co-exist with netscape4. --ravi
Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)
g kohler wrote: Concerning the Somel - Parmaksiz (based on ShaikhTonak) difference of estimates about Turkey - dont know. But regarding estimates of SV USA, Moseleys book compares his estimates with those of other authors. All of these authors measured the same theoretical concept (SV). But the estimates diverged considerably. One of the reasons was that other authors stayed closer to the statistical categories of the GDP accounting system, whereas Moseley re-cast the data into authentic Marxian categories. And the intellectual/political payoff for this authenticity is? Doug
Re: mileage
joanna bujes wrote: How is it better than Netscape 7.0? Not arguingjust want to know... good time for me to once again pitch mozilla, the open source browser: http://www.mozilla.org/ well, they are both pretty much the same thing, afaik. netscape = 6 is mozilla + some GUI stabilization - bleeding edge features + marketing droids additions (aol instant messenger, etc). --ravi
Re: mileage aka my irrelevant post for the day
Devine, James wrote: is there a way that the list-server could be set up to filter out all things that aren't in text format, while leaving attachments? i beleive the list server can be set to do so, but there is also a way for individual users to designate what kind of messages (the kind of formatting) they want to receive. From: k hanly I used to be on a diabetes list that had several HTML nannies that would chide anyone who sent anything other than plain text messages. There are still quite a few systems I guess that cant handle HTML etc... my system/mailreader can handle HTML, but other than in some special cases, i see no point in sending HTML mail and in fact many disadvantages. additionally, HTML mail, rather than making it easier, seems to make messages more unreadable for the disabled. i have already whined about this tendency of non-[ip-]communications folks to converge on HTML and HTTP (and now XML) as the silver bullet for any formatting or communication -- one good parody of this tendency was the recent IP over XML draft. when we let ;-) the windows folks on to the internet, we created such monsters as email messages that are nothing but normal text typed out as a word document and included as attachments. bloat, platform dependence, disk/bandwidth waste, etc, etc. HTML email is a milder form of this degeneracy. now don't even get me started on gratuitous capitalization and bottom quoting (the latter being my submission to bush for inclusion in the axis of evil, now that saddam is gone though not captured). ;-) --ravi
Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)
Assuming that we're still interested in changing capitalism, I would argue that Marx's categories help us to understand how the imperatives of profitability and capitalist growth operate, in theory and in practice. That is sufficiently large enough payoff (intellectual or otherwise) for me. Ahmet Tonak - Original Message - From: Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 3:00 PM Subject: Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel) g kohler wrote: Concerning the Somel - Parmaksiz (based on ShaikhTonak) difference of estimates about Turkey - don't know. But regarding estimates of SV USA, Moseley's book compares his estimates with those of other authors. All of these authors measured the same theoretical concept (SV). But the estimates diverged considerably. One of the reasons was that other authors stayed closer to the statistical categories of the GDP accounting system, whereas Moseley re-cast the data into authentic Marxian categories. And the intellectual/political payoff for this authenticity is? Doug
Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)
E. Ahmet Tonak wrote: Assuming that we're still interested in changing capitalism, I am. I would argue that Marx's categories help us to understand how the imperatives of profitability and capitalist growth operate, in theory and in practice. That is sufficiently large enough payoff (intellectual or otherwise) for me. As I've said before, and never been convinced to the contrary, I don't see how the intelligent use of bourgeois stats and categories doesn't accomplish the same task. Unless you're trying to make the argument that rising OCC = FROP = system collapses as profits go to 0. But no one makes that anymore, right? Doug
unproductive expenditures and surplus-value
[was: RE: [PEN-L] Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)] Assuming that we're still interested in changing capitalism, I would argue that Marx's categories help us to understand how the imperatives of profitability and capitalist growth operate, in theory and in practice. That is sufficiently large enough payoff (intellectual or otherwise) for me. Ahmet Tonak --- I don't understand this. Why should the wages salaries of unproductive labor-power (U) be included as part of surplus-value (S)? didn't Marx once say that S corresponded to profits+interest+rent (with the latter being phenomenal forms of the former)? that excludes U. from the point of view of the capitalist class, isn't U part of _costs_? is it possible for the capitalists to accumulate based on U? or must they accumulate based on S, net of U? If they can't use U for accumulation (any more than they can use the wages salaries of productive labor-power for accumulation), why not focus on S, net of U? Fred Moseley has argued that the changes in the Marxian rate of profit (measured counting U in the numerator) helps us understand changes in the conventional rate of profit (with U as part of costs). That makes more sense to me (on the abstract level). But, in the end, isn't it the conventional rate of profit (CRP) that's important to the laws of motion of capitalism? and in the determination of the CRP, isn't the mathematical role of U _exactly the same as_ the mathematical role of the wages salaries of _productive_ labor-power (V)? Put in a different way, it's often assumed that (all else constant), surplus-value production is proportional to V, i.e., S/V = s'. Thus, if U/V rises, all else equal, the rate of profit falls, since S/(V + U) = s'/(1 + U/V) falls. But why can't s' rise to accomodate the rise in U/V? In fact, Moseley and others who measure U and count it as part of surplus-value show that S/V does rise rather than being constant. So the rate of profit need not fall as a result of the rising U/V. In other words, why not assume, for example, that S/(V + U) is constant (as a first approximation)? Adam Smith had a different theory (one that he didn't articulate much at all), i.e., that spending on U was a substitute for investment in capital goods that promote the productivity of productive labor-power. But that's not what Shaikh and Tonak are talking about. Jim
Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)
Doug Henwood wrote: I don't see how the intelligent use of bourgeois stats and categories doesn't accomplish the same task. With a suitable definition of intelligent use, it must accomplish the same task. But then we cannot easily communicate the results to orthodox Marxists with no or little training in standard economics. And, yes, there's a (growing?) group of Marxists that don't have (don't want to have?) training in standard economics. Perhaps they've decided a priori that -- after David Ricardo -- there's nothing in bourgeois economics worthy of study. I don't know if this belief underlies it, but there is a recent posting on PEN-L about advising students to avoid graduate economics programs. If this is a broader trend, then Marxists are increasingly moving to history, geography, sociology, political science, literature, gender studies, cultural studies, etc. -- running away from economics. This creates a real rift -- at first academic, but potentially political. If we don't speak the same language, we are more likely to misunderstand each other. However, at the end of the day, it's the broader public that we want to engage with. So, I really don't know what the best answer is -- except that it is a good idea to try and be conversant in orthodox Marxism, modern economics, etc., and not to reject others on the basis of terminological preference. Julio _ MSN Amor: busca tu ½ naranja http://latino.msn.com/autos/
Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)
Wasn't Marx proud that his understanding of surplus value helped to elucidate the nature of exploitation in ways that conventional measures would not? On Thu, Dec 04, 2003 at 04:14:55PM -0500, Doug Henwood wrote: As I've said before, and never been convinced to the contrary, I don't see how the intelligent use of bourgeois stats and categories doesn't accomplish the same task. Unless you're trying to make the argument that rising OCC = FROP = system collapses as profits go to 0. But no one makes that anymore, right? Doug -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
USA humbled
Bush's withdrawal of protective steel tariffs looks a significant defeat, a signal about the real balance of power, which is not overwhelmingly in favour of the USA. Or does it look differently to the west of the Atlantic? Or is it largely invisible? Chris Burford London
Re: USA humbled
Looks like defeat to me. The local rags arent' giving it much spin or headlines...except to offer the consolation that the tarriffs were there to offer the steel industry time to retool and reinvent themselves...that this work was largely doneso now US steel is newly competitive and tarriffs aren't needed anymore. Right, Joanna Chris Burford wrote: Bush's withdrawal of protective steel tariffs looks a significant defeat, a signal about the real balance of power, which is not overwhelmingly in favour of the USA. Or does it look differently to the west of the Atlantic? Or is it largely invisible? Chris Burford London
Re: mileage aka my irrelevant post for the day
what's bottom quoting? joanna
Re: college students again and a question
So, I really don't know what the best answer is -- except that it is a good idea to try and be conversant in orthodox Marxism, modern economics, etc., and not to reject others on the basis of terminological preference. Julio I don't know what exactly you mean by modern economics Julio but if it is what is currently being taught at the main stream universities, I have no objection to learning that and indeed it is easier for me to learn that since it is quite (pseudeo-)mathematical. And, I am doing just that. But I don't think the difference is a matter of terminological preference. I am sure most of my Marxian friends will not like to hear this, but the difference is ideological. Both are belief systems, in my view. For example, I am not as deeply in love with Marxian theory of value as Jurriaan is, nor I am as deeply in love with contract theory as who knows whom? All theories are based on assumptions, including mathematics. Like, if you reject the Axiom of Choice or, equivalently, Zorn's Lemma, much of mathematical analysis, and everything else that goes with it, collapses. Life is about choices in my view, or beliefs if you like. Best, Sabri
Title correction: Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)
The above should have been the title of my previous post. Sabri
Re: unproductive expenditures and surplus-value
James Devine wrote:
I don't understand this. Why should the wages salaries of
unproductive labor-power (U) be included as part of surplus-value
(S)? didn't Marx once say that S corresponded to
profits+interest+rent (with the latter being phenomenal forms of the
former)? that excludes U.
from the point of view of the capitalist class, isn't U part of
_costs_? is it possible for the capitalists to accumulate based on
U? or must they accumulate based on S, net of U? If they can't use U
for accumulation (any more than they can use the wages salaries of
productive labor-power for accumulation), why not focus on S, net of
U?
This, essentially, is exactly Marx's position:
The general law is, that all those expenses of circulation which only
arise from changes of form of commodities add no value to the latter.
They are merely expenses required for the realization of value or for
its conversion from one form into another. The capital laid out for
these expenses (including the labor employed by it) belongs to the
*faux frais* [unproductive but necessary expenses] of capitalist
production. Its replenishment must be carried out from the {gross}surplus-
product and forms, from the point of view of the entire capitalist
class, a deduction from the {gross}surplus-value or surplus-product,
just as, for a laborer, the time required for the purchase of his
means of
subsistence is lost time. (v.II, p.143)
and
These costs form additional capital, but they produce no
surplus-value. They must be made good out of the value of
the commodities. For a portion of the value of the commodities
must once more be converted into these circulation costs; and no
additional surplus-value is created thereby. So far as this concerns
the total capital of society it means that a portion of it must be
set aside for secondary operations which are no part of the process
of creating value, and that this portion of the social capital must
be continually reproduced for this purpose...the additional value,
which the merchant adds to the commodities by his expenses,
resolves itself into an addition of previously existing values.
(v.III. pp. 343-345)
Since addition of previously existing values is precisely
the way in which constant capital transfers value to the
product, it is clear that Marx regards the capital laid out
for unproductive but necessary labor as part of the circulating
portion of constant capital.
Fred Moseley has argued that the changes in the Marxian rate of
profit (measured counting U in the numerator) helps us understand
changes in the conventional rate of profit (with U as part of
costs). That makes more sense to me (on the abstract level). But, in
the end, isn't it the conventional rate of profit (CRP) that's
important to the laws of motion of capitalism? and in the
determination of the CRP, isn't the mathematical role of U _exactly
the same as_ the mathematical role of the wages salaries of
_productive_ labor-power (V)?
Put in a different way, it's often assumed that (all else constant),
surplus-value production is proportional to V, i.e., S/V = s'.
Thus, if U/V rises, all else equal, the rate of profit falls, since
S/(V + U) = s'/(1 + U/V) falls.
But why can't s' rise to accomodate the rise in U/V? In fact,
Moseley and others who measure U and count it as part of
surplus-value show that S/V does rise rather than being constant. So
the rate of profit need not fall as a result of the rising U/V. In
other words, why not assume, for example, that S/(V + U) is constant
(as a first approximation)?
Marx's answer is that fixed constant capital can and does tend
to rise without limit, but employed productive labor-power is
limited both by the available labor force and by the strength of
the working class which, by constantly pressing for a reduction
in the workday or workweek, tends historically to reduce the
total productive labor-time, from which surplus-value takes the
form of a deduction. Thus fixed capital must historically tend
to grow faster than relative surplus-value.
Shane Mage
When we read on a printed page the doctrine of Pythagoras that all
things are made of numbers, it seems mystical, mystifying, even
downright silly.
When we read on a computer screen the doctrine of Pythagoras that
all things are made of numbers, it seems self-evidently true. (N.
Weiner)
Re: college students again and a question
For example, I am not as deeply in love with Marxian theory of value as Jurriaan is, nor I am as deeply in love with contract theory as who knows whom? It makes absolutely no sense for a socialist to be in love with a theory, because a theory is only a means to an end. The only thing I can personally be in love with in this sense is sustainable human progress at the fastest pace possible for me. From my personal point of view, your pattern of choices is just weird, but then, you could say the same for me I guess. While you're at it, why don't you sort out Arnold's accounting problem, so that we can get on with more interesting stories. J.
Thailand: new, improved dirigisme
[Far Eastern Economic Review] When Business And Politics Mix Former telecommunications tycoon Thaksin Shinawatra has used his great popularity to pursue a variety of business-friendly policies. But critics say that the appearance is growing of policies that favour friends and family By Shawn W. Crispin/BANGKOK Issue cover-dated December 11, 2003 THAI PRIME MINISTER Thaksin Shinawatra vowed to bring CEO-style management to government upon winning office in early 2001. Now, almost three years into the tycoon-turned-politician's term, the line between big business and government has, indeed, blurred. But not necessarily by instilling a sense of corporate efficiency to the business of government, as candidate Thaksin promised. Thaksin has pursued expansionary economic policies and easy credit to revive Thai businesses, pump up the stockmarket and set a new property boom in motion. The resulting surge in growth has put Thailand back on foreign investors' radar screens, helping drive the Stock Exchange of Thailand up as much as 85% since January. That economic success has earned Thaksin unprecedented political popularity, and most political analysts believe that he and his Thai Rak Thai party will score another huge victory during upcoming general elections, which must be called by January 2005. But the way in which Thaksin appears to be using that strong mandate is worrying to some. They believe that the closer ties he has encouraged between big business and politics often create the appearance of conflicts of interest. At the same time, Thaksin has vigorously suppressed criticism of his government, pressuring opposition politicians and democracy groups with the threat of libel suits, and manoeuvring to win favourable press with the offer of advertising from state enterprises and politically connected private companies. Such moves are prompting critical comparisons between Thaksin's administration and one-party-dominant governments in Malaysia and Singapore. Former prime ministers Mahathir Mohammad of Malaysia and Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore used democratic mandates to tame the press, quash political opposition and direct economic development. The stronger [Thaksin] gets, the more he sees the interests of the Thai people as one and the same with the interests of his friends' and family's growing business empires, says Sirichoke Sopha, a member of parliament for the opposition Democrat Party. Thaksin's cabinet includes several former leaders of big businesses. While the Thai constitution required them to personally divest all holdings when they entered government, their families have retained interests in everything from entertainment and media to finance and telecoms. For example, while Education Minister Adisai Bodharamik, founder of telecoms firm Jasmine International, no longer has a personal stake in the company, his family still owns a majority stake. Deputy Interior Minister Pracha Maleenont's family owns BEC World, Thailand's biggest multimedia company. Thaksin and his supporters argue that business-minded politicians can better manage the economy than the career politicians in the previous Democrat Party-led government. They have recent performance on their side. Thailand is on track to grow 6.4% this year and Thaksin predicts the economy will grow 8% next year and 10% in 2005. With a high tide, all boats rise, says Suranand Vejjajiva, spokesman for Thai Rak Thai. Our government has opened opportunities for many people, like [small and medium-sized enterprises] and farmers. He notes that it isn't just big business that benefits from the strong economy. Still, some opposition politicians and democracy groups are crying foul about what they perceive to be increasing conflicts inherent in cosy ties between public and private interests. They point to the recent move by Thaksin's family, which mainly consists of ownership by his wife and son, into the residential-property market, a sector which Thaksin's government has supported with an array of incentives for developers and buyers. As a result, new housing purchases are expected to grow 30% this year, an upbeat trend that the family hopes will benefit its SC Asset Co. The family-controlled Shin Corp.'s recent joint venture with AirAsia to establish Thailand's first budget airline is cited as another potential conflict of interest. Earlier this year, Thaksin unveiled plans to transform the northern city of Chiang Mai, in his home province, into a regional aviation hub. AirAsia intends to use Chiang Mai as a base for flights into China. Meanwhile, Shin Satellite, another company in which Thaksin's family holds a majority stake, recently won an eight-year tax holiday worth 16 billion baht ($401.5 million) for its soon-to-be-launched IPSTAR broadband satellite system from Thailand's Board of Investment. The tax break raised eyebrows because it represented the first time the state agency, historically charged with attracting foreign investment,
Britain: bribery du jour
BAE accused of hiding cash paid to win deals David Leigh and Rob Evans report on allegations based on Swiss bank records which, it is claimed, show how Britain's biggest arms firm conceals the sums it pays out to seal contracts Friday December 5, 2003 The Guardian Britain's biggest arms company stands accused of running an international system of secret commission payments, using Swiss banks and a tiny island in the Caribbean. The allegations, by sources involved in the transactions, are based on Swiss bank records. These normally closely-guarded documents have emerged following long-running controversies over BAE Systems' arms sales and the frequent allegations of corruption which surround them. BAE denies any illegality or wrongdoing. The banking files, along with BAE internal records, reveal, it is claimed, the system by which a public company has removed its fingerprints from covert payments round the world. BAE funnels cash to agents to persuade foreign officials to buy its planes. Key documents are alleged to be hidden beyond British jurisdiction in a Swiss lawyers' vault. The cash's origin is said to be rendered invisible once it has passed through offshore companies. BAE is accused of using British Virgin Island entities with such exotic names as Red Diamond Trading to distance itself from the transactions. One commission agent told the Guardian: I've worked for a lot of aircraft companies, but BAE is the only one with such an institutionalised system. Another said as long ago as the 1980s, he had to fly to Geneva to sign secret deals on arms sales to India. A third source, an employee of a BAE sub-contractor, described how in 1994 Saudi commissions were routed through BVI front companies. But he did not have access to documents. One of the peculiarities of the files we have seen is that they appear to show the same agent getting two parallel contracts. One is an open contract, signed in London for straightforward payments at a modest commission rate. But the second is a covert agreement, signed and hidden in Switzerland, for much larger sums, alleged to be paid through BAE's secret offshore channel. When the Guardian put these allegations to BAE, they said: In pursuit of its legitimate business goals, BAE Systems pays people for lawful activities to accomplish what they have been hired to do. The firm did not answer the allega tion that it was using secret offshore companies to achieve its ends. We also asked: · Why does BAE's relationship with entities such as Red Diamond Trading not appear in the company published accounts? · How is this consistent with UK company law? · How is concealed transfer of such funds consistent with UK financial regulations? · Why are BAE's agreements lodged outside UK jurisdiction? The company replied: BAE Systems rigorously complies with the laws of the UK and the laws of the countries in which it operates. BAE Systems denies any allegations of wrongdoing. The heart of BAE's worldwide cash machine is a suite of high-security offices at Warwick House in Farnborough, where the company's airfield dominates the Hampshire town. The head of the HQ marketing services department there is Andrew Fletcher. His predecessor was a long-serving BAE executive, Hugh Dickinson. Mr Fletcher refused to speak to the Guardian. But when the allegations were put to Mr Dickinson, he agreed: Yes, my name's on all the documents. BAE did not comment on the claim that the system was fully authorised by their board, chaired by Sir Dick Evans. According to our sources, when secret payments were organised, a confidential agency agreement would be drawn up with a single copy. The head of marketing services, or sometimes his assistant, would fly to Geneva with the document. It is claimed some signings took place in the 1990s at the offices of a Swiss private bank, Lombard Odier, which kept the single copy of each agreement. The parties were never allowed access to it without the other being present. Lombard Odier, like other secretive Swiss banks, has run into past controversy. Funds from the late president Marcos of the Philippines were among those which turned up there. Around 1997, documents suggest that BAE changed its system. Files from Farnborough say that the new custodian was to be a firm of Geneva lawyers, Rene Merkt and Associates. Three officials were given access: Rene Merkt himself, Jacques Merkt and Cyril Abecassis. A former BAE executive described to us how a special vault was constructed, and swept by security men for bugs before the secret files were driven there in a BAE van. Contacted in Geneva, Mr Abecassis refused to comment on behalf of the law firm. In one set of transactions, the documents show $50,000 (£29,000) being transferred by BAE's marketing services organisation in London to accounts belonging to Red Diamond Trading Limited and then on to the agents. The payments continued into this year. Red Diamond was set up in 1998 in the BVI by a
Re: Questions about California Budget Crisis query
The most obvious question would be how the pain from the cuts will be distributed. The state university system will cut enrollment to make the budget cuts work, but you can imagine who will be left out in to cold. In terms of disabilities, you might ask what expendiures they will make that will help the state to take advantage of the productive potential of the disabled. On Wed, Dec 03, 2003 at 10:11:45PM -0800, Doyle Saylor wrote: Hello All, Our radio program, Pushing Limits, is going to feature two budget analysts on the Schwarzenegger budget. However, our collective's budget expert is going out of town and can't co-host that night. So I thought I would ask for some economic help from Pen-L. What would you ask these people? They are pretty knowledgeable. We have a 30 minute program. So we have to pack a lot into a short time. Any help would be appreciated. thanks, Doyle -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: mileage aka my irrelevant post for the day
joanna bujes wrote: what's bottom quoting? quoting the message you are responding to at the bottom of your message, rather than responding after it. the worst form of bottom quoting is the one where someone quotes a 300 line post and on top of it adds me too or i disagree or some such one-liner. there are some cases where bottom quoting is valid, such as when you wish to enclose the message you are responding to, purely for reference. apart from that, imho, if you are responding to points raised in a post, you break your response up into chunks with the text your are responding to, followed by your response. example: on 13th january, 2003 joanna bujes wrote: i think george bush is quite a hottie. he has beautiful eyes. what you must be nuts! the guy squints!!! and he has a nice butt too! perhaps you are still referring to his head that is stuck up in there? --ravi ;-)
Re: college students again and a question
While you're at it, why don't you sort out Arnold's accounting problem, so that we can get on with more interesting stories. J. Hi J., I will respond to you in a language you seem to understand best. I don't give a fucking shit to Arnold's accounting problems or to you. You called for it, so don't blame me. Not best, S.
Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)
On Thu, 4 Dec 2003, Doug Henwood wrote: g kohler wrote: Concerning the Somel - Parmaksiz (based on ShaikhTonak) difference of estimates about Turkey - dont know. But regarding estimates of SV USA, Moseleys book compares his estimates with those of other authors. All of these authors measured the same theoretical concept (SV). But the estimates diverged considerably. One of the reasons was that other authors stayed closer to the statistical categories of the GDP accounting system, whereas Moseley re-cast the data into authentic Marxian categories. And the intellectual/political payoff for this authenticity is? Doug A different understanding of the causes of the decline of the rate of profit in the postwar US economy, and of the reasons for its only partial recovery, in spite of two decades of wage cuts, speed-up, etc.
Re: USA humbled
it's a defeat in that Bush had to choose between losing votes in states that would be slammed by the EU (and also the possibility of a true trade war) and losing votes in the states whose steel industries are no longer protected. But the US industries that use steel are going to gain. Jim Looks like defeat to me. The local rags arent' giving it much spin or headlines...except to offer the consolation that the tarriffs were there to offer the steel industry time to retool and reinvent themselves...that this work was largely doneso now US steel is newly competitive and tarriffs aren't needed anymore. Right, Joanna
Re: Estimating the surplus - Turkey (Cem Somel)
Michael Perelman wrote: Wasn't Marx proud that his understanding of surplus value helped to elucidate the nature of exploitation in ways that conventional measures would not? That's a political/sociological point. Trying to quantify it reminds me of Hayek's Prices Production. Doug
Re: Estimating the surplus\Doug's question
Sorry, Doug, but too many conversations are going on at the same time on this. I think Tonak was making a different point. But, here's my foolish quick late night try (foolish since this is stuff you know well and I am just I taking the bait to find out to which element of these breakdowns you SPECIFICALLY object). No doubt to the amusement of the list at my expense :)- 1) Its not just Marxist but a Marxist Classical concept: investment drives the economy; expectation of future profit drives investment; current profit rates *help* drive those expectations (all this in the 'long run'). Hence the big focus on profit rates. Bourgeois categories (as you put it) just don't have the same role for profit (to be picky, they haven't got profit at all in the 'perfect market' model). Depending on the flavor of neoclassical economics the long run is driven by (disembodied) technical change/population growth and blah blah. 2) BUT to be a mechanic you need to know what's under the hood. e.g. is the profit rate rising because labor has been squeezed or because of something going on in the physical capital (see #3)? A marxist will measure the labor squeeze in terms of 'surplus value' but any other measure would do (up to this point only!) [digression: Tonak's point was that the other authors were measuring something totally different called 'surplus' which Tonak/Shaikh say is a non-marxist concept, closer maybe to some Ricardian traditions, and a normative, subjective concept about what it should *really* take to produce something. It was this type of calculation that I was asking Tonak about.] So far this is still big tent: Classicals and Marxists together need to recalculate the standard format of the data. Neo-Classicals don't think in terms of labor-capital tradeoffs and don't seek to separate the components of the profit rate into labor vs capital and since N.C.s predominate the NIPA doesn't calculate in ways others can use. So one has to recalculate and re-categorize the date. [I won't touch the 'bourgeois data' reference. To me, there is data - calculated and categorized in accordance different frameworks, more or less. Or, I go pomo: There is no data in the world.] 3) But then you want to figure out what exactly is going on in the capital side of the equation. So you have to breakdown price effects, productivity (technological improvement), and the simple arithmetical lowering you get by just adding more of the same capital without technological improvement (the OCC issue). Some (neo-marxists?), like the Wolfe article I posted, don't see much in the OCC. But they still need to recalculate the NIPA data to get at all these other issues. [BTW, does anyone know if any serious Marxist EVER did say OCC = FROP = system collapses or was that just a straw man we were taught? Was it always clear that FROP was a tendency that weighs upon other, upward, pushes going on at the same time leading to a dynamic system in struggle? In any event, the point is that again one wants to measure both the tendency and the counter flows to see how the ebb and flow is going and conventional NIPA can't do it.] 4) All of this is for long period analysis. For short period analysis I think most Marxists and Classicals I would be satisfied with *some* version of 'pure' Keyensian (not neo-classical/Keynsian analysis). For this type of analysis the conventional NIPA data works, more or less (even neo-classicals do some customizing though). Am I right that, so far, you have tended to do more of the short period analysis (and damn well) and so maybe haven't felt the need to recalculate the NIPA categories? One CAN string along a series of short period analysis and for a while it is a practical solution for short term policy proposals (some Keynsians, like Paul Davidson, would say forever). But when deep fundamentals change ... aren't YOU going to want these recalculations? Paul At 04:14 PM 12/4/2003 -0500, you wrote: E. Ahmet Tonak wrote: Assuming that we're still interested in changing capitalism, I am. I would argue that Marx's categories help us to understand how the imperatives of profitability and capitalist growth operate, in theory and in practice. That is sufficiently large enough payoff (intellectual or otherwise) for me. As I've said before, and never been convinced to the contrary, I don't see how the intelligent use of bourgeois stats and categories doesn't accomplish the same task. Unless you're trying to make the argument that rising OCC = FROP = system collapses as profits go to 0. But no one makes that anymore, right? Doug
