On this 200th anniversary of Karl Marx’s entry into the world there have been a lot of summings up. Inspired by Brad DeLong, who posted slides from his lectures on Marx and Marxism, here are mine in the form of two Google Doc files, Historical Materialism and Marxist Economics. They were the basis of a pair of lectures I gave last winter. If it seems like there are way too many of them it’s because a lecture period at Evergreen can run as long as three hours.*
*Yes, I know students aren’t supposed to retain much after about 20 minutes, but I break up the lectures into chunks, classes are small, and we have lots of discussion. That could just be my ideology speaking, of course.
5 comments:
Thanks for posting the slides to your lectures, Prof. Dorman.
If possible I'd appreciate more information about the subjects you treat in slides 21, 22, and 23 of "Marxist Economics and the Critique of Capitalism".
Where, for instance, can I read about the mistake Marx made in his algebra? That's the main point of Slide #21.
Very importantly, as I had a limited education, is there a "Okishio Theorem for Dummies" kind of exposition a guy like me could find accessible? Lecture notes, a chapter from a book for freshmen, something like that. (Slide #22)
Can you explain in more details what you write in slide #23? I'm thinking particularly on these three sentences:
(1) Marx didn’t think markets had any fundamental effects on the economy.
(2) He didn’t think there was any general relationship between use value (benefit) and exchange value (price).
(3) He never engaged with Adam Smith’s invisible hand argument.
Hi Magpie. (I'm in Europe at the moment and enjoying the magpies.) I purposely leave out lots of detail in the slides; they're mainly for helping students get the structure of the lecture as it's proceeding. Behind each line is one or more paragraphs of explanation, examples, referencing hedging, etc. In other words, many more words than I will put up now.
1. The general name for the literature that addresses Marx's algebraic snafu is The Transformation Problem. The issue was first noticed by Bohm-Bawerk in the late 19th century; Okishio proved the technical change - profit relationship from a set of assumptions. Since then the debate has been about those assumptions. The most influential modern treatment (but by no means the last word) is Steedman's Marx after Sraffa. You'll need some linear algebra to follow it. To my knowledge, no one has put together a non-algebraic exposition, although this would not be very hard to do. If any readers are still following this and know of such a thing, please chime in.
2. (a) Marx's analysis attempts to be purely structural -- how capitalism has to function irrespective of market ups and downs. The example I give in class is a game of musical chairs, where who grabs a chair when the music stops is like succeeding in the market. But there are fewer chairs than players.
(b) That appears to be correct. I've read the three volumes of Capital, admittedly not Theories of Surplus Value (his raw notes), but I haven't seen any indication he recognized a general relationship between use value and price. That in turn would be a justification for proposing comprehensive planning as a feature of socialism. If readers can cite passages to the contrary, I'd be grateful.
(c) Same as (b). To be fair, the hijacking of "invisible hand" for the purpose of saying private interest leads to public benefit had not established itself in Marx's time. My chief illustration, based on my own research, is the failure of Marx to address Smith's argument about compensating wage differentials (an application of the invisible hand) in the context of dangerous working conditions. I found that a striking omission, since Smith's hypothesis was often used in court to deny injured workers' claims against their employers: they were paid extra once to accept the risk, so why should they be paid extra again to suffer it? I have a longer discussion in my book Markets and Mortality.
Many thanks for your kind reply, Prof. Dorman. I hope you have a nice stay.
Behind each line is one or more paragraphs of explanation, examples, referencing hedging, etc. In other words, many more words than I will put up now.
I've downloaded both sets (PDF format) but the only thing I got was the slides. Maybe something went wrong?
1. The general name for the literature that addresses Marx's algebraic snafu is The Transformation Problem. The issue was first noticed by Bohm-Bawerk in the late 19th century; (...)
That much I do know, thanks. I think you are referring to what some call Neo-Ricardians. Are you aware of the work of others, perhaps more obscure, within and without the Neo-Ricardians, who have replied to that literature?
2. (a) Marx's analysis attempts to be purely structural -- how capitalism has to function irrespective of market ups and downs. (...)
Would it be mistaken if I sum up that like this: Marx's analysis (and that of the nineteenth century political economists) was a long-run analysis, as opposed to the focus more modern economists put on short-run market fluctuations?
(b) That appears to be correct. (...) I haven't seen any indication he recognized a general relationship between use value and price. That in turn would be a justification for proposing comprehensive planning as a feature of socialism.
I agree. But I've seen other critics claiming otherwise, thus my interest in your views.
(c) Same as (b). To be fair, the hijacking of "invisible hand" for the purpose of saying private interest leads to public benefit had not established itself in Marx's time.
I take it you mean "Same as (a)", but I think I don't quite understand.
Maybe the "invisible hand" wasn't commonly adopted back then to explain all the virtues of free-markets, but even without that specific invocation there were many back then who still said private interest leads to public benefit, using all sorts of arguments. Not unlike in our own days.
As a matter of fact, Marx has been criticised for being excessively harsh with them.
Nothing wrong with the slides. Everything that's missing in them is in the lectures. You had to be there....
1. Some Marxists have argued for assumptions regarding wages that restore the tendency of the rate of profit to fall. And it's true; if you make the "right" assumptions, you can get Marx's "mother of all contradictions" back. I regard this as a sterile debate. Once you accept that the profit rate can either rise or fall depending on what happens with wages, it becomes an empirical matter. The profit rate has been just dandy recently, thank you.
2. Again, I have not seen this in Marx. If someone can cite passages where he made the demand-side argument about prices (which we associate with marginal utility theory), I'll be happy to change my mind.
3. I did mean "same as 2", since it's about what I haven't seen in Marx, not what I have. And ultimately 2 and 3 are the same. The bit about compensating wage differentials is highly diagnostic for me, since Marx read Smith and other early political economists *very* closely on issues pertaining to working conditions. In fact, if Smith is right, it's a problem for Marx's theory of alienation, as Nozick pointed out: workers would demand extra pay to compensate them for the "disutility" of being alienated. Long ago I argued that, even if Smith is right, it is in the nature of alienation that its burden can't be cancelled out by extra pay.
BTW, no need to call me Prof. We don't have titles in Blogland.
BTW, no need to call me Prof. We don't have titles in Blogland.
Thanks. I find it uncomfortable to refer to others I've never met personally by their first name. I understand others feel different about that. As a compromise, if you prefer, I'll address you as Dorman.
Nothing wrong with the slides. Everything that's missing in them is in the lectures. You had to be there....
I understand.
1. Some Marxists have argued for assumptions regarding wages that restore the tendency of the rate of profit to fall.
So, you do know about others working outside the Neo-Ricardian/Sraffian school.
But I wasn't thinking specifically of Marx's tendency of the profit rate to fall at all or referring in particular to any of those groups working outside or inside the Neo-Ricardian school. My point of view is "ecumenical", if you like.
(Incidentally, I understand Marx wasn't the only one to believe in it: there were hints of it in The Wealth of Nations and in Ricardo; even in Keynes' General Theory, come to think of it)
And it's true; if you make the "right" assumptions, you can get Marx's "mother of all contradictions" back. I regard this as a sterile debate. Once you accept that the profit rate can either rise or fall depending on what happens with wages, it becomes an empirical matter. The profit rate has been just dandy recently, thank you.
Indeed, it's an empirical matter. And a profit rate has been dandy recently. But I don't think it's a matter of "right" or "wrong" assumptions, Dorman. Theoretical work in neoclassical economics often involves that, but Marx was no neoclassical economist.
As I see things is more a matter of reading correctly a notoriously difficult-to-read body of work, never finished by its author, who worked in exceedingly difficult circumstances, using on top distinctions (productive/unproductive, for instance) long dismissed.
And I believe it's far from sterile. But I won't insist on that point. De gustibus non est disputandus, I suppose.
3. I did mean "same as 2", since it's about what I haven't seen in Marx, not what I have. And ultimately 2 and 3 are the same. The bit about compensating wage differentials is highly diagnostic for me, since Marx read Smith and other early political economists *very* closely on issues pertaining to working conditions. In fact, if Smith is right, it's a problem for Marx's theory of alienation, as Nozick pointed out: workers would demand extra pay to compensate them for the "disutility" of being alienated. Long ago I argued that, even if Smith is right, it is in the nature of alienation that its burden can't be cancelled out by extra pay.
Well, I'm sure that's an interesting normative point, but I believe we were in agreement that Marx was attempting to make a positive point; a point which was beyond the scope of the ups and downs of markets, yes?
I believe Joan Robinson (one of the contributors referenced in your lectures) once remarked about Marshall changing the question from long-run wealth distribution to something like relative prices of eggs and cups of tea.
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