[OPE-L:3563] Re: RE: Re: RE: money-capital as initial givens

[Paul Cockshott <wpc@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 00:58 05/07/00 +0100, you wrote:
> Fred.
> My point is that the scale of what capitalists earn will vary with the
> amount of money put forward at the start of the M-C-M' circuit.  And since
> you agree that M can be expanded from credit then the scale of M' is driven
> by what what capitalists spend (M) as initial outlays.  What they spend is
> not constrained by what they earn, it is only constrained by credit
> arrangements. In this sense they earn what they spend. Regardless of the
> volume of surplus labour produced in the previous period they can expand
> their money spending in accordance with how much can be borrowed. The volume
> of surplus labour is therefore driven by the initial money spend.
>
> Am not sure if I am articulating this well, but I think if you view
> capitalism as a monetary production economy then this way of reasoning
> follows logically.  Viewing surplus labour as the starting point, as if it
> was some sort of virtual bank holding labour units, is akin I think to a
> corn model in which the farmer holds corn units.
>
> Yours comradely, Andrew.

Andrew, I am not sure that you should imply any opposition between
Marx and Kalecki on this. I think that Kalecki's dynamic equations are
derived from a reading of chapter 20 part 5 of volume 2 of capital, where
Marx makes essentially the same point. The argument is implicit
throughout this section but is brought out clearly in the paragraph:

> So far as the entire capitalist class is concerned, the proposition
> that it must itself throw into circulation the money required for the
> realisation of its surplus-value (correspondingly also for the
> circulation of its capital, constant and variable) not only fails to appear
> paradoxical, but stands forth as a necessary condition of the
> entire mechanism. For there are here only two classes: the working-class
> disposing only of its labour-power, and the capitalist class,
> which has a monopoly of the social means of production and money. It would
> rather be a paradox if the working-class were to advance in the
> first instance from its own resources the money required for the
> realisation of the surplus-value contained in the commodities.
> But the individual capitalist makes this advance only by acting as a buyer,
> expending money in the purchase of articles of consumption or
> advancing money in the purchase of elements of his productive capital,
> whether of labour-power or means of production. He never parts
> with his money unless he gets an equivalent for it. He advances money
> to the circulation only in the same way as he advances commodities
> to it. He acts in both instances as the initial point of their circulation.

This is basically Kalecki's point. I am not sure whether Marx fully
realised the implications of this for dynamics, or even for the general
explanation for the existence of profit, but even now, I dont think
anyone has clearly explained the interrelation between Kalecki's
equations for the determination of profit, and the production of
surplus value.