I wrote:
>it's possible to get disaggregated figures and get rid of the
>software component.
Doug asks:
Why would you want to do that? Software is part of the capital stock,
isn't it? And adding machine, a linotype machine, and a typewriter
would be part of the capital stock; software lets a general-purpose
computer do all those things better than the originals. Is it the
noncorporeality that's the problem?
I reply:
I thought that the phrase "if one wants to" was implicit at the end of the sentence, given the context (a reply to Michael Perelman). I agree that _in theory_ software is part of the "capital stock" (a labor-produced means of production) but in practice its rate of depreciation is so high that it shouldn't be counted as part of the fixed capital stock. Anyway, it depends on what one's purpose is. It makes sense to do calculations with and without software included, in order to do sensitivity analysis (i.e., to see if the results change).
Jim
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