Marx and Keynes on unemployment

[sardoni@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Claudio Sardoni)]

>Ajit says: I agree with Bill. In the next posting Claudio went on to say that
>since accumulation implies investment and future expectation etc., you *have*
>to bring in money. But we are basically making a theoretical point. Let us
>suppose there is no uncertaintly about future etc. If Caludio's point is true,
>then tell me what is the logical flaw in Ricardo's chapter on machinery or how
>his argument necessarily rest on the special status of money in the theory?
Ricardo on machinery gave some important and interesting insights but his
analysis inb chapter 31 cannot be ragarded as a satisfactory explanation of
the capitalist process of accumulation. After all Ricardo fails to provide
us with an analysis of what happens in the process from a lower to a higher
K/L ratio. He gives us only the likely results of that process. My point is
that in order to provide a fullfledged analysis of the process, Ricardo,
like any other, needs money and, hence, effective demand. What does it
happen, in the socalled "short period", when workers are expelled from the
industries where more cpital intensive investment is being made? What does
it happen to aggregate demand? Marx, in the second volume of the Theories of
surplus value, tried to give an answer along these lines. The volume is
almost entirely concerned with a critique of Ricardo.
Claudio Sardoni
Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche
telephone +39-6-44284 231 fax +39-6-4404 572