Post-Keynesian

Some of these should have been more impacted: Macroeconomics: Measures of Total Factor Productivity, every model with an aggregate production function, and a belief that business cycles are to be explained by sticky or rigid prices or other imperfections are all shown to be questionable. Marxist economics: Steedman's Marx after Sraffa made a splash, with many writing afterwards. Lately, I've read a bit of Riccardo Bellofiore, but a bibliography here could go on and on. Monetary...

Figure 1: Factor Wage Curves For Feasible Techniques There are 12 coefficients that can be varied in my minimum multisector model in which production in all sectors can require both fixed and circulating capital. I do not think I am being very orderly in exploring this twelve-dimensional space. This is a fluke case in which the maximum rate of profits is zero for both the Alpha and the Beta techniques. If only new machines are used as means of production in producing new machines and in...

Figure 1: Variation of Choice Of Technique with a Coefficient of Production This post continues the analysis of this example. The coefficients of production and the techniques are the same as in the linked post, except here I consider the results of varying a1, 2, the amount of corn needed as circulating capital in operating Process II at unit level. Figure 1 above shows how the choice of technique varies with this parameter. This is a two-sector model, in which new machines and corn are...

I have been reading Noah Smith, off and on, for years. He has expressed scepticism about the obvious unrealism of macroeconomics, but I have not found him knowledgaable about heterodox economics. Noah Smith claims to have a view on the Cambridge Capital Controversy. He is asked, "Is there someplace that help me learn Sraffa? The stuff I've read from him is interesting, but is often difficult conceptually." His response is, "Just read Sraffa." And he is asked, "Which side are you on re...

Figure 1: A Wage Frontier1.0 Introduction This post presents a numberic example of a non-interlocked system with fixed capital and no superimposed joint production. This seems to be the minimum multiple-sector model: Of the production of commodities by means of comodities With both circulating and fixed capital, In which the fixed capital consists of machines of non-constant efficiency with a physical lifetime of more than one period. This is a step in my research agenda of exploring...

[embedded content]Seminar I finally watched Production of Commodities at 60. Our host and moderator is Matias Vernengo. Seminar participants are Franklin Serrano, Antonella Palumbo, and Ed Nell, who present in that order. They take questions at the end. I cannot recall who made these points; they generally agreed. But here are some I noted. Sraffa is not only about an internal critique of marginalist theory, but a setting out of an alternative theory. This is a rediscovery of the...

This post presents a limited account of the history of analyzing prices of production with non-uniform rates of profits. I start from developments in post Sraffian price theory. D’Agata (2018) and Zambelli (2018b) have argued that Sraffian prices of production can still be defined when rates of profits have regular and persistent variations among industries. Barriers to entry or idiosyncratic properties of investment can result in such variations. Steedman (1981) presents the first...

The 2020 "Nobel Prize" in economics goes to Paul Milgrom and Robert Wilson. I suppose it is nice that economists acknowledge that markets are not natural entities but need to be constructed. For example, consider the Federal Communications Commission auction of the microwave spectrum. The 2012 "Nobel Prize" went to Alvin Roth and Lloyd Shapley. The 1996 "Nobel Prize", to William Vickrey (a Post Keynesian, by the way) was also for acution theory. The 2002 prize went to Daniel Kahneman and...

Figure 1: Prices of Production1.0 Introduction This post presents a new kind of fluke case in the analysis of the choice of technique, at least new to me. I call this a pattern for requirements for use, and it can arise only in a case of joint production. My graphs in this post have some incomprehensible notation, since I am currently exploring perturbing parameters, in line with my research agenda. I know that perturbing the requirements for use removes the indeterminancy in this example....

This is C27 in Sraffas archives. 97 Fortis Green London N2 Tudor 0214 6th August 1966 Dear Piero, I do not know whether you know Roger Simon, who is Secretary of the Labour Research Department. At all events he is a great admirer and enthusiast of Gramsci. Thanks to his initiative, plans are afoot (in which I too am collaborating) to publish a new volume of Gramsci's works translated into English and Lawrence & Wishart have agreed, in principle, to undertake publication. We...