Tag Archives: Sraffa Effects

This blog, over years, presents a welter of fluke cases. I created many of the numerical examples to illustrate the reswitching of techniques, capital reversing, or some such so-called 'perversity'. Fluke cases can be combined. For example, a fluke switch point at a rate of profits of zero can also be a fluke switch point at which three wage curves intersect. Or two switch points on the wage frontier can both be fluke switch points at which four wage curves, not necessarily the same,...

Figure 1: A Pattern Diagram1.0 Introduction Aside, perhaps from the above visualization, nothing novel is presented in this post. It follows an example presented by Freni (1991). I know of this example from problems 7.7 and 7.29 in Kurz and Salvadori (1995). The oddities of this example can be seen in an earlier and more complicated example from D'Agata (1983). This is an example of intensive rent. When the requirements for use are large enough, capitalists will use more than one process...

Figure 1: Wage Curves and Rent1.0 Introduction I might as well illustrate an example with extensive rent and reswitching. I find it incredible that the agents in these sorts of models understand the implications of, say, a variation of the distribution of income for their self-interests. Nevertheless, I try to note the consequences of variation in the distribution of income and perturbations of model parameters on prices of production. And I do not worry too much about disequilibria. 2.0...

Figure 1: Wage Curves for Fluke Case for r-Order of Fertility1.0 Introduction This post illustrates two fluke cases that can arise in a model with land and extensive rent. I call these a pattern of switch points for the r-order of fertility and a pattern of switch points for the w- order of fertility. I have previously described a fluke case in the order of rentability, which can be either over the wage axis or over the axis for the rate of profits. These fluke cases can arise in an...

Figure 1: A Partition of a Slice of the Parameter Space1.0 Introduction This post presents another example from Woods (1990). It is a modification of this example. That previous example demonstrates that the order of fertility - the order in which lands of various types and that support different processes of production are taken into cultivation - varies with distribution. If the wage were different, the order of fertility could be different. Furthermore, the order of rentability - the...

Figure 1: A Partition of a Slice of the Parameter Space1.0 Introduction This post tells a story in which owners of a certain type of land find the amount of their land needed to produce net output declines. Wages stay constant, and the rent for some landlords increases. This example is generalized from Woods (1990). 2.0 Technology This an example (Table 1) of a capitalist economy in which two commodities, iron and corn, are produced. One process is known for producing iron. In the iron...

Figure 1: Switch Points Varying With Perturbations In Markup In Iron Industry I have created an example with three produced commodities and a choice of technique. The three produced commodities are called iron, steel, and corn. Corn is taken to be the numeraire and the only commodity purchased by households for consumption. Markups are assumed to vary among industries, even when prices of production prevail. I was able to locate various fluke switch points in that example. The fluke switch...

Figure 1: Variation of Switch Points with the Markup in the Steel Industry1.0 Introduction I want to continue to analyze this example. This example does not do everything I would like with a three-commodity example. Specifically, I do not have a case of triple-switching in the parameter space I explore in this post. That space of relative markups, in a model with n industries, has (n - 1) dimensions. And it is partitioned by (n - 2)-dimensional manifolds, where each manifold corresponds to...

Figure 1: Wage Curves for the Example1.0 Introduction The Cambridge Capital Controversy (CCC) applies to models both of competitive industries and of non-competitive industries. Around a switch point exhibiting capital-reversing, a higher wage is associated with greater employment per unit of net output produced. It is not merely a question of what technology is available. It is also a matter of the power of firms among industries to extract value from their workers, their upstream...

I have a working paper at the Centro Sraffa. Abstract: This article considers structural economic dynamics, in models with fixed capital and a choice of technique, of the production of commodities. Fluke switch points are described and cataloged. For fluke switch points, parameter perturbations create a qualitative change in how the choice of technique varies with distribution. Techniques are presented for visualizing partitions of parameter spaces such that the analysis of the choice of...