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{{Short description|Pricing problem in Marxism}} |
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{{About|the transformation problem in economics|the transformation problem in group theory|Conjugacy problem}} |
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{{Multiple issues| |
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{{Marxist theory}} |
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{{more footnotes needed|date=October 2014}} |
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In 20th century discussions of [[Karl Marx]]'s [[Marxian economics|economics]] the '''transformation problem''' is the problem of finding a general rule to transform the "values" of commodities (based on labour according to his [[labour theory of value]]) into the "competitive prices" of the marketplace. This problem was first introduced by Marx himself in Chapter 9 of ''[[Das Kapital|Capital]]'s'' draft Volume III, where he also tried to solve it. The essential difficulty was this: given that he derived profit, in the form of [[surplus value]], from direct labour inputs and that the ratio of direct labour input to capital input varied widely between commodities, how could he reconcile this with tendency to an average rate of profit on all capital invested? |
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{{original research|date=July 2020}} |
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}} |
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{{Marxian economics|expanded=Topics}} |
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In 20th-century discussions of [[Karl Marx]]'s [[Marxian economics|economics]], the '''transformation problem''' is the problem of finding a general rule by which to transform the "values" of commodities (based on their socially necessary labour content, according to his [[labour theory of value]]) into the "competitive prices" of the marketplace. This problem was first introduced by Marxist economist [[Conrad Schmidt (economist)|Conrad Schmidt]]<ref>{{Cite book |last=Böhm-Bawerk |first=Eugen |title=Karl Marx and the Close of his System |year=1896 |publisher=CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform |isbn=978-1466347687 |language=en}}</ref> and later dealt with by Marx in chapter 9 of the draft of [[Capital, Volume III|volume 3 of ''Capital'']]. The essential difficulty was this: given that Marx derived profit, in the form of [[surplus value]], from direct labour inputs, and that the ratio of direct labour input to capital input varied widely between commodities, how could he reconcile this with a tendency toward an average rate of profit on all capital invested among industries, if such a tendency (as predicted by Marx and Ricardo) exists? |
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==Overview== |
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The production of any commodity generally requires both labour and some produced [[means of production]] (or capital goods), like tools and materials. The amount of labour required is called the ''direct'' labour input into the commodity. But the required capital goods have in their turn been produced (in the past) by labour and other capital goods; and so on for these other capital goods, and so on. The sum of all the amounts of labour, that were direct inputs into this backwards-stretching series of capital goods produced in the past, is called the ''indirect'' labour input into the commodity. Summing the direct and indirect labour inputs gives the ''total'' labour input into the commodity, which may also be called the total amount of labour "embodied" in it, or its direct and indirect labour contents. |
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== Marx's theory == |
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According to Volume I, Chapter I of ''Capital'' the Marxian "value" of a commodity is defined as its total amount of embodied labour if it was produced using current production technology, or its [[socially necessary labour time]]. On the other hand, the (relative) "competitive price" of the same commodity is the ratio at which it is exchanged with other commodities in a competitive market system, and this ratio tends to be given by its relative cost of production. The transformation problem, studied by Marx in Chapter 9 of ''Capital's'' Volume III through a set of numerical examples, is the problem of finding the relationship between values and prices in a competitive capitalist economy, or, to put it mathematically, finding a set of functions that transform the ratios between amounts of embodied labour into such relative prices. Marx argued that although there was no relationship between values and prices at the level of the individual enterprise (or "Department" or sector of the economy), the total amounts of production and profit generated in the economy were still equal to the total amounts of labour and surplus labour in the economy. According to Marx, labour intensive sectors redistribute surplus value to capital intensive sectors in order to equalise the rate of profits. |
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Marx defines [[Exchange value|value]] as the number of hours of labor socially necessary to produce a commodity. This includes two elements: First, it includes the hours that a worker of normal skill and dedication would take to produce a commodity under average conditions and with the usual equipment (Marx terms this "living labor"). Second, it includes the labor embodied in raw materials, tools, and machinery used up or worn away during its production (which Marx terms "dead labor"). In capitalism, workers spend a portion of their working day reproducing the value of their means of subsistence, represented as wages (necessary labor), and a portion of their day producing value above and beyond that, referred to as [[surplus value]], which goes to the capitalist (surplus labor). |
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Since, according to Marx, the source of capitalist profit is this [[surplus labor]] of the workers, and since in this theory only new, living labor produces value, it would appear logical that enterprises with a low [[Organic composition of capital|organic composition]] (a higher proportion of capital spent on living labor) would have a higher rate of profit than would enterprises with a high organic composition (a higher proportion of capital spent on raw materials and means of production). However, in models of classical perfect competition, higher rates of profit are not generally found in enterprises with a low organic composition, and low profit rates are not generally found in enterprises with a high organic composition.{{citation needed|date=May 2024}} Instead, there is a tendency toward [[Surplus value#Equalization of rates of surplus value|equalization of the rate of profit]] in industries of different organic compositions. That is, in such models with no barriers to entry, capitalists are free to disinvest or invest in any industry, a tendency exists towards the formation of a general rate of profits, constant across all industries. |
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Many mathematical economists assert that a set of functions in which Marx's equalities hold does ''not'' generally exist at the individual enterprise or aggregate level, so that Chapter 9's transformation problem has no general solution, outside two classes of very special cases. This was first pointed out by, among others, [[Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk|Böhm-Bawerk]] (1896) and [[Ladislaus Bortkiewicz|Bortkiewicz]] (1906). In the second half of the twentieth century, [[Wassily Leontief|Leontief]]’s and [[Piero Sraffa|Sraffa]]’s work on linear production models provided a framework within which to prove this result in a simple and general way. |
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Marx outlined the transformation problem as a theoretical solution to this discrepancy. The tendency of the rate of profit toward equalization means that, in this theory, there is no simple translation from value to money—e.g., ''1 hour of value equals 20 dollars''—that is the same across every sector of the economy. While such a simple translation may hold approximately true in general, Marx postulated that there is an economy-wide, systematic deviation according to the organic compositions of the different industries, such that ''1 hour of value equals 20 dollars times T'', where ''T'' represents a transformation factor that varies according to the organic composition of the industry in consideration. |
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Although he never actually mentioned the transformation problem, Sraffa’s (1960) Chapter VI on the "reduction" of prices to "dated" amounts of current and past embodied labour gave implicitly the first general proof, showing that the competitive price <math>P_i</math> of the <math>i^{-th}</math> produced good can be expressed as |
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In this theory, ''T'' is approximately 1 in industries where the organic composition is close to average, less than 1 in industries where the organic composition is below average, and greater than 1 in industries where the organic composition is higher than average. |
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:<math>P_i = \sum_{n=0}^\infty l_{in} w {(1+r)^n}</math>, |
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where <math>n</math> is the time lag, <math>l_{in}</math> is the lagged-labour input coefficient, <math>w</math> is the wage and <math>r</math> is the "profit" (or net return) rate. Since total embodied labour is defined as |
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:<math>E_i = \sum_{n=0}^\infty l_{in}</math>, |
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it follows from Sraffa’s result that there is generally no function from <math>E_i</math> to <math>P_i</math>, as was made explicit and elaborated upon by later writers, notably [[Neo-Ricardianism|Ian Steedman]] in ''Marx after Sraffa''. |
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A standard reference – with an extensive survey of the entire literature pre-1971 and a comprehensive bibliography – is [[Paul Samuelson|Samuelson]]'s (1971) "Understanding the Marxian Notion of Exploitation: A Summary of the So-Called Transformation Problem Between Marxian Values and Competitive Prices" ''Journal of Economic Literature'' '''9''' 2 399–431. |
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Since the 1970s several major schools of [[Marxian economics]] have arisen in response to the transformation problem-related challenges of the neoclassical and Sraffian schools. [[Analytical Marxists]] accepted that the transformation problem disproved the [[Labour Theory of Value]] and based their Marxian social theory on a combination of the [[Fundamental Marxian theorem]], [[game theory]], and other neoclassical and mathematical tools. Empirical Marxists, including [[Anwar Shaikh (economist)|Anwar Shaikh]], [[Moshe Machover]], and Paul Cockshott, maintain that since empirical data bears out the correspondence of prices and labour values, the transformation problem is irrelevant. Followers of the [[Temporal Single System Interpretation]] and the New Interpretation argue that critics have misunderstood Marx's definition of value and that, correctly defined, there is no difference between value and price. |
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This article uses a very simplified linear production model to survey Marx's [[labour theory of value]], starting from its precursors in British [[classical economics]]. It then offers a simple proof of the general lack of solution for the transformation problem, highlighting Marx's formal error in his attempt to find one. Finally, it summarizes some possible implications of this result, as Marxists and non-Marxists see them. |
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==Implications== |
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The lack of any function to transform Marx's "values" to competitive prices has important implications for Marx's theory of labour [[exploitation]] and [[capital accumulation|economic dynamics]], namely that there is no [[Tendency of the rate of profit to fall]]. This means that it is not pre-ordained that capitalists must exploit labour to compensate for a declining rate of profit. This implies that Marx's prophecy that worsening labour exploitation would result in an eventual revolution against the capitalist system and the establishment of [[communism]] is logically and mathematically false. |
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Because Marx was considering only [[Socially necessary labour time|socially necessary labor]], this variation among industries has nothing to do with higher-paid, skilled labor versus lower-paid, unskilled labor. This transformation factor varies only with respect to the organic compositions of different industries. |
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The mathematical proof that Marx's transformation problem has no general solution has been formally questioned [http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~fmoseley/CRITIQUE.pdf] by proponents of the [[Temporal Single System Interpretation]], who argue that the determination of prices by simultaneous linear equations (which assumes that prices are the same at the start and end of the production period) is logically inconsistent with the determination of value by labour time. Other Marxian economists accept the proof, but reject its relevance for some key elements of Marxian political economy. Still others reject Marxian economics outright, and emphasise the politics of the assumed [[relations of production]] instead. To this extent, the transformation problem—or rather its implications—is still today a controversial question. |
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==British classical |
== British classical labor theory of value == |
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Marx's value theory was developed from the [[ |
Marx's value theory was developed from the [[labor theory of value]] discussed by [[Adam Smith]] and used by many British [[classical economists]]. It became central to his economics. |
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===Simplest case: |
=== Simplest case: labor costs only === |
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Consider the |
Consider the simple example used by Adam Smith to introduce the subject. Assume a hunters’ economy with free land, no slavery, and no significant current production of tools, in which beavers <math>(B)</math> and deer <math>(D)</math> are hunted. In the language of modern [[linear production models]], call the unit labour-input requirement for the production of each good <math>l_i</math>, where <math>i</math> may be <math>B</math> or <math>D</math> (i.e., <math>l_B</math> is the number of hours of uniform labour normally required to catch a beaver, and <math>l_D</math> a deer; notice that we need to assume labour as uniform in order to be able, later on, to use a uniform wage rate). |
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In this case, Smith noticed, each hunter will be willing to exchange one deer (which costs him <math>l_D</math>hours) for <math>{l_D \over l_B}</math> beavers. The ratio <math>{l_D \over l_B}</math>—i.e., the relative quantity of labour embodied in (unit) deer production with respect to beaver production—gives thus the exchange ratio between deer and beavers, the "relative price" of deer in units of beavers. Moreover, since the only costs are here labor costs, this ratio is also the "relative unit cost" of deer for any given competitive uniform wage rate <math>w</math>. Hence the relative quantity of labor embodied in deer production coincides with the ''competitive relative price'' of deer in units of beavers, which can be written as <math>{P_D \over P_B}</math> (where the <math>P</math> stands for absolute competitive prices in some arbitrary unit of account, and are defined as <math>P_i = wl_i</math>). |
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===Capital costs=== |
=== Capital costs === |
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Things |
Things become more complicated if production uses some scarce [[capital good]] as well. Suppose that hunting requires also some arrows <math>(A)</math>, with input coefficients equal to <math>a_i</math>, meaning that to catch, for instance, one beaver you need to use <math>a_B</math> arrows, besides <math>l_B</math> hours of labour. Now the unit total cost (or absolute competitive price) of beavers and deer becomes |
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:<math>P_i = wl_i + k_A a_i , (i = B, D) </math> |
:<math>P_i = wl_i + k_A a_i , (i = B, D) </math> |
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where <math>k_A</math> |
where <math>k_A</math> denotes the capital cost incurred in using each arrow. |
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This capital cost is made up of two parts. First, there is the replacement cost of substituting the arrow when it is lost in production. This is <math>P_A</math>, or the competitive price of the arrows, multiplied by the proportion <math>h \le 1</math> of arrows lost after each shot. Second, there is the net rental or return required by the arrows' owner (who may or may not be the same person as the hunter using it). This can be expressed as the product <math>r P_A</math>, where <math>r</math> is the (uniform) ''net rate of return'' of the system. |
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Summing up, and assuming a uniform replacement rate <math>h</math>, the absolute competitive prices of beavers and deer may be written as |
Summing up, and assuming a uniform replacement rate <math>h</math>, the absolute competitive prices of beavers and deer may be written as |
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:<math>P_i = wl_i + (h + r) P_A a_i</math> |
:<math>P_i = wl_i + (h + r) P_A a_i</math> |
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Yet |
Yet we still have to determine the arrows' competitive price <math>P_A</math>. Assuming arrows are produced by labor only, with <math>l_A</math> man-hours per arrow, we have: |
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:<math>P_A = wl_A</math> |
:<math>P_A = wl_A</math> |
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Assuming further for simplicity <math>h = 1</math> (all arrows are lost after just one shot, so that they are [[circulating capital]]), the absolute competitive prices of beavers and deer become: |
Assuming further, for simplicity, that <math>h = 1</math> (i.e., all arrows are lost after just one shot, so that they are [[circulating capital]]), the absolute competitive prices of beavers and deer become: |
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:<math>P_i = wl_i + (1 + r) wl_A a_i</math> |
:<math>P_i = wl_i + (1 + r) wl_A a_i</math> |
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Here <math>l_i</math> is the |
Here, <math>l_i</math> is the quantity of labor directly embodied in beaver and deer unit production, while <math>l_A a_i</math> is the labor indirectly thus embodied, through previous arrow production. The sum of the two, |
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:<math>E_i = l_i + l_A a_i</math> |
:<math>E_i = l_i + l_A a_i</math>, |
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gives the total |
gives the total quantity of labor embodied. |
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It is now obvious that the relative competitive price of deer <math>{P_D \over P_B}</math> can no longer be generally expressed as the ratio between total amounts of labour embodied. With <math>a_i > 0 </math> the ratio <math>{E_D \over E_B}</math> will correspond to <math>{P_D \over P_B}</math> only in two very special cases: if either <math>r = 0</math>; or, if <math>{l_B \over l_D} = {a_B \over a_D}</math>. In general the two ratios will not only differ: <math>{P_D \over P_B}</math> may change for any given <math>{E_D \over E_B}</math>, if the net rate of return or the wages vary. |
It is now obvious that the relative competitive price of deer <math>{P_D \over P_B}</math> can no longer be generally expressed as the ratio between total amounts of labour embodied. With <math>a_i > 0 </math> the ratio <math>{E_D \over E_B}</math> will correspond to <math>{P_D \over P_B}</math> only in two very special cases: if either <math>r = 0</math>; or, if <math>{l_B \over l_D} = {a_B \over a_D}</math>. In general the two ratios will not only differ: <math>{P_D \over P_B}</math> may change for any given <math>{E_D \over E_B}</math>, if the net rate of return or the wages vary. |
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As it will now be seen, this general lack of any functional relationship |
As it will now be seen, this general lack of any functional relationship between <math>{E_D \over E_B}</math> and <math>{P_D \over P_B}</math>, of which Ricardo had been particularly well aware, is at the heart of Marx's transformation problem. For Marx, r is the quotient of surplus value to the value of capital advanced to non-labor inputs, and is typically positive in a competitive capitalist economy. |
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== |
== Marx's labour theory of value == |
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=== |
=== Surplus value and exploitation === |
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Marx distinguishes between [[labour power]] as the potential to work, and labour, which is its actual use. He describes labour power as a commodity, and like all commodities, Marx assumes that on average it is exchanged at its value. Its value is determined by the value of the quantity of goods required for its reproduction. |
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Marx defined the "value" of [[commodities]] as the total amount of socially necessary labour embodied in their production. He developed this special brand of the labour theory of value in the first Chapter of ''Capital'''s Volume I. Due to the influence of Marx's particular definition of value on the transformation problem, he is quoted at length where he argues as follows: |
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Yet there is a difference between the value of labour power and the value produced by that labour power in its use. Unlike other commodities, in its use, labour power produces new value beyond that used up by its use. This difference is called [[surplus value]] and is for Marx the source of profit for the capitalists. The appropriation of surplus labor is what Marx denoted the exploitation of labour. |
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<blockquote> |
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"Let us take two commodities, e.g., corn and iron. The proportions in which they are exchangeable, whatever those proportions may be, can always be represented by an equation in which a given quantity of corn is equated to some quantity of iron: e.g., 1 quarter corn = x cwt. iron. What does this equation tell us? It tells us that in two different things—in 1 quarter of corn and x cwt. of iron, there exists in equal quantities something common to both. The two things must therefore be equal to a third, which in itself is neither the one nor the other. Each of them, so far as it is exchange value, must therefore be reducible to this third." |
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[…] |
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</blockquote> |
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<blockquote> |
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"This common 'something' cannot be either a geometrical, a chemical, or any other natural property of commodities. Such properties claim our attention only in so far as they affect the utility of those commodities, make them use values. But the exchange of commodities is evidently an act characterised by a total abstraction from use value." |
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[…] |
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</blockquote> |
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<blockquote> |
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"If then we leave out of consideration the use value of commodities, they have only one common property left, that of being products of labour. […] Along with the useful qualities of the products themselves, we put out of sight both the useful character of the various kinds of labour embodied in them, and the concrete forms of that labour; there is nothing left but what is common to them all; all are reduced to one and the same sort of labour, human labour in the abstract." |
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[…] |
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</blockquote> |
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<blockquote> |
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"A use value, or useful article, therefore, has value only because human labour in the abstract has been embodied or materialised in it. How, then, is the magnitude of this value to be measured? Plainly, by the quantity of the value-creating substance, the labour, contained in the article." |
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:Karl Marx, [http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm#35b/ ''Capital'' Volume I, Chapter 1] |
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</blockquote> |
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=== Labour as the "value-creating substance" === |
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However, contrary to popular belief, Marx did not deny the role of supply and demand influencing price: |
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Marx defined the "value" of a [[commodity]] as the total amount of socially necessary labour embodied in its production. He developed this special brand of the labour theory of value in the first chapter of volume 1 of ''Capital'''. Due to the influence of Marx's particular definition of value on the transformation problem, he is quoted at length where he argues as follows: |
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<blockquote>Let us take two commodities, e.g., corn and iron. The proportions in which they are exchangeable, whatever those proportions may be, can always be represented by an equation in which a given quantity of corn is equated to some quantity of iron: e.g., 1 quarter corn = x cwt. iron. What does this equation tell us? It tells us that in two different things—in 1 quarter of corn and x cwt. of iron, there exists in equal quantities something common to both. The two things must therefore be equal to a third, which in itself is neither the one nor the other. Each of them, so far as it is exchange value, must therefore be reducible to this third.</blockquote> |
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:It suffices to say that if supply and demand equilibrate each other, the market prices of commodities will correspond with their natural prices, that is to say, with their values as determined by the respective quantities of labor required for their production. |
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<blockquote>This common 'something' cannot be either a geometrical, a chemical, or any other natural property of commodities. Such properties claim our attention only in so far as they affect the utility of those commodities, make them use values. But the exchange of commodities is evidently an act characterised by a total abstraction from use value.</blockquote> |
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:[http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1865/value-price-profit/ch02.htm#c6/ ''Value, Price and Profit'' Chapter 2] |
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<blockquote>If then we leave out of consideration the use value of commodities, they have only one common property left, that of being products of labour. […] Along with the useful qualities of the products themselves, we put out of sight both the useful character of the various kinds of labour embodied in them, and the concrete forms of that labour; there is nothing left but what is common to them all; all are reduced to one and the same sort of labour, human labour in the abstract.</blockquote> |
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<blockquote>A use value, or useful article, therefore, has value only because human labour in the abstract has been embodied or materialised in it. How, then, is the magnitude of this value to be measured? Plainly, by the quantity of the value-creating substance, the labour, contained in the article. |
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:—Karl Marx, [http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm#35b/ ''Capital'', Volume I, Chapter 1]</blockquote> |
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=== Variable and constant capital === |
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It may be incidentally noticed that the uniform-labour assumption of modern linear production models makes their labour inputs quantitatively equivalent to amounts of Marx's "human labour in the abstract". The quantitative aspects of Marx's value and price theories—which include the transformation problem—can thus be expressed in the mathematical language of such models: see Samuelson (1971). |
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As labour produces in this sense more than its own value, the direct-labour input is called [[variable capital]] and denoted as <math>v</math>. The quantity of value that living labour transmits to the deer, in our previous example, varies according to the intensity of the exploitation. In the previous example, <math>v_i = l_W l_i</math>. |
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By contrast, the value of other inputs—in our example, the indirect (or "dead") past labour embodied in the used-up arrows—is transmitted to the product as it stands, without additions. It is hence called [[constant capital]] and denoted as ''c''. The value transmitted by the arrow to the deer can never be greater than the value of the arrow itself. In our previous example, <math>c_i = l_A a_i</math>. |
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===Surplus value and exploitation=== |
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Within the quantitative relationships relevant to the transformation problem, labour plays a twofold role according to Marx. First, labour is itself a commodity which is produced, exchanged and used as a means of production—labour is thus a kind of capital in the sense that it is still an input. Marx refers to this as [[labour power]]. The "labour value" of each unit of labour is the amount of labour embodied in the goods that make up the real [[Subsistence theory of wages|subsistence wages]] rate. This amount of labour will be denoted here as <math>l_W</math> (with <math>0 < l_W < 1</math> in any viable system). In our previous example, the Marxian value of the direct-labour input required by unit beaver and deer production is thus <math>l_W l_i</math>. Like that of any other means of production (or capital), this value is entirely transmitted to the product. |
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=== Value formulas === |
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However, this is not all. Being the "substance" of value, direct (or "living") current labour has for Marx the further property of creating and transmitting to the product a further amount of value, over and above its own. Formally, this property derives from the definition of value and the above assumption that <math>0 < l_W < 1</math>: less than one unit of labour is embodied in the wage goods that pay for (or "produce", so to speak) one unit of labour. This extra value is called [[surplus value]] and denoted by <math>s</math>. The amount of surplus value created in unit beaver and deer production will be denoted here as <math>s_i</math>. |
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The total value of each produced good is the sum of the above three elements: constant capital, variable capital, and surplus value. In our previous example: |
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If the actual real wage is the subsistence wage used to calculate <math>l_W</math>, all this surplus value created by labour will be received by the owners of the capital goods, called "capitalists". This is what Marx denoted as [[exploitation]] of labour. |
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===Variable and constant capital=== |
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As labour produces in this sense more than its own value, the direct-labour input is called [[variable capital]] and denoted as <math>v</math>. The amount of value which labour transmits to the deer in our previous example, varies according to the intensity of the exploitation. In our previous example one has <math>v_i = l_W l_i</math>. |
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By contrast, the value of other inputs—in our example the indirect (or “dead”) past labour embodied in used up arrows—is transmitted to the product as it stands, without additions. It is hence called [[constant capital]] and denoted as ''c''. The value transmitted by the arrow to the deer can never be greater than the value of the arrow itself. In our previous example one has <math>c_i = l_A a_i</math>. |
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===Value formulas=== |
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The total value of each produced good is obtained as the sum of the above three elements: constant capital plus variable capital plus surplus value. In our previous example: |
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:<math>p_i = c_i + v_i + s_i = l_A a_i + l_W l_i + s_i </math> |
:<math>p_i = c_i + v_i + s_i = l_A a_i + l_W l_i + s_i </math> |
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Where <math>p_i</math> stands for the (unit) Marxian value of beavers and deer. |
Where <math>p_i</math> stands for the (unit) Marxian value of beavers and deer. |
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However, from |
However, from Marx's definition of value as total labour embodied, it must also be true that: |
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:<math>p_i = l_A a_i + l_i = E_i</math> |
:<math>p_i = l_A a_i + l_i = E_i</math> |
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Solving for <math>s_i</math> the above two relationships one has: |
Solving for <math>s_i</math> the above two relationships one has: |
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:<math>{s_i \over v_i} = {(1- l_W) \over l_W} = \sigma |
:<math>{s_i \over v_i} = {(1- l_W) \over l_W} = \sigma </math> |
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for all <math>i</math>. |
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This necessarily uniform ratio <math>{s_i \over v_i} = \sigma</math> is called by Marx the [[rate of surplus value]], and it allows to re-write Marx's value equations as: |
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This necessarily uniform ratio <math>{s_i \over v_i} = \sigma</math> is called by Marx the [[rate of exploitation]], and it allows to re-write Marx's value equations as: |
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:<math>p_i = c_i + v_i (1 + \sigma) = l_A a_i + l_W l_i (1 + \sigma)</math> |
:<math>p_i = c_i + v_i (1 + \sigma) = l_A a_i + l_W l_i (1 + \sigma)</math> |
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== Classical tableaux == |
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==Transformation of values into prices== |
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Like Ricardo, Marx |
Like Ricardo, Marx believed that ''relative'' labour values— <math>{p_D \over p_B}</math> in the above example—do not generally correspond to relative competitive prices— <math>{P_D \over P_B}</math> in the same example. However, in volume 3 of ''Capital'' he argued that competitive prices are obtained from values through a '''transformation'' process, whereby capitalists ''redistribute'' among themselves the given ''aggregate'' surplus value of the system in such a way as to bring about a tendency toward an equal rate of profit, <math>r</math>, among sectors of the economy. This happens because of the capitalists' tendency to shift their capital toward sectors where it earns higher returns. As competition becomes fierce in a given sector, the rate of return falls, while the opposite will happen in a sector with a low rate of return. Marx describes this process in detail.<ref>[http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch09.htm Capital III, Ch. 9]</ref> |
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===Marx's reasoning=== |
=== Marx's reasoning === |
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The two |
The following two tables adapt the deer-beaver-arrow example seen above (which, of course, is not found in Marx, and is only a useful simplification) to illustrate Marx's approach. In both cases it is assumed that the total quantities of beavers and deer captured are <math>Q_B</math> and <math>Q_D</math> respectively. It is also supposed that the subsistence real wage is one beaver per unit of labour, so that the amount of labour embodied in it is <math>l_W = E_B = l_A a_B + l_B < 1</math>. Table 1 shows how the total amount of surplus value of the system, shown in the last row, is determined. |
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{| border="2" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" style="vertical-align:center;text-align:center; border: 1px #aaa solid; border-collapse: collapse;" |
{| border="2" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" style="vertical-align:center;text-align:center; border: 1px #aaa solid; border-collapse: collapse;" |
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! Sector |
! Sector |
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! Total Constant Capital <br/> <math>Q_i c_i</math> |
! Total Constant Capital <br/> <math>Q_i c_i</math> |
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! Total Variable Capital <br/> <math>Q_i v_i</math> |
! Total Variable Capital <br/> <math>Q_i v_i</math> |
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! Total Surplus Value <br/><math> \sigma Q_i v_i</math> |
! Total Surplus Value <br/><math> \sigma Q_i v_i</math> |
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! Unit Value <br/><math>c_i + (1 + \sigma) v_i</math> |
! Unit Value <br/><math>c_i + (1 + \sigma) v_i</math> |
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|- |
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! Beavers |
! Beavers |
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| <math>Q_B l_A a_B</math> |
| <math>Q_B l_A a_B</math> |
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| <math>Q_B(l_A a_B + l_B) l_B</math> |
| <math>Q_B(l_A a_B + l_B) l_B</math> |
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! Total |
! Total |
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| <math> \sigma (l_A a_B + l_B) (Q_B l_B + Q_D l_D) </math> |
| <math> \sigma (l_A a_B + l_B) (Q_B l_B + Q_D l_D) </math> |
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Table 2 illustrates how Marx thought this total would be redistributed between the two industries, as "profit" at a uniform return rate, ''r'', over constant capital. First, the condition that total "profit" must equal total surplus value—in the final row of table 2—is used to determine ''r''. The result is then multiplied by the value of the constant capital of each industry to get its "profit". Finally, each (absolute) competitive price in labour units is obtained, as the sum of constant capital, variable capital, and "profit" per unit of output, in the last column of table 2. |
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Table 1 shows how the total amount of surplus value of the system—in the last row—is determined. |
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{| border="2" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" style="vertical-align:center;text-align:center; border: 1px #aaa solid; border-collapse: collapse;" |
{| border="2" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" style="vertical-align:center;text-align:center; border: 1px #aaa solid; border-collapse: collapse;" |
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|+'''''Table 2—Marx's transformation formulas in the deer-beaver-arrow production model''''' |
|+'''''Table 2—Marx's transformation formulas in the deer-beaver-arrow production model''''' |
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|- |
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! Sector |
! Sector |
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! Total Constant Capital <br/> <math>Q_i c_i</math> |
! Total Constant Capital <br/> <math>Q_i c_i</math> |
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! Total Variable Capital <br/> <math>Q_i v_i</math> |
! Total Variable Capital <br/> <math>Q_i v_i</math> |
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! Redistributed Total <br/>Surplus Value <br/> <math> rQ_i c_i</math> |
! Redistributed Total <br/>Surplus Value <br/> <math> rQ_i c_i</math> |
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! Resulting <br/> Competitive <br/>Price <br/> <math> v_i + (1 + r) c_i</math> |
! Resulting <br/> Competitive <br/>Price <br/> <math> v_i + (1 + r) c_i</math> |
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|- |
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! Beavers |
! Beavers |
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| <math> Q_B l_A a_B </math> |
| <math> Q_B l_A a_B </math> |
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| <math> Q_B (l_A a_B + l_B) l_B </math> |
| <math> Q_B (l_A a_B + l_B) l_B </math> |
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| <math> (l_A a_B + l_B) l_B + (1 + r) l_A a_B </math> |
| <math> (l_A a_B + l_B) l_B + (1 + r) l_A a_B </math> |
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|- |
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! Deer |
! Deer |
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| <math> Q_D l_A a_D</math> |
| <math> Q_D l_A a_D</math> |
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| <math> Q_D (l_A a_B + l_B) l_D </math> |
| <math> Q_D (l_A a_B + l_B) l_D </math> |
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! Total |
! Total |
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|<math>r l_A(Q_B |
|<math>r l_A(Q_B a_B + Q_D a_D) = \sigma (l_A a_B + l_B) (Q_B l_B + Q_D l_D)</math> |
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Tables 1 and 2 parallel the tables in which Marx elaborated his numerical example.<ref>[http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch09.htm Capital, III Chapter 9]</ref> |
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Table 2 then illustrates how Marx thought that this total would be redistributed between the two industries, as “profit” at a uniform return rate ''r'' over constant capital. First, the condition that total “profit” must equal total surplus value – in the last row of table 2 – is used to determine ''r''. The result is then multiplied by the value of the constant capital of each industry, to get its “profit”. Finally, each (absolute) competitive price in labour units is obtained, as the sum of constant capital, variable capital and “profit” per unit of output, in the last column of Table 2. |
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=== Marx's supposed error and its correction === |
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Tables 1 and 2 parallel the tables in which Marx elaborated his numerical example in [http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch09.htm Chapter 9 of ''Capital's'' Volume III]. |
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===Marx's error and its correction=== |
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Later scholars argued that Marx's formulas for competitive prices were mistaken. |
Later scholars argued that Marx's formulas for competitive prices were mistaken. |
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First, [[competitive equilibrium]] requires a uniform rate of return over constant capital valued at its ''price'', not its Marxian value, contrary to what is done in |
First, [[competitive equilibrium]] requires a uniform rate of return over constant capital valued at its ''price'', not its Marxian value, contrary to what is done in table 2 above. Second, competitive prices result from the sum of costs valued at the ''prices'' of things, not as amounts of embodied labour. Thus, both Marx's calculation of <math>r</math> and the sums of his price formulas do not add up in all the normal cases, where, as in the above example, relative competitive prices differ from relative Marxian values. Marx noted this but thought that it was not significant, stating in chapter 9 of volume 3 of ''Capital'' that "Our present analysis does not necessitate a closer examination of this point." |
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The [[simultaneous linear equations]] method of computing competitive (relative) prices in an equilibrium economy is today very well known. In the greatly simplified model of |
The [[simultaneous linear equations]] method of computing competitive (relative) prices in an equilibrium economy is today very well known. In the greatly simplified model of tables 1 and 2, where the wage rate is assumed as given and equal to the price of beavers, the most convenient way is to express such prices is in units of beavers, which means normalising <math>w = P_B = 1</math>. This yields the (relative) price of arrows as |
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:<math>P_A = l_A</math> beavers. |
:<math>P_A = l_A</math> beavers. |
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Substituting this into the relative-price condition for beavers |
Substituting this into the relative-price condition for beavers, |
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:<math> 1 = l_B + (1 + r) l_A a_B</math> |
:<math> 1 = l_B + (1 + r) l_A a_B</math>, |
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gives the solution for the rate of return as |
gives the solution for the rate of return as |
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:<math>r = {(1 - l_B) \over (l_A a_B)} - 1</math> |
:<math>r = {(1 - l_B) \over (l_A a_B)} - 1</math> |
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Finally, the price condition for deer can hence be written as |
Finally, the price condition for deer can hence be written as |
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:<math>P_D = l_D + (1 + r) l_A a_D = l_D + {a_D (1 - l_B) \over a_B} </math> |
:<math>P_D = l_D + (1 + r) l_A a_D = l_D + {a_D (1 - l_B) \over a_B} </math>. |
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This latter result, which gives the correct competitive price of deer in units of beavers for the simple model used here, is generally inconsistent with Marx's price formulae of |
This latter result, which gives the correct competitive price of deer in units of beavers for the simple model used here, is generally inconsistent with Marx's price formulae of table 2. |
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[[Ernest Mandel]], defending Marx, explains this discrepancy in term of the time frame of production rather than as a logical error |
[[Ernest Mandel]], defending Marx, explains this discrepancy in term of the time frame of production rather than as a logical error; i.e., in this simplified model, capital goods are purchased at a labour value price, but final products are sold under prices that reflect redistributed surplus value.<ref>Ernest Mandel [http://www.marxists.org/archive/mandel/19xx/marx/ch04.htm Marx's Theory of Value]</ref> |
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== After Marx == |
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===The non-transformation problem=== |
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=== Engels === |
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Moreover, it is now easy to show that deer's ''relative'' embodied labour defined as <math>e_D={E_D \over E_B}</math> can vary, while at the same time the correctly defined relative price <math>P_D</math> remains constant. This follows from the fact that in our simple model <math>e_D</math> varies with <math>l_A</math> while—as long as the real wage is given—<math>P_D</math> does not. Thus any change in the labour input required by arrow production will affect the Marxian value of deer relative to beavers, but will leave the economic value of deer (i.e., its exchange rate with beavers) totally unaffected. |
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[[Friedrich Engels]], the editor of volume 3 of ''Capital'', hinted since 1894 at an alternative way to look at the matter. His view was that the pure Marxian "law of value" of volume 1 and the "transformed" prices of volume 3 applied to different periods of economic history. In particular, the "law of value" would have prevailed in pre-capitalist exchange economies, from Babylon to the 15th century, while the "transformed" prices would have materialized under capitalism: see Engels's quotation by Morishima and Catephores (1975), p. 310. |
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Engels's reasoning was later taken up by Meek (1956) and Nell (1973). These authors argued that, whatever one might say of his interpretation of capitalism, Marx's "value" theory retains its usefulness as a tool to interpret pre-capitalist societies, because, they maintained, in pre-capitalist exchange economies there were no "prices of production" with a uniform rate of return (or "profit") on capital. It hence follows that Marx's transformation must have had a ''historical'' dimension, given by the actual transition to capitalist production (and no more Marxian "values") at the beginning of the modern era. In this case, this true "historical transformation" could and should take the place of the mathematical transformation postulated by Marx in chapter 9 of volume 3. |
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[[Image:Non Transformation.png|right|The non-transformation problem: relative Marxian value varies, but relative price stays put, as the labour input coefficient for arrow production takes on different values.|frame|400px]] |
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=== Other Marxist views === |
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The diagram on the right shows this through a numerical example. All the input coefficients, bar <math>l_A</math>, have been given arbitrary numerical values. The two curves show the numerical corresponding values of <math>P_D</math> and <math>e_D</math> (on the vertical axis), calculated as <math>l_A</math> varies along the horizontal axis. As one can see, <math>P_D</math> is a horizontal line, showing constancy, while <math>e_D</math> is a falling curve. |
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There are several schools of thought among those who see themselves as upholding or furthering Marx on the question of transformation from values to prices, or modifying his theory in ways to make it more consistent. |
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According to the [[temporal single-system interpretation]] of ''Capital'' advanced by Alan Freeman, Andrew Kliman, and others, Marx's writings on the subject are most robustly interpreted in such a way as to remove any supposed inconsistencies.{{sfn|Choonara|2007}} Modern traditional Marxists argue that not only does the labour theory of value hold up today, but also that Marx's understanding of the transformation problem was in the main correct. Andrew Kliman claimed using the TSSI framework: "Simple reproduction and uniform profitability do require that supplies equal demands, but they can be equal even if the input and output prices of Period 1 are unequal. Since the outputs of one period are the inputs of the next, what is needed in order for supplies to equal demands is that the output prices of Period 1 equal the input prices of Period 2. But they are always equal; the end of one period is the start of the next, so the output prices of one period necessarily equal the input prices of the next period. Once this is recognized, Bortkiewicz’s proofs immediately fail, as was first demonstrated in Kliman and McGIone (1988)".<ref name=JG>Joseph Green (2010): [http://www.communistvoice.org/45cTransformation1.html On the non-naturalness of value: A defense of Marx and Engels on the transformation problem (part one)]</ref> |
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This appears to prove that the competitive exchange ratio between deer and beavers has actually nothing to do with relative total embodied labour, contrary to the above-quoted claim by Marx in ''Capital'''s Volume I. |
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In the probabilistic interpretation of Marx advanced by Emmanuel Farjoun and Moshe Machover in ''Laws of Chaos'' (see references), they "''dis''solve" the transformation problem by reconceptualising the relevant quantities as random variables. In particular, they consider profit rates to reach an equilibrium ''distribution''. A heuristic analogy with the statistical mechanics of an ideal gas leads them to the hypothesis that this equilibrium distribution should be a gamma distribution. |
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==Formal conclusions== |
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===Samuelson's eraser algorithm=== |
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As it has been shown in the literature, the above result holds true in general, including the more complicated models that Marx actually used. In Samuelson’s (1971) words, this means that the "transformation" of Marxian values into competitive prices must generally take the form of an '''''eraser algorithm''''', described as follows: |
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Finally, there are Marxist scholars (e.g., [[Anwar Shaikh (Economist)|Anwar Shaikh]], [[Makoto Itoh]], Gerard Dumenil and Dominique Levy, and Duncan Foley) who hold that there exists no incontestable logical procedure by which to derive price magnitudes from value magnitudes, but still think that it has no lethal consequences on his system as a whole. In a few very special cases, Marx's idea of labour as the "substance" of (exchangeable) value would not be openly at odds with the facts of market competitive equilibrium. These authors have argued that such cases—though not generally observed—throw light on the "hidden" or "pure" nature of capitalist society. Thus Marx's related notions of surplus value and unpaid labour can still be treated as ''basically'' true, although they hold that the practical details of their workings are more complicated than Marx thought. |
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:"Contemplate the two mutually-exclusive alternatives of 'values' and 'prices'. Write down one. Now transform by taking an eraser and rubbing it out. Then fill in the other one. ''Voila!'' You have completed your transformation algorithm." |
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== Critics of the theory == |
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===Special cases=== |
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Some mathematical economists assert that a set of functions in which Marx's equalities hold does ''not'' generally exist at the individual enterprise or aggregate level, so that chapter 9's transformation problem has no general solution, outside two very special cases. This was first pointed out by, among others, [[Ladislaus Bortkiewicz|Bortkiewicz]] (1906). In the second half of the 20th century, [[Wassily Leontief|Leontief]]’s and [[Piero Sraffa|Sraffa]]’s work on linear production models provided a framework within which to argue this result in a general way. |
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This fails in just ''two'' special cases. The first and best known one is when no "transformation" is actually needed, because competitive prices and Marxian values happen to coincide to begin with. As already noticed, that is the case with either <math>r = 0</math> or (in the previous example) <math>{l_B \over a_B} = {l_D \over a_D}</math>. In Marxian terms, the latter condition is described as a ''uniform organic composition of capital'' in all production lines. |
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Although he never actually mentioned the transformation problem, Sraffa’s (1960) chapter 6 on the "reduction" of prices to "dated" amounts of current and past embodied labour gave implicitly the first general proof, showing that the competitive price <math>P_i</math> of the <math>i^{th}</math> produced good can be expressed as |
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But there is also a ''second'' and less trivial case, unnoticed until relatively recent times. This is a development of Sraffa’s (1960) notion of "standard commodity", and has been called by Samuelson (1971) the case of "equal ''internal'' composition of (constant) capitals". It takes place when every production line happens to use all the various ''produced'' means of production (including the goods entering the real wage) ''in the same proportions among themselves''. When this is so, the same proportions apply to both value and cost calculations. Marx's transformation procedure—based on value proportions—can then be rescued, as it produces the correct ''relative'' costs and competitive prices. |
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:<math>P_i = \sum_{n=0}^\infty l_{in} w {(1+r)^n}</math>, |
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Yet, even when such very special conditions are met, prices can still be computed in the generally correct way, just based on information about input coefficients, with no need for any detour through Marxian values. Moreover, once prices have been thus directly determined, one can formally set up an '''''inverse transformation process''''', whereby Marxian values are obtained from prices, rather than the other way round. |
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where <math>n</math> is the time lag, <math>l_{in}</math> is the lagged-labour input coefficient, <math>w</math> is the wage, and <math>r</math> is the "profit" (or net return) rate. Since total embodied labour is defined as |
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==Implications and interpretations== |
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The literature summarised above relates to the logical (mathematical) aspects of the transformation problem, as discussed by the numerical examples of Chapter 9 of ''Capital's'' Volume III. All the above formal conclusions have ceased to be controversial since more than a generation ago. To critics of Marx, their upshot appears to be that – since under competitive capitalism prices are generally unrelated to the direct and indirect labour contents of individual commodities – Marx's "value" of ''Capital'''s Volume I, and its attendant notions of surplus value, [[surplus labour]] and exploitation, are a purely fictional construct, of no theoretical or practical usefulness. |
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:<math>E_i = \sum_{n=0}^\infty l_{in}</math>, |
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Yet, controversy still remains, as many Marxist theorists contend that there is no logical failure. |
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it follows from Sraffa’s result that there is generally no function from <math>E_i</math> to <math>P_i</math>, as was made explicit and elaborated upon by later writers, notably [[Ian Steedman]] in ''Marx after Sraffa''. |
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===Mathematical vs historical transformation=== |
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Frederick Engels – the editor of ''Capital'''s Volume III – hinted since 1894 at a possibly alternative way to look at the whole matter. His view was that the pure Marxian "law of value" of Volume I and the "transformed" prices of Volume III applied to different periods of economic history. In particular, the "law of value" would have prevailed in the pre-capitalist exchange economies – from Babylon to the fifteenth century of the common era – while the "transformed" prices would have materialized under capitalism: see Engels' quotation by Morishima and Catephores (1975) p. 310. |
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A standard reference, with an extensive survey of the entire literature prior to 1971 and a comprehensive bibliography, is [[Paul Samuelson|Samuelson]]'s (1971) "Understanding the Marxian Notion of Exploitation: A Summary of the So-Called Transformation Problem Between Marxian Values and Competitive Prices" ''Journal of Economic Literature'' '''9''' 2 399–431. |
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Although Engels was reasoning on the mistaken presumption that Marx's transformation was formally correct, his basic idea does not depend on this, and was later taken up by Meek (1956) and Nell (1973). These authors argued that – whatever one must say of his interpretation of capitalism – Marx's "value" theory keeps its usefulness as a tool to interpret pre-capitalist societies, because – they maintained – in pre-capitalist exchange economies there were no "prices of production" with a uniform rate of return (or "profit") on capital. It hence follows that Marx's transformation must have had a ''historical'' dimension, given by the actual transition to capitalist production (an no more Marxian "values") at the beginning of the modern era. Then this true "historical transformation" could and should take the place of the failed mathematical transformation attempted by Marx in Chapter 9 of Volume III. |
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Proponents of the temporal single system interpretation such as Moseley (1999), who argue that the determination of prices by simultaneous linear equations (which assumes that prices are the same at the start and end of the production period) is logically inconsistent with the determination of value by labour time, reject the principles of the mathematical proof that Marx's transformation problem has no general solution. Other Marxian economists accept the proof, but reject its relevance for some key elements of Marxian political economy. Still others reject Marxian economics outright, and emphasise the politics of the assumed [[relations of production]] instead. |
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As Althusser and Balibar (1970) and others have pointed out, this proposal runs counter Marx's own ideas, as expressed in Marx (1859), where one reads: |
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=== Non-Marxian critiques === |
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:"''The point at issue is not the role that various economic relations have played in the succession of various social formations'' appearing in the course of history […], but their position within modern society." (En. trans. p.210, italics in the original.) |
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Mainstream scholars such as [[Paul Samuelson]] question the assumption that the basic nature of capitalist production and distribution can be gleaned from unrealistic special cases. For example, in special cases where it applies, Marx's reasoning can be turned upside down through an inverse transformation process; Samuelson argues that Marx's inference that |
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<blockquote>Profit is therefore the [bourgeois] disguise of surplus value which must be removed before the real nature of surplus value can be discovered." (''Capital'', volume 3, chapter 2)</blockquote> |
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Moreover, the available quantitative research by economic historians has ''not'' generally endorsed Engels' view of antiquity and the Middle Ages as a "value epoch" in the Marxian sense: see for instance Hicks (1969) and Godelier (1973). |
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could with equal cogency be "transformed" into: |
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However, be that as it may, the proposed "historical" dimension of the transformation problem does not seem to affect in any way the (non-) applicability of Marx's notion of exploitation to contemporary capitalist societies. |
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<blockquote>Surplus value is therefore the [Marxist] disguise of profit which must be removed before the real nature of profit can be discovered.<ref>Samuelson (1971), p. 417</ref></blockquote> |
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===Other Marxist views=== |
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Most interpretations of Marx's value theory consider it as an attempt to explain capitalist distribution as the result of labour exploitation, defined through the notion of surplus value. Yet, particularly if the wage is given, distribution is in itself determined by prices. Thus the transformation problem is central to the usefulness of Marx's economics in explaining exploitation, via a linkage from values (and hence surplus value) to prices. Indeed, no positive Marxian theory of labour exploitation through distribution could ever be built without some at least implicit reference to such linkage. Marx's reference was very explicit, and this is precisely why the transformation problem worried him so much. |
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To clarify this point, it may be noticed that the special cases in question are also precisely those where [[John Bates Clark|J. B. Clark]]'s old model of ''aggregate'' marginal productivity holds strictly true, leading to equality between the equilibrium levels of the real wage rate and labour's aggregate marginal product, a hypothesis regarded as disproved by all sides during the [[Cambridge capital controversy]]. One would thus have a "pure" state of capitalist society where Marx's [[exploitation theory]] and its main supposed confutation were both true. |
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According to the [[Temporal single-system interpretation]] of "Capital" advanced by Alan Freeman, Andrew Kliman and others, Marx's writings on the subject can be interpreted in such a way as to remove any supposed inconsistencies (Choonara, 2007). |
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Like Clark's contention about the "fairness" of marginal-productivity wages, so Marx's basic argument—from the "substance" of value to the concept of exploitation—is claimed to be a set of non-analytical and non-empirical propositions. That is why, being non-falsifiable, both theories may be found to apply to the same formal and/or empirical object, though they are supposed to negate each other. |
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However, there are also political-economic readings of ''Capital'', such as [[Harry Cleaver]]'s ''[[Reading Capital Politically]]'', that re-define exploitation as a direct control of worked time, unrelated as such to distribution. These readings are usually associated with the [[Autonomist Marxism|autonomist]] strand of Marxism, which focuses on production as the key economic site within society. These readings of ''Capital'' are typically hostile to economics as such, and seek to side-step issues like the transformation problem by claiming that all social arrangements in capitalism (in particular, profit and distribution) are politically determined as contests between classes. |
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Samuelson not only dismissed the labour theory of value because of the transformation problem, but provided himself, in cooperation with economists like [[Carl Christian von Weizsäcker]], solutions. Von Weizsäcker (1962),<ref name=CW>Weizsäcker, Carl Christian von (2010): A New Technical Progress Function (1962). German Economic Review 11/3 (first publication of an article written in 1962)</ref> along with Samuelson (1971),<ref name=WS>Weizsäcker Carl Christian von, and [[Paul A. Samuelson]] (1971): A new labor theory of value for rational planning through use of the bourgeois profit rate. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences U S A. [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC389151/ download of facsimile]</ref> analysed the problem under the assumption that the economy grows at a constant rate following the [[Golden Rule savings rate|Golden Rule of Accumulation]]. Weizsäcker concludes: |
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Notice should also be taken of the probabilistic interpretation of Marx advanced by Emmanuel Farjoun and Moshe Machover in ''Laws of Chaos'' (see references). They "''dis''solve" the transformation problem by reconceptualising the relevant quantities as random variables. In particular, they drop the assumption of strict equalisation of profit rates and instead consider an equilibrium ''distribution'' of firm profit rates. A heuristic analogy with the statistical mechanics of an ideal gas leads them to the hypothesis that this equilibrium distribution should be a gamma distribution. |
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<blockquote>The price of the commodity today is equal to the sum of the 'present' values of the different labour inputs.<ref>Weizsäcker (2010 [1962]), p. 262</ref></blockquote>Even during the 19th century, [[Austrian school of economics|Austrian economist]] [[Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk]] criticizes Marx's solution as being inconsistent : while in the first chapter of the first volume of The Capital Karl Marx explained that the value of any commodity was generally reflected by the quantity of labor required, inequality being only a temporary exception, this therefore means that the level of value generated is completely independent of the quantity of capital of a company, in other words, the [[organic composition of capital]] (i.e. the ratio between the quantity of capital and the quantity of labor) of a company has no impact on the profits generated.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Böhm-Bawerk |first=Eugen |title=Karl Marx and the Close of his System |year=1896 |isbn=978-1466347687 |pages=13 |publisher=CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform |language=en |quote=According [to Karl Marx], given an equal rate of surplus value, every branch of production must show a different, a special rate of profit, on the condition certainly, which Marx has hitherto always assumed, that commodities exchange with each other 'according to their values', or in proportion to the work embodied in them.}}</ref> However when faced to the transformation problem, Karl Marx is forced to reconsider his thesis, thus he explains in the third volume of Capital that after production, capitalists will reallocate their capital towards companies having made the highest rates of surplus value until the rate of surplus value stabilizes for all companies in a sector of production (since capital is not a source of value and therefore of profit for Marx), thus, the prices of goods will go from 'induced' by the value of labor to ''price of production'' (the sum of wages and annual profits), "The value and price of the commodity coincide only accidentally and exceptionally." However, Böhm-Bawerk pinpoints the contradiction formulated with the relation between the value and the price of the good in the first volume, thus, the Marxist theory appears contradictory and the [[labor theory of value]] illogical.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Böhm-Bawerk |first=Eugen |title=Karl Marx and the Close of his System |year=1896 |isbn=978-1466347687 |pages=19 |publisher=CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform |language=en |quote=The value [of labour] was declared to be 'the common factor which appears in the exchange relation of commodities' (i. 13). We were told, in the form and with the emphasis of a stringent syllogistic conclusion, allowing of no exception, that to set down two commodities as equivalents in exchange implied that 'a common factor of the same magnitude' existed in both, to which each of the two 'must be reducible' (i. 11). (...) And now in the third volume (...) that individual commodities do and must exchange with each other in a proportion different from that of the labour incorporated in them, and this not accidentally and temporarily, but of necessity and permanently. I cannot help myself; I see here no explanation and reconciliation of a contradiction, but the bare contradiction itself. Marx's third volume contradicts the first. The theory of the average rate of profit and of the prices of production cannot be reconciled with the theory of value. This is the impression which must, I believe, be received by every logical thinker. And it seems to have been very generally accepted. Loria, in his lively and picturesque style, states that he feels himself forced to the 'harsh but just judgment' that Marx 'instead of a solution has presented a mystification.'}}</ref> |
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Finally, there are Marxist scholars (e.g., [[Anwar Shaikh (Economist)|Anwar Shaikh]], Fred Moseley, Alan Freeman, [[Makoto Itoh]], Gerard Dumenil & Dominique Levy, Duncan Foley) who accept that there exists no incontestable logical procedure by which to derive price magnitudes from value magnitudes, but still think that it has no lethal consequences on his system as a whole, for the following reasons. |
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=== Marxian reply to non-Marxian critiques === |
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As it has just been seen, in a few very special cases, Marx's idea of labour as the "substance" of (exchangeable) value would not be openly at odds with the facts of market competitive equilibrium. These authors have argued that such cases—though admittedly not generally observed—throw light on the "hidden" or "pure" nature of capitalist society. Thus Marx's related notions of surplus value and unpaid labour can still be treated as ''basically'' true, although the practical details of their workings are admittedly much more complicated than Marx thought. |
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The Marxian reply to this mainstream view is as follows. The attempt to discard the theoretical relevance of the necessary preconditions of Marx's value analysis in volume 1 of ''Capital'' through a [[reductio ad absurdum]] is superficial. By first identifying that the preconditions necessary for J. B. Clark's old model of ''aggregate'' marginal productivity to hold true are the same as those necessary for Marxian values to conform to relative prices, we are then supposed to conclude that the foundation of Marx's analysis ''as based in these preconditions'' is faulty ''because'' Clark's model had been proven wrong in the Cambridge capital controversy. The superficiality stems from the fact that those who support this reduction forget that the Cambridge capital controversy called the entire concept of marginal productivity into question by attacking not Clark's special case assumptions but the notion that physical capital can be aggregated. Marx simply does not run into this problem because his analysis does not rely on an aggregation of physical quantities that receive a return based on their contribution as "factors" of production. The fact that marginal productivity in its aggregate form is "a hypothesis regarded as disproved by all sides during the Cambridge capital controversy" has nothing to do with the validity of the special cases of Marx, and thus we ''would not'' "have a "pure" state of capitalist society where Marx's [[exploitation theory]] and its main supposed confutation (Clark) were ''both'' true", as is concluded from this view,'' because'' the "correctness" or "incorrectness" of Clark's aggregate marginal productivity scheme in this case flows not from special case assumptions but from the fact that he is aggregating physical units of capital; i.e., Clark's argument would still not hold true ''even with'' the assumed special cases. |
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To further clarify this point, consider the following. First, it is never possible to provide any absolute scientific proof for the truth of ''any'' particular concept of economic value in economics, because the attribution of economic value itself always involves human and moral interpretations that go beyond facts and logic. By nature, the concept of economic value is not a scientifically provable concept but an assumption. Marx himself explicitly ridiculed the idea that he should be required to "prove his concept of value".{{Citation needed|reason=Where does Marx explicitly ridicule this?|date=April 2024}} |
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In particular, some (e.g. [[Anwar Shaikh (Economist)|Anwar Shaikh]]) have suggested, following the explicit remarks by Marx and Engels, that—since aggregate surplus value will generally differ from aggregate "profit"—the former should be in fact treated as a mere ''pre-condition'' for the latter, rather than a full explanation of it. Using input-output data and empirical proxies for labour-values, [[Anwar Shaikh (Economist)|Anwar Shaikh]] & Ochoa have provided some statistical evidence to show that, although there may be no incontestable ''logical'' deduction possible of specific price magnitudes from specific value magnitudes even within a complex model (in contrast to a probabilistic ''prediction''), even a "93% Ricardian theory" of labour-value appears to be a better empirical predictor of price than its rivals. Real capitalism just seems to function much more like ordinary people, businessmen and accountants understand it, and much less like neo-classical economists insist on portraying it, whatever the beavers and deer happen to be doing. That is probably one reason why, rightly or wrongly, Marx's theory retains its plausibility for many people. |
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Finally, as [[Piero Sraffa]] showed, the theory of the production and distribution of a surplus, however it might be devised, is logically independent of any particular theory of the exploitation of labour. Labour exploitation may occur and be conceptualised in various ways, regardless of which theory of value is held to be true. Consequently, if Marx's theory of labour exploitation is false, this is a separate issue. |
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===Mainstream views=== |
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Mainstream scholars such as Samuelson question the assumption that the basic nature of capitalist production and distribution can be gleaned from unrealistic special cases. For example, in special cases where it apply, Marx's reasoning can be easily turned upside down, through an ''inverse'' transformation process, Samuelson argue that Marx's inference: |
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== See also == |
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<blockquote> |
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* [[Capital accumulation]] |
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"Profit is therefore the [bourgeois] disguise of surplus value which must be removed before the real nature of surplus value can be discovered." (''Capital'' Volume III, Chapter 2) |
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* [[Chinese economic reform]] |
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</blockquote> |
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* [[Critique of political economy]] |
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* [[Labour theory of value]] |
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* [[Law of value]] |
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* [[Prices of production]] |
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* [[Return of capital]] |
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* [[Socially necessary labour time]] |
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* [[Surplus value]] |
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* [[Temporal single-system interpretation]] |
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== Notes == |
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could with equal cogency be “transformed” into: |
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{{Reflist}} |
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== References == |
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<blockquote> |
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* Marx, K. (1859) ''Zur Kritik der politischen Oeconomie'', Berlin (trans. ''A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy'' London 1971). |
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"Surplus value is therefore the [Marxist] disguise of profit which must be removed before the real nature of profit can be discovered." [Samuelson (1971) p.417] |
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* Marx, K. (1867) ''Das Kapital'' Volume I. |
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</blockquote> |
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* Marx, K. (1894) ''Das Kapital'' Volume III (ed. by F. Engels). |
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* {{cite book | url=https://www.marxists.org/deutsch/referenz/boehm/1896/xx/ | author=Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk | title=Zum Abschluss des Marxschen Systems | location=Berlin | year=1896 |language=de}} |
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To further clarify this point, it may be noticed that the special cases in question are also precisely those where [[John Bates Clark|J.B. Clark]]’s old model of ''aggregate'' marginal productivity holds strictly true, leading to equality between the equilibrium levels of the real wage rate and labour's aggregate marginal product, a hypothesis regarded as disproved by all sides during the [[Cambridge capital controversy]]. One would thus have a "pure" state of capitalist society where Marx's [[exploitation theory]] and its main supposed confutation were ''both'' true. |
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* {{cite book | author=Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk | contribution=Karl Marx and the Close of his System | pages=1–118 | url=https://mises.org/files/karl-marx-and-close-his-systempdf/download?token=_cPu9SFP | editor=Paul M. Sweezy | title=Karl Marx and the Close of his System | location=New York | publisher=Augustus M. Kelley | year=1949 }} |
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* {{cite journal | url=https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bortkiewicz.1906.pdf | author=Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz | title=Wertrechnung und Preisrechnung im Marxschen System (1) | journal=[[Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik]] | volume=23 | number=1 | pages=1–50 | year=1906 | language=DE }} |
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This remarkable result, it is maintained, leads straight to the heart of the matter. Like Clark’s contention about the "fairness" of marginal-productivity wages, so Marx's basic argument—from the "substance" of value to the concept of exploitation—is claimed to be a set of non-analytical and non-empirical propositions. That is why, being non-falsifiable, both theories may be found to apply to the same formal and/or empirical object, though they are supposed to negate each other, as [[Karl Popper]]{{Fact|date=May 2009}} and many others{{Who|date=May 2009}} had argued. |
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* {{cite journal | url=https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bortkiewicz.1907a.pdf | author=Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz | title=Wertrechnung und Preisrechnung im Marxschen System (2) | journal=Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik | volume=25 | number=1 | pages=10–51 | year=1907 | language=DE }} |
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* {{cite journal | url=https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bortkiewicz.1907b.pdf | author=Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz | title=Wertrechnung und Preisrechnung im Marxschen System (3) | journal=Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik | volume=25 | pages=455–488 | year=1907 | language=DE }} |
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===Marxian reply to mainstream views=== |
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* {{cite journal | url=https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bortkiewicz.1907c.pdf | author=Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz | title=Zur Berichtigung der grundlegenden theoretischen Konstruktion von Marx im dritten Band des 'Kapital' | journal=Jahrbücher für Nationalökonomie und Statistik |series=III Folge | volume=34 | pages=319–335 | year=1907 | language=DE }} |
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* {{cite book | author=Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz | chapter=On the Correction of Marx's Fundamental Theoretical Construction in the Third Volume of ``Capital | pages=197–221 | editor=Paul M. Sweezy | title=Karl Marx and the Close of his System | location=New York | publisher=Augustus M. Kelley | year=1949 | chapter-url=https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Bortkiewicz.1949.pdf }} |
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The Marxian reply to this mainstream view is as follows: |
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* {{cite web|last=Choonara|first=J.|year=2007|url=http://www.isj.org.uk/index.php4?id=353&issue=115|title=Marx's "transformation" made easy}} |
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*it is firstly argued that it is never possible to provide any absolute scientific proof for the truth of ''any'' particular concept of economic value in economics, because the attribution of economic value itself always involves human and moral interpretations which go beyond facts and logic. By nature, the concept of economic value is not itself a scientifically provable concept but an assumption. Marx himself explicitly ridiculed the idea that he should be required to "prove his concept of value". |
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*Secondly, however, the validity of any proposed theory of value depends on its explanatory, [[heuristic]] and predictive power, i.e. whether it makes possible a coherent interpretation of the known facts that can at least to some extent predict observable trends. In this sense, Marx evidently felt that he had "proved" the validity of his concept of value by the integrated theory of capitalist development which it made possible (see also [[law of value]]). What mattered was the ''application'' of the concept. |
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*Thirdly, once a certain concept of economic value is assumed, certain predictions or explanations can be made on the basis of it, and those explanations or predictions can at least in principle be falsified by reference to logic and observables. And that concept of value can be compared with rival concepts and the rival theories they make possible, in order to establish which has more explanatory or predictive capacity. |
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*Fourthly, modern [[philosophy of science]] rejects Popper's falsification theory as an adequate portrayal of science. Scientific statements are not necessarily ''falsifiable'' statements but instead ''fallible'' statements (they could be wrong) which, in principle, can be tested against observables, even if contingently we do not yet know technically how to do this. Scientists do not aim mainly to falsify theories, but confirm them to provide usable knowledge. |
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*Finally, as [[Piero Sraffa]] showed clearly, the theory of the production and distribution of a surplus, however it might be devised, is logically independent of any particular theory of labour-exploitation. Labour-exploitation may occur and be conceptualised in various ways, regardless of which theory of value is held to be true. Consequently, if Marx's theory of labour-exploitation is false, this is a quite separate issue. |
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==References== |
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*Marx, K. (1859) ''Zur Kritik der politischen Oeconomie'', Berlin (trans. ''A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy'' London 1971). |
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*Marx, K. (1867) ''Das Kapital'' Volume I. |
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*Marx, K. (1894) ''Das Kapital'' Volume III (ed. by F. Engels). |
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*Böhm-Bawerk, E., von (1896) "Zum Abschluss des Marxschen Systems" ''Festgabe für Karl Knies'' Berlin [trans. P. Sweezy ed. (1949) ''Karl Marx and the close of his system by Eugen Böhm-Bawerk and Böhm-Bawerk’s criticism of Marx by Rudolf Hilferding with an appendix by L. von Bortkiewicz'']. |
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*Bortkiewicz, L. von (1906) "Wertrechnung und Preisrechnung im Marxschen System" ''Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik'' 3, XXIII and XXV [trans. "Value and Price in the Marxian System" ''International Economic Papers'' 1952 2 5–60]. |
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* Choonara, J. (2007) [http://www.isj.org.uk/index.php4?id=353&issue=115 "Marx's "transformation" made easy"] |
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* Alan Freeman: ''Price, value and profit - a continuous, general treatment.'' In: Alan Freeman, Guglielmo Carchedi (editors): ''Marx and non-equilibrium economics.'' Edward Elgar. Cheltenham, UK, Brookfield, US 1996. |
* Alan Freeman: ''Price, value and profit - a continuous, general treatment.'' In: Alan Freeman, Guglielmo Carchedi (editors): ''Marx and non-equilibrium economics.'' Edward Elgar. Cheltenham, UK, Brookfield, US 1996. |
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*Meek, R. (1956) 'Some Notes on the Transformation Problem' ''Economic Journal'' '''66''' (March) 94-107. |
* Meek, R. (1956) 'Some Notes on the Transformation Problem' ''Economic Journal'' '''66''' (March) 94-107. |
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* {{cite book | url=http://laprimaradice.myblog.it/media/02/02/2829581832.pdf | author=Piero Sraffa | title=Production of Commodities by Means of Commodities — Prelude to a Critique of Economic Theory | location=Bombay | publisher=Vora & Co., Publishers Bvt. Ltd. | year=1960 }} |
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*Sraffa, P. (1960) ''Production of commodities by means of commodities''. |
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*Hicks, J. (1969) ''A Theory of Economic History'' Oxford. |
* Hicks, J. (1969) ''A Theory of Economic History'' Oxford. |
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*Althusser, L. and E. Balibar (1970) ''Reading 'Capital' '' London. |
* Althusser, L. and E. Balibar (1970) ''Reading 'Capital' '' London. |
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*Samuelson, P.A. (1971) "Understanding the Marxian Notion of Exploitation: A Summary of the So-Called Transformation Problem Between Marxian Values and Competitive Prices" ''Journal of Economic Literature'' '''9''' 2 399–431. |
* Samuelson, P.A. (1971) "Understanding the Marxian Notion of Exploitation: A Summary of the So-Called Transformation Problem Between Marxian Values and Competitive Prices" ''Journal of Economic Literature'' '''9''' 2 399–431. |
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*Godelier, M. (1973) ''Horizon, trajets marxistes en anthropologie'' Paris. |
* Godelier, M. (1973) ''Horizon, trajets marxistes en anthropologie'' Paris. |
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*Nell, E.J. (1973) 'Marx's Economics. A Dual Theory of Value and Growth: by Micho Morishima' (book review) ''Journal of Economic Literature'' '''XI''' 1369-71. |
* Nell, E.J. (1973) 'Marx's Economics. A Dual Theory of Value and Growth: by Micho Morishima' (book review) ''Journal of Economic Literature'' '''XI''' 1369-71. |
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*Morishima, M. and G. Catephores (1975) 'Is there an "historical transformation problem"?' ''Economic Journal '''85''' (June) 309-28. |
* Morishima, M. and G. Catephores (1975) 'Is there an "historical transformation problem"?' ''Economic Journal '''85''' (June) 309-28. |
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*[[Anwar Shaikh (Economist)|Anwar Shaikh]] papers: [http://homepage.newschool.edu/~AShaikh/] |
* [[Anwar Shaikh (Economist)|Anwar Shaikh]] papers: [https://web.archive.org/web/20100421170313/http://homepage.newschool.edu/~AShaikh/] |
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*Alan Freeman papers: [http://www.iwgvt.org/index.php] |
* Alan Freeman papers: [http://www.iwgvt.org/index.php] |
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*Fred Moseley papers: [http://home.mtholyoke.edu/~fmoseley/] |
* Fred Moseley papers: [http://home.mtholyoke.edu/~fmoseley/] |
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* Makoto Itoh, ''The Basic Theory of Capitalism''. |
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*Emmanuel Farjoun and Moshe Machover, ''Laws of Chaos; A Probabilistic Approach to Political Economy'', London: Verso, 1983. [http://www.probabilisticpoliticaleconomy.net] |
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* Gerard Dumenil & Dominique Levy papers [https://web.archive.org/web/20110806050911/http://www.jourdan.ens.fr/~levy/] |
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* Duncan Foley papers [https://web.archive.org/web/20050526081100/http://cepa.newschool.edu/~foleyd/] |
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*Makoto Itoh, ''The Basic Theory of Capitalism''. |
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*Gerard Dumenil & Dominique Levy papers [http://www.jourdan.ens.fr/~levy/] |
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*Duncan Foley papers [http://cepa.newschool.edu/~foleyd/] |
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* Hagendorf, Klaus: [http://ssrn.com/paper=1489383 Labour Values and the Theory of the Firm. Part I: The Competitive Firm. Paris: EURODOS; 2009.] |
* Hagendorf, Klaus: [http://ssrn.com/paper=1489383 Labour Values and the Theory of the Firm. Part I: The Competitive Firm. Paris: EURODOS; 2009.] |
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* Moseley, Fred (1999). "[http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~fmoseley/CRITIQUE.pdf A 'New Solution' for the Transformation Problem: A Sympathetic Critique]". |
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{{Authority control}} |
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==See also== |
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*[[labour theory of value]] |
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*[[law of value]] |
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*[[surplus value]] |
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*[[socially necessary labour time]] |
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*[[prices of production]] |
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*[[capital accumulation]] |
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*[[return of capital]] |
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*[[Temporal Single System Interpretation]] |
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Transformation Problem}} |
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[[Category:Marxist theory]] |
[[Category:Marxist theory]] |
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[[Category:History of economic thought]] |
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[[Category:Marxian economics]] |
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[[de:Allgemeine Profitrate]] |
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[[ja:転形問題]] |
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In 20th-century discussions of Karl Marx's economics, the transformation problem is the problem of finding a general rule by which to transform the "values" of commodities (based on their socially necessary labour content, according to his labour theory of value) into the "competitive prices" of the marketplace. This problem was first introduced by Marxist economist Conrad Schmidt[1] and later dealt with by Marx in chapter 9 of the draft of volume 3 of Capital. The essential difficulty was this: given that Marx derived profit, in the form of surplus value, from direct labour inputs, and that the ratio of direct labour input to capital input varied widely between commodities, how could he reconcile this with a tendency toward an average rate of profit on all capital invested among industries, if such a tendency (as predicted by Marx and Ricardo) exists?
Marx's theory
[edit]Marx defines value as the number of hours of labor socially necessary to produce a commodity. This includes two elements: First, it includes the hours that a worker of normal skill and dedication would take to produce a commodity under average conditions and with the usual equipment (Marx terms this "living labor"). Second, it includes the labor embodied in raw materials, tools, and machinery used up or worn away during its production (which Marx terms "dead labor"). In capitalism, workers spend a portion of their working day reproducing the value of their means of subsistence, represented as wages (necessary labor), and a portion of their day producing value above and beyond that, referred to as surplus value, which goes to the capitalist (surplus labor).
Since, according to Marx, the source of capitalist profit is this surplus labor of the workers, and since in this theory only new, living labor produces value, it would appear logical that enterprises with a low organic composition (a higher proportion of capital spent on living labor) would have a higher rate of profit than would enterprises with a high organic composition (a higher proportion of capital spent on raw materials and means of production). However, in models of classical perfect competition, higher rates of profit are not generally found in enterprises with a low organic composition, and low profit rates are not generally found in enterprises with a high organic composition.[citation needed] Instead, there is a tendency toward equalization of the rate of profit in industries of different organic compositions. That is, in such models with no barriers to entry, capitalists are free to disinvest or invest in any industry, a tendency exists towards the formation of a general rate of profits, constant across all industries.
Marx outlined the transformation problem as a theoretical solution to this discrepancy. The tendency of the rate of profit toward equalization means that, in this theory, there is no simple translation from value to money—e.g., 1 hour of value equals 20 dollars—that is the same across every sector of the economy. While such a simple translation may hold approximately true in general, Marx postulated that there is an economy-wide, systematic deviation according to the organic compositions of the different industries, such that 1 hour of value equals 20 dollars times T, where T represents a transformation factor that varies according to the organic composition of the industry in consideration.
In this theory, T is approximately 1 in industries where the organic composition is close to average, less than 1 in industries where the organic composition is below average, and greater than 1 in industries where the organic composition is higher than average.
Because Marx was considering only socially necessary labor, this variation among industries has nothing to do with higher-paid, skilled labor versus lower-paid, unskilled labor. This transformation factor varies only with respect to the organic compositions of different industries.
British classical labor theory of value
[edit]Marx's value theory was developed from the labor theory of value discussed by Adam Smith and used by many British classical economists. It became central to his economics.
Simplest case: labor costs only
[edit]Consider the simple example used by Adam Smith to introduce the subject. Assume a hunters’ economy with free land, no slavery, and no significant current production of tools, in which beavers and deer are hunted. In the language of modern linear production models, call the unit labour-input requirement for the production of each good , where may be oder (i.e., is the number of hours of uniform labour normally required to catch a beaver, and a deer; notice that we need to assume labour as uniform in order to be able, later on, to use a uniform wage rate).
In this case, Smith noticed, each hunter will be willing to exchange one deer (which costs him hours) for beavers. The ratio —i.e., the relative quantity of labour embodied in (unit) deer production with respect to beaver production—gives thus the exchange ratio between deer and beavers, the "relative price" of deer in units of beavers. Moreover, since the only costs are here labor costs, this ratio is also the "relative unit cost" of deer for any given competitive uniform wage rate . Hence the relative quantity of labor embodied in deer production coincides with the competitive relative price of deer in units of beavers, which can be written as (where the stands for absolute competitive prices in some arbitrary unit of account, and are defined as ).
Capital costs
[edit]Things become more complicated if production uses some scarce capital good as well. Suppose that hunting requires also some arrows , with input coefficients equal to , meaning that to catch, for instance, one beaver you need to use arrows, besides hours of labour. Now the unit total cost (or absolute competitive price) of beavers and deer becomes
where denotes the capital cost incurred in using each arrow.
This capital cost is made up of two parts. First, there is the replacement cost of substituting the arrow when it is lost in production. This is , or the competitive price of the arrows, multiplied by the proportion of arrows lost after each shot. Second, there is the net rental or return required by the arrows' owner (who may or may not be the same person as the hunter using it). This can be expressed as the product , where is the (uniform) net rate of return of the system.
Summing up, and assuming a uniform replacement rate , the absolute competitive prices of beavers and deer may be written as
Yet we still have to determine the arrows' competitive price . Assuming arrows are produced by labor only, with man-hours per arrow, we have:
Assuming further, for simplicity, that (i.e., all arrows are lost after just one shot, so that they are circulating capital), the absolute competitive prices of beavers and deer become:
Here, is the quantity of labor directly embodied in beaver and deer unit production, while is the labor indirectly thus embodied, through previous arrow production. The sum of the two,
- ,
gives the total quantity of labor embodied.
It is now obvious that the relative competitive price of deer can no longer be generally expressed as the ratio between total amounts of labour embodied. With the ratio will correspond to only in two very special cases: if either ; or, if . In general the two ratios will not only differ: may change for any given , if the net rate of return or the wages vary.
As it will now be seen, this general lack of any functional relationship between and , of which Ricardo had been particularly well aware, is at the heart of Marx's transformation problem. For Marx, r is the quotient of surplus value to the value of capital advanced to non-labor inputs, and is typically positive in a competitive capitalist economy.
Marx's labour theory of value
[edit]Surplus value and exploitation
[edit]Marx distinguishes between labour power as the potential to work, and labour, which is its actual use. He describes labour power as a commodity, and like all commodities, Marx assumes that on average it is exchanged at its value. Its value is determined by the value of the quantity of goods required for its reproduction.
Yet there is a difference between the value of labour power and the value produced by that labour power in its use. Unlike other commodities, in its use, labour power produces new value beyond that used up by its use. This difference is called surplus value and is for Marx the source of profit for the capitalists. The appropriation of surplus labor is what Marx denoted the exploitation of labour.
Labour as the "value-creating substance"
[edit]Marx defined the "value" of a commodity as the total amount of socially necessary labour embodied in its production. He developed this special brand of the labour theory of value in the first chapter of volume 1 of Capital'. Due to the influence of Marx's particular definition of value on the transformation problem, he is quoted at length where he argues as follows:
Let us take two commodities, e.g., corn and iron. The proportions in which they are exchangeable, whatever those proportions may be, can always be represented by an equation in which a given quantity of corn is equated to some quantity of iron: e.g., 1 quarter corn = x cwt. iron. What does this equation tell us? It tells us that in two different things—in 1 quarter of corn and x cwt. of iron, there exists in equal quantities something common to both. The two things must therefore be equal to a third, which in itself is neither the one nor the other. Each of them, so far as it is exchange value, must therefore be reducible to this third.
This common 'something' cannot be either a geometrical, a chemical, or any other natural property of commodities. Such properties claim our attention only in so far as they affect the utility of those commodities, make them use values. But the exchange of commodities is evidently an act characterised by a total abstraction from use value.
If then we leave out of consideration the use value of commodities, they have only one common property left, that of being products of labour. […] Along with the useful qualities of the products themselves, we put out of sight both the useful character of the various kinds of labour embodied in them, and the concrete forms of that labour; there is nothing left but what is common to them all; all are reduced to one and the same sort of labour, human labour in the abstract.
A use value, or useful article, therefore, has value only because human labour in the abstract has been embodied or materialised in it. How, then, is the magnitude of this value to be measured? Plainly, by the quantity of the value-creating substance, the labour, contained in the article.
- —Karl Marx, Capital, Volume I, Chapter 1
Variable and constant capital
[edit]As labour produces in this sense more than its own value, the direct-labour input is called variable capital and denoted as . The quantity of value that living labour transmits to the deer, in our previous example, varies according to the intensity of the exploitation. In the previous example, .
By contrast, the value of other inputs—in our example, the indirect (or "dead") past labour embodied in the used-up arrows—is transmitted to the product as it stands, without additions. It is hence called constant capital and denoted as c. The value transmitted by the arrow to the deer can never be greater than the value of the arrow itself. In our previous example, .
Value formulas
[edit]The total value of each produced good is the sum of the above three elements: constant capital, variable capital, and surplus value. In our previous example:
Where stands for the (unit) Marxian value of beavers and deer.
However, from Marx's definition of value as total labour embodied, it must also be true that:
Solving for the above two relationships one has:
for all .
This necessarily uniform ratio is called by Marx the rate of exploitation, and it allows to re-write Marx's value equations as:
Classical tableaux
[edit]Like Ricardo, Marx believed that relative labour values— in the above example—do not generally correspond to relative competitive prices— in the same example. However, in volume 3 of Capital he argued that competitive prices are obtained from values through a 'transformation process, whereby capitalists redistribute among themselves the given aggregate surplus value of the system in such a way as to bring about a tendency toward an equal rate of profit, , among sectors of the economy. This happens because of the capitalists' tendency to shift their capital toward sectors where it earns higher returns. As competition becomes fierce in a given sector, the rate of return falls, while the opposite will happen in a sector with a low rate of return. Marx describes this process in detail.[2]
Marx's reasoning
[edit]The following two tables adapt the deer-beaver-arrow example seen above (which, of course, is not found in Marx, and is only a useful simplification) to illustrate Marx's approach. In both cases it is assumed that the total quantities of beavers and deer captured are and respectively. It is also supposed that the subsistence real wage is one beaver per unit of labour, so that the amount of labour embodied in it is . Table 1 shows how the total amount of surplus value of the system, shown in the last row, is determined.
Sector | Total Constant Capital |
Total Variable Capital |
Total Surplus Value |
Unit Value |
---|---|---|---|---|
Beavers | ||||
Deer | ||||
Total |
Table 2 illustrates how Marx thought this total would be redistributed between the two industries, as "profit" at a uniform return rate, r, over constant capital. First, the condition that total "profit" must equal total surplus value—in the final row of table 2—is used to determine r. The result is then multiplied by the value of the constant capital of each industry to get its "profit". Finally, each (absolute) competitive price in labour units is obtained, as the sum of constant capital, variable capital, and "profit" per unit of output, in the last column of table 2.
Sector | Total Constant Capital |
Total Variable Capital |
Redistributed Total Surplus Value |
Resulting Competitive Price |
---|---|---|---|---|
Beavers | ||||
Deer | ||||
Total |
Tables 1 and 2 parallel the tables in which Marx elaborated his numerical example.[3]
Marx's supposed error and its correction
[edit]Later scholars argued that Marx's formulas for competitive prices were mistaken.
First, competitive equilibrium requires a uniform rate of return over constant capital valued at its price, not its Marxian value, contrary to what is done in table 2 above. Second, competitive prices result from the sum of costs valued at the prices of things, not as amounts of embodied labour. Thus, both Marx's calculation of and the sums of his price formulas do not add up in all the normal cases, where, as in the above example, relative competitive prices differ from relative Marxian values. Marx noted this but thought that it was not significant, stating in chapter 9 of volume 3 of Capital that "Our present analysis does not necessitate a closer examination of this point."
The simultaneous linear equations method of computing competitive (relative) prices in an equilibrium economy is today very well known. In the greatly simplified model of tables 1 and 2, where the wage rate is assumed as given and equal to the price of beavers, the most convenient way is to express such prices is in units of beavers, which means normalising . This yields the (relative) price of arrows as
- beavers.
Substituting this into the relative-price condition for beavers,
- ,
gives the solution for the rate of return as
Finally, the price condition for deer can hence be written as
- .
This latter result, which gives the correct competitive price of deer in units of beavers for the simple model used here, is generally inconsistent with Marx's price formulae of table 2.
Ernest Mandel, defending Marx, explains this discrepancy in term of the time frame of production rather than as a logical error; i.e., in this simplified model, capital goods are purchased at a labour value price, but final products are sold under prices that reflect redistributed surplus value.[4]
After Marx
[edit]Engels
[edit]Friedrich Engels, the editor of volume 3 of Capital, hinted since 1894 at an alternative way to look at the matter. His view was that the pure Marxian "law of value" of volume 1 and the "transformed" prices of volume 3 applied to different periods of economic history. In particular, the "law of value" would have prevailed in pre-capitalist exchange economies, from Babylon to the 15th century, while the "transformed" prices would have materialized under capitalism: see Engels's quotation by Morishima and Catephores (1975), p. 310.
Engels's reasoning was later taken up by Meek (1956) and Nell (1973). These authors argued that, whatever one might say of his interpretation of capitalism, Marx's "value" theory retains its usefulness as a tool to interpret pre-capitalist societies, because, they maintained, in pre-capitalist exchange economies there were no "prices of production" with a uniform rate of return (or "profit") on capital. It hence follows that Marx's transformation must have had a historical dimension, given by the actual transition to capitalist production (and no more Marxian "values") at the beginning of the modern era. In this case, this true "historical transformation" could and should take the place of the mathematical transformation postulated by Marx in chapter 9 of volume 3.
Other Marxist views
[edit]There are several schools of thought among those who see themselves as upholding or furthering Marx on the question of transformation from values to prices, or modifying his theory in ways to make it more consistent.
According to the temporal single-system interpretation of Capital advanced by Alan Freeman, Andrew Kliman, and others, Marx's writings on the subject are most robustly interpreted in such a way as to remove any supposed inconsistencies.[5] Modern traditional Marxists argue that not only does the labour theory of value hold up today, but also that Marx's understanding of the transformation problem was in the main correct. Andrew Kliman claimed using the TSSI framework: "Simple reproduction and uniform profitability do require that supplies equal demands, but they can be equal even if the input and output prices of Period 1 are unequal. Since the outputs of one period are the inputs of the next, what is needed in order for supplies to equal demands is that the output prices of Period 1 equal the input prices of Period 2. But they are always equal; the end of one period is the start of the next, so the output prices of one period necessarily equal the input prices of the next period. Once this is recognized, Bortkiewicz’s proofs immediately fail, as was first demonstrated in Kliman and McGIone (1988)".[6]
In the probabilistic interpretation of Marx advanced by Emmanuel Farjoun and Moshe Machover in Laws of Chaos (see references), they "dissolve" the transformation problem by reconceptualising the relevant quantities as random variables. In particular, they consider profit rates to reach an equilibrium distribution. A heuristic analogy with the statistical mechanics of an ideal gas leads them to the hypothesis that this equilibrium distribution should be a gamma distribution.
Finally, there are Marxist scholars (e.g., Anwar Shaikh, Makoto Itoh, Gerard Dumenil and Dominique Levy, and Duncan Foley) who hold that there exists no incontestable logical procedure by which to derive price magnitudes from value magnitudes, but still think that it has no lethal consequences on his system as a whole. In a few very special cases, Marx's idea of labour as the "substance" of (exchangeable) value would not be openly at odds with the facts of market competitive equilibrium. These authors have argued that such cases—though not generally observed—throw light on the "hidden" or "pure" nature of capitalist society. Thus Marx's related notions of surplus value and unpaid labour can still be treated as basically true, although they hold that the practical details of their workings are more complicated than Marx thought.
Critics of the theory
[edit]Some mathematical economists assert that a set of functions in which Marx's equalities hold does not generally exist at the individual enterprise or aggregate level, so that chapter 9's transformation problem has no general solution, outside two very special cases. This was first pointed out by, among others, Bortkiewicz (1906). In the second half of the 20th century, Leontief’s and Sraffa’s work on linear production models provided a framework within which to argue this result in a general way.
Although he never actually mentioned the transformation problem, Sraffa’s (1960) chapter 6 on the "reduction" of prices to "dated" amounts of current and past embodied labour gave implicitly the first general proof, showing that the competitive price of the produced good can be expressed as
- ,
where is the time lag, is the lagged-labour input coefficient, is the wage, and is the "profit" (or net return) rate. Since total embodied labour is defined as
- ,
it follows from Sraffa’s result that there is generally no function from to , as was made explicit and elaborated upon by later writers, notably Ian Steedman in Marx after Sraffa.
A standard reference, with an extensive survey of the entire literature prior to 1971 and a comprehensive bibliography, is Samuelson's (1971) "Understanding the Marxian Notion of Exploitation: A Summary of the So-Called Transformation Problem Between Marxian Values and Competitive Prices" Journal of Economic Literature 9 2 399–431.
Proponents of the temporal single system interpretation such as Moseley (1999), who argue that the determination of prices by simultaneous linear equations (which assumes that prices are the same at the start and end of the production period) is logically inconsistent with the determination of value by labour time, reject the principles of the mathematical proof that Marx's transformation problem has no general solution. Other Marxian economists accept the proof, but reject its relevance for some key elements of Marxian political economy. Still others reject Marxian economics outright, and emphasise the politics of the assumed relations of production instead.
Non-Marxian critiques
[edit]Mainstream scholars such as Paul Samuelson question the assumption that the basic nature of capitalist production and distribution can be gleaned from unrealistic special cases. For example, in special cases where it applies, Marx's reasoning can be turned upside down through an inverse transformation process; Samuelson argues that Marx's inference that
Profit is therefore the [bourgeois] disguise of surplus value which must be removed before the real nature of surplus value can be discovered." (Capital, volume 3, chapter 2)
could with equal cogency be "transformed" into:
Surplus value is therefore the [Marxist] disguise of profit which must be removed before the real nature of profit can be discovered.[7]
To clarify this point, it may be noticed that the special cases in question are also precisely those where J. B. Clark's old model of aggregate marginal productivity holds strictly true, leading to equality between the equilibrium levels of the real wage rate and labour's aggregate marginal product, a hypothesis regarded as disproved by all sides during the Cambridge capital controversy. One would thus have a "pure" state of capitalist society where Marx's exploitation theory and its main supposed confutation were both true.
Like Clark's contention about the "fairness" of marginal-productivity wages, so Marx's basic argument—from the "substance" of value to the concept of exploitation—is claimed to be a set of non-analytical and non-empirical propositions. That is why, being non-falsifiable, both theories may be found to apply to the same formal and/or empirical object, though they are supposed to negate each other.
Samuelson not only dismissed the labour theory of value because of the transformation problem, but provided himself, in cooperation with economists like Carl Christian von Weizsäcker, solutions. Von Weizsäcker (1962),[8] along with Samuelson (1971),[9] analysed the problem under the assumption that the economy grows at a constant rate following the Golden Rule of Accumulation. Weizsäcker concludes:
The price of the commodity today is equal to the sum of the 'present' values of the different labour inputs.[10]
Even during the 19th century, Austrian economist Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk criticizes Marx's solution as being inconsistent : while in the first chapter of the first volume of The Capital Karl Marx explained that the value of any commodity was generally reflected by the quantity of labor required, inequality being only a temporary exception, this therefore means that the level of value generated is completely independent of the quantity of capital of a company, in other words, the organic composition of capital (i.e. the ratio between the quantity of capital and the quantity of labor) of a company has no impact on the profits generated.[11] However when faced to the transformation problem, Karl Marx is forced to reconsider his thesis, thus he explains in the third volume of Capital that after production, capitalists will reallocate their capital towards companies having made the highest rates of surplus value until the rate of surplus value stabilizes for all companies in a sector of production (since capital is not a source of value and therefore of profit for Marx), thus, the prices of goods will go from 'induced' by the value of labor to price of production (the sum of wages and annual profits), "The value and price of the commodity coincide only accidentally and exceptionally." However, Böhm-Bawerk pinpoints the contradiction formulated with the relation between the value and the price of the good in the first volume, thus, the Marxist theory appears contradictory and the labor theory of value illogical.[12]
Marxian reply to non-Marxian critiques
[edit]The Marxian reply to this mainstream view is as follows. The attempt to discard the theoretical relevance of the necessary preconditions of Marx's value analysis in volume 1 of Capital through a reductio ad absurdum is superficial. By first identifying that the preconditions necessary for J. B. Clark's old model of aggregate marginal productivity to hold true are the same as those necessary for Marxian values to conform to relative prices, we are then supposed to conclude that the foundation of Marx's analysis as based in these preconditions is faulty because Clark's model had been proven wrong in the Cambridge capital controversy. The superficiality stems from the fact that those who support this reduction forget that the Cambridge capital controversy called the entire concept of marginal productivity into question by attacking not Clark's special case assumptions but the notion that physical capital can be aggregated. Marx simply does not run into this problem because his analysis does not rely on an aggregation of physical quantities that receive a return based on their contribution as "factors" of production. The fact that marginal productivity in its aggregate form is "a hypothesis regarded as disproved by all sides during the Cambridge capital controversy" has nothing to do with the validity of the special cases of Marx, and thus we would not "have a "pure" state of capitalist society where Marx's exploitation theory and its main supposed confutation (Clark) were both true", as is concluded from this view, because the "correctness" or "incorrectness" of Clark's aggregate marginal productivity scheme in this case flows not from special case assumptions but from the fact that he is aggregating physical units of capital; i.e., Clark's argument would still not hold true even with the assumed special cases.
To further clarify this point, consider the following. First, it is never possible to provide any absolute scientific proof for the truth of any particular concept of economic value in economics, because the attribution of economic value itself always involves human and moral interpretations that go beyond facts and logic. By nature, the concept of economic value is not a scientifically provable concept but an assumption. Marx himself explicitly ridiculed the idea that he should be required to "prove his concept of value".[citation needed]
Finally, as Piero Sraffa showed, the theory of the production and distribution of a surplus, however it might be devised, is logically independent of any particular theory of the exploitation of labour. Labour exploitation may occur and be conceptualised in various ways, regardless of which theory of value is held to be true. Consequently, if Marx's theory of labour exploitation is false, this is a separate issue.
See also
[edit]- Capital accumulation
- Chinese economic reform
- Critique of political economy
- Labour theory of value
- Law of value
- Prices of production
- Return of capital
- Socially necessary labour time
- Surplus value
- Temporal single-system interpretation
Notes
[edit]- ^ Böhm-Bawerk, Eugen (1896). Karl Marx and the Close of his System. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. ISBN 978-1466347687.
- ^ Capital III, Ch. 9
- ^ Capital, III Chapter 9
- ^ Ernest Mandel Marx's Theory of Value
- ^ Choonara 2007.
- ^ Joseph Green (2010): On the non-naturalness of value: A defense of Marx and Engels on the transformation problem (part one)
- ^ Samuelson (1971), p. 417
- ^ Weizsäcker, Carl Christian von (2010): A New Technical Progress Function (1962). German Economic Review 11/3 (first publication of an article written in 1962)
- ^ Weizsäcker Carl Christian von, and Paul A. Samuelson (1971): A new labor theory of value for rational planning through use of the bourgeois profit rate. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences U S A. download of facsimile
- ^ Weizsäcker (2010 [1962]), p. 262
- ^ Böhm-Bawerk, Eugen (1896). Karl Marx and the Close of his System. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. p. 13. ISBN 978-1466347687.
According [to Karl Marx], given an equal rate of surplus value, every branch of production must show a different, a special rate of profit, on the condition certainly, which Marx has hitherto always assumed, that commodities exchange with each other 'according to their values', or in proportion to the work embodied in them.
- ^ Böhm-Bawerk, Eugen (1896). Karl Marx and the Close of his System. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. p. 19. ISBN 978-1466347687.
The value [of labour] was declared to be 'the common factor which appears in the exchange relation of commodities' (i. 13). We were told, in the form and with the emphasis of a stringent syllogistic conclusion, allowing of no exception, that to set down two commodities as equivalents in exchange implied that 'a common factor of the same magnitude' existed in both, to which each of the two 'must be reducible' (i. 11). (...) And now in the third volume (...) that individual commodities do and must exchange with each other in a proportion different from that of the labour incorporated in them, and this not accidentally and temporarily, but of necessity and permanently. I cannot help myself; I see here no explanation and reconciliation of a contradiction, but the bare contradiction itself. Marx's third volume contradicts the first. The theory of the average rate of profit and of the prices of production cannot be reconciled with the theory of value. This is the impression which must, I believe, be received by every logical thinker. And it seems to have been very generally accepted. Loria, in his lively and picturesque style, states that he feels himself forced to the 'harsh but just judgment' that Marx 'instead of a solution has presented a mystification.'
References
[edit]- Marx, K. (1859) Zur Kritik der politischen Oeconomie, Berlin (trans. A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy London 1971).
- Marx, K. (1867) Das Kapital Volume I.
- Marx, K. (1894) Das Kapital Volume III (ed. by F. Engels).
- Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk (1896). Zum Abschluss des Marxschen Systems (in German). Berlin.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk (1949). "Karl Marx and the Close of his System". In Paul M. Sweezy (ed.). Karl Marx and the Close of his System. New York: Augustus M. Kelley. pp. 1–118.
- Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz (1906). "Wertrechnung und Preisrechnung im Marxschen System (1)" (PDF). Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik (in German). 23 (1): 1–50.
- Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz (1907). "Wertrechnung und Preisrechnung im Marxschen System (2)" (PDF). Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik (in German). 25 (1): 10–51.
- Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz (1907). "Wertrechnung und Preisrechnung im Marxschen System (3)" (PDF). Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik (in German). 25: 455–488.
- Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz (1907). "Zur Berichtigung der grundlegenden theoretischen Konstruktion von Marx im dritten Band des 'Kapital'" (PDF). Jahrbücher für Nationalökonomie und Statistik. III Folge (in German). 34: 319–335.
- Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz (1949). "On the Correction of Marx's Fundamental Theoretical Construction in the Third Volume of ``Capital" (PDF). In Paul M. Sweezy (ed.). Karl Marx and the Close of his System. New York: Augustus M. Kelley. pp. 197–221.
- Choonara, J. (2007). "Marx's "transformation" made easy".
- Alan Freeman: Price, value and profit - a continuous, general treatment. In: Alan Freeman, Guglielmo Carchedi (editors): Marx and non-equilibrium economics. Edward Elgar. Cheltenham, UK, Brookfield, US 1996.
- Meek, R. (1956) 'Some Notes on the Transformation Problem' Economic Journal 66 (March) 94-107.
- Piero Sraffa (1960). Production of Commodities by Means of Commodities — Prelude to a Critique of Economic Theory (PDF). Bombay: Vora & Co., Publishers Bvt. Ltd.
- Hicks, J. (1969) A Theory of Economic History Oxford.
- Althusser, L. and E. Balibar (1970) Reading 'Capital' London.
- Samuelson, P.A. (1971) "Understanding the Marxian Notion of Exploitation: A Summary of the So-Called Transformation Problem Between Marxian Values and Competitive Prices" Journal of Economic Literature 9 2 399–431.
- Godelier, M. (1973) Horizon, trajets marxistes en anthropologie Paris.
- Nell, E.J. (1973) 'Marx's Economics. A Dual Theory of Value and Growth: by Micho Morishima' (book review) Journal of Economic Literature XI 1369-71.
- Morishima, M. and G. Catephores (1975) 'Is there an "historical transformation problem"?' Economic Journal 85 (June) 309-28.
- Anwar Shaikh papers: [1]
- Alan Freeman papers: [2]
- Fred Moseley papers: [3]
- Makoto Itoh, The Basic Theory of Capitalism.
- Gerard Dumenil & Dominique Levy papers [4]
- Duncan Foley papers [5]
- Hagendorf, Klaus: Labour Values and the Theory of the Firm. Part I: The Competitive Firm. Paris: EURODOS; 2009.
- Moseley, Fred (1999). "A 'New Solution' for the Transformation Problem: A Sympathetic Critique".