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Looking through some of the comments, I want to add that Piketty talks much more clearly about these topics and makes better points than most consensus economis

by 0x262d 7y ago

Looking through some of the comments, I want to add that Piketty talks much more clearly about these topics and makes better points than most consensus economists, pundits, etc, so I'm glad people are reading him rather than eg NYT columnists. But I think people who find this sort of thing interesting would find marxism's analysis of the economy much more interesting and convincing. Start with Wage Labour And Capital then try either Value Price And Profit or Capital itself.

nemo 7y ago
Anyone interested in Marx should read Bertrand Russel's critiques of Marxism and his analysis of the Manifesto with an honest mind. The Hegelianism behind Marxism is a tool that can prove both that the Kingdom of Prussia in the 1760s was a reflection of God's will, as well as giving Marx the idea that he had a scientific approach to history that let him predict the future. Any tool of reasoning that can prove anything, in the end proves nothing, and all of Marx's history and analysis is steeped in Hegelian dialectic rendering it nonsense. His many predictions all failed, but his ideology lived on despite Scientific Socialism being a failed science. Also anyone interested in Marx should take the time to understand the Labor Theory of Value. It's a lynchpin of Marx's analysis, and it's an idea long since thoroughly discredited. Marxism is a house built on sand.
- clairity 7y ago
  > "[the Labor Theory of Value is] an idea long since thoroughly discredited." that's quite a claim to make without any backing ("everything is nothing" is not particularly useful). i've read some of the main critiques [0], but none thoroughly discredits it. yes, the critiques show flaws, but not fatal ones. so what's the fatal flaw? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticisms_of_the_labour_theory_of_value https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticisms_of_the_labour_theor...
  - nemo 7y ago
    I think it'd worth reading that page again with an open mind. If you really read through that and thought that there are no fatal issues that's fine, I don't agree, though I doubt there's anything that anyone could say to change your mind. But I will retract and restate. The Labor Theory of Value is taken seriously by Marxists because they require it, but in terms of expert opinion it's long since been rejected. If you don't care about expert opinion and are willing to listen to ideologues then you will find compelling feeling arguments for the whole shambolic mess that is Marxist ideology. The Labor Theory of Value isn't a single flaw in Marxism, but one of dozens of serious points of incoherence. Marxism is an anti-empirical archaism of the Victorian era. Marxism is built on a dialectic that literally cannot reveal truth. Marxism makes many predictive claims that are false. Russell took apart the contradictions and irrationality of Hegelianism a long time ago and ended Hegelianism in the Anglo-American philosophical world because of it.
    - 0x262d 7y ago
      Ah, people who believe in marxism are ideologues and people who believe in the predominant ruling-class economic wisdom are simply wisely following expert advice. I feel like I've been here before. If you dropped the constantly condescending hyperbolic anti marxist stuff and made substantive criticisms besides linking to wikipedia this could be a more interesting conversation!
      - nemo 7y ago
        "people who believe in marxism are ideologues and people who believe in the predominant ruling-class economic wisdom are simply wisely following expert advice" You are half right. People who are adherents to Marxism are certainly ideologues - Marxism is an ideology, not a science, and it's anti-empiricism leaves it there permanently. There's quite a lot of diversity among expert opinion on the many matters Marx discusses, and while current economics is barely a science, we have learned some things in the past 150 years. Marxism is a cult that pretends to have a science, despite the 150 year old claptrap in the source being unscientific, incoherent, and with most key concepts in Marx's ideas of economics being discredited. His more useful ideas have been picked up by everyone, and he's useful as a foil to illustrate ignorant concepts, but there really has been some progress in the sciences Marx was foundering at in the last 150 years. Dumping Hegelian magical thinking and learning to ground concepts in empirical data helped quite a lot for progress. The faithful follow Marx's anti-empiricism and adhere to Dear Leader's Greatness out of a sense of identity in the cause of seeking justice and economic fairness because it's a cult not a science. Marxists murdered anyone on the left who didn't agree with them as happily as the Capitalists, but these days it is possible to dump Marx and still be sincerely committed to universal economic justice. In fact it's our only chance given Marxism's dismal failure.
  - uk_programmer 7y ago
    The labour theory of value is easily discredited. The market determines the value i.e. what people are willing to pay for something. The labour theory of value is simply describing the cost of producing something. Whether people are willing to buy it as that price (which would be same as selling it at cost) is an entirely different matter.
    - clairity 7y ago
      you're making the normative and tautological argument that values are what they are because that's what (you think) they should be, not that there is any intrinsic reason for value to be defined only by a market. markets are great theoretical constructs, but real-world markets don't behave the way we always envision they ought to. they're subject to all sorts of external forces. beyond market settling times, what the delta between labor value and market value very likely indicates is some sort of mispricing in the market, often due to some external, malign manipulation (i.e., an application of force, or power). efficient markets should tend toward the labor value of production, that is, profits are minimized to that of idiosyncratic risk (like pandemics).
      - uk_programmer 7y ago
        > you're making the normative and tautological argument that values are what they are because that's what (you think) they should be, not that there is any intrinsic reason for value to be defined only by a market. markets are great theoretical constructs, but real-world markets don't behave the way we always envision they ought to. they're subject to all sorts of external forces. It isn't about what I think. When people make purchases they will typically try to buy as cheaply as possible. If someone is looking to make a purchase they will typically go to whoever is offering it cheapest, if other people want to compete they will either have to offer it at the same price or cheaper. Are you claiming this isn't true? Because I have witnessed it with my own eyes. I used to work in a Petrol Station we were ones of the cheapest places around and we had a lot of custom. Other places that were more expensive were empty at the same time on the same days because they were more expensive. There is of course exceptions to this (Head and Shoulders Shampoo being the classic example) but they are outliers. The same with a labour market. The market rate for a C# programmer is approximately £350-450 a day in the UK. More specialist development roles pay more e.g. Angular JS developers which are typically £500-750 a day (the last time I looked). There is less Angular JS developers that are available (low supply) so to attract talent companies that wish to hire need to raise the rate. However C# developers in the UK are much more common (higher supply) so companies won't pay those high prices. Are you telling me this isn't happening? Because you can go to total jobs yourself and put C# developer Manchester and you will see difference in market rate yourself. > beyond market settling times, what the delta between labor value and market value very likely indicates is some sort of mispricing in the market, often due to some external, malign manipulation (i.e., an application of force, or power). efficient markets should tend toward the labor value of production, that is, profits are minimized to that of idiosyncratic risk (like pandemics). Not true. You are making several assumptions: 1) That there is abundance of said product (high supply). 2) People are wanting or needing to make a purchase. 3) That there isn't other competitors which have improved their processes or paying their employees less. Number 2 being the most important IMO as everything else is normally equal. If nobody wants to buy it at the cost (or higher) you will be selling it at a loss.
- jahaja 7y ago
  You know that Bertrand Russell was a socialist/communist right?
  - nemo 7y ago
    He was a socialist, but anti-authoritarian, and a strong critic of all forms of Hegelianism including Marxism. He tried (with limited success) to formulate alternate concepts of socialism that weren't authoritarian and had a respect for civil liberties, as he saw that Marxism's various tries at revolution and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat were not only failing to bring socialism, but perverting it into something even worse than capitalism. I'm not a fan of Capitalism at all, but Marxism is even worse.
    - jahaja 7y ago
      Yeah, he promoted some sort of Council communism IIRC.
- orthecreedence 7y ago
  > [LTV is] an idea long since thoroughly discredited Not really? It has neither been proven nor disproven, not because of unsoundness in theory, but because of lack of ability to measure the data needed to (dis)prove it (http://bnarchives.yorku.ca/308/2/20101200_cockshott_nitzan_bichler_testing_the_ltv_exchange_web.htm http://bnarchives.yorku.ca/308/2/20101200_cockshott_nitzan_b...). On top of this, sure Marx made some bad predictions, but the breadth of his work was not predicting the future or describing what a socialist economy looks like, but the analysis of capitalism and the social relations that form around it. This analysis is still extremely relevant, regardless of his value theory. Sure some people cling to it and pretend all parts of Capital are still relevant even though things have changed drastically, but that doesn't negate all of Marx's work or ideas.
  - nemo 7y ago
    There's no doubt you believe that, and if you would like to salvage what you can with open eyes to the glaring and serious faults in Marx's work, that's fine, though for me it's like trying to save Creationism. Those working to save both Marxism and Creationism seem like they have the same motive - a faith trying to justify a doctrine rather than follow the evidence. I hadn't mentioned it, but Marxism's anti-empiricism is another incredibly serious issue as well that both shows what a freakish 19th c archaism Marxism is, but also undermines enough to not make it seem worth saving the micrograms of baby for the kilos of bathwater.

by 0x262d 7y ago

nemo 7y ago

Anyone interested in Marx should read Bertrand Russel's critiques of Marxism and his analysis of the Manifesto with an honest mind. The Hegelianism behind Marxism is a tool that can prove both that the Kingdom of Prussia in the 1760s was a reflection of God's will, as well as giving Marx the idea that he had a scientific approach to history that let him predict the future. Any tool of reasoning that can prove anything, in the end proves nothing, and all of Marx's history and analysis is steeped in Hegelian dialectic rendering it nonsense. His many predictions all failed, but his ideology lived on despite Scientific Socialism being a failed science. Also anyone interested in Marx should take the time to understand the Labor Theory of Value. It's a lynchpin of Marx's analysis, and it's an idea long since thoroughly discredited. Marxism is a house built on sand.

clairity 7y ago
> "[the Labor Theory of Value is] an idea long since thoroughly discredited." that's quite a claim to make without any backing ("everything is nothing" is not particularly useful). i've read some of the main critiques [0], but none thoroughly discredits it. yes, the critiques show flaws, but not fatal ones. so what's the fatal flaw? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticisms_of_the_labour_theory_of_value https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticisms_of_the_labour_theor...
- nemo 7y ago
  I think it'd worth reading that page again with an open mind. If you really read through that and thought that there are no fatal issues that's fine, I don't agree, though I doubt there's anything that anyone could say to change your mind. But I will retract and restate. The Labor Theory of Value is taken seriously by Marxists because they require it, but in terms of expert opinion it's long since been rejected. If you don't care about expert opinion and are willing to listen to ideologues then you will find compelling feeling arguments for the whole shambolic mess that is Marxist ideology. The Labor Theory of Value isn't a single flaw in Marxism, but one of dozens of serious points of incoherence. Marxism is an anti-empirical archaism of the Victorian era. Marxism is built on a dialectic that literally cannot reveal truth. Marxism makes many predictive claims that are false. Russell took apart the contradictions and irrationality of Hegelianism a long time ago and ended Hegelianism in the Anglo-American philosophical world because of it.
  - 0x262d 7y ago
    Ah, people who believe in marxism are ideologues and people who believe in the predominant ruling-class economic wisdom are simply wisely following expert advice. I feel like I've been here before. If you dropped the constantly condescending hyperbolic anti marxist stuff and made substantive criticisms besides linking to wikipedia this could be a more interesting conversation!
    - nemo 7y ago
      "people who believe in marxism are ideologues and people who believe in the predominant ruling-class economic wisdom are simply wisely following expert advice" You are half right. People who are adherents to Marxism are certainly ideologues - Marxism is an ideology, not a science, and it's anti-empiricism leaves it there permanently. There's quite a lot of diversity among expert opinion on the many matters Marx discusses, and while current economics is barely a science, we have learned some things in the past 150 years. Marxism is a cult that pretends to have a science, despite the 150 year old claptrap in the source being unscientific, incoherent, and with most key concepts in Marx's ideas of economics being discredited. His more useful ideas have been picked up by everyone, and he's useful as a foil to illustrate ignorant concepts, but there really has been some progress in the sciences Marx was foundering at in the last 150 years. Dumping Hegelian magical thinking and learning to ground concepts in empirical data helped quite a lot for progress. The faithful follow Marx's anti-empiricism and adhere to Dear Leader's Greatness out of a sense of identity in the cause of seeking justice and economic fairness because it's a cult not a science. Marxists murdered anyone on the left who didn't agree with them as happily as the Capitalists, but these days it is possible to dump Marx and still be sincerely committed to universal economic justice. In fact it's our only chance given Marxism's dismal failure.
- uk_programmer 7y ago
  The labour theory of value is easily discredited. The market determines the value i.e. what people are willing to pay for something. The labour theory of value is simply describing the cost of producing something. Whether people are willing to buy it as that price (which would be same as selling it at cost) is an entirely different matter.
  - clairity 7y ago
    you're making the normative and tautological argument that values are what they are because that's what (you think) they should be, not that there is any intrinsic reason for value to be defined only by a market. markets are great theoretical constructs, but real-world markets don't behave the way we always envision they ought to. they're subject to all sorts of external forces. beyond market settling times, what the delta between labor value and market value very likely indicates is some sort of mispricing in the market, often due to some external, malign manipulation (i.e., an application of force, or power). efficient markets should tend toward the labor value of production, that is, profits are minimized to that of idiosyncratic risk (like pandemics).
    - uk_programmer 7y ago
      > you're making the normative and tautological argument that values are what they are because that's what (you think) they should be, not that there is any intrinsic reason for value to be defined only by a market. markets are great theoretical constructs, but real-world markets don't behave the way we always envision they ought to. they're subject to all sorts of external forces. It isn't about what I think. When people make purchases they will typically try to buy as cheaply as possible. If someone is looking to make a purchase they will typically go to whoever is offering it cheapest, if other people want to compete they will either have to offer it at the same price or cheaper. Are you claiming this isn't true? Because I have witnessed it with my own eyes. I used to work in a Petrol Station we were ones of the cheapest places around and we had a lot of custom. Other places that were more expensive were empty at the same time on the same days because they were more expensive. There is of course exceptions to this (Head and Shoulders Shampoo being the classic example) but they are outliers. The same with a labour market. The market rate for a C# programmer is approximately £350-450 a day in the UK. More specialist development roles pay more e.g. Angular JS developers which are typically £500-750 a day (the last time I looked). There is less Angular JS developers that are available (low supply) so to attract talent companies that wish to hire need to raise the rate. However C# developers in the UK are much more common (higher supply) so companies won't pay those high prices. Are you telling me this isn't happening? Because you can go to total jobs yourself and put C# developer Manchester and you will see difference in market rate yourself. > beyond market settling times, what the delta between labor value and market value very likely indicates is some sort of mispricing in the market, often due to some external, malign manipulation (i.e., an application of force, or power). efficient markets should tend toward the labor value of production, that is, profits are minimized to that of idiosyncratic risk (like pandemics). Not true. You are making several assumptions: 1) That there is abundance of said product (high supply). 2) People are wanting or needing to make a purchase. 3) That there isn't other competitors which have improved their processes or paying their employees less. Number 2 being the most important IMO as everything else is normally equal. If nobody wants to buy it at the cost (or higher) you will be selling it at a loss.
jahaja 7y ago
You know that Bertrand Russell was a socialist/communist right?
- nemo 7y ago
  He was a socialist, but anti-authoritarian, and a strong critic of all forms of Hegelianism including Marxism. He tried (with limited success) to formulate alternate concepts of socialism that weren't authoritarian and had a respect for civil liberties, as he saw that Marxism's various tries at revolution and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat were not only failing to bring socialism, but perverting it into something even worse than capitalism. I'm not a fan of Capitalism at all, but Marxism is even worse.
  - jahaja 7y ago
    Yeah, he promoted some sort of Council communism IIRC.
orthecreedence 7y ago
> [LTV is] an idea long since thoroughly discredited Not really? It has neither been proven nor disproven, not because of unsoundness in theory, but because of lack of ability to measure the data needed to (dis)prove it (http://bnarchives.yorku.ca/308/2/20101200_cockshott_nitzan_bichler_testing_the_ltv_exchange_web.htm http://bnarchives.yorku.ca/308/2/20101200_cockshott_nitzan_b...). On top of this, sure Marx made some bad predictions, but the breadth of his work was not predicting the future or describing what a socialist economy looks like, but the analysis of capitalism and the social relations that form around it. This analysis is still extremely relevant, regardless of his value theory. Sure some people cling to it and pretend all parts of Capital are still relevant even though things have changed drastically, but that doesn't negate all of Marx's work or ideas.
- nemo 7y ago
  There's no doubt you believe that, and if you would like to salvage what you can with open eyes to the glaring and serious faults in Marx's work, that's fine, though for me it's like trying to save Creationism. Those working to save both Marxism and Creationism seem like they have the same motive - a faith trying to justify a doctrine rather than follow the evidence. I hadn't mentioned it, but Marxism's anti-empiricism is another incredibly serious issue as well that both shows what a freakish 19th c archaism Marxism is, but also undermines enough to not make it seem worth saving the micrograms of baby for the kilos of bathwater.