A Simple Course in Capital Theory: A Misunderstood Debate

2021 ◽  
pp. 001946622110239
Author(s):  
Amit Bhaduri
Keyword(s):  
Real Wage ◽  
The Other ◽  
Short Paper ◽  
Marginal Productivity ◽  
Profit Rate ◽  
Circular Reasoning ◽  
Capital Theory ◽  
Production And Distribution ◽  
Productivity Theory ◽  
Relative Scarcity

This short paper is a demonstration of the difficulty with the textbook production function which uses the notion of capital as a factor of production. Because, this notion is logically incompatible with the other notion of the money value of capital needed for distribution theory. Theories of production and distribution become incompatible. Outside a one commodity world, this leads to insurmountable circular reasoning. The value of capital cannot be measured without first knowing its distributional parameters (e.g. real wage or the profit rate) and if they are known the marginal productivity theory based on the notion of the relative scarcity of capital as a factor of production is not only superfluous but meaningless. The scarcity of something which cannot be measured even in theory cannot be defined.

A Modern Post-Mortem on Böhm's Capital Theory: Its Vital Normative Flaw Shared by Presraffian Mainstream Capital Theory

2001 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 301-317 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul A. Samuelson
Keyword(s):  
Interest Rate ◽  
Nobel Prize ◽  
Real Wage ◽  
Wage Rate ◽  
Post Mortem ◽  
Marginal Productivity ◽  
Capital Theory ◽  
Real Wage Rate ◽  
Friedrich Hayek

The Nobel Prize of Piero Sraffa and Joan Robinson that Stockholm never awarded might have pleased at least one of them. Its citation would have included: “Their investigations uncovered a fatal normative flaw in Böhm-Bawerkian and modern mainstream capital theory.”Just prior to Alfred Marshall's 1890 ascendancy as leading world economist, Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk (1851–1914) perhaps wore that crown thanks to his three-volume treatise on the history and fundamentals of interest theories. Böhm (1884, 1889, 1909, 1912) somewhat independently followed in the footsteps of Stanley Jevons (1871) and himself strongly stimulated Knut Wicksell (1893), Irving Fisher (1906, 1907, 1930), and Friedrich Hayek (1931, 1941). Pugnacious and somewhat incoherent, Böhm and his disciples battled cogently the competing school of John Bates Clark (1899) and Frank Knight (1934, 1935a, 1935b), which idealized a permanent scalar capital alleged to be virtually permanent and with a marginal productivity determining its interest rate in much the same way that primary labor's marginal productivity determines its real wage rate and primary land's marginal productivity determines its real rent rate(s). The Clark-Knight paradigm—and, for that matter, Frank Ramsey's 1928 mathematical clone—shares the Böhm-Hayek vital normative flaw.

Adolphe Landry's Theory of Profits

2012 ◽  
pp. 125-140
Author(s):  
Heinz D. Kurz
Keyword(s):  
Contemporary Literature ◽  
Critical Assessment ◽  
Marginal Productivity ◽  
Productivity Theory

The paper provides a critical assessment of Adolphe Landry's contributions to the theory of capital and interest. His analysis represents one among several variants of marginal productivity theory. The distinguishing feature of his variant is that he considers entrepreneurship a scarce factor of production alongside with the usual factors labour, land and capital. He thus tries to put entrepreneurship - the innovative agens, as Schumpeter saw it - into the Procrustean bed of marginalist theory. It is not clear whether Landry's combination of various ideas to be found in the contemporary literature generates a coherent whole, because his argument is often suggestive and vague and lacks analytical rigour.

Paratexts, Italian style

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 156-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luca Barra ◽  
Massimo Scaglioni
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Professional Practices ◽  
International Trends ◽  
Production Processes ◽  
Production And Distribution ◽  
Main Production ◽  
The One ◽  
Original Practices ◽  
Tv Show ◽  
Depth Interviews

In recent years, the completed transition towards a fully developed multichannel environment and the growth of non-linear offers has brought to the Italian television (TV) landscape unprecedented attention on the ways in which programmes are communicated to the audience and their images and identities are carefully built. The preparation and circulation of promos have therefore grown in importance and relevance in the national TV industry, as new original practices emerged and a long-lasting tradition was challenged by new formats and goals. Building on a set of in-depth interviews with professionals involved in the writing, production and distribution of promos, and analysis of other production materials, the article reconstructs the ‘promotional cultures’ of Italian broadcasters, analysing the main production processes, the different kinds of promos and the various skills involved, and the logics and constraints involved in the making of these ephemeral paratexts that more and more are pervading both the structure of programming flow and the experience of national TV viewers. Thus, the article investigates the professional practices and logics of contemporary commercial and pay TV programme promotion in Italy, defining the role played by national private broadcasters and transnational groups in shaping an Italian promotional space on TV. The ‘Italian style’ of TV show promotion emerges as a constant negotiation between local historical traditions and clichés, on the one hand, and international trends in promo production and aesthetics, on the other, with a solid path shared with other countries and broadcasters, and some peculiar specificities.

Problems for the architect and town planner caused by air in motion

1971 ◽  
Vol 269 (1199) ◽  
pp. 335-341 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Short Paper ◽  
High Rise ◽  
Engineering Problems ◽  
Original Contribution ◽  
Motion Range ◽  
The Subject

This short paper makes no original contribution to knowledge but simply describes and identifies a range of problems encountered in practice by town planners and architects. The term ‘ architectural ’ in the subject title of the Discussion Meeting is taken to imply that the results of aerodynamic research are now as applicable to architectural as to engineering problems. Architecture is broadly interpreted as the coordination of many techniques to give significant form to social programmes. As this is a comprehensive activity, it follows that the problems caused by air in motion range from the location and layout of whole cities at one end of the scale, to the design of a window or the control of an ornamental jet of water at the other. In the middle of this range typical problems arise from the siting of buildings singly and in groups, and in the structure and cladding of high-rise and low-rise buildings to resist wind, rain penetration and air-borne pollution.

A screening checklist to minimize the adverse effects of cosmetic dermatological procedures; a short paper (Preprint)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanjeewani Fonseka ◽  
Sewwandi Abeyrathna
Keyword(s):  
Risk Factors ◽  
Adverse Effects ◽  
The Other ◽  
Short Paper ◽  
Full Understanding ◽  
External Appearance ◽  
Increase Patient Satisfaction ◽  
Dermatology Clinic ◽  
Screening Guideline ◽  
Remedial Actions

BACKGROUND Cosmetic dermatological procedures which are aimed at enhancing the external appearance have troublesome yet preventable adverse effects. At present, there is a lack of a comprehensive screening guideline to detect patients with risk factors for such adverse effects. OBJECTIVE To introduce a comprehensive screening checklist to pick up the patients’ risk factors in advance, in order to prevent or minimize adverse effects from cosmetic dermatological procedures. METHODS The checklist was administered to 1150 patients attending an outpatient dermatology clinic for cosmetic dermatological procedures. Checklist composed of 30 ‘yes/no’ type questions and 7 other components in the pre-procedure workup. RESULTS Except for two risk factors (being pregnant and having a pacemaker inserted), all other assessed possible risk factors were present in one or more patients who attended for procedures. The most prevalent risk factor was the current use of medications in 226 (19.65%) patients. The other commonly found risk factors were: lack of full understanding of the procedure (14.52%) and phobia/fear of injections (9.30%). CONCLUSIONS The screening checklist that we used is a simple yet comprehensive tool for minimizing the possible adverse effects of cosmetic dermatological procedures. We were able to postpone, take remedial actions or alter the cosmetic dermatological procedures after going through the checklist and increase patient satisfaction and improve the safety of the doctor as well. CLINICALTRIAL Not applicable

Technological Effects on Wages and Labour: Classical and Neoclassical Ideas

2012 ◽  
pp. 97-124
Author(s):  
Anastassios D. Karayiannis ◽  
Ioannis A. Katselidis
Keyword(s):  
Technological Progress ◽  
New Technology ◽  
Marginal Productivity ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Rate Effects ◽  
Short Run ◽  
Real Wage Rate ◽  
Productivity Theory ◽  
The One ◽  
The 19Th Century

The introduction of new technology may have significant effects on the level of employment and the real wage rate; effects that have received considerable attention even from the economic thinkers of the classical period. This paper aims to analyze and evaluate the various views and arguments of early classical and neoclassical economists concerning the technological effects on wages and employment. On the one hand, the economists of the early decades of the 19th century (mainly between 1800 and 1840) had recognized and analyzed many of the effects of technology on labourers' welfare. On the other hand, early neoclassical theorists of the period between 1890 and 1935 tried to expand on the classical views and to develop their own theoretical arguments, based on new perceptions like the marginal productivity theory. The main conclusion drawn is that most of early classical and neoclassical economists recognized and specified the temporary adverse effects of new technology on labour (e.g. short-run unemployment), but, at the same time, they argued for the beneficial long-run consequences of technological progress on labourers' welfare.

Leakage from Electrified Metal Plates and Points placed above and below Uninsulated Flames

1899 ◽  
Vol 22 ◽  
pp. 38-46
Author(s):  
Lord Kelvin ◽  
Magnus Maclean
Keyword(s):  
Electrical Properties ◽  
Copper Plate ◽  
The Other ◽  
Short Paper ◽  
Internal Diameter ◽  
Bunsen Burner ◽  
Metal Plates ◽  
Burning Charcoal ◽  
Initial Difference ◽  
To Receive

§ 1. In § 10 of our paper “On Electrical Properties of Fumes proceeding from Flames and Burning Charcoal,” communicated to this Society on 5th April, results of observations on the leakage between two parallel metal plates with an initial difference of electric potential of 6·2 volts between them, when the fumes from flames and burnings were allowed to pass between them and round them, were given. The first part (§§ 1–4) of the present short paper gives results of observations on the leakage between two copper plates 1 centimetre apart, when one of them is kept at a constant high positive or negative potential; and the other, after being metallically connected with the electrometer-sheath, is disconnected, and left to receive electricity through fumes between the two.The method of observation (see fig. 1) was as follows:—Two copper plates were fixed in a block of paraffin at the top of a round tinned iron funnel 96 centimetres long and 15·6 centimetres internal diameter. A spirit-lamp or a Bunsen burner, the only two flames used in these experiments, was placed at the bottom of the funnel, 86 centimetres below the two copper plates. One terminal of a voltaic battery was connected to one plate, B, and the other terminal was connected to the sheath of a Kelvin quadrant electrometer. The other copper plate was connected to one of the pair of quadrants of the electrometer in such a way that by pulling a silk cord with a hinged platinum wire at its end, this copper plate and this pair of quadrants could be insulated from the sheath of the electrometer and the rest of the apparatus.

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