How Capitalists Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Crisis

How Capitalists Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Crisis
Bichler, Shimshon and Nitzan, Jonathan. (2013). Research Note. 22 November. pp. 1-9. (Article - Working Paper; English).

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Abstract or Brief Description

Do capitalists really want a recovery? Can they afford it?

On the face of it, the question sounds silly: of course capitalists want a recovery; how else can they prosper? According to the textbooks, both mainstream and heterodox, capital accumulation and economic growth are two sides of the same process. Accumulation generates growth and growth fuels accumulation, so it seems bootless to ask whether capitalists want growth. Growth is their lifeline, and the more of it, the better it is.

Or is it?

In the United States, rising unemployment – which hammers the well-being of workers, unincorporated businesses and the unemployed – serves not to undermine but to boost the overall income share of capitalists. And as employment growth decelerates, the income share of the Top 1% – which includes the capitalists as well as their protective power belt – soars. Under these circumstances, what reason do capitalists have to ‘get the economy going’? Why worry about rising unemployment and zero job growth when these very processes serve to boost their income-share-read-power?

Language

English

Publication Type

Article - Working Paper

Keywords

capital crisis DA economic policy economic theory growth income distribution labour Marxism monetarism neoclassical economics power profit underconsumption United States

Subject

BN Conflict & Violence
BN Ideology
BN Distribution
BN Agency
BN Power
BN Region - North America
BN Business Enterprise
BN Capital & Accumulation
BN Value & Price
BN Class
BN Labour
BN Crisis
BN Production
BN Macro
BN Growth

Depositing User

Jonathan Nitzan

Date Deposited

22 Nov 2013

Last Modified

08 Apr 2016 01:10

URL:

https://bnarchives.net/id/eprint/387

Available Versions of this Item

• How Capitalists Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Crisis. (deposited 22 Nov 2013) [Currently Displayed]
  • How Capitalists Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Crisis. (deposited 15 Jun 2014)
  • How Capitalists Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Crisis. (deposited 24 Nov 2013)

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