>>> Jim heartfield <jim at heartfield.demon.co.uk> 03/12/00 06:52PM >>
It was the Stalinist Varga who first argued that Marx's law of profit no
longer applied:
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CB: Jim H. says the above and then quotes something in which the words "law of profit" don't appear. And then what is "Marx's law of profit" ? There is the law of value, the law of the tendency of the rate of profit to fall, the mandate to accumulate, but the "law of profit" ?
'the economic theory of Marx in general and his theory of crisis in particular is based upon industrial capitalism, upon the capitalism of free competition. Present day capitalism, however, is monopoly capitalism - imperialism.'
Had Marx lived longer he would have noticed 'a new element in the development of capitalism: monopoly profit, the artificial rise of the share of monopoly capital in the total profit at the expense of the income of the smaller capitalists and the independent producers still operating'
E Varga, The Great Crisis and Its Political Consequences, London, 1935, pp26-7
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And of course, the theory of monopoly capitalism and imperialism that Varga is referring to is Lenin's theory. How odd not to mention the origin and most famous exponent of the theory being criticized.
CB