[lbo-talk] Re: wotsit madder

[Michael Dawson -PSU]

> So the FROP would be completely consistent with the
> top-heaviness theory of capitalist crisis -- that
> there is a shortage of profitable investment
> opportunities in production. Defenders of the FROP
> theory would not deny that top-heaviness exists. They
> would say that top-heaviness is only a symptom and you
> need the FROP theory to know why top-heaviness arises
> and how it relates to the rest of the economic
> phenomena.
>
> Isn't this what Marx is trying to work out in all of
> those difficult passages of Volume III? (I can't tell
> for sure if he succeeds.)
>
> Tom

I can see the point and realism of Doug's usage, but I still think the above
is erroneous.  Productive (leading to increased goods/services output)
capitalist investments are made based on the existence or non-existence of
promising pools of effective demand, not on the basis of some general
profit-rate calculation:  "I have x-million dollars.  If I invest it in
Project A, how much more money am I likely to get back?  Are there enough
potential buyers of the goods/services we'll make to make this bet?  What
returns have other recent investors been getting from this firm?"