On Dec 10, 2006, at 1:28 PM, Patrick Bond wrote:
> Yes, quite significant ways of deriving profits are occurring away
> from the point of production,
Where do they come from? Thin air? How can the system as a whole conjure value merely out of exchanging virtual titles to wealth? The profits of financiers come ultimately from interest and fees paid by business and consumer debtors, even if there are countless steps between producers & reciipents.
Many of the examples you cite are of stocks of capitalized income flows, not the flows themselves. But if those are to be converted into actual cash, then the cash has to come from incomes derived (by capital or labor) from the production of goods & services. And what would all those profits mean if they couldn't be converted into actual consumer or investment goods?
There's something a little retro and moralizing about the prominence accorded p.a. in your & Harvey's analyses that wants to look away from actual production and focus instead on "gambling" and "parasitism."
Doug