> They argue that derivatives mark such a further shift, with
> associated gains for capital. I do agree with their point that
> the left should not just dismiss it all as a speculative drain
> on the real economy, or as capital deciding it is no longer
> interested in production. To do so is to miss the changing
> nature of capitals social power and leads to a politics that,
> what?, seeks to return to the good old days before
> derivatives.
Quickly, four things:
1. In retrospect, switching capital to the financial sector to the extent done has proved to be a supreme drain on surplus value production overall. I mean, the crisis has devalorized capital, massively. And this continues, as the economy drags along. That doesn't mean that the technical developments in finance are garbage.
2. Finance, as defined under the NAICS is many things. I haven't read them all, but the few Marxists I've read seem to completely miss the *fact* that there is an aspect of finance that is *productive* -- of use value, value, and surplus value. To the extent finance is intertemporal trade, finance enhances the mass of value and surplus value. It is productive, because it enables *labor cooperation* over time among firms, industries, etc. Just like there's a cross sectional division of labor. There's a temporal division of labor. We're standing on the shoulders of giants. Marx wrote that credit was a productive force. Indeed. (A productive force is a force -- ultimately labor -- that produces use values.)
3. The development of finance, the understanding of planning principles under uncertainty is something that communism will need (critically absorbed, like every other cultural development under capitalism). Things that won't work for capitalism as a whole will -- duly understood -- work beautifully for communism.
And I forgot the fourth thing.