[net.politics] Marxist economics 101

tpkq@charm.UUCP (Timothy Kerwin) (04/05/84)

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	Recently there has been a series of exchanges in net.politics
between liberals, who blame Reagan for all of the country's economic
problems, and conservatives, who (quite rightly) point out that these
problems have roots which predate the Reagan administration by many
years.  And on the other hand, the conservatives are saying that
Reagan can claim credit for the recent economic recovery.

	In fact, as Marx pointed out over a hundred years ago, a
periodic cycle of booms and recessions is inevitable under the
capitalist mode of production.  As a result of the anarchy of
capitalist production, the government, through various forms
of fiscal and monetary tinkering, can at best only slightly prolong a
boom, or slightly delay a recession.  The recovery is no more a result
of Reagan's policies than the recession was a result of Carter's.
Both were trying, each in his own way, to ensure a high rate of profit
for the capitalist class.

	Similarly, several people have discussed the problem of
unemployment, and suggested various possible "causes" and "solutions"
to the problem.  (One submitter even suggested that the cure for
unemployment is population control!)  Unemployment is a built-in
feature of capitalism.  There never has been, nor can there ever be, a
capitalist system without unemployment.  The unemployed constitute an
"industrial reserve army," which is absolutely necessary for the
expansion of capitalist enterprise into new spheres.  Another effect
of unemployment is that the "supply" of labor power is permanently
greater than the "demand" for it.  This results (in the absence of
strong labor unions) in the lowering of wages toward the minimum necessary
to maintain the life of the worker.  This result is most evident in
the colonial and semi-colonial countries, where the expansion of
capital has met little organized resistance from workers.

	The point is that if you want to find solutions to the
problems of recession, unemployment, inflation, etc., you have to look
beyond the capitalist system.