2013RePEc: Research Papers in EconomicsOpen access

Credit, the Turnover of Capital, and the Law of the Falling Rate of Profit: A Critical Note

Miguel D. Ramírez

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Abstract

This brief paper argues that the total turnover period of capital, comprising both its time of production and circulation, has been almost totally ignored in the Marxian literature as an important counteracting factor to the law of the declining rate of profit. It is not mentioned at all by Marx in his famous Chp. XIV, Vol. III of Capital where he discusses other important counteracting forces, nor by Engels [in this particular context] who edited both Vols. II and III. Moreover, this note contends that had Marx lived to re-write Vols. II and III, he would have explicitly connected the expanding role of credit [associated with the development of capitalism] to a significant reduction in the turnover period of capital, thereby boosting the rate of surplus-value, and countering, in an highly erratic and contradictory manner, the fall in the rate of profit.

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This brief paper argues that the total turnover period of capital, comprising both its time of production and circulation, has been almost totally ignored in the Marxian literature as an important counteracting factor to the law of the declining rate of profit. It is not mentioned at all by Marx in his famous Chp. XIV, Vol. III of Capital where he discusses other important counteracting forces, nor by Engels [in this particular context] who edited both Vols. II and III. Moreover, this note contends that had Marx lived to re-write Vols. II and III, he would have explicitly connected the expanding role of credit [associated with the development of capitalism] to a significant reduction in the turnover period of capital, thereby boosting the rate of surplus-value, and countering, in an highly erratic and contradictory manner, the fall in the rate of profit.

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This brief paper argues that the total turnover period of capital, comprising both its time of production and circulation, has been almost totally ignored in the Marxian literature as an important counteracting factor to the law of the declining rate of profit. It is not mentioned at all by Marx in his famous Chp. XIV, Vol. III of Capital where he discusses other important counteracting forces, nor by Engels [in this particular context] who edited both Vols. II and III. Moreover, this note contends that had Marx lived to re-write Vols. II and III, he would have explicitly connected the expanding role of credit [associated with the development of capitalism] to a significant reduction in the turnover period of capital, thereby boosting the rate of surplus-value, and countering, in an highly erratic and contradictory manner, the fall in the rate of profit.

Key concepts: Rate of profit, Economics, Surplus value, Capitalism, Prices of production, Capital (architecture), Capital accumulation, Profit (economics)

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