On measuring the wealth of nations: the US economy, 1964-2001

This paper examines the methodology of Shaikh and Tonak (Measuringthe Wealth of Nations, 1994) underlying their calculation ofestimates of productive labour in the US economy from 1964 to2001. The focus is not on the results but on the methods thatgenerate them. The paper finds that the compromises made byShaikh and Tonak because of data unavailability are unreliable,and that better approximations are possible. On this latterbasis, the Shaikh and Tonak methodology can be used to providethe labour and wage estimates needed for empirical investigationsin the surplus-based tradition.     

Ideology, markets and money

Contemporary economic theory is considered in terms of the science/ideologydistinction. Marx's critique of Hegel is then used to derivea demarcation criterion that sharply separates scientific knowledgefrom ideology. This critique interprets Hegelian methodologyas fundamentally ideological because it understands realityin terms of abstract thought and then hypostatises that thoughtas reality. This process is more generally treated in termsof Marx's theory of value and money, in which money really doesdo what Hegelian logic purports to do. The consequences of consideringMarxian theory in this way provide some purchase on the logicand limitations of contemporary economic theory.     

The Labour Theory of Value as Foundation for Empirical Investigations

This paper outlines some recent approaches to the construction of an accounting structure which relates observable prices to Marxian labour values. The first is that proposed (independently of each other) by Duménil and Foley (DF); the second in some sense is a generalization which focuses on gross value produced rather than net value added; and a third imposes some temporal structure upon the second approach. The second two approaches are based on different definitions of labour value from that in the DF approach, and in the paper it is argued that the DF approach is both more theoretically coherent and more practically useful.