Hartmut Elsenhans,Saving Capitalism from the Capitalists

Hartmut Elsenhans's Saving Capitalism from the Capitalists presents an intriguing argument: capitalist elites have induced unsustainable capitalism to the disadvantage of labor and the system as a whole. The author proposes a fairly unconventional solution. He suggests that democratic socialism can be the necessary political complement to our capitalist system. By drawing on the socialist capacity to empower labor and increase mass consumption, we could achieve a more balanced and sustainable capitalism. The book is ideally suited for readers of Keynesian and post Keynesian analysis on contemporary capitalism and it fits in the discourse on problems of low income growth, declining demand, and investment opportunities in major world economies.     

马克思主义与后凯恩斯主义经济增长理论比较研究*——从经济增长基本方程说起

本文从设定经济增长基本方程出发，探讨了马克思主义与后凯恩斯主义经济学构建闭合增长模型的不同思路，进而对两种增长理论进行详细的比较分析。研究发现，马克思主义与后凯恩斯主义增长理论都对收入分配给予了特别的关注，并且都坚持阶级、制度、非均衡的分析方法；然而，两者在所依据的理论基础、经济增长的最终决定因素、资本主义经济增长是否存在极限以及增长过程中的市场结构等问题上仍存在明显分歧。与后凯恩斯主义增长理论相比，马克思主义增长理论在理论基础、研究视阈及内在逻辑一致性等方面都更具优势。全面比较马克思主义与后凯恩斯主义经济增长理论对于构建中国特色发展经济学具有重要的借鉴意义。     

Is currency seigniorage exogenous for inflation tax in Turkey?

This paper discusses the implications of the validity of the conditioning hypothesis for the maintained money demand equation for an inflation tax analysis. We also test the validity of the quantity-theoretical inflation tax model for the post-1980 quarterly Turkish data by using Johansen cointegration techniques. The results suggest that the tax rate (inflation) is weakly exogenous for the parameters of the long-run money demand (tax base) equation. This result, consistent with a Keynesian endogenous seigniorage-exogenous inflation tax rate theory prior, does not support the hypothesis that the Turkish inflation can be explained by the conventional inflation tax revenue-maximizing motive alone.     

凯恩斯与马克思国民收入理论的比较研究

凯恩斯的国民收入基本公式以及实现宏观经济平衡的基本条件(I=S)与马克思资本主义两大部类再生产基本公式和平衡条件具有内在的相似性和逻辑关系。作为对宏观经济整体运行状态的研究,凯恩斯的国民收入公式和I=S在马克思两大部类再生产基本公式和平衡条件简单变形的基础上就可以得出。可以说,凯恩斯开创的宏观经济学是对马克思社会再生产理论模型的基本公式及相关经济思想的直接吸收和客观发展。     

后凯恩斯主义经济学的货币非中性理论

后凯恩斯主义经济学的突出贡献是将凯恩斯关于不确定性和货币非中性思想发展为一个完整的关于货币非中性的理论框架,它强调无论是长期还是短期,货币都是影响真实部门的一个重要因素。后凯恩斯主义的货币理论在凯恩斯的灵活偏好理论中加入融资性需求,这样就必然导致存量和流量的矛盾,从而造成利息率的不确定性和波动性;从不同角度分析了货币的创造过程,提出了内生货币供给理论。这一理论完全是与主流经济学所信奉的货币数量论对立的,从而拒绝资本主义经济自然趋于长期充分就业均衡的概念。     

Workers' investment funds and the dynamic inefficiency of capitalism

This paper examines the effects of the partial transfer of control over the investment decision from capitalists to workers, which is an essential feature of plans to establish workers' investment funds, in a two-class model of capitalism formulated as a differential game. It is shown that the institutional change which provides the workers with means to invest their savings directly, instead of having to use the capitalists as agents for accumulation, improves economic efficiency. As a consequence, the economy saves, invests, grows and consumes more than the pure capitalist society, which is characterized by the Keynesian separation of saving and investment decisions.     

The Limits of Organizational Change

The paper builds on the Marxist concept of exploitation to explore the meaning of the Post Keynesian notion of uncertainty. Uncertainty is mediated by institutions and is distributed unevenly among different social groups. As different historical social formations entail different institutional structures, the distribution and nature of uncertainty will also differ. The social configurations between class relations and uncertainty are analyzed for the capitalist, feudal and slave modes of production. It is demonstrated that modes of production do not only imply specific exploitative relations but also different relative distributions of uncertainty amongst classes. The joining of Marxian and Post Keynesian approaches allows for a richer understanding of exploitive relations and illuminates the full societal impact of uncertainty. It is shown that only in capitalism is the exploited class exposed to a substantial degree of economic uncertainty.     

Consumer sentiment and countercyclical fiscal policies

We re‐explore the consequences of some popular countercyclical intervention rules in a simple Keynesian‐type macroeconomic model in which the dynamics of consumer sentiment and business cycles are intertwined. We find that fiscal policy does not only have a direct effect on national income via the well‐known Keynesian multiplier process but also an indirect effect by affecting consumer sentiment. The good news is that the indirect effect may amplify the direct effect and therefore increases a policy‐maker’s impact on national income. However, the bad news is that due to the interactions between the business cycle and the evolution of consumer sentiment, the stabilization of national income is an intricate matter.     

Toward the crisis: a Kaleckian-Keynesian interpretation of the instability of growth and capital accumulation in Brazil

This article examines theoretically and empirically the instability of Brazilian investment and growth for the past couple of decades, highlighting the evolution that led to the current crisis. A theoretical discussion highlights the importance of Kaleckian and Keynesian approaches in understanding the semi-stagnation of the Brazilian economy since the 1990s. Empirical evidence shows that investment has increased until 2013, but not to the point of getting the economy back on the track of high growth rates and higher investment-GDP ratios. The econometric findings are compatible with the theoretical underpinnings of investment activity based on Keynes and Kalecki and suggest the existence of room for activist policies in Brazil in order to stimulate economic activity.     

Going out of the Great Recession? Contrast between the United States and Europe: Proposed work from economic history, 1960–2014

In recent work, the authors have proposed to the United States a model that explains the trend behavior of the rate of profit from share surplus, capital productivity, and the coefficient of financialization. The main results of the explanatory model allow the authors to affirm that with the change of control of Keynesianism to neoliberalism since 1980, there has been a substantial fall in the profit rate to half the values achieved in the years of Keynesian regulation (1945–1973). This significant fall in the level of benefits is due to a substantial fall in capital productivity. The authors are currently working on adapting the explanatory model for the U.S. economy to the main countries of the European Union (Germany, France, Italy, United Kingdom, and Spain). The results show that the pattern of behavior of the variables described in the reference country—the world capitalist economic system, the United States—is repeated more or less precisely in the main countries of the European Union; Germany, France, Italy, United Kingdom, and Spain.     

Keynes,investment, unemployment and expectations

In Keynes’ General Theory, investment determines effective demand, which determines unemployment and the labour market plays a negligible role. In New Keynesian models, labour market institutions determine the natural rate of unemployment and the speed at which unemployment adjusts to it. Investment is mostly ignored as a key variable behind the problem of high unemployment, despite a strong empirical association between investment and unemployment. We discuss the evolution of the ‘Keynesian’ model, and how in the process of domesticating the General Theory, the central relationship between unemployment and investment and the role of the state of confidence was bred out of the model. We then present some evidence of the centrality of investment and expectations to the long‐term evolution of unemployment in OECD countries. We also argue that recent results in finance, which find that individuals do not behave rationally and, moreover, that there may be no basis for rational calculation, provides support for Keynes’s notion that animal spirits play a central role in investment.     

Empirical macroeconomic model of the Finnish economy (EMMA)

This paper provides a review of the empirical macroeconomic model (EMMA) built for forecasting purposes at the Finnish Labour Institute for Economic Research. The model is quite small, consisting of 71 endogenous and 70 exogenous variables. The number of behavioural equations is 15. The basis of the model is Keynesian, although the model has some novel properties. They are the treatment of the supply side and prices that follow the routes of the neoclassical synthesis. The parameters of the model are estimated from quarterly data that cover the years 1990–2005. The model also contains a Kalman-filtered variable to control the deep recession in Finland at the beginning of the '90s. This special feature brings the model closer to the new calibrated models.     

Alternative indicators for predicting the probability of declining inflation: evidence from the US

The performance of inflation indicators for predicting the probabilityof inflation falling inside constant and moving targets is consideredwith a probit model using US data. Given the Federal ReserveSystem's emphasis on achieving price stability, particular attentionis given to the target that future inflation will be below recentinflation. In contrast with earlier years, the unemploymentand capacity utilisation rates do not perform well in forecastingthe direction of inflation in the mid and late 1990s. We suggestthat extending the Keynesian Phillips curve analysis to considerchanges in labour market conditions, technological advance andworker skills, and openness will increase understanding of theseissues.     

新自由主义、金融危机与资本主义模式的调整——美国模式、日本模式和瑞典模式的比较

20世纪80年代,伴随着新自由主义思潮的兴起,发达资本主义国家的不同市场经济模式集体转向了新自由主义市场经济模式。20世纪90年代,美国模式、日本模式和瑞典模式几乎同时爆发了金融危机。美国模式对新自由主义政策进行了短暂调整后,又重蹈覆辙;日本模式则在新自由主义模式与日本模式之间摇摆不定,其结果导致日本经历了失去的二十年。瑞典模式则在坚持自身模式合理内核的基础上,弱化了新自由主义政策主张,迅速走出危机,走向持续发展。2007年美国次贷危机标志着新自由主义模式的终结,可以预见,无论是美国模式、日本模式还是瑞典模式,都将在坚持自身模式合理内核的基础上,更加注重向经济绩效和社会绩效均衡发展的方向调整。从本质上看,无论哪种资本主义市场经济模式,都无非是资本主义生产关系的一种调节形式而已,它们都无法从根本上克服资本主义基本矛盾带来的经济周期律。     

Vicarelli,Keynes, and the unstable nexus between investment,liquidity, and finance

The goal of this article is to reconstruct Keynes’s vision of the unstable nexus between investment, liquidity and finance, as set out by the Italian economist Fausto Vicarelli (1936–1986). As argued in the article, one of Vicarelli’s main contributions consists of explaining the inherent instability of financially sophisticated capitalist economies in terms of the interaction (and double dissociation) between investment, saving, and stock-holding decisions, within a Keynesian framework characterized by the presence of fundamental uncertainty. While Vicarelli’s interpretation of Keynes is best understood in the context of the post-Keynesian literature, its relevance goes beyond that, as its sheds light on current issues related to the post-2008 financial crisis and its policy implications.     

Oscillations between repressed inflation and Keynesian equilibria due to inertia in decision making

In the framework of a rationed equilibrium economy as introduced by Malinvaud, the paper studies the long term evolution of the economy around the Repressed inflation—Keynesian boundary, introducing timelags in agents' response to changes in prices and wages. Depending on the distribution of timelags we show that the economy exhibits either decreasing oscillations around the boundary, eventually converging to zero, or (semi-) stable steady oscillations between the two regions. The obtained results therefore clarify the validity of the claim that a basic feature of modern economies is the cycling motion between Repressed inflation and Keynesian equilibria.     

The Return of Keynesian Economics: A Contribution in the Spirit of John Cornwall's Work

This paper assesses the recent interest for Keynesian economics in academia and policy-making circles. It examines the main features of Keynesian economics vis-à-vis neoclassical economics, before presenting the three-equation New Consensus Macroeconomics (NCM) model and its Keynesian roots. Drawing on the work of John Cornwall, the main conclusion of the paper is that the most important criticisms of the model are related to the acceptance of the axiom of independence between aggregate supply and aggregate demand by proponents of the NCM view.     

A real and monetary analysis of capitalism

Building on ideas of Joseph Schumpeter, this paper constructs and compares a real and a monetary model of capitalism. The paper’s thesis is that real and monetary analysis are both necessary for describing the capitalist cycle. The real model is in four parts. The first part is a simplified static Walrasian exchange. The second part uses a time dynamic to show price and productivity equilibrium over time. The third part defines surplus-value, capital, accumulation, profit and producer’s surplus. The fourth part defines economic evolution and long-term analysis. Each of the four parts has a corresponding Mathematica program and a table of sample data. The real model shows a relationship between long term average profit, GDP and capitalization. A monetary model is then constructed which empirically defines monetary and real products, the capital-market, the real economy and investment. The monetary model is first described under conditions of laissez-faire. The concepts of appreciation, overinvestment and the capitalist cycle are defined with the aid of the real model. Finally, the post laissez-faire capitalist cycle is described with an emphasis on the government policies of post 1980 capitalism. The conclusion of the paper—based on the real and monetary models—is that post 1980 capitalism changes but does not eliminate the capitalist cycle because government policies do not address over-investment, rather these policies abet over-investment.     

Fiscal and Monetary Policy Interaction in a Simple Accelerator Model

In this paper, a simple Keynesian and discrete time multiplier ?C accelerator model is developed, which results after the inclusion of the money market and a balanced government budget constraint in Samuelson??s (1939) business cycle model. The resulted model is proved to be less stable and the evolution of income around its equilibrium is more likely to exhibit a sinusoidal way of movement. The magnitude of the main tools of fiscal and monetary policy is assumed to be determined solely by the government and the Central Bank respectively, so that income??s constant amplitude around its intertemporal equilibrium value is minimized.     

A new Keynesian framework and wage and price dynamics in the USA

This paper investigates theoretical implications from a new Keynesian model focusing on the labor market, by imposing them as testable restrictions in an estimated vector error correction model on US data from 1982Q3 to 2016Q1. By this, I conduct an important, but rarely addressed, step in assessing the empirical relevance of a theoretical new Keynesian model. Another advantage of this approach is that the cycle and trend components of the data are separated when imposing the testable restrictions, such that there is no need to filter the data series prior to estimation. The results show that most of the properties pertaining to the theoretical model cannot be rejected when imposed as restrictions. The new Keynesian model on the labor market is thus found to be empirically relevant. Furthermore, the estimated econometric model explains a large degree of the wage and price dynamics in the USA, such that the paper also provides an estimated macroeconometric model.