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January 14, 2015

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Vrot

In other words markets are evil and not be trusted, unless of course markets are telling you what you want to hear, in which case hooray for markets!

Deviation From The Mean

"I've worked in and around finance all my working life - and I feel no conflict between this fact and my Marxian ideas."

I wouldn't worry too much, Marx was friendly with a number of city guys and Engels played the market.

I guess my issue with you is that I often infer from your analysis that anarchy is simply unavoidable no matter what economic system you have. Which would somewhat go against Marxist beliefs. But maybe I have interpreted you incorrectly?

Danny A

'Markets' are entirely a creation of human society and behaviour so of course they are NEVER perfect but are ALWAYS defined by humans.
So "We should therefore be cautious about policy prescriptions, about the potential for improving capitalism for the better." is a very defeatist comment in my opinion, I think this sort of attitude inevitably leads to a laissez-faire approach that frees market participants to rig them at the expense of non-participants.

gastro george

Anna Hedge#s has some interesting points, but is a bit too charitable. For example:

"But this raises the question - where does the money these wizards juggle come from? ... one source is pension funds. Dissolving/ abolishing/confiscating the money sloshing around in ‘the City’ would have negative consequences for a LOT of people, many on low incomes ..."

It could also be argued that the City does an awful lot of salami slicing of people's pensions - and they're at the forefront in politicking for individual private pensions rather than the cheaper and more efficient collective versions.

Jay Jeffers

Very interesting post - I like it

I wonder why we see the Marxian claim differently though (and hopefully it doesn't turn on some Marxian v Marxist distinction)? You wrote,

"This is consistent with the Marxian claim that capitalism has run out of oomph, that the relations of production have become fetters on the economy, perhaps because inequality holds back growth."

But this seems like a pretty watered down statement relative to, say, "Capitalism has a central contradiction in its fundamentals, such that it will eventually collapse because of this central contradiction." I mean, puttering along and being held back because of a bug isn't the same as having a fatal flaw built in (and the latter is what Marxism says, right?. Like, not the same at all. I wonder how that strikes you...

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