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Book Cover
E-book
Author Roemer, John E.

Title Free to lose : an introduction to Marxist economic philosophy / John E. Roemer
Published Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press, 1988

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Description 1 online resource (x, 203 pages) : illustrations
Contents Contents -- 1. Introduction -- The Private Property System -- Exploitation -- Classes -- Historical Materialism -- Capitalism and Freedom -- Method -- A Preview -- 2. The Origin of Exploitation -- An Egalitarian Distribution of Capital -- The Technical Definition of Exploitation -- Unequal Ownership of the Capital Stock -- The Causes of Exploitation -- The Industrial Reserve Army -- Concluding Comments -- 3. Feudalism and Capitalism -- A Brief Account of Feudalism -- A Difference between Capitalism and Feudalism -- 4. Exploitation and Profits
Embodied Labor and ExploitationPrices and the Profit Rate -- The Relationship between Exploitation and Profits -- An Economy with Many Produced Goods -- The Social Division of Labor and the Perception of Exploitation -- The Labor Theory of Value -- 5. The Morality of Exploitation -- Exploitation as the Source of Profits -- The Initial Distribution -- Justification of Unequal Distribution -- 6. The Emergence of Class -- A Definition of Equilibrium for a Corn Model with Assets -- Class Formation -- Class and Wealth -- Class and Exploitation
The Significance of ClassExploitation Deemphasized -- 7. Exploitation without a Labor Market -- The Corn Economy with a Capital Market -- Capital Market Island: The Five-Class Model -- Capital Markets and Workers� Cooperatives -- Exploitation without Labor or Capital Markets -- International Capitalism: Imperialism and Labor Migration -- Domination versus Exploitation versus Property Relations -- 8. Historical Materialism -- Economic Structure, Productive Forces, and Superstructure -- The Role of Class Struggle -- The Logic of the Theory
Challenges from Economic HistoryEvolving Property Relations -- 9. Evolving Forms of Exploitation -- Historical Materialism and Private Property -- The Failure of Surplus Value as a Measure of Exploitation -- A Property-Relations Approach to Capitalist Exploitation -- Feudal Exploitation -- A Comparison of Revolutionary Transitions -- Socialist Exploitation -- Socially Necessary Exploitation -- Syndicalization versus Socialization -- 10. Public Ownership of the Means of Production -- The Case for Public Ownership -- Three Political Philosophies
The Story of Able and InfirmCharacterization of an Economic Constitution -- Evaluation -- 11. Epilogue -- Appendix: Statements and Proofs of Theorems -- Bibliographical Notes -- References -- Index
Summary John Roemer challenges the morality of an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production. Unless you start with a certain amount of wealth in such a society, you are only "free to lose." This book addresses crucial questions of political philosophy and normative economics in terms understandable by readers with a minimal knowledge of economics
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 193-197) and index
Notes English
Print version record
Subject Marxian economics -- Mathematical models
Marxian economics -- Philosophy
POLITICAL SCIENCE -- Political Ideologies -- Communism & Socialism.
BUSINESS & ECONOMICS -- Economics -- General.
Marxian economics -- Philosophy
Marxian economics -- Mathematical models
Economie marxiste -- modèles mathématiques.
Economie marxiste -- Philosophie.
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9780674042865
0674042867
9780674318755
0674318757