Critique of Political Economy

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Critique of political economy is the investigation and representation of the mode of production and ideology of bourgeois society, begun by Karl Marx since the mid-19th century . The criticism aims at the same time at the classical political economy , the social conditions and the bourgeois ideology that veils them. The aim of the critique of political economy is the recognition and abolition of this form of society by the exploited working class. In his exile in London, Marx published a first report on this in 1859, On the Critique of Political Economy , and in 1867 the first volume of his main work Das Kapital , Critique of Political Economy .

According to Marx, the mistake of classical political economy consisted mainly in the fact that its theorists either failed to show what the relationship between the workload for the production of goods and their exchange value actually is (e.g. Ricardo ), or that they denied such a connection (e.g. Bailey). In contrast to the classics of political economy, Marx was concerned with lifting the "ideological veil" of surface phenomena and exposing the "essence" of the capitalist mode of production.

At the same time, his criticism was directed at the competing socialist theories such as Proudhon's and Lassalle's , which, in Marx's view, did not achieve the rank of classics of political economy and whose errors led the workers' movement down the wrong track .

Position within Marxism

In addition to the materialistic anthropology of Marx's early work, the historical materialism begun by Marx and Friedrich Engels since 1845, and the later Engel's works on scientific dialectics , the writings on the Critique of Political Economy are the main sources of Marxism.

Nowadays the critique of political economy within Marxism is considered to be the most important and central project, which has led to a large number of advanced approaches within and outside academic circles and is being pursued.

Representation in capital

method

In the so-called method chapter of the introduction to the Grundrisse , Marx criticizes that classical economics had proceeded from the concrete to increasingly abstract categories in order to reproduce reality in the head, whereby reality then appears as a thought structure. On the other hand, it is correct to begin with the most abstract categories and to present them as these categories emerge from one another in modern bourgeois society.

Marx's approach is understood as a dialectical representation method in different ways .

According to the interpretation that goes back to Engels, which prevailed for a long time and is partially represented today, Marx used a logical-historical method in Capital in which he began the presentation with historically oldest and at the same time simplest forms of commodity production and from there traced the development of more modern forms. This school of interpretation places an emphasis on quantitative and economic analysis and has led to the development of a Marxist economic theory.

On the other hand, according to an interpretation that is widespread today, Marx begins the presentation under the premise of a fully developed modern commodity production, and presents the various forms of commodity value in a logical-systematic manner. This interpretation is represented by the " Neue Marx-Lektüre " and places great emphasis on it the scientific penetration of value . According to this interpretation, the dialectical representation in capital is cyclical insofar as Marx, assuming a developed commodity production, starts from the most abstract form of value and reconstructs this assumed commodity production in the course of the value form analysis.

Value and Money Theory

Goods analysis

The starting point of Marx's investigation is the wealth of bourgeois society as an immense collection of goods with the individual goods as an elementary form.

To be a commodity is not a natural property of things, but a social one; only in capitalist societies does it represent the typical form of wealth. Commodities are freely reproducible goods that are produced exclusively for exchange on the market.

Goods have a value that has a double form as use value and exchange value . The use-value of a good consists in the fact that its properties make it useful for the satisfaction of a human need; it is independent of the social form in which it appears. Exchange value is the quantitative exchange ratio of two consumer goods.

Use value and exchange value are in dialectical contradiction to one another. On the one hand, they are opposite determinations of the same thing; On the other hand, there is a relationship of dependency between them: without use value there is no exchange value and without exchange value there is no access to use values.

The goods are manufactured through private labor. Like the goods, this has a “double character”: concrete and abstract work . Concrete work produces qualitatively different use values. With it, man appropriates the objects of nature to satisfy his needs. The abstract labor produces the exchange values. It includes a naturalization and de- individualization of human work insofar as it reduces this on the one hand to the mere "expenditure of human labor in the physiological sense" and on the other hand to the socially necessary working hours.

Value form analysis and functions of money

With the analysis of the form of value , Marx claims to achieve something that has no equivalent in bourgeois economy. Your goal is to solve the “money puzzle”. Marx's thesis is that the simple value relationship of two goods already contains the structure of the money form.

The value form analysis is often understood as if Marx wanted to trace the historical origin of money on a high level of abstraction starting from the simple exchange of products. From the perspective of the “New Marx Reading”, however, the Marxian analysis refers exclusively to the commodity in capitalism.

In the simple form of value, the value of one commodity is expressed in another commodity (x commodity A = y commodity B). The latter becomes the value expression of the former. The use value of commodity B serving as an equivalent expresses the value of commodity A. By dialectically driving the contradictions and deficiencies of the individual forms of value, Marx develops the following form of value from the previous one: “simple form of value”, “individual or random form of value”, “total and developed form of value”, “general form of value”. In the transition from the “general form of value” to the “form of money”, however, there is a “break in the dialectical representation”. The money form does not arise from the shortcomings of the general form of value, but rather from the “social act” of the goods owner. Which commodity turns into money historically is relatively random. It just has to meet certain properties: uniformity, durability and divisibility.

Marx distinguishes three basic money functions:

  1. As a “general measure of values”, it quantifies the value of every commodity.
  2. As a "means of circulation" it mediates the actual exchange of goods. In the exchange process, the owner wants to transform commodity A, which for him is not a use value, into another commodity B (e.g. a chair), in whose use value he is interested. He sells commodity A and then buys commodity B for the money received for it. Marx describes this process as the “ metamorphosis of commodity” (for the owner of commodity A, it is transformed into commodity B). The material content of this metamorphosis is the replacement of one use value by another, Marx also speaks here of the “social metabolism”. In contrast to the simple exchange of products (goods A for goods B), the exchange is mediated by money; the process has the form commodity - money - commodity (C – G – W).
  3. As “real money” it functions as treasure, means of payment and world money. As a treasure , money is withdrawn from circulation. It should no longer mediate the circulation of goods, but rather exist as an independent form of value outside of circulation. As a means of payment , it completes a purchase that has already taken place. Finally, as world money , money functions on the world market . There it can be used again as a medium of circulation to broker a purchase, as a means of payment to make it, or as an “absolutely social material of wealth” when it comes to the transfer of wealth from one country to another (e.g. B. after a war).

Commodity fetish

Marx transfers the term " fetish " , which comes from the religious sphere, to the economic things of the bourgeois world. The commodity fetish is also an objective phenomenon of social practice and a subjective phenomenon of consciousness for Marx.

As soon as things are viewed as commodities, their value seems to be inherent in them. But one thing has no value of its own and cannot naturally express the value of another thing either. For this it is necessary for things to become commodities, and for people to ascribe natural properties to things that exist in the commodity form, which actually only adhere to them because of social conditions. Value gives itself the "appearance of being in itself" and dominates people because they consider it to be natural. It only exists in people's imaginations, but precisely because of this it becomes real. By acting as subjects that exchange goods, people confirm the existence of value anew every day.

Capital theory

The transition from money to capital

Marx advocates a monetary capital theory. As the final result of the circulation of commodities (C – M – W), money is at the same time the first manifestation of capital (M – W – M '), in which the commodity production aimed at exchange value is realized. Only in the movement M – W – M '(“general formula of capital”) does the value retain its independent form, increase and thus become the purpose of the whole process.

Capital as the "automatic subject"

Marx describes capital as the self-utilizing value. As such, it executes the movement money - commodity - money (G – W – G '). The increase in value achieved in the movement of capital, the difference between G 'and G, is what Marx describes as “ surplus value ” - a term that can be found neither in classical political economy nor in modern economics.

According to Marx, the capitalist production of goods is not geared towards the satisfaction of needs , but towards the valorization of value. Satisfaction of needs occurs only as a by-product, provided that it coincides with the realization of capital. The only purpose of the movement of capital is the limitless increase in the value advanced.

A capitalist is not already someone who has a large amount of value at his disposal, but only someone who actually uses this amount of value as capital, i.e. H. makes the movement of capital for its own subjective purpose. The capitalist follows the logic of capital in his actions and becomes the “personification of an economic category” or “economic character mask ”. If the capitalist only executes the logic of capital, then not he, but capital, the utilizing value, is “subject”. In this context, Marx speaks of capital as an “ automatic subject ”.

The class relation as a condition of surplus value

Since the exchange of goods is an " equivalent exchange ", i.e. only goods with the same value are exchanged, the surplus value cannot be formed in the circulation (W-W or W-W '). Rather, it is created by a commodity whose use value has the property of being a source of value, so that the consumption of this commodity creates value, and indeed a higher value than it needs to restore it. That particular commodity is human labor .

In order for the money owner to find labor as a commodity on the market, there must be people who, on the one hand, are legally free persons and owners of their labor, and on the other hand have no means of production or other means of subsistence, which is why they are forced - by the "silent compulsion of economic conditions ”- to sell their labor. Marx speaks of the free wage worker "in the double sense that as a free person he has his labor power as his commodity, that on the other hand he has no other commodities to sell, being free and single, free of all things necessary for the realization of his labor power". The capitalist mode of production is thus based on a class relationship between owners (owners of money and means of production) and propertyless but legally free workers.

The value of the labor power commodity

Like any commodity, labor has use value and (exchange) value. The use value of labor power consists in its expenditure, i.e. labor itself. Marx sees the value of labor power as analogous to the value of any other commodity “determined by the labor time necessary for the production, including reproduction, of this specific article”. For maintenance, each individual needs a range of foods, in the broadest sense, so not just food, but z. B. also clothing, accommodation and the costs for the next generation.

Changes in the value of labor can result from two sources: from a change in the value of the food “necessary for reproduction” or from a change in the amount of food that is considered necessary for reproduction. The extent of the necessary food varies in the individual countries and epochs; it depends on what is considered to be normal living conditions in a country and what is asserted as claims by the workers in the class struggle. In this context, Marx speaks of a “historical and moral element” which, unlike all other commodities, is included in the value determination of the commodity labor power.

The difference between the value of labor power - that is, the sum of value that labor power needs on average for daily reproduction - and the value that the individual worker can produce anew in a day under normal circumstances, is precisely what constitutes the surplus value. The fact that the individual worker receives less in value from the capitalist for his labor power than he produces through his labor is what Marx describes as “ exploitation ”.

The capitalist production process

The dual character of the production process and the composition of capital

Similar to the commodity, the capitalist production process has a double character. It is a unit of the work process, which produces a certain use value, and the utilization process, in which the surplus value is produced.

In the work process, people have an impact on nature on the one hand and at the same time change themselves by developing their own skills. However, the work process always takes place in a certain social form: as a slave, serf peasant, independent craftsman or capitalist wage worker.

Within the capitalist production process, the labor process shows two peculiarities: it runs under the control of the capitalist and its product is the property of the capitalist and not of the immediate producer.

The prerequisite for the recovery process is the purchase and use of the goods, labor and the use of means of production (raw materials, machines, etc.).

While the value of the means of production consumed in the production of a commodity is included in the value of the newly produced commodity, this is not the case with the value of labor. The difference between the newly added value and the value required to reproduce labor-power (in the form of wages) represents surplus-value. In other words, labor-power is the only commodity that produces a greater value than its own Reproduction is needed.

The value of the quantity of goods produced in a certain period can be described in the following formula:

W = c + v + m
  • W = value of the goods produced
  • c = constant capital
  • v = variable capital
  • m = added value

The constant capital c denotes the value of the raw materials used and the proportional value of the tools and machines used. That component of capital that is used to pay wages is what Marx calls variable capital v. The realization of the capital results only from its variable component. The degree of utilization can be measured by relating the surplus value to the variable capital: Marx describes the quantity “m / v” as the surplus value rate . It is also a measure of the exploitation of labor.

Like labor and the production process, the composition of capital also has a dual character. Marx distinguishes a material side - the “ technical composition of capital ” - from a value side - the “value composition of capital”. The “technical composition of capital” is the ratio of the mass of the means of production used and the amount of labor required to use them. The “value composition of capital”, on the other hand, describes the ratio of constant to variable capital (c / v). Marx also calls the composition of values, as far as it is determined by the technical composition, the “ organic composition of capital ”. It reflects the development of the productive forces under capitalism.

Surplus value and capital accumulation

Basically there are two ways of increasing the rate of surplus value (m '= m / v): increasing the mass of surplus value (production of absolute surplus value) and lowering the required variable capital (production of relative surplus value).

The mass of surplus value produced by a single worker can be increased by lengthening the overtime (lengthening the working day, increasing the work intensity ), which Marx calls the production of absolute surplus value .

The lowering of the variable capital can be achieved by increasing the productive power of labor , which shortens the working time necessary to create a product. Marx calls this the production of relative surplus value . The increase in productive power takes place through the means of cooperation , the division of labor and the use of machines, with which a larger number of products can be manufactured with the same amount of work and the value of the individual product decreases.

The decisive motive for the increase in productive power, however, is not the increase in the rate of surplus value, but the " compulsory laws of competition ". These compel the capitalists to take part in the increase in the productivity of their competitors, even if they are not individually interested in an ever higher capital utilization.

Because of the competition, the individual capitalist is forced not to consume a large part of the surplus value achieved, but to further utilize it as capital. At the end of the valorisation process M-M-M ', money is again advanced as capital, namely not just the original value G, but a value increased by the surplus value - minus the capitalist's consumer spending. The transformation of surplus value into capital is called accumulation .

For large investments, a loan may be necessary for accumulation . On the other hand, there may be cases in which not all of the surplus value is needed for accumulation and a part can be invested as interest- bearing capital in banks or on the financial market.

The typical accumulation process takes place with a constant increase in the proportion of constant capital compared to variable capital. Marx assumes that the “release effect” of the increase in productive power outweighs the “employment effect” of accumulation in the long term. The capitalist production process tends to produce an ever-growing “ industrial reserve army ” - workers who are forced to sell their labor but cannot find a buyer.

The circulation of capital

The three stages of movement of capital

According to Marx, capital as the “value that is valorized” can “only be understood as movement and not as a stationary thing”. Its cycle described in the "general formula of capital" GW-G 'takes place in three stages.

The capital cycle
Pm
G – W ... P ... W'-G '
A.

Pm : means of production A : labor P : production
G : original money capital G ' : new money capital W : original commodity W' : new commodity

  1. First of all, the capitalist appears as the buyer of the means of production (Pm) and labor (A). The movement of capital here consists in the transformation of money capital (G) into productive capital - the commodity labor power (A) and the commodity means of production (Pm).
  2. According to this, the productive capital allows the labor force employed to transfer the value of the means of production to the object to be manufactured and to create the new value. The productive capital is transformed into commodity capital (W ').
  3. In the end, the goods are sold on the market and the capitalist gets back his originally advanced capital, enlarged. The commodity capital (W ') is converted into money capital (G').

The three stages of movement of capital form an inseparable unit. Each stage has its presupposition in the preceding one and is itself a presupposition for the next one. The circulation of capital can be interrupted in all three stages. If the capital stalls in the first phase, the money capital turns into "treasure". Money is withdrawn from circulation and becomes a useless item. If there is an interruption in the second phase, the means of production are idle and unemployment occurs . If the capital movement is interrupted in the third phase, the goods cannot be sold and the capital cycle cannot be renewed.

The turnover of capital

The turnover time of capital is of great importance for the capitalist production process. This is understood to mean the time span in which this - in its three phases - is renewed. The differentiation between fixed capital and circulating capital corresponds to the different turnover times of capital.

Fixed capital ” is understood to mean that part of the constant capital that remains fixed as use value until it is worn out in the production process, while it is constantly objectified as value in their goods. It transfers its value to the product in proportion to the usage time (e.g. a machine with a 10-year service life transfers a tenth of its value to the goods every year). The circulating capital, on the other hand, goes completely into the product within a single period of production. It is made up of two different parts, the raw materials and the labor.

The capitalist is interested in increasing the rate of turnover of capital, since this causes the production of a greater surplus value with the same capital investment or the same surplus value with a lower capital investment. However, this interest is counteracted by objective tendencies such as the increasing share of fixed capital (machines) due to increasing competition.

The profit

Added value and profit

“Profit” is one of the terms that no longer express the “essence” but the “empiricism” of capitalist relationships.

While previous studies had shown that the value of a capitalistically produced commodity can be represented as the sum of constant, variable capital and surplus value (W = c + v + m), this is shown differently on the empirical level of capitalist society. There only the cost price of a commodity plays a role; this is identical to the sum of constant and variable capital (k = c + v).

Instead of surplus value, profit plays the decisive role in the world of capitalism . Although it is the same size as that, it is not related to the value of the labor, but to the cost price (p = W - k). In profit, the difference between constant and variable capital and their different roles in the process of exploitation is obliterated and exploitation is veiled. Any excess over the cost price seems to arise equally from both types of capital. Profit does not appear as the result of the surplus labor of the workers, but as the result of the function of the entire capital advanced.

The rate of profit

For the capitalist, even more important than profit is the effort with which it is achieved. The measure for this is the rate of profit - as the percentage ratio of profit to the total capital employed: p '= m / (c + v).

The level of the rate of profit basically depends on four factors:

  1. Size of the rate of surplus value (m '= m / v) . It is directly proportional to the rate of profit. All methods of increasing the exploitation of the workers also serve to increase the rate of profit.
  2. Organic composition of capital . At a given rate of surplus value it is inversely proportional to the rate of profit. However, since the increase in the organic composition of capital is at the same time an expression of increasing labor productivity, it is usually associated with a rising rate of surplus value and, consequently, a rising rate of profit.
  3. Rate of turnover of capital . It is inversely proportional to the rate of profit. The longer the turnover time, the lower the profit rate.
  4. Economy in the application of constant capital . Marx understands by this the better utilization of the means of production. It is directly proportional to the level of the rate of profit.

The rate of profit is subject to two basic laws: a spatial one - the equalization of the profit rates between the various branches - and a temporal one - its tendency to fall.

The equalization of the rates of profit results directly from the laws of competition. The competition asserts itself both within one and the same branch and between the different branches of industry. First of all, it causes the "creation of the same market value and market price" within a branch. The constant redistribution of surplus-value among the capitalists of various branches in favor of branches with a higher organic composition of capital ultimately gives rise to average profit.

The tendency of the rate of profit to fall (p '= m / (c + v)) arises, according to Marx, from the growing organic composition of capital (c / v). The two sizes are related as follows:

The rate of profit does not fall as the organic composition of capital increases. Your case may affect a. the increase in the rate of surplus value and the "relative overpopulation", which leads to a cheaper product, labor and to the prevention of the introduction of modern technology.

The tendency of the rate of profit to fall promotes the “concentration” and “centralization” of capital and the growth of the “industrial reserve army”. Ultimately, it expresses the fundamental “limit” and “the only historical, temporary character of the capitalist mode of production”.

The loan capital

Interest and credit

In capitalism there is a temporary release of money capital. One way to exploit this is to turn it into "loan capital". In this process, money itself becomes a commodity. It is borrowed to turn it into capital, i.e. H. to make a profit in a given period of time. The "price" to be paid for this particular commodity is interest . Interest is paid from the profit that was made with the help of money. This process can be represented in the formula:

G - G - W - G '- G ".
  • G = (credit) money
  • W = goods
  • G '= money increased by profit
  • G "= money increased by the interest

The interest-bearing capital is advanced twice: first by its owner (“money capitalist”) to the industrial capitalist (“functioning capitalist”), then by the latter to finance a profitable production process. This is followed by a double return: first to the industrial capitalist and from there back to the money owner. Normally the return flow to the industrial capitalist then includes the profit, the return flow to the money owner the interest that is paid from this profit.

By splitting profit into interest and entrepreneurial profits, the common source of both - the unpaid surplus labor of wage workers - is concealed. It would appear that interest and business profit came from two different sources. The interest appears as the "fruit of capital" that belongs to every owner of capital. Money seems to multiply by itself through interest, which is why Marx describes interest-bearing capital as the “most fetish-like form” of capital. The entrepreneurial profit, on the other hand, seems to arise from the work of the functioning capitalist and to be his wages. The difference between profit and wages thus seems to have disappeared and the entrepreneur only differs from the worker in terms of his independence.

Interest-bearing capital is conveyed in the form of credit . An important form is the bank loan, which represents a promise to pay that itself performs monetary functions. This "credit money" arises with the granting of loans, so to speak, "out of nowhere" and so the money "doubles". It disappears again when the promise to pay is honored, if the promised amount has to be paid out in cash.

The main motive for taking out credit is to increase the rate of profit. A developed credit system enables the capitalist on the one hand to forego building up treasures and to borrow idle capital, on the other hand to accumulate far more than just the profits of the previous period.

Securities

With the development of the productive forces, the need for capital grows, which is more and more often than the possibilities of an individual capitalist and of banks. This is why new forms of loan capital, securities ( bonds and stocks ) are emerging.

Securities have a price, their respective market price, but no value. They merely represent claims to values: in the case of bonds, for interest and repayment of the original amount, in the case of shares on part of the distributed profit ( dividend ) and the right to vote at the shareholders' meeting .

The circulation of securities represents a similar doubling as the credit money: in addition to the real capital that has flowed from the money owner to a company and is used by it, there is the right to interest or dividend payments, which are traded with changing market values. These circulating claims, stocks and shares, are what Marx calls " fictitious capital ". The fictitious character of the securities comes under a. in the expression that their price (the market price ) has nothing to do with the value they represent (the face value ).

The fetishism of the bourgeoisie

In bourgeois society, capital, landed property (land) and labor appear as three different and independent sources of the value produced annually. It looks as if the owners of capital, real estate and labor normally receive as income precisely that part of the value that their "production factor" adds to the product. Marx describes this as the “ trinitarian formula ”: “Capital” and “soil” are assigned quasi magical abilities in capitalist society and become subjects of the social process.

This fetishization comes about because the value character of goods appears as a social natural fact. Analogous to the production process, in which work is expended, means of production are applied and land is used, the value creation process is also understood as the addition of value contributions of the production factors. The basis of this reversal is that there seems to be no essential difference between work and wage labor. But if there is no essential difference between labor and wage labor, then there is also no such difference between the means of production and capital opposed to labor, and between earth and landed property.

Open questions

One of the main points of criticism of modern economics is the so-called "objective theory of values", which Marx adopted from classical economics. According to the critics, the value and price of goods cannot be traced back to the labor involved in their manufacture. Neoclassicism, on the other hand, represents a “subjective theory of values” which, based on the individual benefit of the economic subjects, wants to determine the value of a good with the help of marginal utility calculations .

The validity of the law postulated by Marx of the tendency of the rate of profit to fall is also controversial within Marxism, as is the status of this law for Marxism.

Even the Marxian conception of money as a commodity appears to many interpreters as outdated - especially in view of the modern central bank character of money and the end of stable exchange rates through gold backing after the abandonment of the Bretton Woods system .

literature

Texts by Karl Marx

Secondary literature

Web links

Abbreviations

A. Worker
c constant capital
G Money capital
k Cost price
m added value
m ' Rate of surplus value
P production
p profit
p ' Rate of profit
Pm means of production
v variable capital
W. Value of goods produced

Individual evidence

  1. Cf. en: Samuel Bailey
  2. MEW 23, p. 49
  3. MEW 23, p. 50
  4. Marjorie Wiki: Dual Character
  5. MEW 23, p. 61
  6. a b MEW 23, p. 62
  7. See, for example, the " Marxist economic theory " by Ernest Mandel
  8. See the list of value forms
  9. See Heinrich: Die Wissenschaft vom Wert , p. 182
  10. a b MEW 23, p. 101
  11. cf. MEW Vol. 23, p. 119
  12. MEW 23, p. 158
  13. ^ Gerhard Bolte: From Marx to Horkheimer. Aspects of critical theory in the 19th and 20th centuries. Darmstadt 1995, p. 34
  14. MEW 23, p. 161
  15. MEW 23, p. 100
  16. MEW 23, p. 169
  17. MEW 23, p. 183
  18. See MEW 23, p. 184
  19. MEW 23, p. 185
  20. Cf. Richter: Political Economy of Capitalism and Socialism. P. 143.
  21. MEW 23, p. 335
  22. MEW 24, p. 109
  23. See Heinrich: Critique of Political Economy , p. 132
  24. See MEW 25; P. 33
  25. MEW 25, p. 46.
  26. Cf. Richter: Political Economy of Capitalism and Socialism. P. 178f.
  27. MEW 25, p. 190
  28. See MEW 25, p. 242 ff.
  29. MEW 25, pp. 251f.
  30. On Marx's theory of interest and credit cf. v. a. Joachim Bischoff / Axel Otto u. a .: exploitation - self-enigma - regulation. Volume 3 of “Kapital” , Hamburg 1993.
  31. See MEW 25, p. 351
  32. Graphics based on Heinrich, Critique of Political Economy , p. 155, with a slight modification of the original from MEW 25, p. 353
  33. MEW 25, p. 387
  34. MEW 25, p. 404
  35. See Heinrich: Critique of Political Economy , pp. 154–160
  36. See MEW 25, p. 838
  37. See MEW 25, p. 833
  38. Heinz-J. Bontrup: Economics. Basics of micro and macro economics. 2nd Edition. R. Oldenbourg, Munich / Vienna 2004, p. 39-40 .
  39. Michael Heinrich: Justification problems. On the debate about Marx's "law of the tendency of the rate of profit to fall" . Ed .: Marx Engels Yearbook 2006. Akademie Verlag, Berlin 2007, p. 47-80 .
  40. Michael Heinrich: Critique of the political economy. An introduction. 14th edition. Butterfly Verlag, Stuttgart 2018, p. 67-69 .