Friday, April 20, 2012

Mixed Review 4-20-12(CAPITALISM AND IT'S FANS)

The Mixed review is a record of my daily readings. I hope it provides a resource for your own projects and projections into the intricacies of our world.


The 1st Item of the night is: Capitalism Hits the Fan (1/9)





FOR PREVIEW ONLY. as the caption reads "This is a low-quality screen capture of a low-quality preview of a lecture on the economic meltdown, by Richard D. Wolff, Professor of Economics Emeritus, University of Massachusetts, Amherst." The irony of a low-quality for promotion-only version of a Critique of capitalism aside I think that is a great analyses of our current economic crises. (maybe the irony makes it even better!) To be fare there where high-quality versions of other lectures by the same name, but I liked this one so what the hell.

The main thrust of Richard d. Wolff's critique is that Capitalism has been undone by lowering wages for workers. Wolff's points out that these lowering wages necessitated that the working class pay with credit cards, which then creates credit bobbles and economic catastrophe. I assume his downplaying of the rule of banking practices in all this is a rhetorical devices aimed at focusing the lens more keenly on a yet even lesser understood problem, the lowering of workers’ wages relative to the inflation of credit bubbles. The reason I think this down playing is rhetorical is because the critique of banking isn't actually absent from Wolff's analysis, it reemerges in the form of a critique of credit cards, Wolff merely says that this credit expansion is not the primary factor in collapse, to him worker wages are. To me his analysis is a great synthesis of the Austrian school's theory of Inflation (credit expansion) and the Marxist theory of the means of production.



All and all Richard d. Wolff's critique of capitalism is a potent one and should not be ignored.



Also make shore to check out the links on Austrian theory of inflation and the Marx's theory of the means of production, this is importent stuff! Compiar and let me know what you think of my assessment.


I'm going to leave it to you to watch all from 1 to 9 so here is the first one.


Here is a link to the wiki page on Marx theory of the means of production:
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Means_of_production

And the link to the wiki page on the Austian schools theory of inflation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation#Austrian_view


The 2ed Item of the night is: Bankrupt On Selling by Modest Mouse



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