IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wea/econth/v5y2016i2p44.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Reply to Commentaries on ‘The Labour Theory of Property and Marginal Productivity Theory’

Author

Listed:
  • David Ellerman

    (University of California at Riverside, USA, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia)

Abstract

Jamie Morgan's commentary (Morgan, 2016) on my paper 'The Labour Theory of Property and Marginal Productivity Theory' (Ellerman, 2016) and Ted Burczak's later comments (Burczak, 2016) raise a number of issues that surely will occur to other readers and that need to be addressed. I take the occasion to expand upon the arguments and to explore some related issues. In the narrative that unfolds, Frank H. Knight plays the role of the sophisticated defender of the system of renting, hiring and employing human beings. He was quite clear that the social role of economics is to develop an idealised model, the competitive free enterprise model, and then to frame the normative discussion in terms of that model. Knight would agree with the whole thread of heterodox 'criticism' that the actual economy falls far short of the ideal – which is why I largely eschewed the descriptive shortcomings of ideal model as a purported model of the actual economy. Instead my paper focused on developing a critique of the key part of the idealised model, the marginal productivity theory of distribution under competitive conditions. That critique is based on the usual juridical principle of imputing legal responsibility in accordance with factual responsibility – the principle whose property-theoretic application is the modern treatment of the labour theory of property. Historically, heterodox economics faced a fork in the road in the 19th century: whether to criticise 'the system' by developing the inchoate 'labour theory' as a theory of value or a theory of property. Marx and much of left-wing economics took the labour-theory-of-value road, whereas my paper is part of a modern attempt – Thomas Hodgskin (1832) being an earlier attempt – to take the labour-theory-of-property road. As we will see, much of the debate still revolves around these two roads. Read David Ellerman's original paper "The Labour Theory of Property and Marginal Productivity Theory" › Read Jamie Morgan's commentary on David Ellerman's paper ›

Suggested Citation

  • David Ellerman, 2016. "Reply to Commentaries on ‘The Labour Theory of Property and Marginal Productivity Theory’," Economic Thought, World Economics Association, vol. 5(2), pages 44-61, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:wea:econth:v:5:y:2016:i:2:p:44
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://et.worldeconomicsassociation.org/papers/reply-to-commentaries-on-the-labour-theory-of-property-and-marginal-productivity-theory/
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: http://et.worldeconomicsassociation.org/files/WEA-ET-5-2-Ellerman.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Harcourt,G. C., 1972. "Some Cambridge Controversies in the Theory of Capital," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521096720, October.
    2. Bruno Jossa & Gaetano Cuomo, 1997. "The Economic Theory of Socialism and the Labour-managed Firm," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 1091.
    3. Jeremy Adelman, 2013. "Worldly Philosopher: The Odyssey of Albert O. Hirschman," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 9935.
    4. David Ellerman, 2016. "The Labour Theory of Property and Marginal Productivity Theory," Economic Thought, World Economics Association, vol. 5(1), pages 1-19, March.
    5. Friedman, Milton, 2002. "Capitalism and Freedom," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226264202.
    6. Ellerman, David, 2010. "Marxism as a capitalist tool," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 696-700, December.
    7. David Ellerman, 2015. "On the Renting of Persons: The Neo-Abolitionist Case Against Today's Peculiar Institution," Economic Thought, World Economics Association, vol. 4(1), pages 1-20, March.
    8. Jamie Morgan, 2016. "Power, Property, the Law, and the Corporation – a Commentary on David Ellerman's paper: 'The Labour Theory of Property and Marginal Productivity Theory'," Economic Thought, World Economics Association, vol. 5(1), pages 1-37, March.
    9. Friedman, Milton, 2002. "Capitalism and Freedom," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226264219, Febrero.
    10. Bruno Jossa, 2012. "Cooperative Firms as a New Mode of Production," Review of Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(3), pages 399-416, July.
    11. David Ellerman, 2014. "On Property Theory," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(3), pages 601-624.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. David Ellerman, 2017. "Comment on 'About Waged Labour: From Monetary Subordination to Exploitation'," Economic Thought, World Economics Association, vol. 6(2), pages 37-44, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. David Ellerman, 2016. "The Labour Theory of Property and Marginal Productivity Theory," Economic Thought, World Economics Association, vol. 5(1), pages 1-19, March.
    2. Felix Windegger & Clive L. Spash, 2021. "Reconceptualising Freedom in the 21st Century: Degrowth vs. Neoliberalism," SRE-Disc sre-disc-2021_02, Institute for Multilevel Governance and Development, Department of Socioeconomics, Vienna University of Economics and Business.
    3. Howard Stein, 2012. "The Neoliberal Policy Paradigm and the Great Recession," Panoeconomicus, Savez ekonomista Vojvodine, Novi Sad, Serbia, vol. 59(4), pages 421-440, September.
    4. Adam Martin & Matias Petersen, 2019. "Poverty Alleviation as an Economic Problem," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 43(1), pages 205-221.
    5. Innset, Ola, 2023. "Dual Argument, Double Truth: On the continued importance of the state in neoliberal thought," SocArXiv kyvdm, Center for Open Science.
    6. Julia Rotter & Peppi-Emilia Airike & Cecilia Mark-Herbert, 2014. "Exploring Political Corporate Social Responsibility in Global Supply Chains," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 125(4), pages 581-599, December.
    7. Potgieter, Petrus H., 2010. "Water and energy in South Africa – managing scarcity," MPRA Paper 23360, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Kivisto, Hanna, 2016. "Capital as Power and the Corporatization of Education," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, pages 1-17.
    9. Levy, Daniel & Snir, Avichai, 2022. "Potterian Economics," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 1, pages 1-32.
    10. Ulrike Reisach, 2016. "The creation of meaning and critical ethical reflection in operational research," EURO Journal on Decision Processes, Springer;EURO - The Association of European Operational Research Societies, vol. 4(1), pages 5-32, June.
    11. Qichun He & Meng Sun, 2018. "Does Fiscal Decentralization Increase the Investment Rate? Evidence from Chinese Panel Data," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 19(1), pages 75-101, May.
    12. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/5vh7udhojr93npqcg7j64df9d4 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Robert Hahn & Robert Litan & Hal Singer, 2010. "Addressing the next wave of Internet regulation: Toward a workable principle for nondiscrimination," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 4(3), pages 365-382, September.
    14. Klaus M. Leisinger, 2008. "Zur Relevanz der Unternehmensethik in der Betriebswirtschaftlehre (oder: The Business of Business is still Business–But the Rules have Changed)," Schmalenbach Journal of Business Research, Springer, vol. 60(58), pages 26-49, January.
    15. Tortia, Ermanno C., 2017. "The firm as a common. The case of the accumulation and use of capital resources in co-operative enterprises," MPRA Paper 76735, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Åsbjørn Melkevik, 2016. "No progressive taxation without discrimination? On the generality of the law in the classical liberal tradition," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 27(4), pages 418-434, December.
    17. Layman Daniel, 2012. "Locke on Basic Income," Basic Income Studies, De Gruyter, vol. 6(2), pages 1-12, January.
    18. Jose Luis Retolaza & Leire San-Jose, 2021. "Understanding Social Accounting Based on Evidence," SAGE Open, , vol. 11(2), pages 21582440211, April.
    19. Røpke, Inge, 2020. "Econ 101—In need of a sustainability transition," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    20. Chauffour, Jean-Pierre, 2011. "On the relevance of freedom and entitlement in development : new empirical evidence (1975-2007)," Policy Research Working Paper Series 5660, The World Bank.
    21. Jan-Erik Lane, 2010. "Development Without Freedom? East and South East Asia: Vibrant Markets but a Rule of Law Deficit," Asia Pacific Journal of Public Administration, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(2), pages 177-186, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wea:econth:v:5:y:2016:i:2:p:44. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Jake McMurchie (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/worecea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.