Ranging from pre-class to slave economy, from peasant economy to capitalism, this analytical book provides illuminating insight into the functionality of economic systems. A must-read for those striving to bring down fossil capitalism.
Author(s): W. Paul Cockshott
Publisher: Monthly Review Press
Year: 2019
Language: English
Pages: 377
City: New York
Tags: Economic History; Economics; Marxism
Cover
HOW THE WORLD WORKS
Title Page
Copyright Page
Contents
Preface
1 Introduction
2 Pre-Class Economy
2.1 Agriculture
2.2 Reproduction
2.3 Class Formation
2.4 War, Patriarchy, Religion, and the Laws of Statistics
3 Slave Economy
3.1 Technology Complex
3.2 Scheme of Reproduction
3.3 Contradictions and Development
3.4 Human Reproduction
3.5 Commodities and Prices
3.5.1 Neoclassical Prices
3.5.2 The Classical Theory of Prices
3.5.3 Evidence for the Theory
3.6 Labor and Price under Slavery
3.7 Money
4 Peasant Economy
4.1 Natural and Technical Conditions
4.2 Forms of Surplus
4.3 Reproduction Structure
4.4 Comparison with Capitalism
4.5 The Smithian Critique of Feudalism
5 Capitalist Economy
5.1 The Capitalist Price Mechanism
5.2 Recurrence Relations
5.3 Capitalist Surplus
5.4 Technology and Surplus
5.4.1 Vital Energy
5.4.2 Hero’s Turbine Not Enough
5.4.3 Practical Turbines
5.4.4 Why Power was Essential
5.4.5 An Iron Subjugation
5.4.6 Automation or Self-Action
5.4.7 Profit of First Use
5.4.8 Wage Levels and Innovation
5.4.9 Relative Exploitation
5.4.10 Summary
5.5 Capitalism and Population
5.5.1 Population, Food, and Empire
5.5.2 Family and Population
5.6 Domestic and Capitalist Economy
5.6.1 Gender Pay Inequality
5.6.2 Narrowing the Wage Gap
5.6.3 Division of Domestic Labor
5.6.4 Reducing Overall Housework
5.6.5 Moving Tasks Out of the Domestic Economy
5.7 Distribution of Wage Rates
5.8 The Next Generation
5.9 Long-Term Trend of Profitability
5.10 Productive and Unproductive Activities
5.10.1 Violence
5.10.2 Vice
5.10.3 Finance
5.10.4 Modern Rents
6 Socialist Economies
6.1 What Does Socialism Mean?
6.2 Power
6.3 Reproduction and Division of Labor
6.4 Determination of the Surplus Product
6.5 Socialist Economic Growth
6.6 Why the Socialist Economies Still Used Money
6.7 Socialism or State-Owned Capitalism
6.8 Why the Law of Value Really Applies in Socialist Economies
6.8.1 Intersectoral Relations
6.8.2 Intrasectional Constraints
6.9 Crisis of Socialism and Effects of Capitalist Restoration
6.9.1 Long Term
6.9.2 Medium Term
6.9.3 Results
7 Future Economics
7.1 Technology Complex
7.1.1 Materials
7.1.2 Transport
7.1.3 Information
7.2 Population
7.3 Politics
Appendices:
A Showing which Sectors are Productive
B Illusions Engendered by Averages
B.1 Constraints on Reproduction Schemes
B.2 First Experiment
B.2.1 Results
B.3 Discussion
B.4 Second Experiment
B.4.1 Results
B.5 Further Discussion
B.6 Model and Reality
Bibliography
Notes
Index
