<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rss version="2.0"
	xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/"
	xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/"
	xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
	xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"
	xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/"
	xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/"
	xmlns:itunes="http://www.itunes.com/dtds/podcast-1.0.dtd"
	xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/"
>

<channel>
	<title>World Socialist Party (US) &#187; Economics</title>
	<atom:link href="http://wspus.org/category/economics/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
	<link>http://wspus.org</link>
	<description></description>
	<lastBuildDate>Tue, 07 Feb 2012 17:10:31 +0000</lastBuildDate>
	<language>en</language>
	<sy:updatePeriod>hourly</sy:updatePeriod>
	<sy:updateFrequency>1</sy:updateFrequency>
	<generator>http://wordpress.org/?v=abc</generator>
	<!-- podcast_generator="podPress/8.8" - maintenance_release="8.8.5.3" -->
	<copyright>Copyright &#xA9; 2012 World Socialist Party (US) </copyright>
	<managingEditor>joinwspus@wspus.org</managingEditor>
	<webMaster>joinwspus@wspus.org</webMaster>
	<category>posts</category>
	<ttl>1440</ttl>
	<image>
		<url>http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4016/4261195043_233c9929ca_o.jpg</url>
		<title>World Socialist Party (US) &#187; Economics</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org</link>
		<width>144</width>
		<height>144</height>
	</image>
	<itunes:subtitle></itunes:subtitle>
	<itunes:summary></itunes:summary>
	<itunes:keywords></itunes:keywords>
	<itunes:category text="Society &amp; Culture" />
	<itunes:author></itunes:author>
	<itunes:owner>
		<itunes:name></itunes:name>
		<itunes:email>joinwspus@wspus.org</itunes:email>
	</itunes:owner>
	<itunes:block>no</itunes:block>
	<itunes:explicit>no</itunes:explicit>
	<itunes:image href="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4016/4261195043_233c9929ca_o.jpg" />
		<item>
		<title>Crisis: the stories so far</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2011/06/crisis-the-stories-so-far/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2011/06/crisis-the-stories-so-far/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 04 Jun 2011 05:14:45 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>SPGB</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Books]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Capitalism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Crisis]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2283</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Business As Usual: The Economic Crisis And The Failure Of Capitalism by Paul Mattick. Reacktion Books: 2011. Just yesterday, we were all supposed to believe that the globalisation of capitalism and free markets was the route to freedom, peace and prosperity for all. Then, with barely an explanation, and somewhat out of the blue, the story changed. Now we are to believe that, due to circumstances beyond anyone’s control, prosperity will have to give way to austerity. The good times are over. It is characteristic of crises that the stories we are expected to believe suddenly change. But how can we understand the change? And might there not be better stories than the rather grim and gloomy one we’ve been ordered to swallow? Paul Mattick Jnr’s short book is just such an alternative. For him the crisis signals the complete bankruptcy and destruction of mainstream economics. Why crisis is impossible Why did the crisis appear as a bolt out of the blue? Why was it not expected or anticipated by any economist or mainstream commentator? In short, because there is no place in the standard economic story for crisis, any more than there’s a place for wizards and interstellar travel [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2011/06/crisis-the-stories-so-far/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Was the crisis just a mistake?</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2011/03/was-the-crisis-just-a-mistake/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2011/03/was-the-crisis-just-a-mistake/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 13 Mar 2011 08:04:08 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>FN Brill</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[USA]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2167</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission set up by the US government reported at the end of January. They concluded that the crisis of 2007 and 2008 was the result of “human action and inaction, not of Mother Nature or computer models gone haywire”, but “of human mistakes, misjudgments, and misdeeds” and so avoidable. Obviously, the crisis was the outcome, even if unintended, of decisions by humans to behave in particular ways, but that’s not at issue. We need to know why the economic decision-makers involved took the decisions they did. What was the context of their decisions? What were the constraints acting on them? The driving force of capitalism is the pursuit of profits by competing enterprises. As the Commission put it, “in our economy, we expect businesses and individuals to pursue profits…” If there is a chance to make a profit from some activity then the businesses in that field will go for it. If the profits are high enough then other businesses will enter the field to share in the bonanza. This is what happened in the US. From 1997 until 2006 there was a boom in house building and buying. Big profits were to be made from [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2011/03/was-the-crisis-just-a-mistake/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Who Pays the Price of the Recession?</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2011/01/who-pays-the-price-of-the-recession/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2011/01/who-pays-the-price-of-the-recession/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 28 Jan 2011 06:26:56 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>SPGB</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2034</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Households face the most dramatic squeeze in living standards since the 1920s, Mervyn King, the Governor of the Bank of England warned. Families will see their disposable income eaten up as they “pay the inevitable price” for the financial crisis. With wages failing to keep pace with rising inflation, workers’ take- home pay will end the year worth the same as in 2005 — the most prolonged fall in living standards for more than 80 years. Households face the most dramatic squeeze in living standards since the 1920s, Mervyn King, the Governor of the Bank of England warned. Families will see their disposable income eaten up as they “pay the inevitable price” for the financial crisis. With wages failing to keep pace with rising inflation, workers’ take- home pay will end the year worth the same as in 2005 — the most prolonged fall in living standards for more than 80 years.“In 2011, real wages are likely to be no higher than they were in 2005,” he said. “One has to go back to the 1920s to find a time when real wages fell over a period of six years&#8230;The squeeze on living standards is the inevitable price to pay [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2011/01/who-pays-the-price-of-the-recession/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>World poverty: cause and effects</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2010/11/world-poverty-cause-and-effects-2/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2010/11/world-poverty-cause-and-effects-2/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 04 Nov 2010 18:15:34 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Suzy</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=1909</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[How should poverty be measured if at all? Part of the measure of statistics is that, however well-meant the goal, there are bound to be flaws and weaknesses. Any individual&#8217;s subjective assessment of their own poverty will likely be quite different from that of an objective report. Over the years different studies have listed different requirements to be included into what constitutes poverty, but how many of these have consulted with the subjects of the report as to their own assessment of their situation? If poverty is to be eliminated, how it is manifested in different parts of the world, how it impacts differently on people of different regions and particularly its causes need to be thoroughly understood. “Our aim should be to set the poverty line at a level where people can actually have a standard of living which we would consider morally acceptable,” says David Woodward in a July/August New Internationalist article. The article, based on a report which he co-authored with Saamah Abdallah, explains the pitfalls and openings for misinterpretation of such economic-based poverty lines as the well known dollar-a-day as used in measuring the Millennium Development Goals. At least, he says, the dollar-a-day approach put poverty [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2010/11/world-poverty-cause-and-effects-2/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>China’s working class drives capitalist development</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2010/09/china%e2%80%99s-working-class-drives-capitalist-development/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2010/09/china%e2%80%99s-working-class-drives-capitalist-development/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 03 Sep 2010 01:26:07 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Suzy</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[China]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Work]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=1779</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The heroic and inspiring struggles of China’s working class will only lay the ground for new and improved exploitation methods – unless, that is, the struggle turns political – and socialist. “I do the same thing every day,” said one employee at the Foxconn factory in Shenzhen, China, where more than ten workers have committed suicide. “I have no future.” Many, perhaps most, workers will know exactly how he feels. But to the bourgeois mind, it’s all an impenetrable puzzle. There was something criminally stupid and sickeningly idiotic about the reaction to the suicides of Terry Gou, the billionaire founder and chairman of the company, which makes electronic parts for the likes of Apple and Dell. According to a report in Bloomberg Businessweek (7 June), Gou said that he had no idea why the suicides were happening. “From a logical, scientific standpoint, I don’t have a grasp on that,” said Gou. “No matter how you force me, I don’t know.” Another worker interviewed at the factory might have given the hapless Gou a few clues: conversation and human interaction on the production line is forbidden, bathroom breaks are kept to ten minutes every two hours, and workers are yelled at [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2010/09/china%e2%80%99s-working-class-drives-capitalist-development/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Communist Camp</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2010/08/communist-camp/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2010/08/communist-camp/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 02 Aug 2010 21:23:19 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Suzy</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=1631</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[What happens when you swap your wage-slavery for a rucksack? You get communism. That, at least, was the argument of Aditya Chakrabortty in a column for the Guardian (13 July), drawing on the arguments of the late Marxist philosopher GA Cohen. Camping and caravan trips last year were up 27 percent on the previous year and sales of tents and other equipment continue to climb, as workers cut back on holiday spending due to the recession, according to a report in the same newspaper. But camping, says Chakrabortty, is not just a bit of fun (or a horrific trial comparable to fleeing a war zone with your belongings strapped to your back, depending on taste): it’s also a “socio-political experiment” demonstrating the feasibility of communism. How so? Well, on a camping trip, “adult hierarchy is flattened, utensils and resources are pooled. Tasks are performed as a unit: you may lay on the food, but your friend is a better cook, and her boyfriend will clean the dishes. There is no question of people being paid differently for different tasks. Nor [can you claim a] ‘banjo bonus’ for providing a highly-valued service enjoyed by less-talented souls.” And the objections to this [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2010/08/communist-camp/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Life is sweet for the rich</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2010/07/life-is-sweet-for-the-rich/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2010/07/life-is-sweet-for-the-rich/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 20 Jul 2010 20:38:39 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Suzy</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Capitalism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Class]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Work]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=1609</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[From MarketWatch.com Tiffany &#38; Co says sales at its flagship New York store jumped 26% in the first quarter. International luxury goods giant Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy whose brands range from Fendi to Givenchy to Moet &#38; Chandon Champagne, plus, of course, Vuitton bags says U.S. sales boomed 20% in the first quarter, including a remarkable 58% boost for sales of jewelry and expensive watches like Tag Heuer. the Swiss watch federation says exports of luxury watches (those $2,000 &#8220;timepieces&#8221;) to the U.S. rose 12% in May and are now ahead 9% for the year. Super-luxury goods purveyor Richemont which owns such brands as Cartier, Dunhill, and Van Cleef &#38; Arpels says U.S. sales are up. The Sunseeker Club in New York, America&#8217;s biggest dealership in the multi-million dollar British luxury power boats say business is strong again. Those who have the money to spend, they say, are spending it. The truth is, this is a great time in which to be rich. According to consultants Cap Gemini, the wealthy saw their net worth bounce back sharply last year. And while those with $1 million or more did pretty well, the real story was the boom among the ultra rich: [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2010/07/life-is-sweet-for-the-rich/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Waste and Want: Grapes of Wrath revisited</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2010/07/waste-and-want-grapes-of-wrath-revisited/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2010/07/waste-and-want-grapes-of-wrath-revisited/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 16 Jul 2010 00:58:30 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=1598</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[In his famous novel The Grapes of Wrath (Chapter 25), John Steinbeck described how food was destroyed during the Great Depression: Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people come for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges&#8230; A million people hungry, needing the fruit – and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country. Burn coffee for fuel in the ships&#8230; Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out [with nets]. Slaughter the pigs and bury them&#8230; And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificates – died of malnutrition – because the food must be forced to rot. A few more facts. In 1933 alone, the federal government bought 6 million hogs and destroyed them. Vast quantities of milk were poured down the sewers. 25 million acres of crops (the area of a square with sides 200 miles long) [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2010/07/waste-and-want-grapes-of-wrath-revisited/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>What&#8217;s being poor?</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2010/07/whats-being-poor/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2010/07/whats-being-poor/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 14 Jul 2010 05:40:25 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Suzy</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[poverty]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=1594</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[World Bank claims that we are broadly on course to halve the proportion of people living below the $1 a day poverty line by 2015 are based on a seriously flawed measurement system, says a new report by the New Economics Foundation. The report claims the setting of the $1 dollar a day definition of poverty is: arbitrary; it imposes inconsistent standards between countries; it fails to reflect differences in inflation between rural and urban areas; it gives much greater weight to the prices of goods brought by richer people in those countries than by poorer people. David Woodward, author of the report How poor is poor? says:- “at the $1 a day line, typically between one in twelve and one in six children die before the age of five &#8211; mostly from poverty-related causes. Between a third and half of those who survive, however, are malnourished. How can anyone say that people are not poor just because their incomes have risen to this level? It is not having an income less than $1 or $2 a day which is bad, but having an income which is inadequate to allow good health and nutrition, access to education or even survival.” [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2010/07/whats-being-poor/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Socialist Guide to Marx&#8217;s Capital (4. Mystery of Money)</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2010/03/socialist-guide-to-marxs-capital-4-mystery-of-money/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2010/03/socialist-guide-to-marxs-capital-4-mystery-of-money/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 25 Mar 2010 01:13:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>MS</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Capitalism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Economics]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=1471</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[A “world without money” describes one essential aspect of socialism. But to get a clearer idea of how society can function without money we need a better understanding of money and why it must exist under capitalism. It might seem odd to suggest that people don’t really understand money all that well, for it is hard to get through a single day without thinking about money in some way or another. Yet for all the thought given to money, or how to get more of that magical substance, most people pretty much take its existence for granted, which is why the idea of a world without money seems ludicrous. Most economics textbooks more or less try to define money by listing up a number of its functions, as reflected also on the Wikipedia page for money: “Money is anything that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts.  The main functions of money are distinguished as: a medium of exchange, a unit of account, a store of value, and occasionally, a standard of deferred payment.&#8221; This is certainly true enough, and Marx also discusses the various functions of money in Chapter 3 of Capital, but listing [...]


No related posts.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://wspus.org/2010/03/socialist-guide-to-marxs-capital-4-mystery-of-money/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
	</channel>
</rss>

