ABSTRACT

Introduction The analysis of unemployment presented in the volume devoted to the pathologies of capital accumulation (Schmitt, 1984a) was carried out in value terms and by distinguishing between three periods corresponding, respectively, to the formation of profits, their investment, and the amortization of fixed capital. The analysis proposed in this chapter concerns the same problem, but it is carried out in terms of prices and the distinction between periods is replaced by that between sectors, corresponding to the production of wage-goods, profit-goods, and amortizationgoods respectively. Both analyses lead to the same result and to the same solution. The advantage of the analysis advocated here is that it accounts for an increase in value of produced output due to the increase in the physical productivity of labour made possible by the presence of fixed capital. Labour alone remains the only macroeconomic factor of production, and wage units remain the unique measurement unit of produced output. Yet, value may consistently be brought at the level of prices.