ABSTRACT

The tendency of the rate of profit to fall had become part of the economists' credo since the time of the classical school of political economy. D. Ricardo tried to interpret it as a symptom of the "law of diminishing returns". The "law of the falling tendency" in the rate of profit has been interpreted by some economists as the "Marxist theory of economic crises". According to him, the law of the falling profit rate was the decisive distinguishing characteristic of crises: Crises were the manifestation of the increase in the organic capital composition in the course of capitalist development, at a faster rate than the increase in labour productivity. Karl Marx's "law of the falling tendency in the profit rate" was also criticised in the post World-War II era on the basis of the "Okishio theorem", formulated by in 1961 Nobuo Okishio, who reached similar conclusions as Tugan-Baranowsky.