ABSTRACT
This chapter explains what the organic composition of capital is and how it connects with K. Marx's other key ideas. It examines criticisms which reject the underlying assumptions about the labour theory of value and surplus value. The chapter discusses criticisms which accept the labour theory of value and surplus value but nevertheless reject the consequences that are supposed to flow from the resulting argument about the organic composition of capital: a falling rate of profit leading to capitalism's collapse. It reviews the Grundrisse argument about automation. The chapter assesses what worth remains of the whole idea of the organic composition of capital. The only way to make investment in machinery profitable is to make mass consumption equal mass production. The chapter deals with an argument designed to show that constant capital is just as capable as variable capital of producing surplus value.
