Section C - What are the myths of capitalist economics?

Introduction

C.1 What determines prices within capitalism?

C.1.1 What is wrong with this theory?
C.1.2 So what does determine prices?
C.1.3 What else affects price levels?

C.2 Where do profits come from?

C.2.1 Why does this surplus exist?
C.2.2 Are capitalists justified in appropriating a portion of surplus value for themselves (i.e. making a profit)?
C.2.3 Why does innovation occur and how does it affect profits?
C.2.4 Wouldn't workers' control stifle innovation?
C.2.5 Aren't executives workers and so create value?
C.2.6 Is interest not the reward for waiting, and so isn't capitalism just?
C.2.7 But wouldn't the "time value" of money justify charging interest in a more egalitarian capitalism?

C.3 What determines the distribution between profits and wages within companies?

C.4 Why does the market become dominated by Big Business?

C.4.1 How extensive is Big Business?
C.4.2 What are the effects of Big Business on society?
C.4.3 What does the existence of Big Business mean for economic theory and wage labour?

C.5 Why does Big Business get a bigger slice of profits?

C.5.1 Aren't the super-profits of Big Business due to its higher efficiency?

C.6 Can market dominance by Big Business change?

C.7 What causes the capitalist business cycle?

C.7.1 What role does class struggle play in the business cycle?
C.7.2 What role does the market play in the business cycle?
C.7.3 What else affects the business cycle?

C.8 Is state control of money the cause of the business cycle?

C.8.1 Does this mean that Keynesianism works?
C.8.2 What happened to Keynesianism in the 1970s?
C.8.3 How did capitalism adjust to the crisis in Keynesianism?

C.9 Would laissez-faire policies reduce unemployment, as supporters of "free market" capitalism claim?

C.9.1 Would cutting wages reduce unemployment?
C.9.2 Is unemployment caused by wages being too high?
C.9.3 Are "flexible" labour markets the answer to unemployment?
C.9.4 Is unemployment voluntary?

C.10 Will "free market" capitalism benefit everyone, especially the poor?

C.11 Doesn't Chile prove that the free market benefits everyone?

C.11.1 But didn't Pinochet's Chile prove that "economic freedom is an indispensable means toward the achievement of political freedom"?

C.12 Doesn't Hong Kong show the potentials of "free market" capitalism?