[96] 'The premise of simple reproduction, that I(_v + s_) is equal to
II_c_, is irreconcilable with capitalist production, although this does
not exclude the possibility that a certain year in an industrial cycle
of ten or eleven years may not show a smaller total production than the
preceding year, so that there would not have been even a simple
reproduction, compared to the preceding year. Indeed, considering the
natural growth of population per year, simple reproduction could take
place only in so far as a correspondingly larger number of unproductive
servants would partake of the 1,500 representing the aggregate
surplus-product. But accumulation of capital, actual capitalist
production, would be impossible under such circumstances' (_Capital_,
vol. ii, p. 608).
[97] Ricardo, _Principles_, chap. viii, 'On Taxes'. MacCulloch's edition
of Ricardo's Works, p. 87, note. (Reference not given in original.)
[98] 'The specifically capitalist mode of production, the development of
the productive power of labour corresponding to it, and the change
thence resulting in the organic composition of capital, do not merely
keep pace with the advance of accumulation, or with the growth of social
wealth. They develop at a much quicker rate, because mere accumulation,
the absolute increase of the total social capital, is accompanied by the
centralisation of the individual capitals of which that total is made
up; and because the change in the technological composition of the
additional capital goes hand in hand with a similar change in the
technological composition of the original capital. With the advance of
accumulation, therefore, the proportion of constant to variable capital
changes. If it was originally say 1 : 1, it now becomes successively 2 :
1, 3 : 1, 4 : 1, 5 : 1, 7 : 1, etc., so that, as the capital increases,
instead of 1/2 of its total value, only 1/3, 1/4, 1/5, 1/6, 1/8, etc.,
is transformed into labour-power, and, on the other hand, 2/3, 3/4, 4/5,
5/6, 7/8 into means of production. Since the demand for labour is
determined not by the amount of capital as a whole, but by its variable
constituent alone, that demand falls progressively with the increase of
the total capital, instead of, as previously assumed, rising in
proportion to it. It falls relatively to the magnitude of the total
capital, and at an accelerated rate, as this magnitude increases. With
the growth of the total capital, its variable constituent or the labour
incorporated in it, also does increase, but in a constantly diminishing
proportion. The intermediate pauses are shortened, in which accumulation
works as simple extension of production, on a given technical basis. It
is not merely that an accelerated accumulation of total capital,
accelerated in a constantly growing progression, is needed to absorb an
additional number of labourers, or even, on account of the constant
metamorphosis of old capital, to keep employed those already
functioning. In its turn, this increasing accumulation and
centralisation becomes a source of new changes in the composition of
capital, of a more accelerated diminution of its variable, as compared
with its constant constituent' (_Capital_, vol. i, pp. 642-3).
[99] 'The course characteristic of modern industry, viz., a decennial
cycle (interrupted by smaller oscillations), of periods of average
activity, production at high pressure, crisis and stagnation, depends on
the constant formation, the greater or less absorption, and the
re-formation of the industrial reserve army or surplus population. In
their turn, the varying phases of the industrial cycle recruit the
surplus population, and become one of the most energetic agents of its
reproduction' (ibid., pp. 646-7).
[100] _Capital_, vol. i. pp. 593-4.
[101] Ibid., p. 594.
[102] Op. cit., vol. ii, pp. 596-601.
_CHAPTER VII_