Economics of Modern Capitalism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Economics of Modern Capitalism - Essay Example Malthus made two propositions in his argument about population. Firstly, that population escalates in a geometrical type of ratio and secondly, that subsistence rises in an arithmetical type of ratio. These two Malthus’ propositions form the popular population principle which, as he argues is part of the causes of lack of progress by mankind to the achievement of happiness. This so called cause is coherently related to the human nature where there is a continual trend of the entire animated life to rise in populations beyond what is there to nourish them. The necessary as well as natural impacts arising from such tendency are misery and other related vices that has had philanthropists trying in vain to rectify. The principle of population applied by Malthus to bring forth his argument is all based upon natural law where animated life increases far much higher than the available means for the subsistence of their life. This natural law of growth in population is usually put in check by another as Malthus continued to argue, which is the necessity law that restrains the growth inside particular boundaries and at the same time keeping it as low as the available subsistence means. In the case of humans, this natural law of necessity acts by the dictated way of numerous checks that can be ranked under two major categories. These major categories are with the inclusion of; (i) preventive kind of checks that put an impediment upon fertility and (ii) the positive types of checks that raise mortality or the death probability. The final outcome is the misery and poverty situations witnessed among the poor of every country as well as the futile attempts by the well-to-do to rescue them. Marx, and Engel alike, on the other hand came up with a counter argument in reaction to Malthus’ theory of population. They did their analysis under two levels to make their argument clear. The first level is their view that Malthus’ theory is too general principally i n that it is just another of the way bourgeois economists make more reified the relationships observed in a typical society. In the theory of Malthus, reify bears the meaning of changing concrete historical relations in a society as well as processes into eternal laws of nature. The process of reification mentioned with regards to social relationships, are characterised in the intellectual production nature under the capitalist conditions of production and the process of human reflections of the social life forms in tandem with the scientific analysis of the same social life forms. The second level is the more precise level of the Marx’s reaction to Malthus’ population principle. This level is about the principle of â€Å"the reserve army of labour† which is also referred to as the relative surplus population. He expounds on his point as he continues to make an analysis of the capital accumulation general law. Marx says that the expansion and accumulation of cap ital comprises of the capitalism’s driving force and this becomes a possibility only in scenarios where capitalists are able to operate at a gain. Gains arise in the appropriation of the surplus value that is produced by the power of labour he purchases. Accumulation arises at the point where capitalists change a part of their surplus value capital. This serves capitalists by allowing them some space to realise expansion and to apportion the extra surplus value and