Veblen has been claimed and rejected both by sociologists and economists as being one of theirs. He enriched and attacked both disciplines, as he did so many others: philosophy, history, social psychology, politics, and linguistics. Because he took all knowledge as necessary and relevant to adequate understanding, Veblen was a holistic analyst of the social process. First published in 1904, this classic analysis of the U.S. economy has enduring value today. In it, Veblen posited a theory of business fluctuations and economic growth which included chronic depression and inflation. He predicted the socioeconomic changes that would occur as a result: militarism, imperialism, fascism, consumerism, and the development of the mass media as well as the corporate bureaucracy. Douglas Dowd's introduction places the volume within the traditions of both macroeconomics and microeconomics, tracing Veblen's place among social thinkers, and the place of this volume in the body of his work.

Theory of business enterprise

New technologies are driving transformational changes in the global financial system. Virtual currencies (VCs) and the underlying distributed ledger systems are among these. VCs offer many potential benefits, but also considerable risks. VCs could raise efficiency and in the long run strengthen financial inclusion. At the same time, VCs could be potential vehicles for money laundering, terrorist financing, tax evasion and fraud. While risks to the conduct of monetary policy seem less likely to arise at this stage given the very small scale of VCs, risks to financial stability may eventually emerge as the new technologies become more widely used. National authorities have begun to address these challenges and will need to calibrate regulation in a manner that appropriately addresses the risks without stifling innovation. As experience is gained, international standards and best practices could be considered to provide guidance on the most appropriate regulatory responses in different fields, thereby promoting harmonization and cooperation across jurisdictions.

Virtual Currencies and Beyond; Initial Considerations

This paper analyses the recent changes in financial practices and relations in emerging capitalist economies (ECEs) using the example of Brazil. It argues that in ECEs these financial transformations, akin to the financialisation phenomena observed in Core Capitalist Economies (CCEs), are fundamentally shaped by their subordinated integration into a financialised and structured world economy. To analyse this subordinated financialisation, the paper draws on the framework of international currency hierarchies. It shows by means of two specific processes how the existence of a hierarchic international monetary system has changed the financial behaviour of domestic economic agents, and with it the structure of the financial system. The first process highlights the phenomenon of reserve accumulation and the changing behaviour of domestic banks. The second points to ECEs’ sustained external vulnerability and its impact on the operations of Brazilian non-financial corporations. The paper also shows that...

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Subordinated Financial Integration and Financialisation in Emerging Capitalist Economies: The Brazilian Experience

The main aim of this paper is to demonstrate, through a review of China's economic reforms, that the emergence of a large private sector and the increased sophistication and diversification of industry has required the continual reorganization of activities between the state and private sectors of the economy. We argue in this paper that the state began to play a major role in important industries and in big finance, as well as in the coordination and socialization of investment, such as economic policy (monetary and fiscal), foreign trade and, especially, the launch of new and higher forms of economic planning.
JEL Classification: O1; O2; P2.

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The political economy of reforms and the present Chinese transition

This paper analyzes the presence of financial constraints for investment in innovation in Brazil. Dynamic investment models are estimated for a panel dataset of 206 Brazilian non-financial firms in the period 1995–2006. Results show that innovation of Brazilian firms is subject to financial constraints in line with previous international evidence. Innovation of Brazilian firms is adversely affected by leverage and also depends on internally generated funds. The models presented incorporate relevant firm characteristics for financial constraints. Our findings suggest the need for further advances at micro- and macroeconomic levels in Brazil to mitigate the observed financial constraints.

http://www.anpad.org.br/admin/pdf/fin618.pdf

Financial Constraints for Innovation in Brazil

O fim do arranjo de Bretton Woods ensejou nao apenas uma mudanca na forma de funcionamento das relacoes economicas em âmbito mundial, mas tambem no proprio modo de operacao do capitalismo. A liberalizacao dos fluxos de capitais e a desregulamentacao e integracao dos mercados financeiros internacionais sob a lideranca dos Estados Unidos deu origem a um novo padrao sistemico de riqueza, a financeirizacao, em que as operacoes financeiras ganham importância cada vez maior na gestao de ativos e passivos por parte das familias e das empresas, e nao apenas de instituicoes do mercado financeiro. Ao contrario do que sugerem interpretacoes mais recentes sobre esse fenomeno, isso nao significa uma tendencia do sistema a estagnacao, mas um aumento da sua instabilidade caracteristica, reforcando os momentos de expansao, mas tambem de contracao. De fato, com a generalizacao e a dominância da logica financeira as decisoes de endividamento e de gasto das empresas e das familias passaram a ser crescentemente sensiveis as oscilacoes correntes e esperadas nos estoques de riqueza, as quais, por sua vez, sao sensiveis as mudancas dos precos dos ativos financeiros. Isso implica em transformacoes da relacao entre Estado e mercados, com os bancos centrais e os tesouros nacionais tornando-se refens da necessidade de evitar as perdas patrimoniais privadas e os efeitos perversos que elas podem exercer sobre os niveis de produto, renda e emprego da economia.

/pdf/por-uma-economia-politica-da-financeirizacao-teoria-e-37tvtari34.pdf

Por uma economia política da financeirização: teoria e evidências

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Sistema financeiro: uma análise do setor bancário brasileiro

The pronounced reduction of the bank interest spread in Brazil requests the decrease of the cost of opportunity of the credit operations in the country, represented by the monetary and no-monetary returns of the federal public titles. When allowing the structuring of a flexible and profitable operational posture at the same time, those assets create an anomaly in the credit market, because the banks start to demand a premium of very high risk for the concession of credit, elevating the bank interest spread and increasing the cost of the money in the country.

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O componente "custo de oportunidade" do spread bancário no Brasil: uma abordagem pós-keynesiana

O artigo discute o sistema de Bretton Woods e a dinâmica do Sistema Monetario Internacional depois do abandono do padrao dolar-ouro. Sustenta-se que o colapso do sistema de Bretton Woods legitimou a estruturacao de um padrao de riqueza subjugado ao plano das financas, ao inves da producao e do emprego. Neste sentido, a ideia de ressurgimento do sistema Bretton Woods (BW-2), baseado no esquema Centro-Periferia, onde o Centro emite a moeda internacional e funciona como intermediario financeiro (banco comercial) do mundo e a Periferia atua como regiao exportadora de produtos manufaturados que acumula superavits nas transacoes correntes com o Centro, mostra-se inadequada para captar as transformacoes e a dinâmica do Sistema Monetario Internacional contemporâneo.

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O sistema de Bretton Woods e a dinâmica do sistema monetário internacional contemporâneo

The purpose of this paper is to present the dynamics of the credit market in Brazil between 2007 and 2015, through the analysis of selected data and indicators. The interregnum considered in this paper comprises a period of important changes in the credit market in Brazil. While the expansion of credit until the deepening of the international crisis in 2008 was led by private banks, after the crisis it was the public banks that led this process, increasing considerably their participation in the credit market. However, from mid-2013 the balance of credit operations with free resources, both for individuals and, above all, for companies, started to show a gradual deceleration in the context of an economic downturn that became increasingly strong and the subsequent decrease in the demand for credit. With the deepening of the Brazilian crisis since 2015, the total balance of credit operations in Brazil began to show a real downturn. The evidences suggest that the continued expansion of these operations and, more than that, their development in more appropriate conditions in terms of volume, time and costs, requires not only appropriate microeconomic conditions, but also appropriate macroeconomic conditions, since their absence increases the risk of weakening public institutions, on the one hand, as well as hampers the constitution of a deep, dynamic and competitive credit market in the Brazilian economy, on the other hand.

https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/177459/1/td_2243.pdf

Giuliano Contento de Oliveira

Papers

Por uma economia política da financeirização: teoria e evidências

Sistema financeiro: uma análise do setor bancário brasileiro

O componente "custo de oportunidade" do spread bancário no Brasil: uma abordagem pós-keynesiana

O sistema de Bretton Woods e a dinâmica do sistema monetário internacional contemporâneo

A dinâmica do mercado de crédito no Brasil no período recente (2007-2015)