Accounting for Capitalism

Accounting for Capitalism PDF Author: Michael Zakim
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022654589X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
The clerk attended his desk and counter at the intersection of two great themes of modern historical experience: the development of a market economy and of a society governed from below. Who better illustrates the daily practice and production of this modernity than someone of no particular account assigned with overseeing all the new buying and selling? In Accounting for Capitalism, Michael Zakim has written their story, a social history of capital that seeks to explain how the “bottom line” became a synonym for truth in an age shorn of absolutes, grafted onto our very sense of reason and trust. This is a big story, told through an ostensibly marginal event: the birth of a class of “merchant clerks” in the United States in the middle of the nineteenth century. The personal trajectory of these young men from farm to metropolis, homestead to boarding house, and, most significantly, from growing things to selling them exemplified the enormous social effort required to domesticate the profit motive and turn it into the practical foundation of civic life. As Zakim reveals in his highly original study, there was nothing natural or preordained about the stunning ascendance of this capitalism and its radical transformation of the relationship between “Man and Mammon.”

Accounting for Capitalism

Accounting for Capitalism PDF Author: Michael Zakim
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022654589X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
The clerk attended his desk and counter at the intersection of two great themes of modern historical experience: the development of a market economy and of a society governed from below. Who better illustrates the daily practice and production of this modernity than someone of no particular account assigned with overseeing all the new buying and selling? In Accounting for Capitalism, Michael Zakim has written their story, a social history of capital that seeks to explain how the “bottom line” became a synonym for truth in an age shorn of absolutes, grafted onto our very sense of reason and trust. This is a big story, told through an ostensibly marginal event: the birth of a class of “merchant clerks” in the United States in the middle of the nineteenth century. The personal trajectory of these young men from farm to metropolis, homestead to boarding house, and, most significantly, from growing things to selling them exemplified the enormous social effort required to domesticate the profit motive and turn it into the practical foundation of civic life. As Zakim reveals in his highly original study, there was nothing natural or preordained about the stunning ascendance of this capitalism and its radical transformation of the relationship between “Man and Mammon.”

Economics, Accounting and the True Nature of Capitalism

Economics, Accounting and the True Nature of Capitalism PDF Author: Jacques Richard
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 100048405X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 182

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Book Description
Almost all economists, whether classical, neoclassical or Marxist, have failed in their analyses of capitalism to consider the underpinning systems of accounting. This book draws attention to this lacuna, focusing specifically on the concept of capital: a major concept that dominates all teaching and practice in both economics and management. It is argued that while for the practitioners of capitalism – in accounting and business – the capital in their accounts is a debt to be repaid (or a thing to be kept), for economists, it has been considered a means (or even a resource or an asset) intended to be worn out. This category error has led to economists failing to comprehend the true nature of capitalism. On this basis, this book proposes a new definition of capitalism that brings about considerable changes in the attitude to be had towards this economic system, in particular, the means to bring about its replacement. This book will be of significant interest to readers of political economy, history of economic thought, critical accounting and heterodox economics.

Debt to Society

Debt to Society PDF Author: Miranda Joseph
Publisher: U of Minnesota Press
ISBN: 1452941602
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 316

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Book Description
It is commonplace to say that criminals pay their debt to society by spending time in prison, but what is a “debt to society”? How is crime understood as a debt? How has time become the equivalent for crime? And how does criminal debt relate to the kind of debt held by consumers and university students? In Debt to Society, Miranda Joseph explores modes of accounting as they are used to create, sustain, or transform social relations. Envisioning accounting broadly to include financial accounting, managerial accounting of costs and performance, and the calculation of “debts to society” owed by criminals, Joseph argues that accounting technologies have a powerful effect on social dynamics by attributing credits and debts. From sovereign bonds and securitized credit card debt to student debt and mortgages, there is no doubt that debt and accounting structure our lives. Exploring central components of neoliberalism (and neoliberalism in crisis) from incarceration to personal finance and university management, Debt to Society exposes the uneven distribution of accountability within our society. Joseph demonstrates how ubiquitous the forces of accounting have become in shaping all aspects of our lives, proposing that we appropriate accounting and offer alternative accounts to turn the present toward a more widely shared well-being.

Capital in the History of Accounting and Economic Thought

Capital in the History of Accounting and Economic Thought PDF Author: Jacques Richard
Publisher: Economics and Humanities
ISBN: 9781032046570
Category : Accounting
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Part One. The writings of the accountants: creators of the capital-debt concept -- Part Two. The writings of the economists on the concept of capital -- Part Three. The attacks against the concept of capital-debt.

Smoke & Mirrors, Inc

Smoke & Mirrors, Inc PDF Author: Nicolas Véron
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 9780801444166
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
The authors challenge widespread beliefs that business accounting practices are neutral and involve the mere reporting of objective data, revealing how easily balance sheets can be manipulated.

Accounting for Value in Marx's Capital

Accounting for Value in Marx's Capital PDF Author: Robert Bryer
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 1498536077
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 333

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Book Description
Many scholars discuss Marx’s Capital from many perspectives, but Accounting for Value uniquely advances and defends an ‘accounting interpretation’ of his theory of value, that he used it to explain capitalists’ accounts. It confirms and builds on the Temporal Single-System Interpretation’s refutation of the charge that Marx’s illustration of the ‘transformation from values to prices’ is inconsistent, and its defense of his ‘Law of the Tendential Fall in the Rate of Profit’. It rejects other interpretations by showing that only a ‘temporal’, ‘single-system’ interpretation is consistent with Marx’s accounting. The book shows that Marx became seriously interested in accounts from the late 1850s during an important period in the development of his critique of political economy, asking Engels for information and explanations. Examining their letters in the context of Marx’s evolving work, it argues, supports the hypothesis that discovering he could explain them with his theory of value gave him the breakthrough he needed to decide how to present his work and explains why, in 1862, he decided to change its title to Capital. Marx’s explanations of capitalist accounting, it concludes, amount to an ‘accounting theory’ that explains how individual capitalists and the capital market use what is, for many, the ‘invisible hand’ of accounting to control the production and distribution of surplus value. Marx claimed his theory of value was a work of ‘science’, a critique of political economy that would deliver a ‘theoretical blow’ from which the bourgeoisie would ‘never recover’. He failed, critics argue, because his critique depends on hypothetical entities, which we cannot directly observe, such as ‘value’ and ‘abstract labour’, ‘surplus value’, which means his theory is not open to empirical refutation. The book, however, argues that he used his theory of value to explain the ‘phenomenal forms’ of ‘profit’, ‘rate of profit’, etc., by explaining the observable accounting principles and practices capitalists use to calculate and control them, in which, as he said, we can ‘glimpse’ the determination of value by socially necessary labor time, which experience could have refuted.

Regulating Capitalism?

Regulating Capitalism? PDF Author: J. Zimmermann
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137309288
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
By exploring how financial, legal and wider socio-economic systems can accelerate or decelerate the harmonization in financial markets, this book connects issues both of contemporary political science and accounting research.

Red Capitalism

Red Capitalism PDF Author: Carl Walter
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1118255135
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
The truth behind the rise of China and whether or not it will be able to maintain it How did China transform itself so quickly? In Red Capitalism: The Fragile Financial Foundation of China's Extraordinary Rise, Revised Edition Carl Walter and Fraser Howie go deep inside the Chinese financial machine to illuminate the social and political consequences of the unique business model that propelled China to economic powerhouse status, and question whether this rapid ascension really lives up to its reputation. All eyes are on China, but will it really surpass the U.S. as the world's premier global economy? Walter and Howie aren't so certain, and in this revised and updated edition of Red Capitalism they examine whether or not the 21st century really will belong to China. The specter of a powerful China is haunting the U.S. and other countries suffering from economic decline and this book explores China's next move Packed with new statistics and stories based on recent developments, this new edition updates the outlook on China's future with the most cutting-edge information available Find out how China financed its current position of strength and whether it will be able to maintain its astonishing momentum Indispensable reading for anyone looking to understand the limits that China's past development decisions have imposed on its brilliant future, Red Capitalism is an essential resource for anyone considering China's business strategies in today's extremely challenging global economy.

Six Capitals, or Can Accountants Save the Planet?: Rethinking Capitalism for the Twenty-First Century

Six Capitals, or Can Accountants Save the Planet?: Rethinking Capitalism for the Twenty-First Century PDF Author: Jane Gleeson-White
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 039324668X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 186

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Book Description
A timely and fascinating account of the revolution going on in the world of finance from the acclaimed author of Double Entry. This is the story of a twenty-first-century revolution being led by the most unlikely of rebels: accountants. Only the second revolution in accounting since double-entry bookkeeping began, it is of seismic proportions, driven by the 2008 financial crash and our ongoing environmental crisis. The changes it will wreak are profound and far-reaching and not only will transform the way the world does business but also will alter the nature of capitalism. While the wealth of nations and corporations has been vital to the global economy, increasingly the world is coming to realize that such endless growth is limited by the earth's resources and comes at a huge price to the planet and to human well-being. It simply cannot be sustained. This revolution demands that we go beyond merely accounting for traditional financial and industrial capital and take account of the benefits and detriments to the natural world and society. It urges us to include four new categories of wealth: intellectual (such as intellectual property), human (skills, productivity, and health), social and relationship (shared norms and values), and natural (environment). Making them part of our financial statements and GDP figures may be the only way to address the many calamities we face. Just two years ago this revolution seemed idealistic and unlikely. Today it is quickly unfolding. In 2012, the sea-change year, two key initiatives took root: an international movement to transform how corporate accounting is calculated and the rise of incorporating the effects on the environment to the accounting of national and global economies. Six Capitals tells the story of this coming new age in capitalism, evaluating its promise and the disaster that lies ahead if it is not implemented.

Accounting for History in Marx's Capital

Accounting for History in Marx's Capital PDF Author: Robert Bryer
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1498551645
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 454

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Book Description
The book reinterprets Marx’s historical materialism as a world accounting history, answers his critics, and supports his theory with accounting evidence from history. It explains Marx’s prediction of the ‘inevitability’ of socialism, and outlines the necessary tasks of ‘critical accounting’ for Marxists to get Day One.