Corrections, Updates
Hello dear readers,
Since it’s been a while since I posted, I just wanted to drop a brief update.
First item: my post on “Bills of Exchange Medieval and Modern” was cited by Samuel Chambers in his recent book, Money Has No Value. I’d like to thank Samuel for the interest in my work and also issue an apology, as his footnote reproduces an error of terminology that I made in my original post regarding the term “deliverer” in the exchange by bills. The deliverer is not, as I had it, the person who brings the bill to the payer/drawee, but rather the person who buys the bill from the drawer at the city of issuance (and subsequently “delivers” the bill to the corresponding partner who will present it for acceptance to the drawee). Additionally, the term “taker” is synonymous with “drawer,” and not, as I had mistakenly suggested, the same as what is correctly called the “deliverer.”
While these errors do not impact the overall conclusions of the paper, I regret introducing yet more terminological confusion into the literature on this topic. Mea culpa! I’d like to thank Mimbres School Fellow Jan Delaeter for bringing this error to my attention. I’ve now posted a correction on the original post.
Please note that, generally, I try my best to get things right in these blog posts, but there may be errors as they are unedited and unrevised. Cite at your own risk, and if you are intending to cite them, you might consider sending it my way for me to double check!
In other news, I am encouraged to see that many people have read my previous essays and subscribed to this blog. I hope you are enjoying them. I regret that I have not had time to write much this year: I have been very busy with my duties organizing the Mimbres School for the Humanities, which is now a 501(c)(3) organization with 12 faculty in various roles! So my thoughts about money have been rather more practical than theoretical, as I find myself with a rapidly growing payroll to make and Small Business Stuff to do.
A few people have offered to pledge money to this blog: I will not be monetizing it as I cannot guarantee the regularity of posts. However, if you want to support my work, you are most welcome to do so by supporting Mimbres School at https://mimbres.study.garden. Sign up for a class and get a subscription! Subscriptions and tuitions to the School will help me hire more teaching faculty so that I can free up more of my own time for writing and research. We are also now available in the charitable organizations directories that you may be able to access through Fidelity Charitable, etc.
This fall, I will be taking a sabbatical from my normal workload at the School. It’s my hope that I will be able to make substantial progress on the book version of The Difference That Money Makes during that time. I may post some excerpts from the new material here. It’s my hope to have a finished draft of the book by this time next year, assuming I can avoid falling down any more research rabbit holes. (The intention is for the book to be a bit tighter and shorter than the dissertation was, so hopefully it will turn out to a problem solvable in finite time.)
Part 2 of my “Value Concept” essay will be coming at some point next year. I will have to come to a conclusion about Ricardo in order to write the new chapter of the book, which will reprise much of the “value concept” material in order to make a better transition from Marx to James Stuart and Shakespeare. But I will admit that Ricardo so far has stumped me and I was unable to get myself to a place where I felt confident enough about him to finish the essay, which will have to culminate in the Malthus-Ricardo debate about the post-Napoleonic debt: a debate of incredible importance to the history of economic thought that is not often appreciated. If anybody has any recommendations for clarifying secondary lit on Ricardo (not written by Sraffa), please send it my way. I will be teaching a course on this material at Mimbres School probably next Fall.
I also have some plans to write at some point a review essay on some recent popular books much praised by Marxists, which exhibit a general tendency towards insisting on the “autonomous logic” and “mute compulsion” of capital, thereby leading their readers into deep confusion. The renewed popularity of this sort of theorizing is a bad sign, so I intend to complain about it at some length. The essay will also begin developing some themes on “evil” and “freedom” which will be a significant element of my work over the next few years, probably culminating in a book of its own on economics, racism, and the problem of evil.
If you aren’t yet in the Mimbres School discord server, you ought to consider joining, as there are many discussions happening there that will be of interest to readers of this blog. Message me on twitter @drumm_colin for a link or email at colindrumm@gmail.com.
Thank you! Stay tuned!
C