Roundaboutness

Roundaboutness, or roundabout methods of production, is the process whereby capital goods are produced first and then, with the help of the capital goods, the desired consumer goods are produced.[1]

An argument against Böhm-Bawerk's theory of roundaboutness, in economies with compound interest, was presented by Paul Samuelson[2] during the Cambridge capital controversy.

The concept, interpreted as rising technical composition of capital, is also used by some Marxian authors.[3]

  1. ^ Buechner, M. Northrup (1989). "Roundaboutness and Productivity in Böhm-Bawerk". Southern Economic Journal. 56 (2). Southern Economic Association: 499–510. ISSN 0038-4038. JSTOR 1059226. Retrieved 20 February 2022.
  2. ^ Samuelson, Paul A.(1966) "A Summing Up" Quarterly Journal of Economics 80:4, pp.568-583.
  3. ^ For example John R. Bell: Capitalism and the Dialectic - The Uno-Sekine Approach to Marxian Political Economy. London, New York 2009, p.106.