The aim of this thesis is to examine the impact of corporate control on households' choice on consumption-savings and, as a result, on financial capital accumulation. It attempts to provide an alternative to the managerialist and neoclassical 'orthodoxies' in theory (Part I) and subjects the alternative theories to empirical-econometric testing (Part II). The central theme of the thesis runs as follows. The emergence and growth of the joint-stock company has led to the socialization of the 'ownership' of the means of production. The latter has resulted in the generation of a higher level of aggregate saving being available for investment purposes, than could I-lave been the case in its absence. A preference on the part of the corporate 'controlling group' for higher retention and net inflow to the corporate pension funds ratios than that of the non-controlling shareholders and the latters' inability and/or unwillingness to substitute for increases in corporate savings by sufficiently reducing their net personal savings, has facilitated the achievement of this result. Historical consistency and the existing evidence suggests that it is more plausible to interpret the above as the result of capitalist control of today's corporations, rather than managerial and/or all shareholders' control. Increases in corporate saving and less than perfect substitution between corporate and personal saving will tend to reduce the part of private income devoted to consumption: thus containing the seeds of a realization failure. The Saving Function should be extended to allow for these developments: a proposed 'Monopoly Capitalism Saving Function' appears, closer to describing saving behaviour today. The post-war U.K. evidence does not contradict the above propositions. Our econometric evidence lends support to our proposed form of the saving function, the idea that different forms of saving substitute imperfectly and the other hypotheses advanced in the thesis.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:354609 |
| Date | January 1984 |
| Creators | Pitelis, Christos |
| Publisher | University of Warwick |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/4404/ |
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