t 
( 30th May 1986 ) 
Comment on Professor Ciccone's Paper. 
By J.Steindl 
I may perhaps at the outset state my position: I think 
that 
it is perfectly true/,as prof.Ciccone argues, utilisation 
is flexible not only in the short but also in the long run. 
This does not, however, necessarily exclude that the 
alternative method of adjusting saving to a change in 
accumulation, namely a shift to or from profits ( what he 
calls a change in normal profits ) may not also play a role. 
Ultimately this seems to me to be a question of facts, but 
Professor Ciccone tends to make it an issue of high doctrine. 
Thus he is very concerned to deny that accumulation may have 
an influence on the real wage ( p.17-18 ); his argument is 
that owing to flexible utilisation an increase in accumulation 
could always be accommodated by an increased output from 
the given capital stock which would obviate a decline in 
real wages. But in the context of a growing economy the 
real wage ( also the subsistence wage in a conventional 
historical interpretation ) will presumably be expected 
to rise,and the question will be how much or how little 
it will be permitted to rise by the pace of accumulation. 
In other words, even with all the flexibility in the world 
the pace of accumulation will not be irrelevant for 
the development of the real wage. 
Strictly speaking, Joan Robinson's arguments were not 
concerned with historical developments but with a " long 
run competitive equilibrium", and quite logically Professor 
Ciccone tries to refute her on this ground. He immediately 
meets the difficulty that for a price equilibrium ( Sraffa's 
system though not mentioned is always in the background )