Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/312399 
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2025
Series/Report no.: 
Working Paper No. 182
Publisher: 
Universität Leipzig, Wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Fakultät, Leipzig
Abstract: 
Most neo-Ricardian studies on the "choice of technique" are based on a comparison of alternative technologies applicable to the same industrial branch. Some authors even recommend restrict analyses of the long-run technological changes to a single industry. In reality, innovations often require technological changes in several industries. In this article, it is shown that a step-by-step analysis of complex technological innovations is path-dependent and does not always lead to a result. Furthermore: The number of mathematically possible switch-points is reduced by the number of affected industries and by ambiguous price relations in the vicinity of intersection-points of wage curves. This could, without simplification of Sraffa's theory, explain why situations in which two alternative technologies generate the same prices, i.e. switch-points, are empirically extremely rare events.
Subjects: 
capital theory
switch-points
choice of technologies
path-dependency
embedded equations
JEL: 
B24
C67
O14
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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