At times of crisis, of course there is nothing solid and reliable in traditional theory and everything is questioned. Economics at best is an ill-disciplined discipline. I am not denying that you are intuitive thinkers - or you wouldn't be here - but originality means discovery, not reform and there is no reforming this systemically flawed capitalist economy. The crisis can be patched but it can't be fixed.
It is also true that as with Keynes, who followed Ricardo and Marx, they were trying to understand the economy as it worked in their time however Marx comes closer to describing how it does work and doesn't work EVEN IN OUR TIME. And I won't bore you with quotes from Marx. I and others have posted quotes before to bare this out.
The fact is without planning production for consumption, there is no long-period equilibrium, no fulfilling expectations as to prices, flows of output, profits, etc., which were held in the past and is therefore recreating expectations that will be fulfilled in the future. In reality these situations are never realized. The future under capitalism based only on profits is always going to be vague and uncertain. And it is always going to be unfair and full of pain.
The reasoning behind capitalist economy as a pyramid is based on the fact that exponential growth in perpetuity is an impossibility for any physical entity.
Just considering the consumption of resources, including air to breath has been affected by environmental degradation and the long struggle over relative shares of resources for industrial countries is beyond the scope of constant satisfaction in spite of whatever monetary stringency is imposed on us and the uneven development of trading nations causing insupportable strain on international financial systems and not least of all the growth of wealth having an inverse affect on poverty at home and aid has not reduced it abroad. Unemployment and underemployment also exacerbates social problems and embitters us as to the politics that support these economic non- solutions. Even the "progressive" nature of technology - not least of all outsourcing jobs for cheap labor - has led to even more unemployment. The pyramid is coming down.
-Hank-