A Grammar for Describing Economic Processes: Sequential Provenance Comparison of Profit, Credit and Accumulation

Accounting consistency alone does not establish whether a planned sequence of payments can be executed. This working paper uses Sequential Provenance Comparison (SPC) to distinguish accounting consistency, sequential payment feasibility, terminal-state equality and ordered transaction history. Inspired by chemical reaction notation, the paper represents economic processes as state transitions with explicit execution conditions and update rules. Its application is an original three-firm model of production, settlement and capital accumulation, informed by Carrera’s numerical example. Under the specified prices, purchase plan and accounting rules, initial bank loans spent entirely on wages permit all three firms to record positive individual accounting profits, all four product lots to be sold and all bank-loan principal to be repaid. Reordering the same identified operations can instead cause payment failure. Of the 24 permutations of the final four operations, exactly three complete successfully and reach the same terminal economic state. The paper distinguishes profit attribution from outstanding credit and equipment valued at acquisition prices from equipment valued at production cost. Building on existing discussions of inter-firm equipment purchases and accounting consistency, it makes individual payments and repayments explicit and tests their sequential feasibility. These are conditional, constructive results. Prices and purchase demand are stipulated. The paper does not establish a general theory of income origin or settle the historical comparison of Schmitt and Graziani. Further research will address that comparison, multi-period reproduction, and Schmitt’s explanations of capital malformation, inflation and unemployment. Contents:• English paper and editable manuscript• Japanese paper and editable manuscript• Python verifier using only the standard library• Verification results and reproduction instructions Version 1.0.1 adds Zezza’s undated comments on Rochon to the discussion of accounting precedents, distinguishing the 2003 conference paper from the 2005 chapter. It also clarifies the introduction of Schmitt and Graziani, standardises personal names in the Japanese text and corrects Japanese table-caption pagination. The model, propositions, verification code and numerical results are unchanged. Author: nyun, independent researcher.Working paper / preprint; not peer reviewed.Languages: English and Japanese. 日本語版『経済過程を記述する文法――利潤・信用・蓄積の逐次来歴比較』を併載しています。本稿は、会計的整合性と支払いの逐次実行可能性を区別し、利潤・信用・蓄積の関係を状態遷移と履歴に即して検査する構成例を提示します。再現用コードと実行結果を付属しています。