Admittedly, Bulgakov's real solution and that of Russian Marxists in general who deal extensively with the problem must be sought elsewhere. Just like Tugan Baranovski and Ilyin [Lenin], Bulgakov underlines the fact that the opposing sceptics made a capital error with respect to the possibility of accumulation in analysing the value of the aggregate product. They, especially Vorontsov, assumed that the aggregate social product consists in consumer goods, and they all started from the false premise that consumption is indeed the object of capitalist production. This, as the Marxists now explain, is the source of the entire misunderstanding--of all the imaginary difficulties connected with the realisation of the surplus value, with which the sceptics racked their brains. 'This school created non-existent difficulties because of this mistaken conception. Since the normal conditions of capitalist production presuppose that the capitalists' consumption fund is only a part of the surplus value, and the smaller part at that, the larger being set aside for the expansion of production, it is obvious that the difficulties imagined by this (the _populist_) school do not really exist.'[306] The unconcern with which Bulgakov here ignores the real problem is striking. Apparently it has not dawned on him that the question as to the ultimate beneficiaries, quite irrelevant so long as personal consumption of the entire surplus value is assumed, only becomes acute on the assumption of enlarged reproduction. All these 'imaginary difficulties' vanish, thanks to two discoveries of Marx's which his Russian pupils untiringly quote against their opponents. The first is the fact that, in terms of value, the social product is composed, not of _v + s_, but of _c + v + s_. Secondly, the ratio of _c_ to _v_ in this sum continually increases with the progress of capitalist production, and at the same time, the capitalised part of the surplus value as against that part of it that is consumed, is ever growing. On this basis, Bulgakov establishes a complete theory of the relations between production and consumption in a capitalist society. As this theory plays such an important part for the Russian Marxists in general, and Bulgakov in particular, it will be necessary to get better acquainted with it.