Still, no economist will deny that if the workers generally, that is, as workers (what the individual worker does or can do, as distinct from his genus, can only exist just as exception, not as rule, because it is not inherent in the character of the relation itself), that is, if they acted according to this demand as a rule (apart from the damage they would do to general consumption – the loss would be enormous – and hence also to production, thus also to the amount and volume of the exchanges which they could make with capital, hence to themselves as workers) then the worker would be employing means which absolutely contradict their purpose, and which would directly degrade him to the level of the Irish, the level of wage labour where the most animal minimum of needs and subsistence appears to him as the sole object and purpose of his exchange with capital
This alters absolutely nothing in the nature of the thing and gives no grounds whatsoever for concluding that – because the worker has to sleep 10–12 hours before he becomes capable of repeating his labour and his exchange with capital – labour forms his capital”
“However, regarded more precisely, it becomes clear that the worker who exchanges his commodity goes through the form C–M–M–C in the exchange process. If the point of departure in circulation is the commodity, use value, as the principle of exchange, then we necessarily arrive back at the commodity, since money appears only as coin and, as medium of exchange, is only a vanishing mediation; while the commodity as such, after having described its circle, is consumed as the direct object of need. On the other hand, capital represents M–C–C–M, the antithetical moment."
“Separation of property from labour appears as the necessary law of this exchange between capital and labour. Labour posited as not-capital as such is: (1) not-objectified labour [nicht-vergegenständlichte Arbeit], conceived negatively (itself still objective; the not-objective itself in objective form). As such it is not-raw-material, not-instrument of labour, not-raw-product: labour separated from all means and objects of labour, from its entire objectivity. This living labour, existing as an abstraction from these moments of its actual reality (also, not-value); this complete denudation, purely subjective existence of labour, stripped of all objectivity. Labour as absolute poverty: poverty not as shortage, but as total exclusion of objective wealth. ”
“The substance of value is not at all the particular natural substance, but rather objectified labour. This latter itself appears again in connection with living labour as raw material and instrument of labour.”
“ As the not-being of values in so far as they are objectified, labour is their being in so far as they are not-objectified; it is their ideal being; the possibility of values, and, as activity, the positing of value. As against capital, labour is the merely abstract form, the mere possibility of value-positing activity, which exists only as a capacity, as a resource in the bodiliness of the worker. But when it is made into a real activity through contact with capital – it cannot do this by itself, since it is without object – then it becomes a really value-positing, productive activity.”
“the process of capital coincides with the simple process of production as such, in which its character as capital is quite as extinguished in the form of the process, as money was extinguished as money in the form of value. To the extent to which we have examined the process so far, capital in its being-for-itself, i.e. the capitalist, does not enter at all. It is not the capitalist who is consumed by labour as raw material and instrument of labour. And it is not the capitalist who does this consuming but rather labour. Thus the process of the production of capital does not appear as the process of the production of capital, but as the process of production in general, and capital’s distinction from labour appears only in the material character of raw material and instrument of labour”
“What is productive labour and what is not, a point very much disputed back and forth since Adam Smith made this distinction, [10] has to emerge from the dissection of the various aspects of capital itself. Productive labour is only that which produces capital. Is it not crazy, asks e.g. (or at least something similar) Mr Senior, that the piano maker is a productive worker, but not the piano player, although obviously the piano would be absurd without the piano player? [11] But this is exactly the case. The piano maker reproduces capital; the pianist only exchanges his labour for revenue. But doesn’t the pianist produce music and satisfy our musical ear, does he not even to a certain extent produce the latter? He does indeed: his labour produces something; but that does not make it productive labour in the economic sense; no more than the labour of the madman who produces delusions is productive. Labour becomes productive only by producing its own opposite. Other economists therefore allow the so-called unproductive worker to be productive indirectly. For example, the pianist stimulates production; partly by giving a more decisive, lively tone to our individuality, and also in the ordinary “sense of awakening a new need for the satisfaction of which additional energy becomes expended in direct material production. This already admits that only such labour is productive as produces capital; hence that labour which does not do this, regardless of how useful it may be – it may just as well be harmful – is not productive for capitalization, is hence unproductive labour. Other economists say that the difference between productive and unproductive applies not to production but to consumption. Quite the contrary. The producer of tobacco is productive, although the consumption of tobacco is unproductive. Production for unproductive consumption is quite as productive as that for productive consumption; always assuming that it produces or reproduces capital. ‘Productive labourer he that directly augments his master’s wealth,’ Malthus therefore says, quite correctly (IX,40); [12] correct at least in one aspect. The expression is too abstract, since in this formulation it holds also for the slave. The master’s wealth, in relation to the worker, is the form of wealth itself in its relation to labour, namely capital. Productive labourer he that directly augments capital."
Productive labour is only that which produces capital
Is it not crazy, Mr Senior, that the piano maker is a productive worker, but not the piano player, although obviously the piano would be absurd without the piano player? [11] But this is exactly the case. The piano maker reproduces capital; the pianist only exchanges his labour for revenue. But doesn’t the pianist produce music and satisfy our musical ear, does he not even to a certain extent produce the latter?
He does indeed: his labour produces something; but that does not make it productive labour in the economic sense; no more than the labour of the madman who produces delusions is productive. Labour becomes productive only by producing its own opposite.
hence that labour which does not do this, regardless of how useful it may be – it may just as well be harmful – is not productive for capitalization, is hence unproductive labour. Other economists say that the difference between productive and unproductive applies not to production but to consumption. Quite the contrary. The producer of tobacco is productive, although the consumption of tobacco is unproductive. Production for unproductive consumption is quite as productive as that for productive consumption; always assuming that it produces or reproduces capital. ‘Productive labourer he that directly augments his master’s wealth,’ Malthus therefore says, quite correctly (IX,40); [12] correct at least in one aspect. The expression is too abstract, since in this formulation it holds also for the slave. The master’s wealth, in relation to the worker, is the form of wealth itself in its relation to labour, namely capital. Productive labourer he that directly augments capital.
If I've read this right, it says that the pianist's labour is not productive, but the piano maker's is. Why? I think it makes sense to look at this in terms of the advancement of capital M-C-C-M.
Transparently, a piano making business takes money, invests it in materials and labour, produces a piano, then sells it.
A pianist's labour, on the other hand starts with a commodity (labour power), which has a price (money) which the labourer gets for their service (money), which is used to get other commodities (foodstuff, etc).
The piano making business thus has M-C-C-M as a transition of stages, the pianist however has C-M-M-C as its transition of stages, only the former is an advancement of capital. Any material resources the pianist buys to continue playing reproduces their labour, rather than their money (tools, food, fuel, electricity). — fdrake
A slave isn't a wage labourer, they don't receive a wage. So they can't have the M or M steps as part of their C-M-M-C labour transition. Perhaps slaves create wealth, which is converted to value through the circulation of the commodities' values constituting that wealth. I'm wondering, however, if it makes sense to consider slaves as "wage labourers with wage 0" from the perspective of capital. All of their labour is surplus labour, every moment of their labour is uncompensated work.
In that regard, you could still have slaves in M-C-C-M. You start off with money, you buy slaves and commodities, the slaves work with the commodities to produce more commodities, which are then sold for money. Then, the next time you want to make something, you don't have to buy the slaves, you just have to buy something to reproduce their labour. If Marx is construing the M-C step to necessarily to contain an exchange of wages, then he'd be right to exclude slavery from capital advancement on that basis.
Maybe generalising it is illuminating. If all workers were slaves, there'd be no wages and selling of labour, which would mean there'd be no C-M-M-C transition. If some workers were slaves and some were wage labourers, it seems you can have C-M-M-C active in the economy at large with slaves providing a competitive advantage over those capitalists which use wage labourers.
I'm not sure what to make of this. — fdrake
What the Worker exchanges with capital is his labour itself (the capacity of disposing over it); he divests himself of it. What he obtains as price is the value of this divestiture. He exchanges value-positing activity for a pre-determined value, regardless of the result of his activity. Now how is its value determined? By the objectified labour contained in his commodity. This commodity exists in his vitality. In order to maintain this from one day to the next...he has to consume a certain quantity of food, to replace his used-up blood etc.
Just now the original capital of 100 was: 50-10-40. Produced surplus gain of 10 thalers (25% surplus time) Altogether 110 thalers
(the production of workers becomes cheaper, more workers can be produced in the same time, in proportion as necessary labour time becomes smaller or the time required for the production of living labour capacity becomes relatively smaller. These are identical statements)
An interesting question -- how many distinct processes are there? I can draw meaning out of a passage, but I mean -- at the end of the theory. Here thinking about the phrase "realization process", "production process", "exchange process" -- etc.
Basically, what's the final process map look like? Which processes are embedded in which? is there a consistent map between theses processes at any point in time of Marx's writings, or is it more like there are fair interpretations of what's written, and a more experimental-scientific spirit would be required to pin down the best map?
In the realization process, for instance, Marx has three processes. But there are many sub-processes at work within the three processes of 1) capital has maintained its value by means of exchange of money for living labor, 2) production-process (sub-process) whereby surplus value is created and accumulated to a commodity, then 3) demonetization, the commodity as container of objectified labor time that, if mismanaged, all value could go away i.e. one man owns 130 thalers worth linen (supposing I'm doing that right. I had some questions about how to add, but it seems to fit with Marx's 140 thalers math where he's including the 10 thalers worth of equipment as total capital) that then decay because of mismanagement, that then must be re-monetized in order to become the form of value once again. ie. sold for money.
p 407:
The creation by capital of absolute surplus value -- more objectified labour -- is conditional upon an expansion, specifically a constant expansion, of the sphere of circulation. The surplus value created at one point requires the creation of surplus value at another point, for which it may be exchanged; if only, initially, the production of more gold and silver, more money, so that, if surplus value cannot directly become capital again, it may exist in the form of money as the possibility of new capital
On the other side, the production of relative surplus value i.e. production of surplus value based on the increase and development of the productive forces, requires the production of new consumption; requires that the consuming circle within circulation expands as did the productive circle previously. Firstly, quantitative expansion of existing consumption; secondly: creation of new needs by propagating existing ones in a wide circle; thirdly: production of new needs and discovery and creation of new use values
Thus, just as production founded on capital creates universal industriousness on one side -- i.e. surplus labour, value-creating labour -- so does it create on the other side a system of general exploitation of the natural and human qualities, a system of general utility, utilising science itself just as much as all the physical and mental qualities, while there appears nothing higher in itself, nothing legitimate for itself, outside this circle of social production and exchange. Thus capital creates the bourgeois society, and the universal appropriation of nature as well as of the social bond itself by the members of society. Hence the great civilizing influence of capital; its production of a stage of society in comparison to which all earlier ones appear as mere local developments of humanity and as nature-idolatry For the first time, nature becomes purely an object for humankind, purely a matter of utility; ceases to be recognized as a power for itself; and the theoretical discovery of its autonomous laws appears merely as a ruse so as to subjugate it under human needs, whether as an object of consumption or as a means or production. In accord with this tendency, capital drives beyond national barriers and prejudices as much as beyond nature worship, as well as all traditional, confined, complacent, encrusted satisfactions of present needs, and reproductions of old ways of life. it is destructive towards all of this, and constantly revolutionizes it, tearing down all the barriers which hem in the development of the forces of production, the expansion of needs, the all-sided development of production, and the exploitation and exchange of natural and mental forces
use-value as any need within a social system which is actually satisfied (at least under capital, where exchange is necessary), exchange-value as realized price, rather than ideal price. Contradiction in that need is in units of number-commodity-consumed, and exchange is in units of labour-time (which has a relation to money through the system of circulation at a given time)as use value it is absolutely not measured by the labour time objectified in it, but rather a measuring rod is applied to it which lies outside its nature as exchange value
The contradiction between production and realization -- of which capital, by its concept, is the unity -- has to be grasped more intrinsically than merely as the indifferent, seemingly reciprocally independent appearances of the individual moments of the process, or rather of the totality of processes
What's fascinating to me is how Marx's picture of capital, in spite of all this esoteric trapping, still rings true today. — Moliere
That due to the general trend of the 20th century from the Progressive Era, post-WW2 programs, and just unfolding of the idea of protecting people's time (8 hour workday, labor laws, etc.), Marx's initial critiques, which were valid for the time have been somewhat overcome. — schopenhauer1
I'd say this is too narrow a scope. It's been somewhat overcome, for whom? Events from the New Deal to now validates Marx's description of Capital -- class bifurcation from capital expansion that through its economic power has come to revolutionize democracy itself, putting it up for sale, undermining New Deal era social programs to continue to accumulate and create an industrial reserve army. — Moliere
tl;dr - Marx is still relevant to the events we see today, regardless of how we parse the New Deal and whether having stock-options as payment is owning the means of production. — Moliere
“The surplus value which capital has at the end of the production process – a surplus value which, as a higher price of the product, is realized only in circulation, but, like all prices, is realized in it by already being ideally presupposed to it, determined before they enter into it – signifies, expressed in accord with the general concept of exchange value, that the labour time objectified in the product – or amount of labour (expressed passively, the magnitude of labour appears as an amount of space; but expressed in motion, it is measurable only in time) – is greater than that which was present in the original components of capital. This in turn is possible only if the labour objectified in the price of labour is smaller than the living labour time purchased with it. ”
“If one day’s work were necessary in order to keep one worker alive for one day, then capital would not exist, because the working day would then exchange for its own product, so that capital could not realize itself and hence could not maintain itself as capital. The self-preservation of capital is its self-realization.”
“The great historic quality of capital is to create this surplus labour, superfluous labour from the standpoint of mere use value, mere subsistence; and its historic destiny [Bestimmung] is fulfilled as soon as, on one side, there has been such a development of needs that surplus labour above and beyond necessity has itself become a general need arising out of individual needs themselves – and, on the other side, when the severe discipline of capital, acting on succeeding generations [Geschlechter], has developed general industriousness as the general property of the new species [Geschlecht] – and, finally, when the development of the productive powers of labour, which capital incessantly whips onward with its unlimited mania for wealth, and of the sole conditions in which this mania can be realized, have flourished to the stage where the possession and preservation of general wealth require a lesser labour time of society as a whole, and where the labouring society relates scientifically to the process of its progressive reproduction, its reproduction in a constantly greater abundance; hence where labour in which a human being does what a thing could do has ceased. ”
“The unit in which surplus value is calculated is always a fraction, i.e. the given part of a day which exactly represents the price of labour.”
“Thus the absolute sum by which capital increases its value through a given increase of the productive force depends on the given fractional part of the working day, on the fractional part of the working day which represents necessary labour, and which therefore expresses the original relation of necessary labour to the living work day. The increase in productive force in a given relation can therefore increase the value of capital differently e.g. in the different countries. ”
“the more developed capital already is, the more surplus labour it has created, the more terribly must it develop the productive force in order to realize itself in only smaller proportion, i.e. to add surplus value – because its barrier always remains the relation between the fractional part of the day which expresses necessary labour, and the entire working day. It can move only within these boundaries. The smaller already the fractional part falling to necessary labour, the greater the surplus labour, the less can any increase in productive force perceptibly diminish necessary labour; ”
“Labour does not reproduce the value of the material in which, and of the instrument with which, it works. It preserves their value simply by relating to them in the labour process as to their objective conditions. This animating and preserving force costs capital nothing; appears, rather, as its own force etc."
“t preserves the utility of cotton as yarn by weaving the yarn into fabric. (All this belongs already in the first chapter on production in general.) Preserves it by weaving it”
(for we have not yet reached the aspect of capital in which it is circulating capital, and still have circulation on one side and capital on the other, or production as its presupposition, or ground from which it arises)
The contradiction between production and realization -- of which capital, by its concept, is the unity -- ...
What precisely distinguishes capital from the master-servant relation is that the worker confronts him as a consumer and possessor of exchange values, and that in the form of the possessor of money, in the form of money he becomes a simple centre of circulation -- one of its infinitely many centres, in which his specificity as worker is extinguished
By its nature, therefore, it posits a barrier to labour and value-creation, in contradiction to its tendency to expand them boundlessly
...Hence that overproduction comes from use value and therefore from exchange itself. This is stultified form in Say -- products are exchanged only for products; therefore, at most, too much has been produced of one and too little of another. Forgetting; (1) that values are exchanged for values, and a product exchanges for another only to the extent that it is value; i.e. that it is or becomes money; (2)it exchanges for labour. The good gentleman adopts the standpoint of simple exchange, in which no overproduction is possible, for it is indeed concerned not with exchange value but with use value. Overproduction takes place in connection with realization, not otherwise
In practical commerce, capitalist A can screw capitalist B — Karl effin' Marx
(It will be shown later that the most extreme form of alienation, wherein labour appears in the relation of capital and wage labour, and labour, productive activity appears in relation to its own conditions and its own product, is a necessary point of transition – and therefore already contains in itself, in a still only inverted form, turned on its head, the dissolution of all limited presuppositions of production, and moreover creates and produces the unconditional presuppositions of production, and therewith the full material conditions for the total, universal development of the productive forces of the individual.)
“ecause it presupposes that, despite the doubled force of production, capital continued to operate with the same component parts, to employ the same quantity of necessary labour without spending more for raw material and instrument of labour; † then, therefore, productivity doubles, so that he now needs to spend only 20 thalers on labour, whereas he needed 40 before.”
(investing in lots of fixed capital - me) is only really useful when it acts on great masses, when a single machine can assist the labours of thousands. It is accordingly in the most populous countries where there are most idle men that it is always most abundant.
“It is a law of capital, as we saw, to create surplus labour, disposable time; it can do this only by setting necessary labour in motion – i.e. entering into exchange with the worker. It is its tendency, therefore, to create as much labour as possible; just as it is equally its tendency to reduce necessary labour to a minimum. It is therefore equally a tendency of capital to increase the labouring population, as well as constantly to posit a part of it as surplus population – population which is useless until such time as capital can utilize it. ”
“It is merely to be noted here in order to indicate how later developments are already contained in the general concept of capital. Belongs in the doctrine of the concentration and competition of capitals. – The devaluation being dealt with here is this, that capital has made the transition from the form of money into the form of a commodity, of a product, which has a certain price, which is to be realized. In its money form it existed as value. It now exists as product, and only ideally as price; but not as value as such.”
“The creation by capital of absolute surplus value – more objectified labour – is conditional upon an expansion, specifically a constant expansion, of the sphere of circulation. The surplus value created at one point requires the creation of surplus value at another point, for which it may be exchanged; if only, initially, the production of more gold and silver, more money, so that, if surplus value cannot directly become capital again, it may exist in the form of money as the possibility of new capital.”
On the other side, the production of relative surplus value, i.e. production of surplus value based on the increase and development of the productive forces, requires the production of new consumption; requires that the consuming circle within circulation expands as did the productive circle previously.
“(1) Necessary labour as limit on the exchange value of living labour capacity or of the woes of the industrial population;
(2) Surplus value as limit on surplus labour time; and, in regard to relative surplus labour time, as barrier to the development of the forces of production;
(3) What is the same, the transformation into money, exchange value as such, as limit of production; or exchange founded on value, or value founded on exchange, as limit of production. This is:
(4) again the same as restriction of the production of use values by exchange value; or that real wealth has to take on a specific form distinct from itself, a form not absolutely identical with it, in order to become an object of production at all.”
Oooo listening -- I'm glad he mentioned "experiences" as a thing that's being produced! Super exciting. The reason for inventions of superfluity is the need for expanding consumption! (I mean... there are industries not only doing cruise lines, there are industries built on selling cruise lines!) — Moliere
The tendency to lessen the socially necessary labour time per product decreases the living labour (time) required for its production for sale. When a good is produced for sale, capital "devalues" because it no longer has the money form of value with a distinct amount (investment into commodities), it takes on the form of a commodity which has a certain price. In that regard there is an inversion; in the first step M-C money stands as a potential for commodities which then becomes a commodity, in C-M commodities stand as a potential for money, which then becomes money. Initially M takes the form of an investment, then as a collection of commodity prices, but it must pass through a metamorphosis into a commodity, rather than a representation of a commodity's value. — fdrake
… Apart from the circumstance that the preparation of a larger quantity admits of a more effective division of labour and the employment of superior machinery, there is in this matter that sort of latitude, arising from a quantity of labour and capital lying unemployed, and ready to furnish additional commodities at the same rate. Thus does it happen that a considerable increase of demand often takes place without raising prices.’(73.)>
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