Re: (OPE-L) accumulation and de-accumulation of capital?

From: Paul Zarembka (zarembka@BUFFALO.EDU)
Date: Wed Apr 21 2004 - 21:15:53 EDT 

On Tue, 20 Apr 2004 glevy@PRATT.EDU wrote:

> > Since accumulation of capital must include increasing the number of
> > workers subject to exploitation, penetration of non-capitalist modes of
> > production must be included in moments of accumulation of capital, but I
> > don't know where, in your five moments, you intend to include that.
>
> Hi Paul Z.
>
> First, an abstract, hypothetical question:
> Suppose the wages of productive workers has gone up by 10%
> and there is an increase in v of 10%.  In this case,
> the increase in v would not necessarily cause a increase in
> the quantity of exploited workers.  Supposing also that c
> goes up -- and thus c & v simultaneously rise -- would this
> by your understanding represent an increase in the
> accumulation of capital?

You want to hold c/v, the organic composition of capital, fixed.  But v
increasing confused a distribution question (s/v changing) with a
technological.  Can I answer you using c/(v+s), which avoid the
distributional qustion?

> A more concrete question:  the presumption of the penetration
> of capital into areas of the globe where non-capitalist
> modes of production have dominated is that the quantity of
> wage-laborers exploited by capital will increase.  In recent
> decades, though, the percentage of the population who are
> wage-earners employed by capital in many places in the world
> has _not_ grown.

I believe this is be factually incorrect, but have not organized the
required data.

> Instead, what has grown significantly is the
> percentage of non-wage-earners employed in the petty commodity
> sector (the 'informal sector').  Whether one conceives of this
> group as part of the industrial reserve army or in some
> other way,  if we take your definition of the accumulation of
> capital and _if_ it is true that the quantity of wage-earners
> who are employed by capital and who produce surplus value has
> _not_ grown in recent decades, then has the accumulation of
> capital increased during this time period?  Under what
> circumstances would there be a de-accumulation of capital?

I'll hold on this until we have an understanding on c/(v+s).

Paul z.

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