From: Paul C (clyder@GN.APC.ORG)
Date: Mon May 03 2004 - 16:43:58 EDT
michael a. lebowitz wrote Paul C wrote >> I accept your argument that the actual wage is determined >> by conditions of class struggle, but this allows it to be >> raised above what is strictly necessary for reproduction. > > > I think your 'strictly necessary for reproduction' has a hint of a > standard > based upon physiological requirements. Once we treat that standard, > however, as variable, then it can rise with victories of the working > class. > > Physiological requirements are one thing, and certainly provide a lower limit that became evident in Europe during wartime, but in addition one has to include the cost of education and training. That however leaves a huge margin in the level of consumption between what is necessary to reproduce labour and what is actually consumed. What we have in the theory of labour power is part scientific and part ideological. The ideological component comes from Marx's desire to argue that exploitation came about because of rather than despite the exchange of commodities at their equivalent. To do this he had to assert that it was not labour that was purchased but labour power. This was essentially an ideological imperative in arguing with the Proudhonists, since he wanted to say that exploitation was inevitable in any market system with free labourers. The scientific content is the proposition that in an economy with a surplus, whichever basic commodity is used as the standard of value - be it labour, oil, coal, steel etc, will have a value measured in itself of less than 1. If you are producing a surplus then the amount of the numeraire required to produce directly and indirectly one unit of the numeraire will be less than one unit. The intersection of science and ideology occurs when the value of labour power is taken to have a historical and moral element. As soon as you say that, you are deducing the value of labour power from its long term price, not from its conditions of production. At this point the theory becomes scientifically vacous since it no longer makes and predictions. Contrast this with saying that the price of commodities in general will be determined by the labour socially necessary to produce them. The latter is a testable proposition, one totals up the time used and looks at how well it predicts prices. If one says that the value of labour power is determined by morality and history, then one has no procedure to check if the proposition is true. Any long term average wage is then by definition equal to the value of labour power, and the theory is vacuous. The notion of a minimum reproduction cost of labour is not vacuous on the other hand, since it predicts that when the real wage falls below this, the supply of labour power will falter. We know that modern skilled labour can be reproduced in India at a consumption level that is significantly below that in the USA. So the theory would predict that the Indian standard of living, fo say telephone operators, is above the reproduction level. On the other hand, the wage levels for foreign workers in German factories in the early 1940s were probably significantly below reproduction levels - given the high mortality of the workers. So the concept of there being a minimum reproduction cost of labour powerf has some reality. It is questionable whether this minimum reproduction cost is for labour power or labour. The energy consumption of a person goes up whilst working, so the reproduction cost is a function of the work done, contra Marx, who argues that labour power has a value prior to and independent of the amount of labour actually extracted from it. > >> > >> > >It is only a commitment to the working class interest that >> > >inhibits Marxists from admiting this. >> > >> > You mean we are dishonest? >> >> We want to defend the actual real wage from being reduced >> so we say that it is no more than the value of labour power. >> I suspect that it is well above the value of labour power, but >> of course workers are still exploited. > > > Again, I think Marx recognised that the set of necessaries that underlie > the value of labour could rise. As long as productivity rises more > rapidly, > though, the value of labour-power would fall (and the social gulf-- the > rate of exploitation-- would rise). > michael > Michael A. Lebowitz > Professor Emeritus > Economics Department > Simon Fraser University > Burnaby, B.C., Canada V5A 1S6 > > Currently based in Venezuela. Can be reached at > > Residencias Anauco Suites > Departamento 601 > Parque Central, Zona Postal 1010, Oficina 1 > Caracas, Venezuela > (58-212) 573-4111 > fax: (58-212) 573-7724 > >
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed May 05 2004 - 00:00:01 EDT