From: Ian Hunt (ian.hunt@FLINDERS.EDU.AU)
Date: Tue Jun 12 2007 - 23:55:43 EDT
I don't think any number of unskilled labour hours can perform the work of a skilled surgeon, but for that reason I don't think that the hours worked by surgeons etc count as expenditures of labour power, defined as the group of skills common to all human labour: surgery is the expenditure of a skill that is not shared across people to a higher or lesser degree. On the other hand, it is arguable that an amateur plumber can do plumbing work but at the cost of a lot of hours finding out the regulations, planning the work, and doing the job slowly (the ratio might perhaps be 8 to 1, so nearly everyone hires a plumber, not to mention those jobs where the work has to be inspected and by regulation must be done by a qualified plumber - so bricklaying might be a better example) >Marx says that commodities are commensurate in the market, but there >is no way to >get behind the market to get a handle on the abstract labor >measures. How many >hours of abstract labor does a surgeon represent. Can 20 or 50 >unskilled labor >perform the same procedure? > -- >Michael Perelman >Economics Department >California State University >Chico, CA 95929 > >Tel. 530-898-5321 >E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu >michaelperelman.wordpress.com -- Associate Professor Ian Hunt, Dept of Philosophy, School of Humanities, Director, Centre for Applied Philosophy, Flinders University of SA, Humanities Building, Bedford Park, SA, 5042, Ph: (08) 8201 2054 Fax: (08) 8201 2784
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