Re: [OPE] markets and socialism

diego.guerrero1@telefonica.net

1) I agree with your words: "If enterprise A acquires machines from
enterprise B, it is going to a) do it on its own initiative, b) pay for the
machines with its own bank account, c) own the machines when they arrive.
How is this different from money acting as a medium of exchange in the
classic way?"

D: If you "pay" everibody the same quantity, you are breaking the entire law
of value because the labour force, the main commodity, ceases to be a
commodity. That's essential! Therefore money ceases to be value and becomes
a simple means of account. In the USSR the labour force WAS a commodity: it
doesn't matter whether the range of wages is 1:3 or 1:30. In order to really
change the things, it's necessary that everybody is and feels EQUAL to all
others. Once arrived at that point --and don't forget that I am speaking in
the paper of a communist society, not a transitional society--, it is not so
difficult to overcome the usual way of thinking that, when faced to both
plan and firms, one should identify the former with socialism and the latter
with capitalism. NO! In a communist society, both firms and planners will be
EQUALLY DEMOCRATIC or, if not, it will be firms the most democratic of both
(since it is easier for one person among 1000 people to see what the other
999 are doing that for one amongst 50 millions).

2) You: "If demand was such that price for say bread was higher than the
costs of a particular bakery, that bakery would register a profit. This
profit, once banked, would be money capital."

D: No, it would be a liquid surplus that the firm could invest, indeed, but
the planners are who will decide the maximum rate of growth (of investment
and output) in every sector. And since this system is different from the
Jugoslavian regime, in that the growth of the overall labour force will also
be regulated and all the firms will have to take charge of a part of it, in
a partially planned way, and thereforee there will be no unemployment, one
can say that this amounts only to setting up a kind of fiscal system (a
burden) for firms. No one would object that taxes (differential rates for
different sectors) are eliminating the market in a real capitalist society;
likewise, these "taxes in kind" (labour force) wouldn't be an obstacle to
efficiency in a communist society. It would be something like budget
surpluses and deficits at the social level (rather than at the state level).

3) You: "Is this not what the law of value in a capitalist economy tends to
do anyway, it is only politically imposed immigration controls that impede
it?"

D: No, just the opposite! Capitalism tends to allocate the means of
production in such a way that they can face actual demand like it is now.
That's why it doesn't produce medicines in Africa but instead it does
produce hotels for dogs in USA or EU. What I say is to take the plant
producing hotels for dogs in USA (or whatever) up to now and bring it to
Africa in order for it to begin producing medicines for African people. And
also to send people to Africa to operate those plants, and to form engineers
there for those plants, etc. And to send Africans to USA and the EU to learn
everything an so on...

By the way, why to use "values" as the regulators of final prices in the XXI
century socialism, as in your system, and not "production prices"? I
criticize Dieterich in my paper because he seems to think that (labour)
values are "good" -a socialist thing- and prices are "bad" (capitalists).
This seems to me clearly wrong since prices are also (labor) prices, aren't
they?

Cheers,
Diego

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Paul Cockshott" <wpc@dcs.gla.ac.uk>
To: "Outline on Political Economy mailing list" <ope@lists.csuchico.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2008 2:29 PM
Subject: Re: [OPE] markets and socialism

> Diego
> We shouldn't be impressed by the apparent differences betwen ordinary
> (capitalist) money and money of account. The crux of the matter is
> whether money is inserted in a society where the law of value is still
> governing the economy or instead use value has been enforced by a
> conscious population that aims to finish exploitation and inequalities
> at the world level.
>
> That is in part a reasonable response, and corresponds broadly to the
> orthodox Soviet account
> of the role of money in the USSR. There however, the plan regulated the
> allocation of use values.
> This gave some plausibility to the Soviet argument.
>
> In your proposal as I understand it, allocation of use values is not to
> be planned.
>
> If enterprise A acquires machines from enterprise B, it is going to
>
> a) do it on its own initiative
> b) pay for the machines with its own bank account
> c) own the machines when they arrive
>
> How is this different from money acting as a medium of exchange in the
> classic
> way?
>
> For my part I sympathise with the criticisms  Che made of the USSR, which
> have recently been circulated on OPE-L, namely that it made too much use
> of monetary categories. Your proposal seems to be more in line
> with the Jugoslavian approach, which made even more use of
> monetary and commodity relations.
>
> Your proposal to charge all labour power at the same price would
> certainly tend to even out disparities in the working population, but
> the enterprises would still, as abstract legal entities, constitute
> capitals. If demand was such that price for say bread was higher
> than the costs of a particular bakery, that bakery would register
> a profit. This profit, once banked, would be money capital.
>
> Diego
> -----
> The second necessity is to plan demographic growth and localization of
> labour force and means of production at a world level. This means using
> use values again, and this is used again AGAINST the law of value. The
> demographic growth at a rate of 4% or whatever else is a matter of
> secondary importance. The point is the necessity to move masses of
> people from one point to another: specialists and qualified workers
> towards where they are most needed, simple work force to other places,
> masses of specific means of production... In my opinion, there has to be
> a massive net transfer of population from underdeveloped countries to
> developed countries, and the opposite direction is required for means of
> production.
>
> Paul
> -----
> Is this not what the law of value in a capitalist economy tends to do
> anyway, it is only politically imposed immigration controls that impede
> it.
>
>
>
>
>

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