Re: [OPE] value and measuring labor time

Sorry, misfire -- continuing right along . . .

I took the sentence below you take exception to from reading the passage in the Grundrisse I referred to, penguin 708, v. 29: 94, v. 42: 603-604, where Marx's main point is to insist that the appropriation of disposable time by capital is increasingly contradictory and the contradictions can only be resolved by the mass of workering people taking control over their own disposable time. At that point, he suggests, the measure of wealth is not any longer labor time, but instead disposable time.

h

howard engelskirchen
he31@verizon.net
  ----- Original Message -----
  From: Jurriaan Bendien
  To: Outline on Political Economy mailing list
  Sent: Friday, May 15, 2009 4:30 PM
  Subject: [OPE] value and measuring labor time

  Howard wrote:

  "Surplus labor is disposable time".

  What evidence is there for this idea? At least in Marx's theory, I think this is not true. At the simplest level, the surplus labor is required to sustain:

  (1) the consumption needs of the propertied classes who do not work,
  (2) the reinvestment of capital,
  (3) requirements necessitated by population growth, the security and safety of persons and property, and the formation of reserves.

  Unfortunately few authors have proved able to genuinely theorise the categories of surplus value, surplus product, surplus labor and so on, because these categories were accepted as self-evident.

  Jurriaan

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Received on Sun May 17 08:16:26 2009