[OPE-L:3932] Re: negative surplus-value

Gerald Lev (glevy@pratt.edu)
Sun, 5 Jan 1997 16:46:10 -0800 (PST)

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Paul C wrote in [OPE-L:3931]:

> For instance in 1976 the ratio p/(c+v) for the uk economy was -1.2% after
> taking stock appreciation into account. If one counted the wages of
> unproductive
> workers as part of surplus value, then s/(c+v) was 15.9%, still positive. But
> the classes of wage labourers and salarians taken as a whole were
> consuming more
> than they produced in value terms.

Since the wages of unproductive workers are paid out of s, this is
evidence that surplus-value is positive.

In a similar vein, consider the section of _TSV_ alluded to by Eduardo
the other day in #3920. Marx, in discussing a table [E] where s = 0, but
the rent in pounds varies from 0 to 87 1/2 writes: "If there is no
surplus-value, how can rent exist? Moreover the productivity of land on
the types of land Ib, I, II and III has not altered at all. The
*non-existence* of surplus-value must therefore be sheer illusion" (TSV:
II, p. 451, Progress ed.).

In solidarity, Jerry