Marxism and the workers

Economics Economics Questions
21

No, the conclusion that you are having money witheld from you depends on the Marxian model where you are “producing the product” and the capitalistist is charging you to use his factory. But this model was refuted by marginal economics, and with it goes that conclusion. Workers are not the ones who “produce the product”, the capitalist is. He pays them a market wage to perform a service for him. Wages are not determined by what the capitalist produces.

Its really kind of obvious, just think about iron instead of workers. The iron that goes into a car might say “The car is really made of me, so I should get the money it is sold for. Iron only gets 75% of what the car sells for, the capitalist is witholding money from me!”. But we know that iron has to be bought at a market price becaus people who build cars have to compete with people who build bridges or bikes. What the car sells for does not concern the price of iron. Its the same with workers.

The funny thing is, prctically everyone agrees about marginal utility in theory. But for some reason it goes out the window as soon as we are talking about wages.

22

No. The capitalist pays the worker a given amount for the latter’s labor. Whether that labor is used to provide a service or manufacture products is irrelevant. Whether people are willing to pay the capitalist more for the service or products is also irrelevant. If the worker thinks he can and should be paid more, he’s free to not work or stop working for the capitalist.

23

According to this metric the US Constitution is a voluntary contract because you can go live somewhere else.

24

How in the world did you come to that conclusion?

25

No. The Constitution monopolizes a plot of land that would be “free for all humans” otherwise. Factories are monopolized by their owners because they created them. They would not exist without them. (Also, nothing short of violence could change the owner of the US, a factory is easily sold if you offer more than it is worth.)

I know socialists don’t believe that, because they treat capital as simply falling from the sky at random intervals. Marxist theory starts its analysis in the middle, with capital already formed, therefore the capitalist is merely some lucky guy who happens to occupy a factory that just as well could be owned by the workerz. But in the real world capital accumulation does require calculation, which can’t happen without entrepreneurs and private ownership. The utter lack of car factories in every place on earth except a few propertarian ones should attest to that.

26

Marxism is the only internally consistent socialist framework and, for quite some time at least, it corresponded fairly well to the empirical facts. Nevertheless, the world today looks very different from the one that is predicted by Marx’s framework, and for good reason. The central premise of Marxism, namely that labor magically creates value during the process of production, is incorrect (and therefore all of the conclusions derived from this premise are incorrect).

First, the laborer gets paid the full net present value of his/her productive contributions to the temporal process of production. It is not the case that laborers instantaneously transform initial inputs into final outputs. They (along with other fops) manage to do this over time. If labor was the only input, and if the fruits of labor came to fruition instantly, then you would be correct (all factors of production are co-dependent; labor actually produces nothing on its own).

Next, the capitalists provide the workers with productive capital goods which increase their productivity. The laborer is free to save and create his own capital goods, but this is extremely inefficient and takes a torrential amount of time. Additionally, the capitalist’s endeavor is inherently risky. He only gets paid once the production process is completed. In fact, if his investment is not successful, he doesn’t get paid at all. The laborer, on the other hand, receives his payments no matter what until the contract is terminated (by either side). In other words, the laborer gets paid whether the investment is profitable (successful) or not.

For all these reasons, you are incorrect.

28

No. The Constitution monopolizes a plot of land that would be “free for all humans” otherwise.

Yep. Property does the same thing. Are you going to assume a right to property in order to prove a right to property?

Factories are monopolized by their owners because they created them.

They’re superhumans who build the factories themselves? Source plz

Regardless, countries are monopolized because their government created them, and assumes the risk of invasion in doing so.

They would not exist without them.

That’s absurd.

(Also, nothing short of violence could change the owner of the US, a factory is easily sold if you offer more than it is worth.)

Nothing short of violence can insure a right to property in the first place, so I don’t see what the big deal is. It’s not as if all violence is all bad all the time.

I know socialists don’t believe that, because they treat capital as simply falling from the sky at random intervals.

trololol

. But in the real world capital accumulation does require calculation, which can’t happen without entrepreneurs and private ownership.

There’s a caveat here… if we are defining capital as “legal ownership over the means of production” then yes, this requires the ownership principle. If we’re just defining capital as the means of production themselves… nothing requires that the possessors and controllers over it be granted legal monopoly status upon it.

The utter lack of car factories in every place on earth except a few propertarian ones should attest to that.

First; “factories” are as old as dirt, and as culturally diverse too. But if we’re talking about modern factories… yes, mechinization requires a certain amount of technical progress. Capitalism truly provides this progress better than all the world’s previous systems combined. Yet there is nothing inherent to the mechanization process that requires ownership, merely what is required is legitimized control; which could be provided in a socialist system (if we’re assuming Communism does not equal “the gubment runs everything”)

29

Now wait a second. No one that I’ve heard of actually is against property. Even the staunchest left-anarchists believe in property - communal. So the question is not whether property is moral, but who should get to exclude others. We propose that homesteading and trade should determine exclusion rights, left-anarchists disagree (some just want a lower abandonment time, like mutualists, while an-syns want (I think) communes controlling the property, regardless of who first put it to use or created the capital).

30

“By “value” I mean how much money a certain item will bring.”

Well then you have a different definition of value to Marx. From the very first page of the first volume of Capital:

…The utility of a thing makes it a use value.[4] But this utility is not a thing of air. Being limited by the physical properties of the commodity, it has no existence apart from that commodity. A commodity, such as iron, corn, or a diamond, is therefore, so far as it is a material thing, a use value, something useful. This property of a commodity is independent of the amount of labour required to appropriate its useful qualities. "

…Exchange value, at first sight, presents itself as a quantitative relation, as the proportion in which values in use of one sort are exchanged for those of another sort,[6] a relation constantly changing with time and place. ...exchange value, generally, is only the mode of expression, the phenomenal form, of something contained in it, yet distinguishable from it."

…Some people might think that if the value of a commodity is determined by the quantity of labour spent on it, the more idle and unskilful the labourer, the more valuable would his commodity be, because more time would be required in its production. The labour, however, that forms the substance of value, is homogeneous human labour, expenditure of one uniform labour power. The total labour power of society, which is embodied in the sum total of the values of all commodities produced by that society, counts here as one homogeneous mass of human labour power, composed though it be of innumerable individual units. Each of these units is the same as any other, so far as it has the character of the average labour power of society, and takes effect as such; that is, so far as it requires for producing a commodity, no more time than is needed on an average, no more than is socially necessary.

… The labour time socially necessary is that required to produce an article under the normal conditions of production, and with the average degree of skill and intensity prevalent at the time. The introduction of power-looms into England probably reduced by one-half the labour required to weave a given quantity of yarn into cloth. The hand-loom weavers, as a matter of fact, continued to require the same time as before; but for all that, the product of one hour of their labour represented after the change only half an hour’s social labour, and consequently fell to one-half its former value."

… We see then that that which determines the magnitude of the value of any article is the amount of labour socially necessary, or the labour time socially necessary for its production."

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/

So Marx differentiates between 3 different types of value: ‘use-value’ (a subjective thing that is dependent on the evaluation of the user), ‘exchange-value’ (the same as what we would call price), and ‘value’ (the amount of ‘socially-necessary’ labour-time required to re-produce that commodity). It is also worth nothing that Marx distinguishes between ‘concrete’ labour, ‘abstract’ labour, ‘complex’ labour, and ‘simple’ labour.

It is perfectly valid and fine to call Marx’s LTV bunk, but at least read the book to know what it is he says.

31

Property is inherent to people. Most, if not all, animals behave this way too (e.g. nests, dams, territory in general). Many of us here claim that first use (i.e. homesteading) is the best initial claim to any specific piece of property. After that, it’s up to the owner. The concept of property is not circular. The “rights” regarding the use of property are not circular.

32

Property is inherent to people.

Nobody is born with a hammer in their hand… but what you are really talking about is possession and control, not the specific legal status of property.

Most, if not all, animals behave this way too (e.g. nests, dams, territory in general).

I’m not sure hornets have court systems…

Many of us here claim that first use (i.e. homesteading) is the best initial claim to any specific piece of property.

Then all property in the world is illegitimate. Show me a plot of land which can be traced through legitimate sale from its original homesteaders to now, without some kind of theft or appropration along the way.

33

Then all property in the world is illegitimate. Show me a plot of land which can be traced through legitimate sale from its original homesteaders to now, without some kind of theft or appropration along the way.

Quite possibly. Good thing most of the affected parties are gone, or there would be a large mess. After the parties in conflict are gone, the property is up for homesteading again.

34

The comparison of human beings to pieces of iron is completely absurd. It’s this kind of crap that gives libertarians a bad name.

35

Laotzu, you chose to omit the most important sentence in my post. I suspect because it is the one you don’t really have an answer to.

The truth of the matter is that all of socialist theory completely disregards the need for coordination. Factories do not simply appear in the countryside at regular intervals, to build them we need prices to tell us when it will be feasible to expend which resources to build what factories. And for prices we need private property. This is evidenced by the fact that any country on earth that did not manage to get secure private property rights going does not have factories that the workers could be exploited in. E.g. most of Africa. The formation of capital requires coordination. That’s why all experiments in history that came close to implementing your “real” socialism pretty quickly led to starvation and some strongmen taking over. At least when the gubment runs things there’s some coordination.

Marx avoided this by starting his analysis in the middle, with capital already in place. Sure, at that point you can claim that the capitalists are taking something from the workers that they would have had either way. But monopolization is necessary for factories to exist in the first place. That’s why their monopolization by capitalists is different than the monopolization of land by a nation state. It monopolizes a recourse that humanity could have used anyways.

36

Thus?

Not quite. Possession and control are certainly inherent to people and other animals, but the concept of what belongs to whom is also inherent to people. Infants seem to think that everything is theirs, but as they grow older they understand that other people have claims to property too.

I’m not sure they do either, though they certainly have a hierarchy of power. What’s your point?

This is incorrect for two reasons. The first, as Wheylous pointed out, is that property can be abandoned, thus making it possible to homestead it. The second is that property can be traded.

37

Laotzu, how many times do you need your sorry behind carried out in a stretcher in this same debate over and over again before you actually learn something? Or is your motivation more of the masochistic sort?

38

Laotzu, you chose to omit the most important sentence in my post. I suspect because it is the one you don’t really have an answer to.

I chose to omit because it’s meaningless trolling, and what I found to be the least important part of your post.

The truth of the matter is that all of socialist theory completely disregards the need for coordination.

I’m sure it does. Ya, those central control addicts really don’t care about coordination, right?

Factories do not simply appear in the countryside at regular intervals, to build them we need prices to tell us when it will be feasible to expend which resources to build what factories.

Do we? So what you’re proposing, if we were to postdict history, is that money and price came before any technical progress? Or is this just for factory systems?

And for prices we need private property.

True.

This is evidenced by the fact that any country on earth that did not manage to get secure private property rights going does not have factories that the workers could be exploited in. E.g. most of Africa.

Ya, let us all forget about those factories in China and the USSR… or all the factories and mines in Africa for that matter. Yup, factories are older than capitalist property rights, but require capitalist property rights…

The formation of capital requires coordination.

Yup

That’s why all experiments in history that came close to implementing your “real” socialism pretty quickly led to starvation and some strongmen taking over. At least when the gubment runs things there’s some coordination.

What expirments would that be?

Marx avoided this by starting his analysis in the middle, with capital already in place.

True or false; Marxist economics (as opposed to Marx’s political activism) has anything to do with socialism?

Sure, at that point you can claim that the capitalists are taking something from the workers that they would have had either way. But monopolization is necessary for factories to exist in the first place.

Only elite and intelligent ubermensche could ever think of coming together to build things?

That’s why their monopolization by capitalists is different than the monopolization of land by a nation state. It monopolizes a recourse that humanity could have used anyways.

It meaning property, or statism?

Not quite. Possession and control are certainly inherent to people and other animals, but the concept of what belongs to whom is also inherent to people. Infants seem to think that everything is theirs, but as they grow older they understand that other people have claims to property too.

Exactly; infants think everything belongs to them. So the community (namely in this case, their parents) comes together and stifles his individual rights. Oh the terror! He’s just homesteading things that were abandoned, like other kid’s toys.

People make claims to possession and control (“regular” people just as much as theifs) and the community or state decides who’s claim is legitimate. In feudalism it was basically whoever had the deepest bloodline and/or benefitted the king the most. In capitalism it is basically whoever has the most wealth, or benefits the production of wealth the most. I.E. banks lend money to profitable businesses, not homeless shelters.

I’m not sure they do either, though they certainly have a hierarchy of power

I’m not sure they do.

What’s your point?

That private property is not simply possession and control, as a theif holds the same status, is my point. Private property is a specific type of legal title.

This is incorrect for two reasons. The first, as Wheylous pointed out, is that property can be abandoned, thus making it possible to homestead it. The second is that property can be traded.

Ok. Now show me one small tract of habitable land that can be traced from its original homesteaders to its current owner through abandonement or trade, without any kind of violent appropriation. You can’t. There is no metaphysical justification for property. It basically goes; for thousands of years people just claimed property regardless, and if you had more swords at your hire, your claim was just. Then the merchant and capitalist class gained the economic power to threaten the pre-capitalist (feudal if you will) class dynamic, and became the ruling class. Now we search for any reason we can to justify a concept which basically started with “this is mine now. I’ll hit you with a stick if you disagree.”

39

Maybe if you were Filc or Esuric this would carry some weight. I’ve actually been trounced by them, and learned things.

I can tell you this tho; “I won a debate therefore my position is true” is highly illogical.

40

Except it isn’t, because I never signed the US Constitution. The few men who signed it presumed to speak on behalf of everyone in the United States, both living and yet to be born. That’s fallacious in the extreme, if you ask me.

What you’re talking about is akin to me living next to a factory and being dragged out by the factory owner’s goons one morning to work there. When I protest and ask what the meaning of this is, the factory owner tells me that he put up a sign that says, “Everyone within five miles of this factory must come to work at it from 8 AM until 8 PM every day.” Then he says that, by not moving outside of that five-mile radius, I’ve therefore agreed to the terms he provided. If I don’t agree to the terms, then I must move more than five miles away.