Jim Devine wrote:
>Tom wrote:
>>Somewhere in vol. III of Capital (I haven't been able to track down the
>>location), Marx criticized those vulgar political economists who become so
>>enamored of the idea of interest-bearing capital that they even proclaim
>>wages as a form of interest on the labourer's "capital". Gary Becker, eat
>>your heart out.
>
>in the International Publishers' paperback edition of volume III, it's on
>page 465-6. Marx provides quite a relevant critique of those who seen
>labor-power as a kind of "capital" that pays "interest" to its owner (the
>worker). Becker was obsolete before he wrote.
Thanks. The passage reads:
"instead of explaining the expansion of capital on the basis of the
exploitation
of labour-power, the matter is reversed and the productivity of
labour-power is
explained by attributing this mystical quality of interest-bearing capital to
labour-power itself. . . Unfortunately two disagreeably frustrating facts mar
this thoughtless conception. In the first place, the labourer must work in
order
to obtain this interest. In the second place, he cannot transform the
capital-value
of his labour-power into cash by transferring it. . ."
>>The identity of surplus-value and surplus-labour imposes a qualitative
>>limit upon the accumulation of capital. This consists of the *total
>>working-day*, and the prevailing development of the productive forces and
>>of the population, which limits the number of simultaneously exploitable
>>working-days. But if one conceives of surplus-value in the meaningless
>>form of interest, the limit is merely quantitative and defies all fantasy.
>
>I don't get this.
It's from vol. III again. Although the "total working day" may be hard to
quantify, it has qualitative limits, depending upon definite technical,
historical and physiological factors. At some unspecifiable (and malleable)
point, increasing the length of the working day won't do any more good
because it reduces the productivity of labour below the prevailing average.
Similarly, at some unspecifiable point, intensifying the productivity of
labour won't do any good because it will devalorize a greater quantity of
existing capital than it will produce new surplus-value. Fictitious values
allow capital to exceed (on paper) these qualtitative barriers to
accumulation -- for a while, but only for a while.
>I interpret what's been happening in simpler terms. If given a chance,
>bosses will pay workers with promises. If given a chance, they'll break them.
>
>Since the "market for fictitious human capital" isn't as important as the
>stock market for the day-to-day functioning of capitalism, I don't read it
>this way. However, if credentialed workers get enough in the way of broken
>promises, they might unionize or similar. Here in the US, they sue.
I think this gets to the heart of what I'm asking. Is the stock market
_really_ more important for the day-to-day functioning of capitalism or is
it simply so much easier to quantify and index? The vote-o-matic gives us
President Bush and the NASDAQ index shows an 8.5% gain with an hour of
trading left. The vote-o-matic chokes on chad. What does the NASDAQ choke on
-- options? Is the stock market really more important for the day-to-day
functioning of capitalism or has it simply become -- like American elections
-- an icon of capitalism as divinely-guided and spontaneously self-correcting?
Tom Walker
Sandwichman and Deconsultant
Bowen Island, BC
