Or, maybe what economists really mean (although they don't know it) is
literally an increase in the rate of surplus value. See Marc Linder's "From
Surplus Value to Unit Labor Costs: The Bourgeoisification of a Communist
Conspiracy" in his _Labor Statistics and Class Struggle_.
Linder tells the tale of the peregrination of an American Federation of
Labor resolution to link wage increases to productivity gains to a Marxist
statistical analysis (by Juergen Kuczynski in the 1920s) in support of that
resolution to a business argument that wages must not exceed productivity
gains to a status quo policy regime that productivity gains must precede and
exceed even nominal wage increases.
Jim Devine wrote,
>[COMMENT: I've decided that in common parlance, even among economists (who
>should know better), "productivity" is usually mixed up with
>"profitability." So when the economists say they want increased
>productivity, they mean they want businesses' bottom lines to be doing
>better. This confusion arises in two main ways (besides the
>muddle-headedness of orthodox economics). First, rising labor productivity
>growth rates do NOT prevent inflation if workers get nominal wage gains in
>step with labor productivity. Economists assume -- and hope -- that wages
>won't do so, i.e., that profitability will rise. Also, note that increases
>in productivity growth can hurt recovery: if wages fall behind
>productivity, that hurts consumer spending (all else equal) relative to
>output. If fixed investment is stalled (along with other sources of
>aggregate demand), that hurts aggregate demand. If profitability rises,
>it's possible that fixed investment could get out of its stall.
>
>[Second, economists talk about the disgustingly crude concept of "total
>factor productivity" (output divided by the weighted sum of capital
>"services" and labor services). Not only are the components of the
>denominator almost impossible to measure, but they are weighted according
>to what they are paid in the national income & product accounts (assuming
>that "capital" and "labor" are paid according to their contribution!)
>What's left -- "the residual" -- is mostly profits. So when "total factor
>productivity" goes up, so does the profit rate.]
>
>
Tom Walker
Bowen Island, BC
604 947 2213
