Reply to Loren Goldner's "The Remaking of the American Working Class"
Introduction
On basic concepts
$B!H (JMarx "discovers", in an immanent fashion, through "value as a
condensation of the necessary time of production", the reproduction of human
creative powers $B!I (J
This is false. $B!H (J the value of a commodity represents human labour in the
abstract, the expenditure of human labour in general. $B!I (J(Capital)
and $B!H (JHuman labour-power in motion, or human labour, creates value, but is
not itself value. It becomes value only in its congealed state, when
embodied in the form of some object $B!G (J(Capital)
Loren confuses source of value with value. Human labor is source of value
,but not itself value. This is the reason why analysis of value is begun by
analysis of commodity, not labor process.
Loren says
$B!H (JThe proletariat, which is the commodity form of labor power, which is the
"underside" of the capital relationship $B!I (J
This is false. proletariat has labor power, but he is not the commodity.
$B!H (Jlabour-power can appear upon the market as a commodity, only if, and so
far as, its possessor, the individual whose labour-power it is, offers it
for sale, or sells it, as a commodity. In order that he may be able to do
this, he must have it at his disposal, must be the untrammelled owner of his
capacity for labour, i.e., of his person. [2] He and the owner of money meet
in the market, and deal with each other as on the basis of equal rights,
with this difference alone, that one is buyer, the other seller; both,
therefore, equal in the eyes of the law. The continuance of this relation
demands that the owner of the labour-power should sell it only for a
definite period, for if he were to sell it rump and stump, once for all, he
would be selling himself, converting himself from a free man into a slave,
from an owner of a commodity into a commodity. $B!I (J(Capital)
Loren says
$B!H (JA value for Marx is something that contributes to the process of
valorization. We have already said that value is a relationship , an
inverted relationship of labor power to itself. Thus something has value
which contributes directly or indirectly to the expansion of labor power $B!I (J
This confusion of value with source of value is already pointed out, thus
Loren himself becomes one of Ricardians.
Loren says
$B!H (JValorization is also, as we shall see momentarily, inseparably
valorization of money-capital $B!I (J
What? Where is valorizaiton? For valorization of money-capital,
It is needed to assume valorization in industry and commercial capital. And
to argue money-capital, it is needed to assume to complete to analyze money,
commodity, and social capitals. because $B!H (JMoney -- here taken as the
independent expression of a certain amount of value existing either actually
as money or as commodities -- may be converted into capital on the basis of
capitalist production, and may thereby be transformed from a given value to
a self-expanding, or increasing, value. It produces profit, i.e. , it
enables the capitalist to extract a certain quantity of unpaid labour,
surplus-product and surplus-value from the labourers, and to appropriate it.
In this way, aside from its use-value as money, it acquires an additional
use-value, namely that of serving as capital. $B!I (J (Capital)
It is important to point out that Loren ignores analysis of commodity, but
to understand money-capital, we assume to complete analysis of commodity,
because money-capital assumes $B!H (Jan additional use-value $B!I (J i.e. one side of
commodity.
Cont'd
MIYACHI TATSUO
