Jon writes:
Perhaps Amin and Emmanuel are not concerned with this. But James Becker, the author of "Marxian Political Economy", writes of an "unequal exchange" between skilled and unskilled labor in the core countries. Apparently he is following Marx in saying that the prices of labor, like the prices of all outputs with varying c/v ratios, tend to disproportionality (with regards to values). It is clear how capitalists must sell output above or below it value in order for profit rates to become equalized. Workers sell labor power, but for them there are no profit rates to equalize. Yet Becker states that a competitive economy will tear the prices of labor power away from "values". How does this work? How is it that prices of labor or different grades veer away from costs?
There are several reasons that wage ratios might diverge from the corresponding value of labor power (VLP) ratios. One set of reasons is consistent with the operation of perfectly competitive labor markets, while the other presupposes some systematic departure from perfectly competitive labor market conditions. Perfectly competitive case: first, suppose that the production of skills is itself a capitalist process (as, for example, with firms that offer training courses), complete with labor and constant capital inputs and (equalized) profit rates. Then wage ratios for different types of skilled labor can diverge from their VLP ratios for the same reason that other commodity prices and values are disproportional. Second, suppose that there are "compensating wage differentials" for unequal job risks or unpleasantness (noting that the evidence for such differentials is mixed). Then since these differences are driven by "psychic" rather than "production cost" considerations, wage and VLP ratios will diverge in general. Alternatively, suppose that certain types of labor are absolutely scarce (due, say, to unusual abilities--see e.g. Robert Frank's discussion of "winner-take-all" labor markets) in otherwise competitive markets (this is a case of "pure" rather than "perfect" competition) or, else somehow monopolized (e.g.,on the basis of unionization). In either case some workers will earn the equivalent of economic rents, and then wage and VLP ratios will again diverge in general.
(Also, does anyone know where exactly Marx discusses wages vis a vis OCC and the equalization of profit rates)
In the sense that specifically concerns you here, nowhere (in Capital, at least). Marx considers the consequences of profit rate equalization in Vol III, Part II, but only treats *general* wage variations in that section. By the way, once you allow the possibility of heterogeneous labor, the whole idea of "unequal exchange" becomes rather dicey. First comes the question of how you aggregate different types of labor to get labor values; but second, even supposing you figure out a coherent way to do this, the consistent connections that obtain between class and exploitation status given homogeneous labor don't obtain in general. For what it's worth, Gil
