Roger's point 1. (that living standards are rising) simply contradicts his point 6. and 7. (that workers living standards are below their living standards).
The contradiction that assumes a formal existence in Roger's thinking, is a real contradiction: that between use value and exchange value. Roger finds it difficult to believe that the two can move in opposite directions (when in fact that's a core component of Marx's theory). Consequently he is left with the simply contradictory proposition that incomes are rising and falling at the same time.
He won't get the point (which he thinks mundane, but actually explains his own confusion) that the number of use values available to the worker increase, though the exchangeable value of his labour power falls.
In message <37C31439.96BE0411 at igc.org>, Roger Odisio <rodisio at igc.org>
writes
>
>My point keeps eluding you, Jim.
I'm sorry, I'll try to pay attention.
>I claim the following to be true. (1) The general standard of living
>has been
>rising over time (your pointing out this mundane fact, again, answers
>nothing; it
>only begins the analysis.)
You say mundane, but it was the only point that I was arguing. I did think that it was being denied. But now I see I was mistaken. As to THE analysis, well, it depends what the question is. I should say that I suspect it is quite important that capitalism (or more properly, the hard work of labour) has raised the general standard of living over time. I think Marx says somewhere that the authority of capital rests finally on this, its ability to reproduce society on however basic a level.
Moreover, the failure to understand this point, that Marx's concept of the wage has more than one dimension, effectively defeated an entire generation of Marxist theoreticians. In the 1930s such as Strachey and Varga advanced arguments that the standard of living would fall, on the basis of the 'immiseration' thesis. When living standards rose, they were confused, and tried to amend the theory in artificial ways (expanded aristocracy of labour theory) or just dumped Marxism altogether for having failed them. In fact they had only been failed by a Stalinist dogma of immiseration that Marx never held to.
> (2) Productivity increases cheapen the
>elements of
>labor's subsistence consumption basket.
Yes, indeed, but then I think I was the first to make that point on this thread.
>(3) Despite this cheapening,
>the
>reproduction cost of labor (its social subsistence) has also been rising
>over time,
>in part to reflect the rising living standards you cite (they're some of
>the social
>part of the social subsistence).
Again, I thought I had already said that.
> (4) Wages are determined separately
>from the
>determination of v--capitalists neither know or care much about what
>labor's social
>subsistence is.
Not absolutely separately. The value of labour power is not fixed arbitrarily but has a specific value at a given point in time. Being, therefore, relatively fixed the sum of variable capital divided by the value of labour power gives the number of labourers; the number of labourers times the rate of surplus value gives the mass of surplus value.
On an empirical level the point was reached in Britain a few years ago, where the government had held down nurses pay to the point where they had a recruitment collapse. Newly qualified nurses emigrated (many to America) leaving the Health Service under-resourced. To deal with the problem the government had to introduce a pay review that upped the wage, even though the health service unions had been so thoroughly defeated in the previous attack on public sector pay that they put no noticeable pressure on the NHS.
> (5) What jobs and hours of works are available is also
>determined
>in the labor market bargain, and together with wages they determine
>labor's
>disposable income available to buy its subsistence.
That's true, but given that the number of industrial workers in the world has increased from 247 million in 1960 to 381 million in 1990, in the round, it is not really the case that labour has been pushed out of work (though in local contexts and specific periods that is often the case).
>(6) It is therefore
>possible
>for the change in labor's disposable income to lag changes in its social
>subsistence consumption basket, resulting in immiseration--labor is able
>to buy
>less of its subsistence.
I'm sorry , I don't think this makes sense. Labour's income is its social subsistence consumption basket.
> (7) In the last 25 years, that's what has
>happened in the
>US for some periods and for some workers (individual wages being tied to
>neither
>the value of labor power, nor some measure of labor productivity).
Some individual wages might have fallen below what is necessary to reproduce an average worker (that's averages for you). But if that had happened overall, then the working class would not be able to reproduce itself. But as we have seen, the working class, black and white alike have improved their life expectancy, and continue to reproduce, leading to something of a population explosion. Far from being curtailed, the historical-moral dimension of the value of labour power seems to be extended, with people spending many more years in education than previously, and having considerably enlarged cultural lives. -- Jim heartfield