jim o'connor: absolute and relative surplus value

[Barbara Laurence]

Has anyone seen any study indicating that temp and part-time employment,
speed-ups and stretch-outs, longer hours, forced overtime and other modes
of extracting absolute surplus value themselves increase or multiply during
or after industrial restructuring of various kinds that aims to lower unit
labor costs.
Straight economists wouldn't even raise the question; bent economists would
raise the question without necessarily being able to answer it, given the
way the statistics are collected. Any firm can extract more surplus value
absolutely, up to a point; it's only the system as a whole (competition,
etc.) that produces surplus value relatively. Yet if one could correlate
data on temp. etc., work with rising labor productivity in one or more firm
or in one industry (which generates more rent, temporarily, until the rent
is competed away by other capitals doing restructuring, such that more
surplus value relatively is produced), one would have at least an
indication. Thanks for any help.
Jim O'Connor