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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Charles Brown wrote:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>"---in
capitalism, the human labor power commodity has a unique<BR>characteristic that
no other commodity has. It is the only source of new<BR>value ( exchange-value
!). The labor-power commodity can add more<BR>exchange-value in producing
commodities than the value of the commodities<BR>that went into reproducing
it.<BR><BR>A women's liberationist might point out that there is no magic about
this,<BR>although there is some Mrs.tery. The labor power is produced by the
domestic<BR>labor power give in the home. "Domestic" or reproductive labor is
the only<BR>source of the only source of new value. This logic is the basis of a
unified<BR>Marxist and feminist theory of production and
reproduction."</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman"
size=3>xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><BR>Thanks for reminding us of the central role played by labor
in capitalist reality on both the commercial and domestic fronts (merging
the two is first rate). And this, on a Xmas eve when, I don't
know, you may be trying to escape the commercialism and fantasy that
I've tried hard to avoid since my liberation from childhood. You
cast my attention back to the fundamentals, which have become obscured by
all manner of other (often related) factors, by both the right and left.
Like many others, I did the Das Kapital study group scene in the early 70s
(never became proficient) where the labor theory of value stood forth
strongly. Then it lost favor for various reasons which I'd love to think
of as conspiratorial (but that's complicated by legal definition: 'persons
colluding to commit a crime'). Maybe "orchestrated attempt" (
Rep. John Conyers' description of the Ohio election irregularities) would fit
here. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Relevant to this topic, last Sunday I was part of a seminar that
featured a wise and seasoned scholar/activist from Chicago expounding
on the facts of production job loss as a result of new technology. His
case was strong that there's no turning back from these trends that
will continue to immiserate the world's working classes. Workers
in production are becoming history. Detroit illustrates this
well. But he frustrated me with a curious illustration from the
Labor Party's founding convention (Cleveland, 1996) that we had both
attended. He somewhat cynically called attention to the line from
"Solidarity" that the delegates sang with raised fists: "Without our
brains and muscles not a single wheel would turn." His point
certainly was that computers and robots make production workers
redundant.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I felt obliged to remind our speaker that there's still a paid or unpaid
labor force of some 130 million (plus or minus), including many in
that evolving category called by some the 'service
sector,' mostly low paid and transitory. They have to earn some
kind of living. And they make modern wheels turn. Wheels
in computers and robots MUST turn as designed and maintained by technology
workers. The turning wheels of truck drivers and service personnel
are essential for 'just in time' production, meeting Wal Mart
schedules, and servicing the needs of some 80 million households, eight
million businesses, and untold thousands of public and private service
agencies. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Within these centers of production, service, and reproduction,
workers also make different, more abstract, wheels
turn. Such wheels must keep turning if society as we know it is
to be maintained. Management and organization (of commercial or domestic
operations) is an essential wheel that turns well or poorly depending
on the nature of human participation. The wheel of human
services (essential needs) - as expressed in education, health,
infrastructure, and domestic reproduction - turns in proportion to the skills
and ideology of the workers. More openly commercial
services (auto, insurance, leisure, sales, housing, fast
food, etc), require compliant workers who turn wheels that affect
the bottom line. Without the cooperation of such workers helping make
the wheels turn, the system would grind down to a resounding halt, at
any level of the workers' situations above.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Mental and physical labor is required for all the above
activities. Such labor creates value. Though it seems like a
simple proposition to me, too often it is obscured, forgotten, or swept under
the rug. The workers themselves become lost in the shuffle. The
logic of their potential collective power is put adrift by those on the right
who deplore worker agency. Unfortunately, too many on the progressive
left buy into such logic, perhaps by default or some kind of
burnout. Thus, organized labor continues downhill, the
unorganized don't get organized, and collective
worker power erodes or doesn't get off the ground. What a great
loss and insult to the working class that those who make the wheels turn
and create the value have so little say in how that value is used.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>But a new year is approaching and I'm encouraged by the potential
of further forms of workplace organizing joined to
community-neighborhood organizing. Since the commodity of human labor
power is generated both on the job and at home, as Charles is saying,
what a splendid opportunity to try to find organizing devices that bring
these seemingly divergent sectors together politically. Jobs with Justice
and southern-based Black Workers for Justice illustrate evolving efforts at
this. I'm heartened by quivers of energy being expressed by the Labor
Party. Newer groups like U. S. Labor Against the War and the Million
Worker March committees being seeded across the country give me new year
hope. Community survival groups should become more aroused as their
constituencies continue dropping to the bottom, without jobs or a living
wage. It makes sense to expect the raising of class and
political consciousness of significant numbers of those making the wheels turn
and creating value, but getting increasingly less of the benefits from that
value. It would help a lot if those of us who purport to understand these
things (and are pissed off) would put forth more mental and physical effort
to helping turn the class struggle wheel.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Bob</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
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