According to Marx, exploitation occurs when the surplus generated by labor is not returned to the laborer but retained by someone else. So it does not matter whether that surplus is retained by a capitalist or "society" or rather its representative - in each case it is 'exploitation.' It can be of course argued that 'society' returns the surplus back in the form of providing public good, but so does the capitalist i.e. by funding extravagant consumption, the arts, or by plain reinvestment.
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So then why did Marx, in the "Critique of the Gotha Program," specifically polemicize against the slogan that "workers are entitled to the full product of their labor"? Why was he at pains to point out that under communism it would still be necessary to deduct a portion of the worker's product for the general maintenance and improvement of society?
Are you also saying it makes no difference whether social surpluses are privately or publicly owned because a corporation reinvesting for a profit is basically the same thing as Medicare or Social Security? Are socialism and capitalism different only in name as well? Bush and Cheyney seem to take a radically different view, as do many Bolivians, some of whom have been killed recently in a fight to prevent the privatization of their utilities. And how about all that silliness called the Russian Revolution and the Cold War, which preoccuppied so many people for so much of the last century? Too bad you weren't around to tell them they were fighting over nothing. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <../attachments/20050412/693789f5/attachment.htm>