Isn't "parasitism" the whole point of the "vulgar" labor theory of value, that value is exhaustively constituted by accumulated labor? And isn't the charge of parasitism the real point of value theory, not in a moralistic sense, although also) in an ethical one -- that, as a matter of scientific fact, capitalists qua capitalists contribute nothing essential to the economy, and thus are parasites?And hence they have no claim of right to any property rights to capital or from income deriving from its use?
And at the risk of opening a firestorm about value theory that I really don't want to participate in, I am surprised to hear you, Doug, asking rhetorical questions suggesting an uncritical (or even a critical) acceptance of the notion that it is absurd to suggest that profits might have an origin in something other than something that happens at "the point of production." As the chapters on rent in Capital III show, (not even) Marx himself accepts that idea -- value theory is for him a sort of idealization of a a lot of complicated processes that occur distributed over the whole system of production and reproduction over time. So even on a sensible "orthodox" reading of value theory, it is not the case that for Marx himself or any sensible value theorist, every cent of profit at all times is immediately or even ultimately traceable to some productive act by a wage worker -- merely on average, over time, and systematically, the total quantity of value (an abstract theoretical quantity itself related in rather complex and opaque ways to profit) is proportional to an abstract theoretical property called abstract labor which is socially necessary. This leaves a lot of space to say, as the chapters on rent do, that technological monopolists can make profit by monopolizing technology, at least for a while.
Please note that I am not here indulging in my usual repudiation of the truth, coherence, utility, and intelligibility of value theory. Rather, I am accepting the premises of value theory for the sake of argument and caviling within it about something you say, Doug, using (rather to my surprise -- that is, I am surprised that you use those terms) the premises of value theory itself. Obviously in doing so I am adopting an interpretation that not all modern value theorists share -- but every word in the previous paragraph is a close paraphrase of lots of things Marx himself says many times throughout his critique of political economy in Capital and elsewhere.
--- Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>
> On Dec 10, 2006, at 1:28 PM, Patrick Bond wrote:
>
> > Yes, quite significant ways of deriving profits
> are occurring away
> > from the point of production,
>
> Where do they come from? Thin air? How can the
> system as a whole
> conjure value merely out of exchanging virtual
> titles to wealth? The
> profits of financiers come ultimately from interest
> and fees paid by
> business and consumer debtors, even if there are
> countless steps
> between producers & reciipents.
>
> Many of the examples you cite are of stocks of
> capitalized income
> flows, not the flows themselves. But if those are to
> be converted
> into actual cash, then the cash has to come from
> incomes derived (by
> capital or labor) from the production of goods &
> services. And what
> would all those profits mean if they couldn't be
> converted into
> actual consumer or investment goods?
>
> There's something a little retro and moralizing
> about the prominence
> accorded p.a. in your & Harvey's analyses that wants
> to look away
> from actual production and focus instead on
> "gambling" and "parasitism."
>
> Doug
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