[lbo-talk] Unproductive labor

Tahir Wood twood at uwc.ac.za
Tue Feb 12 23:49:25 PST 2008



> --- Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>>
>> Minor point: it's not about the production of a
>> physical object -
>> services can be "productive" in this view. The
>> transportation of
>> vehicular components can be productive. The
>> transportation of people
>> to visit grandma isn't.
>>
>
> [WS:] But what the operational criteria to
> distinuguish between productive and unproductive
> services? Is transporting people TO work productive?
> How about transporting them FROM work?

Don't ask me. I think the whole distinction is a waste of time.

As I recall, Shaikh & Tonak develop the distinction in their book on translating the national income accounts into Marxese.

There's something wrong here, at least from a position that is critical of capitalism. Yes, you can criticise the way the distinction has been made: For example those feminists who criticise Marx on the grounds that he failed to take into account reproductive labour as being productive have a point. Housework, child rearing, etc. all help to reproduce the labour force and therefore contribute to the value chain. But to say that there is no meaningful distinction has some pretty weird implications for non-capitalists. It means, for example, that a fortune teller's one hour of labour is equally productive to that of an engineer or a bicklayer or a train driver. Yes I do think that trapnsporting workers to and from work is productive; I don't think that selling insurance is ultimately productive. The fact that we need insurance if we own property is a fact that makes sense only from the point of view of private property. One could make similar points about credit, etc. Of course if you think that capitalism is the only possible way of life then sure, anything that makes a profit is productive. Why not cime too then? What makes doing deals outside of the law unproductive and doing deals inside the law productive? Tahir

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