[lbo-talk] advertising and marxism

[James Heartfield]

... mind you Lenin’s answer to Charles’ problem ‘wage laborers are only paid so much, and it is always less than enough to buy all the consumer commodities which they produce’ was that workers are not the only consumers. Capitalists consume, both privately consuming luxuries, and as corporations, consuming those intermediate goods and machines that go to make up consumer goods. The total demand, therefore is greater than the demand of the working class. Lenin explains in Capitalism in Russia, which he bases on Marx’s second volume of capital.