Relative and absolute surplus value

["Charles Brown" <CharlesB@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Jim Devine:

> Nowadays, blue-collar workers are mostly paid by the hour, usually with some
> higher rate for over-time (though there are exceptions), such as time and a
> half for overtime. A longer work-day may thus not raise the rate of
> surplus-value, since the wage paid per hour rises (or at least stays
> constant). The exception is if the boss cheated (i.e., has workers work
> without pay).

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CB: On this I usually think ( and I been told)  that the large amount of overtime in the autoplants , for example, for the last 15 years or so, means that the companies don't have to hire a certain margin of more people. Thereby the company saves on benefits. They squeeze a bit more ( a margin ?) out of overtime workers and that little bit extra has no benefits paid corresponding to it, benefits being part of the modern wage. Thus, lots of overtime, a lengthened work day and week ( undermining the 40 hour workweek  and 8 hour day) does get some surplus value out of this that might be dubbed absolute surplus value.

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> Return to the waged (blue-collar or pink-collar) workers: if OT is cut back,
> this may help the rate of surplus-value, if the wage paid per hour falls
> (since OT pay isn't being paid anymore). This can coincide with _greater _
> work-time for the salaried employees. I think this is what's happening right
> now, though I don't have the evidence at hand.

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CB: I don't think the Big Three would be structuring jobs with so much overtime for the last 15 years if it tended to cutback the rate of exploitation of surplus-value or the rate of profit.

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When Marx discussed these issues, he assumed that what economists call the
> "real wage" was constant (as Mike Lebowitz argues). Then, absolute
> surplus-value extraction means getting more work per paid time period. This
> could involve getting more work-time out of the paid time period (as with
> the discussion of stretch-out above) or getting more work-effort out of the
> work-time spent (increasing the intensity of labor, or speed-up). Relative
> surplus-value comes from mechanization and the like, which allows
> work-effort to be more productive, lowering the societal cost of the real
> wages. Of course, absolute and relative surplus-value get mixed up when
> mechanization raises the intensity of labor.


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CB: I see what you are saying about lengthening the work day if payment is by the day. You are saying it was unpaid overtime !

My recall is that Marx defines relative surplus value such that more commodities per time whether by mechanization or speedup would be relative surplus value. Here are a couple of quotes.

 "The surplus-value produced by prolongation of the working-day, I call absolute surplus-value. On the other hand, the surplus-value arising from the curtailment of the necessary labour-time, and from the corresponding alteration in the respective lengths of the two components of the working-day, I call relative surplus-value"

....

"Hence, independently of this latter circumstance, there is a motive for each individual capitalist to cheapen his commodities, by increasing the productiveness of labour.

 Nevertheless, even in this case, the increased production of surplus-value arises from the curtailment of the necessary labour-time, and from the corresponding prolongation of the surplus-labour. "

CHAPTER TWELVE:
THE CONCEPT OF RELATIVE SURPLUS-VALUE

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> It gets even more confusing when we drop Marx's constant real wage
> assumption. Are real wage cuts part of absolute surplus-value extraction (as
> I asserted) or relative surplus-value extraction (as Michael suggests)?


I'd say wage cuts are neither, but in differentiating relative and absolute surplus value, Marx remarks on this category as actually occurring in practice or class struggle between the workers and capitalists.

"No doubt, the capitalist can, instead of five shillings, pay the labourer four shillings and sixpence or even less. For the reproduction of this value of four shillings and sixpence, nine hours' labour-time would suffice; and consequently three hours of surplus-labour, instead of two, would accrue to the capitalist, and the surplus-value would rise from one shilling to eighteen-pence. This result, however, would be obtained only by lowering the wages of the labourer below the value of his labour-power. With the four shillings and sixpence which he produces in nine hours, he commands one-tenth less of the necessaries of life than before, and consequently the proper reproduction of his labour-power is crippled. The surplus-labour would in this case be prolonged only by an overstepping of its normal limits; its domain would be extended only by a usurpation of part of the domain of necessary labour-time. Despite the important part which this method plays in actual practice, we !
are excluded from considering it in this place, by our assumption, that all commodities, including labour-power, are bought and sold at their full value. Granted this, it follows that the labour-time necessary for the production of labour-power, or for the reproduction of its value, cannot be lessened by a fall in the labourer's wages below the value of his labour-power, but only by a fall in this value itself. "

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> I guess we could spend a lot of time splitting hairs on this issue. Though I
> would be interested to find out if Marx wrote anything definitive on these
> confusions (and I can't think of anyone more able to find it than Michael),
> my interpretation is in terms of the broad sweep of Marx's CAPITAL rather
> than the details. I interpret absolute surplus-value extraction as being
> technologically "backward," getting more out of workers without making
> labor-effort more productive, and relative surplus-value extraction as being
> technologically "progressive," as making labor-effort more productive.
> ("Progressive" here is like "productive" in Marx's theory: it's defined from
> capital's point of view. However, a future socialism might benefit from its
> labor-efforts being made more productive.)

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CB: See above on Marx's direct discussion of this. I agree with your impression of the differences in "backward" and "progressive" , except I am thinking that direct speedup ( foremen pushing, literally speeding up the assembly line in autoplants, shorter breaks) is also a way of extracting relative surplus value.

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In the end, the meaning of the distinction shouldn't depend on "what Marx
> said," since Marx was wrong once or twice. It should depend on how
> theoretically and empirically useful the distinction is, how it fits with a
> holistic/dialectical perspective, and how it helps guide practice.

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CB: Well, it does depend some on what Marx said, because he developed the ideas and definitions, and we are dealing with definitions here.