Re: Estimating the surplus\Doug's question\Fred's comments

[Mike Ballard <swillsqueal@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Thanks Jim!  Now, I feel like I know about where I am
in this discussion.

One, perhpas two more questions from the peanut
gallery:

How does the pile of both current and projected future
wealth production in the USA measure up against the
amount of dollars in circulation, including bonds and
other promissary notes?

I realize that at this stage in that vast accumulation
of commodities, there has to be an excess of dollars
over produced exchange-values in order to grease the
wheels of circulation.  But how much is too much?

I'm not sure of the exact figures, but aren't there
trillions of dollars out there moving their little
electrical impulses around from bank to bank and from
exchange to exchange and so on...?

>From another angle, does the fall in the
exchange-value of the US dollar have something to do
with an excess of cash and promissary notes in
circulation?

I'm obviously not an economist.

Just a wondering Wobbly,


Mike B)
--- "Devine, James" <jdevine@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> Mike asks:
> > ...do you mean by
> > uproductive labour, that labour which does not
> produce
> > a profit for an employer of wage-labour?
>
> according to Marx's definition, unproductive labor
> (U) does not produce surplus-value, though it may
> help the capitalists _realize_ surplus-value.
>
> To my mind, that says that U doesn't help capital as
> a whole, but it can be profitable for an individual
> capitalist to hire. So a stock-broker can be
> profitable to hire, even though (s)he's not
> productive.
>
> > Are you saying that a single barber who owns his
> shop
> > and employs nobody and who cuts hair for a price
> is an
> > example of unproductive labour whereas a bunch of
> > hairdressers employed by a chain for wages and
> whose
> > accumulated services are sold at a profit are
> > productive?
>
> Marx used a similar example. A teacher hired by a
> business is productive, whereas a self-employed
> tutor is not. Note that there's nothing morally good
> about being productive.
>
> > ... In other words, can services as well as
> material goods
> > be counted as part of productive labour in this
> > definition?
>
> for Smith, service laborers were unproductive. For
> Marx, they were productive in most cases.
>
> > And what does the productivity of capital mean?
> > Can capital, of and by itself be productive?
>
> the "productivity of capital" is sloppy writing. It
> refers to the ratio of output to fixed capital
> equipment (the inverse of some measures of the
> organic composition of capital). But, at least in
> Marxian lingo, fixed capital isn't productive.
> However, it can be "indirectly productive," i.e.,
> raising the productivity of productive labor.
>
> > Or, are we talking Capital as a social relation
> here
> > i.e. wage-labour implied?
>
> capital as a social relation is usually productive
> -- for capital.
>
> the more I think about this stuff, the less
> productive it seems.
>
> Jim


=====
*****************************************************************
So long as little children are allowed to
suffer, there is no true love in
this world.

ISADORA DUNCAN
"Memoirs," 1924
This Quarter
Autumn 1929

http://profiles.yahoo.com/swillsqueal

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