super profits

["Devine, James" <jdevine@xxxxxxx>]

[was: RE: [PEN-L] Nick Cohen on Thomas Frank]

In terms of value theory (as I understand it), "super-profits" are simply profits above the social average, which would be the average for the whole capitalist world. Persistent super-profits result from barriers to entry into an industry, raw-material rents, technological rents, and the like.

What was being referred to, I'd guess, is "super-exploitation," which refers to (persistent) situation where real wages are below labor productivity (net of overhead) with a gap in excess of the social average.  That is, the "rate of surplus-value" is above the social average. This kind of situation would arise in "poor country" cases where monopsony and (more likely) more-than-usually oppressive governments working with business keep wages down and unions out -- while rich countries keep the workers from moving to their lands. Much of the actual surplus-value produced in such countries is realized in richer countries as super-profits, where businesses are able to get cheap imports from the poorer countries. To the extent that the low import prices are passed onto consumers as low product prices, the rich-country working classes can benefit (albeit temporarily) from the super-exploitation in the poor countries. In that case, the benefits of super-exploitation don't show up as super-profits, but instead might (in theory) undermine potential worker militancy in the rich countries. The rich countries' workers may also benefit from a lack of entry by -- and thus the lack of competition from -- workers from the poor countries. 

Jim Devine jdevine@xxxxxxx &  http://myweb.lmu.edu/jdevine 

> 
> Where are these super-profits anyway? I keep asking for some evidence
> that this category exists, and keep coming up empty? Is it the cheap
> crap made in China sold at Wal-Mart? That lowers the cost of
> reproduction of the working class some, but that's a thin reed to
> support the whole global structure.
> 
> Doug
>