Re: super-profits

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

I wrote:
>right.  But there's not simple continuity between the "liberal
>stage" of capitalism during the 19th century (under British
>hegemony) and the "neoliberal stage" of the current era (under the
>US thumb). There was a big retreat from globalization  during the
>late 19th century until the early 1930s. (This serious period of
>"interimperialist rivalry" leading to war and depression, as
>Bukharin suggested.) There was also the Cold War period, which set
>the stage for the neoliberal era, but also involved a lot of social
>democracy and the like.

 
Doug writes: 
>Well, yeah. But during the "Golden Age," 1950-70, say, the CPI rose
an average of 2.9% a year in the U.S. In the neoliberal 1990s it rose
an average of...2.9% a year. And your average crisis theorist is
happy to tell you that profitability was higher in the first period
than the second. So, where are those superprofits?<

this is reminiscent of the way my Dad used to argue, constantly changing the subject in subtle ways. I always thought he got it from the Jesuits. Doug, were you trained by Jesuits? But no matter (especially since my bosses are Jesuits).[*]

The important thing isn't the rate of inflation but the rate of surplus-value (or, if you wish, the
share of profits in national income). In the so-called Golden Age, both profit rates and real wages rose (in the US). In the current era, profit rates are rising (until the 2000 recession -- but then after that they've been rising) while real wages have been stagnant. 

But again, it's the relative share of capital's income that counts. This was a high ratio during the US "Golden Age" and a low ratio nowadays. Does that say that super-exploitation is going away? No, since imperialism is still here (even if it's changed its spots) and other things have changed. 
 
I think a structural analysis works better. In the good old daze, the US working class benefited a little (I won't do a calculation) because of cheap imports (mostly of raw materials) from "third world" countries -- and the lack of immigration from the low-wage areas. This is one factor (but not the whole story of) explaining how profit rates could be up at the same time that real wages were doing pretty well. 
 
In the bad current days, US workers are doing better than they would have done otherwise because of cheap manufactured goods from China, etc. The employers are able to get profit-rate increases without encouraging as much grumbling, etc., because of these cheap imports. It's like with Wal-Mart: their low prices -- based in part on cheap manufactured imports -- justify their existence to many people, despite the low wages Wal-Mart pays. 
 
But there's something else going on: "globalization" means greater in-migration and greater competition between "first world" and "third world" workers, so US workers aren't doing very well. They're likely benefiting less from imperialism than they used to. The tendency is toward the creation of a world working-class, though the realization of this tendency will take decades...
 
[*] The old phrase (falsely?) attributed to the Jesuits "start with them when they're young" sure has a new meaning these days, doesn't it?
 
Jim Devine