ALB
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It's another interesting but different graph, showing this time how, since the 1960s, the share of national income of the top 10% has gone up at the same time as the percentage of workers unionised has gone down.I'm not sure, though, that we can conclude that the share of the top 10% went up because the percentage of workers in unions went down. We certainly can't argue that if union membership hadn't declined then the share of the top 10% would not have gone up. That would be to attribute to unions a power they don't have.Unions may (and do) have the power, when first set up, to increase the wages of their members (and some others) and then to more or less maintain this in the long run (pushing up wages in boom times and slowing down wage cuts in slump times), but that's as far as they can go.Not even governments can reducee income inequality. Reformist governments have tried but failed and given up. Instead, in recent decades, governments have helped capitalism's tendency to increased inequality, by reducing taxes on profits and high incomes. Government anti-union legislation, making unions less effective in their limited sphere, may have been a factor but only a minor one.Union membership will have declined in line with the decreased share of manufacturing (where they were well organised) in GDP. But even if union membership hadn't declined I think the top 10 percent's share would still have gone up.
"Middle class" here is defined as "the middle 60 percent of households" by income. So what's really been talked about is the middle 60 percent of income-receivers, most of whom will of course be members of the working class properly defined.In the olden days, the ICC would probably have said it was a conspiracy by the unions, at the behest of the capitalist state, to reduce their own membership and so effectiveness so as to allow the income of the workers concerned to fall. These days they would more probably point to this part of the news item as confirmation of their view that workers are better off without unions:
Quote:Studies have discovered that during the economic recovery, non-union workers fared considerably better than union workers in fields like manufacturing and private construction. Also, during the 1982 and 1991 recessions, states with fewer union members were found to recover more quickly than states with a strong union presence.What should we make of it? First, that the middle 60 percent of incomes is not a very meaningful group. Second, that "middle class" is not a useful description of it as class is determined not by income but relationship to the means of production. Third, that a group's declining share of total income does not necessarily mean (as the title, but not the small print, of the graph suggests) a decline in their real income.
Well, well. Everybody's heard of the revolving door between top civil servants and big business. Now it applies to the BBC economics "experts" and big business:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24288088Not surprising really when you consider that the BBC and other TV news always employ people working for City financial firms to comment on the economy. In the (now distant) past they at least tried to be seen to be neutral by interviewing academics.
By co-incidence the other person who was refused admission to the Socialist Platform meeting on 14 September was the German journalist who was the author of the article from issue 941 of the Weekly Worker JohnD gives.From what she told us in the pub where we went instead, these are an unsavoury lot. Nasty people who break up other people's meetings. She specifically singled out "Platypus" as their English-language version.Incidentally, David Rovics has a hilarious song attacking the idea of a Vanguard (often played during the lunch-hour at our Head Office). It can be heard here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSeU9q6zyT4Here's the lyrics:http://lyrics.wikia.com/David_Rovics:Vanguard
Actually, in his book The Marvelous Learning Animal Arthur Staats doesn't contest "the facts" collected by today's dominant biological determinist scientists, that the brains and brain patterns of men, women, gays, people with learning difficulties, schizophrenics, etc are different. What he is challenging is the "ideological" assumption that these differences must be genetic. He says this is just an assumption which the biological determinists have not been able to prove by showing how genes do or even could determine human social behaviour. He proposes that the differences could equally be due to the experiences (learning) of these groups being different and this having an effect on their brains.You seem to be suggesting that just because socialists favour the second possible explanation socialists should interpret "the facts" in this way. That of course would be wholly "ideological". Staats says that the view he supports needs to be backed up by a coherent theory that fits "the facts", i. e. those who take this approach must show how learning affects and changes the brain. Which is where the neuroscience and (yes) neuroscientists come in. They do indeed seem to be doing our work for us. After all, we are not qualified to do it ourselves, are we? Are you?But we are in danger of turning yet another thread into a discussion of your theory of science.
DJP wrote:Behavioral economists and psychologists are doing the hard work for us!Just reading this book The Marvelous Learning Animal by a behavioural psychologist which seems to be backing up our long-argued position on human nature:http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14568718-the-marvelous-learning-animal
I hadn't realised that this was a Labour Party proposal. What a shower of shameless opportunists. I suppose some fock-us group has told them that militarism is a vote-winner at the moment and they duly oblige. Who said they are the lesser evil? They are just as bad if not worse than the other lot. At least the other lot probably genuinely believe in militarism while Labour is just pretending to try to garner votes.
LBird wrote:Dietzgen on the unity of natural and social in one science:Be careful you might end up with the spiritual interpretation of Dietzgen by Larry Gambone in his strange book on Cosmic Dialectics !http://vcmtalk.com/jospeh_dietzgen_page
alanjjohnstone wrote:If i understand my masonry, SPGBers cannot join the British masons due to the necessary belief in the Supreme Being, the Grand Architect in the Sky, but could join the atheistic French masons. i recall reading about them parading in full regalia during the Paris Commune.I wouldn't have thought so !Freemasonry was a bourgeois revolutionary movement in France, Spain, Italy, etc (I think Bakunin was one; secret societies were his thing. Marx wasn't of course) and the Social Democratic parties of those countries are still riddled with it. Not the Communist parties as they declared it incompatible, as I imagine we would/should. The fact that it played a part in the Paris Commune shows the extent that to which its ideas were still influenced by the French bourgeois revolution of the 18th century.
I think I may have posted this link before but here's Kliman explaining in 3 minutes why redistributing income to the working class is not a way out of the crisis. Anyway, it bears repeating:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O47sXexnM9A#t=6m40s
Just posted this yesterday on another thread:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/general-discussion/andrew-kliman-marxist-humanist-slams-underconsumption-theorists-monthly-rev?page=1#comment-8374Actually, they don't seem to be defending crude underconsumption views (they say explicitly that Rosa Luxemburg was wrong on this). What they do do is defend policies which others defend on underconsumption grounds, e.g. increasing government spending and workers incomes, but which they defend on other grounds ("transitional demands", i.e bait to gain a following). They also point out that "underconsumption" is an apparent feature of one stage of the boom/slump cycle (as it is).As I posted yesterday, I think they score a point against Kliman (one only) when they argue that not all crises are caused by a falling rate of profit due to a rise in the organic composition of capital (crudely, due to increased mechanization). They even mention the explanation of crises we have tended to favour:
Quote:Crises can be caused by disproportionality between different industries.But the document is mainly political. At one point they accuse Kliman of echoing SPGB views:
Quote:Insofar that this means anything, it is that the working class must be 'theoretically' educated – presumably by Kliman and Bruce Wallace – to prepare them for socialism.This sounds familiar. It echoes the arguments of the Socialist Party of Great Britain (SPGB) – not our party, the Socialist Party of England and Wales, but the tiny organisation – that seeks the road to socialism, which by definition must be long and protracted, through abstractly 'educating' working people on the realities of money and demanding its immediate abolition, and the same with classes, the law of value, etc.Such an accusation when used amongst Trotskyists is normally a winner. But Kliman is not a Trotskyist. It may even help us get a debate with him.
Another article, just out, by Wolff defending workers cooperatives still producing for a market as the "alternative" to capitalism and redefining socialism to fit this:http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/18323-debating-capitalism-redefining-outdated-termsHe is of course right that it is inadequate to see capitalism v socialism as the market v state planning. But while capitalism is not incompatible with state planning that doesn't make socialism compatible with the market.
LBird wrote:ALB, I know nothing of Bogdanov. Would you care to provide a short summary of what you consider to be his ideas? Especially those relevant to this discussion, about cognition, or wider scientific method.I don't know much about him either I'm afraid because most of what he wrote has not been translated from Russian. I'm just going by what others (eg Lenin) say he said. In this 1907 article criticising Dietzgen, Plekhanov groups together as having the same sort of ideas Dietzgen, Bogdanov, Pannekoek and Unterman on "cognition":http://www.marxists.org/archive/plekhanov/1907/dietzgen.htmPlekhanov was taking the position of 18th century French materialism that Pannekoek criticised him for. Plekhanov didn't think much of Panneloek either. See: http://www.marxists.org/archive/plekhanov/1907/pannekoek.htm#n1Here's an article by modern Russian group which also links Bogdanov and Pannekoek and provides more on what he meant by "tectology":http://revsoc.org/archives/2201Bogdanov's socialist/communist credentials are confirmed in this extract from his book A Short Course of Economic Science which the party used to recommend:http://revsoc.org/archives/7467I'd like to know more about Bogdanov's ideas myself if anybody who reads Russian can help.
Militant have just published a pamphlet-length reply to Kliman here:http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/17458/20-09-2013/the-causes-of-capitalist-crisis-reply-to-andrew-klimanIt's hilarious in parts, just trotting out moth-eaten Trotskyist dogmas about "degenerate workers state", "transitional programme", "nationalise the monopolies", "vanguard party", etc.. At one point Kliman is accused of being like us::
Quote:Kliman scathingly dismisses the idea of a fighting transitional programme for workers, which is clearly spelt out in the last chapter of his book entitled 'What is to be Undone'.He writes: "The notion that socialism will come about by means of a party that captures state power and nationalizes the means of production is fundamentally misguided". [The Failure of Capitalist Production (TFoCP), p204] Bruce Wallace is at present a member of a party and an international organisation which defends the notion that the working class through its own party will need to fight for the idea of taking power through the nationalisation of the big monopolies – the means of production – on a national and an international scale.This is a precondition for taking economic and state power out of the hands of capitalism and putting it into the hands of the working class, laying the basis for the democratic socialist planning of society.What is Kliman's alternative to this? : "We can have a modern society that operates without the laws of capitalist production being in control". [TFoCP, p206] Just how this can be achieved, remains a mystery.Kliman merely suggests: "There needs to be a new relation of theory to practice, so that regular people are not just the muscle that brings down the old power, but become fully equipped, theoretically and intellectually, to govern society themselves."Nothing short of this can prevent power from being handed over to an elite." This is followed by the sentence: "It seems very utopian". [TFoCP, p206] You can say that again! This is not a fighting programme and perspectives in the Marxist sense but is akin to astronomy where events will develop almost automatically. 'Educate' the working class in the 'fundamentals' and, like rotten fruit, capitalism will collapse of its own accord and socialism will be born!Insofar that this means anything, it is that the working class must be 'theoretically' educated – presumably by Kliman and Bruce Wallace – to prepare them for socialism.This sounds familiar. It echoes the arguments of the Socialist Party of Great Britain (SPGB) – not our party, the Socialist Party of England and Wales, but the tiny organisation – that seeks the road to socialism, which by definition must be long and protracted, through abstractly 'educating' working people on the realities of money and demanding its immediate abolition, and the same with classes, the law of value, etc.Thanks for the compliment.Other gems are:
Quote:He unapologetically shares a 'state capitalist' analysis with the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) in Britain, although he is not a member of their 'international', the International Socialist Tendency (IST).In fact, he dedicates his book to one of the SWP's theoreticians, the late Chris Harman, who shared his approach to the rate of profit issue.Bruce Wallace may try to pretend that this has no bearing on his economic analysis. But it is the experience of ourselves and many workers in Britain with the SWP and others who adhere to a state capitalist analysis of the former Soviet Union – it was a state capitalist regime not a degenerated workers' state, they argue – that it leads them to a mistaken approach on virtually all political questions both of an historical and contemporary character.You wouldn't think that Militant was in an electoral alliance with the SWP in TUSC.They defend the old USSR as "progressive":
Quote:We have explained on many occasions that the collapse of Stalinism not only ended the rule of the monstrous bureaucracy that dominated these societies; it also led to the collapse of the planned economy, which in the past was relatively progressive compared to capitalism.(…) For Kliman, like his SWP cousins, the collapse of Stalinism did not represent an historic defeat for the working class.Kliman is criticised for arguing (we do too) that for Marx there was no "transitional society" between capitalism and communism (= socialism):
Quote:In passing, he criticises the transitional method and programme elaborated by the Bolsheviks and developed by Trotsky.In the American online journal marxisthumanistinitiative.org, he attacks various political opponents, who "ignore the fact that the Critique of the Gotha Programme [by Marx] states – twice – that the first phase of communist society emerges from capitalist society – one is transformed into the other, directly."There is nothing in between, not in Marx's statement.They answer Kliman's criticism of their current reformist programme:
Quote:We have argued in a transitional manner for an increase in government expenditure in order to boost housing, education, workers' share of income, etc. We have also demanded nationalisation of the banks and the finance sector. Yet Kliman opposes this. He writes: "Some leftist economists called for state control or nationalization of the financial system, rather than just regulation, of the financial system… But there cannot be socialism in one country. What results when you try to have socialism in one country is state-capitalism, a state-run system that is still embedded in the global capitalist economy, and which is still locked into a competitive battle with capitals elsewhere in the world. A state-run bank is still a bank." [TFoCP, pp194-5]To be fair, the only point Militant seem to score is when they say Kliman is a "one club golfer" when he argues that the falling rate of profit is the cause of all crises.
LBird wrote:It’s my opinion that the longer-term purpose of these discussions between Communists (cognition, nature versus humanity, matter versus mind, methodology, etc.) is to produce a ‘scientific method’ that can be applied to all aspects of ‘natural humanity’. Thus, there can’t be a separation, which some comrades seem to think is necessary, between the ‘physical’ or ‘material’ world and the ‘social’ or ‘philosophical’ world. As I have shown, Marx thought that the unification of nature and humanity into one science was possible, and I think that we Communists should be attempting to do this. I see my current discussion about ‘theories of cognition’ as a very small step on the winding road to that distant goal.Any method, that we can come up with, has to be applicable to the full range of ‘science’, from physics to sociology, and taking in astronomy, chemistry, biology and psychology (and all the other disciplines), along the way.I would urge you again to look more into the ideas of Alexander Bogdanov who had similar ideas to you on cognition, truth and the unification of science. See for instance:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TectologyHe also meets your test of being a Communist (or socialist, same thing):http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_BogdanovYou may be trying to re-invent the wheel !
