[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

 What did I predict?Slanders and lies, as usual, the political method of the 'materialists'. In a word, Leninism.Those who actually read what I write, and are very careful of the lies of the 'materialists', will be aware that 'society-wide democratic planning' (Marx's ideas about 'social production') has been consciously and deliberately altered by robbo to confuse the unwary as 'society-wide central planning'.robbo thus anticipates his own political regime, in which he as an individual is at the centre of his planning.Individualists, like robbo, will always deny democracy, because they have a 'fear of the mob'. Individualism is a ruling class idea, a social product of the bourgeoisie, and must start from concepts like 'matter', which all individuals claim to 'know', by their individual, biological, asocial, ahistoric, senses. Thus, they don't need to discuss social theory, social practice, or the place of democracy within the social production of socialism.Thus, he defines 'democracy' as 'centralism'.Democratic Communists / Marxists define 'democracy' as 'society-wide'.

 Amusing.  LBird has the gall to accuse socialists of engaging in "slanders and lies" against him  having himself  just just accused them of opposing democracy or democractc decisionmaking in socialism which is demonstrably false.  The truth is socialists have a more nuanced and grounded view of what democracy entails than has LBird.  We recognise that there will necessarily different levels of democratic decisionmaking in socialism – local , regional and global.  We also recognise, along wth Marx, that in socialism the “free development of each is the condition for  the free development of all" and that the very nature  of socialism requires this.  How else do you operate a society based on voluntary cooperation and free accesss without individuals being able to choose for themselves in these matters as opposed to having those decisions imposed on you from above? The truth is democacy and individual freedom/autonomy are not opposites as LBird stupidly perists in maintaining but are absolutely complementary to each other.  The one needs the other for both to exist.  Its a question of striking the right balance.  Too much of either undermines or destroys both. LBrid understands nothing of this.  His views on democracy are childishly simplistic and embarrasingly dumb.  He has got no understanding of the mechanics or the logistics of decsionmaking  and for all his religious-like proclamations about democracy  –  "I am a democratic communist", doh! –  in reality,  his kind of totalitarian thinking will deliver a world  from which any kind of real democracy would be utterly extinguished.   He has just now admitted that his model of decision making is one in which all decisions are made at a "society wide" level.  Meaning 7 billion plus people are going to have to decide on literally  EVERYTHING – from whether or not your local communty needs a new library or doctors surgery  right down to what you as an individual will be allowed to consume or contribute by way of work.  If such a crackpot idea were even remotely feasiable,  which thankfully it is not , it would absolutely require all  such centralised decsionmaking to be concentrated in the hands of tiny technocratic elite – if only by default. This is in effect what LBird advocates though he lacks the wit to see it.  He seems to think that society wide decisionminaking is "democratic" while centralised decisionmaking is not.  But if there is only one body of  decisionmaking and only one centre – namely the whole of society  – then that is by definiition centralised or unicentric, not polycentric.  :LBird opposes in principle the whole idea of polycentric decision-making.  Therefore he advocates society wide central planning from a single centre  and therefore he is Leninist and an opponent of real democracy  for all his bluster to the contrary.  He stands firmly side by side with his comrade Lenin in advocating that " The whole of society will have become a single office and a single factory, with equality of labor and pay" (State and Revolution). It is not for no reason that Lenin favoured a policy of top down "one-man management" and argued that democracy was completely compatible with dictatorship by a single individual .  Given a chance to put his balmy ideas into practice Lbird would argue exactly along the same lines and all in the name of "democracy" of course.

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

 If not, you'll follow the political trajectory of Lenin..

 Whuch  is precisely what LBird is doing with his advocacy of society wide central planning

[robbo203]

Since  LBird seems intent on hijacking the "Socialism and Change" thread, as he has done with so many other threads, with his ridiculous claims about socialists not being democrats,  I thought it fit and proper to resurrect this old thread which is  the more appropiraterate place in which to conduct such a debate. Let us see if he can rebut the arguments presented here. At the end of the day,  for all his bluster, the only one here who truly conforms to a "Leninist" point of view in the way he envisages the future organisation of a socialist society is LBird himself

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

robbo203 wrote:

The main problem I have with the article is that though it talks of the need to  have a plan about how to get to socialism, it  doesnt really define  socialism.  That is the the problem with the left in general.  You cant really move forward unless you have some clear  idea of where you want to move forward to – your end goal

Well, I've tried to discuss this with you and the rest here, and when I define 'socialism' as 'the democratic control of social production', your response is 'why is there a need for democracy in social production?'.I've got no problem with someone arguing that 'the democratic control of social production' is a bit vague, and needs more detail, but the challenging of 'democracy' itself, leaves me baffled.As far as I can tell, 'your end goal' seems to be 'free individuals', but this tells any worker asking nothing about 'social production' or, indeed, 'socialism'.

 As far as i can tell you are being disinegenuous again in pursuit  of your  same old hobby horse.  Ive spelt exactly what I mean by democratic control of the means of production in socialism and why I support  it.  You can find my statement here  http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/general-discussion/socialism-and-democracy If you want to develop your argument do it there not here.  Please dont try to hijack this thread to push your own agenda, LBird, as  you have done with so many threads in the pastThank you

[robbo203]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

https://dissidentvoice.org/2017/09/do-you-socialists-have-any-plans/Discuss.

 This bit is quite important I think: "You will never get people to join your parties, groups or whatever they are on the basis of saying how bad things are. What do you think happens? Do you think we are going to stand up and say, “Things are so bad, I’ve had enough! I’m going to rebel!”? No, people say, “This is too much. I don’t want to hear it anymore”. And then we go watch a ballgame, have a beer and root for a team." The main problem I have with the article is that though it talks of the need to  have a plan about how to get to socialism, it  doesnt really define  socialism.  That is the the problem with the left in general.  You cant really move forward unless you have some clear  idea of where you want to move forward to – your end goal The left broadly speaking sees state ownership or intervention in the economy  as the way forward, real socialism in our sense of the term is something beyond the horizon , something that is supposed to come afterwards and to which they all pay lip service amongst themselves but, even so, to talk about that now is considered "utopian".  However, state ownership and state intervention has been tried and has proven to be a cul de sac that leads to nowhere except more of the same. "Weve done that and got the Tshirt" is the usual sentiment it evokes.   The left then wonders why most workers fail to treat them seriously or feel inspired by what they have to offer.  So they – the left – retreat from programmatic macro-economic declarations about nationalising the "commanding heights" of industry into the quagmire of identity politics where at least by focussing on, or cynically exploiting, some single issue cause they can be assured of a few more votes or a few more members However, there are straw in the wind that things may be changing.  Ive noticed an increasing receptiveness in left wing forums in the last few years  to big bold statements about socialism that bring  out clearly and unequivocally  its nonmarket , moneyless , wageless classless and stateless character.  There is mileage to be had in being positively utopian, after all – with the emphasis very definitely on being positive.  Blaming capitalism all the time  (which we all do) is Ok up to a point but  it can be counteproductive and disempowering after a while.  Like the article suggests, people then get the feeling that there is nothng much they can do about something so comprehensively invasive and abstract as "capitalism"  so they retreat into themselves and the more mundane and manageable aspects of their own lives Like Oscar Wilde said:  A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not worth even glancing at, for it leaves out the one country at which Humanity is always landing. And when Humanity lands there, it looks out, and, seeing a better country, sets sail. Progress is the realisation of Utopias

[robbo203]

Marcos wrote:

It was the same mistake/distortion made by Lenin. He did not define economic exploitation at the point of production. He defined economic exploitation based on the salary of the workers of the colonies indicating that the exploitation of the workers in the colonies was higher than the exploitation at the metropolis. In reality, it was the opposite way because the workers at the metropolis were producing more surplus value. Left wingers like to make boycotts to certain commodities from certain countries indicating that exploitation takes places at the point of sale instead of at the point of production. They continue with the same argumentation of Lenin and they do not understand that capitalism has replaced colonialism, and workers are exploited at the point of production in all parts of the worlds by the ruling elite

 Yes indeed Marcos.  Lenin's "labour aristocracy" thesis is bunkum from start to finish. The idea that the metropolitan capitalists would "bribe" their workers – or at least a particular stratum of mainly skilled workers – out of the superprofits derived from their colonial investments abroad to ensure theese workers political compliance to the system makes absolutely no sense. If the "bribe" was presumably  incorporated into the pay packet of workers,  you might just as well pay the workers more without the bribe – hardly something any employers would be inclined to do for some vague poiltical objective anyway – given the need for employeres to hold costs including labour costs . to remain competitive.  There is plenty of other evidence to throw doubt on the whole idea including one argument I came across by the Trot, Tony Cliff, that wage differentials were greater in European countries that possessed no  colonies compared with those other European countries that possesssed colonies.  If the labour aristrocracy thesis was correct , you would expect this to be the other way round

[robbo203]

MBellemare wrote:

   I am correct on this! Because, if you were correct, @DJP@Marcos@Kerr, capitalism would have ended a long, long time ago! The death knell of capitalism would have sounded decades and decades ago. The fact that you cannot even admit fault with Marx's analysis is fatal to your understanding of Marx, it means you good folks are fetishizing Marx into a religious opiate to sooth your Marxian souls, weary of struggle, and ready to sleep.  

 Michel, With respect, I dont think that is a reaonable charactersation of folk here at all.  Speaking for myself, although I know others here would endorse this view, there are quite a few things that Marx wrote with which I strongly disagree and which I have touched on in other threads on this forum.  Marx's writings are not something to be slavishly followed but nor are they to be unfairly dismissed in blanket fashion without good reason The labour theory of value is an immensely powerful tool for working class emancipation if properly understood and applied.   So many of Marx's critics fail to understand his method.  All theoretical models are simulcra – simplifications of reality.  That means many factors are ignored or held constant in order to discover the unique effect of a particular variable under investigation.  This ceteris paribus assumption is particularly applicable to economic models and Marx made full use of it.  Michael Harrington describes this process rather well in his book Socialism (1972):  Therefore the reader must be warned that the opening pages of Das Kapital – or, for that matter, the entire first volume – contain conscious simplifications.  Marx, like everyone else, actually began with the "chaotic whole” of immediate experience, but in his masterpiece he follows a logical rather than an experiential order.  So in understanding any part of the Marxian analysis one must carefully ask: Under what simplifying assumptions is it subsumed”   As Marx's argument unfolds, one "conscious simplification" after another, disappears.   In your post 223 you not only fail to understand his method but also attribute to him a view which, quite simply, he never held and which quite frankly he explicitly argued against on numerous occasions. You assert:  "Capitalism is predicated on this artificial fabrication of value, price and wage as it pertains to workers' and their labor-power. They, the working population, must continually accept less for the actual value of their labor-power, in order for capitalism and profit to persist."and"Marx had it wrong! He seemed to claim that labor-power was sold at its value (at least from the capitalist's point of view), but it never is. Labor-power is the only commodity that is never exchanged at its actual value and price" This is wrong on several counts. The idea that commodities sold at their value was precisely the kind of simplification that Marx begins with but which he progressively moves away from as his analysis strives to more closely approximate real world conditions so that he ends up saying that commodities do not in fact sell at their values but rather AROUND their "price of production"  (their cost of production plus the average rate of profit) and that, moreover, the actual prices at which they sell are subject to short term fluctuations in supply and demand.  You mistakenly take Marx's initial simplification to be his final postulate on the matter and in the process misunderstand his argument Not only that, you fail to see that the very view you attribute to Marx is one that he rejected.  Marx did not say, even as a conscious simplification, that labour power was sold for less than its value and that this was the reason why workers were being exploited.  On the contrary, he said, the worker was generally paid a "fair price" for her labour power.    Exploitation arose, not becuase the worker was paid less than the value of her labour power but, rather, because when in the course of applying her labour in the form of waged work for her employer, she produces a value in the form of her product  that exceeds the value of the wage she received. In other words, absolutely central to Marx's theory of exploitation was the distinction between labour and labour power.  Your failure to understand this explains why you come out  with claims such as this: "Labor-power must be constantly bought by capitalists at a lower price/value than it is in actually worth. And for this to happen, capitalists must artificially/arbitrarily fabricate and manipulate the value/price of labor-power at a lower value/price, than it is actually worth". This boils down to sayng that the capitalists exploits the workers by artifically/arbitraily raising the price of the workers' product above their value. In other words that profits are made at the point of sale rather than the point of production. But that is, as I say logically and empirically incorrect and you have still to answer the case against this basic claim of yours which I set out in some detail in post  no 198 of this thread

[robbo203]

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

So back to the tree and forest analogy from above.  By your reasoning if one tree grows taller and captures more of the sun then that means the other trees must shrink and grow smaller because they get less sun?  It would seem that's your argument, but it's not supported by reality looking at a forest or a marketplace.  Individual trees only grow up and never shrink. Trees might die off but they don't decrease in size.  Companies rarely shrink too, and usually only grow or die or get replaced or bought out and merged. 

 False analogy. Trees may not decrease in size but a sum of money certainly can! .  If you spend more on one thing within a given budget then what that means, all things being equal, is that you will have a smaller sum of money left over to spend on something else. THAT was the point I was making and that I think is indeed "fairly obvious" Relating this to Michel's claim that businesses are able to arbitrarily raise their prices in the case of certain goods,  the opportunity cost of this – assuming the same volume of sales is maintained in the case of these goods – is that the market demand for other goods will go down,  And since the demand for these other goods goes down so too will their price – thus invalidating the suggestion that prices in general can be raised in this fashion (they can by inflating the currency but that is another matter) And companies can shrink too,  Nike which you earlier wrongly claimed "pretty much owns and controls the entire supply chain for their shoes " actually pulled out of shoe production as such to focus more on the branding and marketing side of the business.  This tendency to downsize and shed loads of workers by outsourcing various aspects of production , distirbution and even internal accounting is far nore common than you imagine and, if I remember correctly, there is a whole chapter devoted to precisely this development in Naomi Kleins book, No Logo

[robbo203]

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

Robbo203,my 2 cents, feel free to ignore since you were asking michel and if you think it matters who answers instead of the quality of the answer.

robbo203 wrote:

…If gold were to regularly fall from the skies then its value would drop to what is needed to collect it”.

Water regularly falls from the sky. So then bottled water which cost $2-$5 each should not exist by your theory.  Doesn't the existence of a robust market for bottled water kind of disprove your theory. 

No – why should it? I live near a spa town which manufactures bottled mineral water.  Quite apart from the extraction process there is the purification process that figures in the costs of production.  This is not to mention the cost of the bottles themselves and transportation costs

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

robbo203 wrote:

…3)           You failed to respond to my point that “If capitalists can just arbitrarily raise their prices or keep their prices high in the face of declining unit production costs then why don’t those capitalists that provide the inputs upon which other capitalists depend to manufacture their commodities, likewise raise the prices of THEIR commodities so that the unit costs of production of those other capitalists, instead of falling will be rising”.  If all capitalists, including those who produce intermediate goods as well as those who produce final goods, are able to just arbitrarily raise their prices, then this obviously negates the claim you make about prices in general steadily rising despite the falling costs of production (which would not be falling after all, in relative terms, since the prices of inputs would also be rising!)  

They do, but what happens is someone in the supply chain buys out the full supply chain.  Nike pretty much owns and controlls the entire supply chain for their shoes and invests (owns stock in ) the rubber companies for the shoe rubber, the textile companies for the shoe canvas, etc. in modern capitalism, the manufacturer is easily replaced and easily owned, but the customers are a finite limited resource.  If a rubber company asks for too much then nike just starts a new rubber company that it owns to compete with the old rubber compay.  Nike can not start a new customer base easily because of brand loyalty and fights for its customers.  other times the consolidation of supply chains is done by some middle agent in the supply chain like two companies own 95% of the soft drink market in the USA and just have different labels on different soft drinks that pretend to compete in the market place. 

 I dont  believe this is correct.   I stand to be corrected but I believe that Nike outsourced shoe production a long time ago .  I recall reading something about this in Naomi Kleins book,  No Logo.  In any event strictly speaking no single  business can possibily own its "full supply chain" given the integrated complexity of modern day production.  Even with the very largest business you can think of there comes a cut off point beyond which it is dependent on inputs that  derive from beyond its domain of ownership and control Quite apart from anything else this does still does not get round the problem Ive raised.  If producers of final goods can just arbitrarily raise their price then why cannot producers of intermediate goods also do that? Insofar as they can also do that then this invalidates Michel's argument  about falling production costs because the production costs would be rising in this case , not falling  

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

robbo203 wrote:

… 5)           Relatedly I have asked you several times to explain what would be the point in a business raising its prices so high that it will deter customers from buying its product and encourage them to look to other suppliers.  Businesses will tend to pitch their prices at a level at which which they can feel reasonably confident that their product will be sold and that places a very significant limit on how much they can raise their prices.  Your response to this is to suggest that capitalists will tend to resort to price fixing, limiting competition between themselves whereby they seek to undercut each other in a price war.  But even if this were the case – and there are all sorts of barriers that make this difficult, though not impossibile, to achieve – this would still not get round the basic problem.  If some companies raised their prices then consumers, if they continued to purchase those commodities at the same level as before, would have less money available to spend on other commodities.  In other words, the market demand for those other commodities would fall and so the companies producing these commodities would be obliged to reduce prices to attract more custom.  Its a case of swings and roundabouts

NO those companies would NOT be oblidged to reduce prices to attract more customers. YES, those companies would be obliged to invest money in an advertising campaign. I know. I've worked for those companies on advertising campaigns and as a consultant.  A new media campaign is the last and final gasp before a company finally goes bankrupt and gets bought and consolidated by it's competitors. they also routinely hire more new employees before they get bought out or go bankrupt.  It's something we in america learn to look for in applying for a job to try and guess how solvent the company is and if our boss is going to pay our salary or not.  

 If a company X prices a good at twice the level that company Y prices more or the less the same good then its fairly obvious that customers are going to switch loyalty from X to Y.  Of course , X is not "obliged" in some legalistic sense to reduce its prices.  It is quite at liberty to continue to pigheadedly charge above the going market rate but then customers too are not obliged to contnue loyally buying from X.  The likelihood is that they will forsake X for Y in their droves You then assert that a company like X, though it is not obliged to reduce its price, is neverthelss obliged to  "invest money in an advertising campaign" – presumably to convince custuomers that while they are paying above the going rate for more or less the same prpduct they are still getting value for money.  Again, they are not "obliged" to engage in advertising.  You might say instead it would help their cause if they did advertise .  But advertising costs money and the higher you want to raise the price of your commodity above the going market rate the more money you are going to have to splash out on advertising to convince people that they are getting "value for money".  This  puts a rather different complexion on Michels claim that capitalists can just arbitrarily raise prices to whatever they want in the face of falling production costs. He overlooks the hidden costs  and risks of raising your prices in a competitive market I would also add that advertising is a zero sum game.   To simply retain their same market share,  businesses have to spend more on advertising because other businesses are spending more on advertising.  .  They have to run faster and faster simply to stand still to coin an expression

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

Advertising didn't really exist in Marx time the same way it does today.  But your making another argument about swings and round abouts and it's maybe similar to the argument about leaches draining a person dry.  if one leach sucks all the blood out of a person then the other leaches have less?  isn't the total number of leaches limited by the total blood capacity of a town?  Well yes, that's true but all the leaches still try to suck the person as hard as they can anyway.  

 Whether or advertising existed in Marx's time is irrelevant to the point being made.  If  a company X puts up the price of its commodity and its customers continue to loyally buy this commdity from C to the same extent as before then the opportunity costs of their decision to do so is that they will have less money to spend on other commodities.  Meaning the market demand for other commodities will diminish to that extent.  This reduction in market demand means that the businesses supplying these commodities wil have to adjust prices downwards accordingly

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

Alan Kerr wrote:

@ LBird,“Let us now picture to ourselves, by way of change, a community of free individuals, carrying on their work with the means of production in common, in which the labour power of all the different individuals is consciously applied as the combined labour power of the community. All the characteristics of Robinson’s labour are here repeated, but with this difference, that they are social, instead of individual.”(Marx)

Yes, Alan, I know Marx's views about 'the democratic control of production by the direct producers' quite well.But I'm asking you about your views.Or are you interpreting Marx to be arguing for a 'Robinson Crusoe' society?It's an easy question to answer, really. Do you think that there is a fourth alternative, 'democratic socialism', to the three that you outlined earlier – individualism, elitism or chaos?If you are arguing for individualism, and calling it 'Robinson Crusoe socialism', that's fine by me – I just disagree with you politically, if that's the case, because I'm a 'democratic socialist', as I think Marx was. If you disagree, too, about Marx and democracy, that's OK by me.

Once again – this seems off topic as far as thsi thead is concerned.  Try another thread or start up a new one

[robbo203]

Michel,   With all due respect, I dont think you have really addressed the points I raised. Let me try to summarise the argument I presented earlier in opposition to your basic thesis that the labour theory of value has been marginalised because there is a growing divergence between, on the one hand, value  – and the falling costs of production – and, on the other, prices which have steadily risen as a consequence of this “creative power” you refer to that the capitalists wield in their lust to “accumulate profit”. (Incidentally, since capitalists have always and everywhere striven after increased profits, it is not clear to me why this particular approach of arbitrarily raising your prices away above the falling costs of production should have only come into fashion now in this “post industrial, post modern society” we are supposed to be living in) 1)            With regard to the empirical data to support your case, I am not asking for detailed evidence. Something as simple as a large scale study comparing wage rates and prices over a fairly long period of time, will do. The sole piece of evidence that Steve San Francisco presented in support of your argument is not really satisfactory since the firms engaging in price mark ups that the study refers to covered only 40% of all sales. What about the other 60%? I have never denied that some commodities could sell at prices above their notional value but the corrollary of that is that other commodities must sell below their value.  Moreover, I presented other evidence pointing to“seven categories of goods and services that are comparatively cheaper today than they were 10 years ago. All figures are based on a BLS comparison of like products and services from August 1998 and August 2008.”   These include phones, electronics, footwear, new vehicles, toys, apparel, watches” (http://www.bankrate.com/finance/personal-finance/7-falling-price-tags-1.aspx) 2)           You state that there is “no governing law that says the sum total of prices must equal the sum total of values”.  Indeed, you state that since some prices have no value in them at all it cannot possibly be true the total sum of prices must equate to the sum total of values. But this is based on a misunderstanding of the labour theory of value.  I will simply quote here from the SPGB’s pamphlet on Marxian economics which deals with this very point:  Under capitalism nearly everything is a commodity, or takes the form of a commodity, is bought and sold. This qualification is necessary to counter the argument often advanced against the Labour Theory of Value that some things that are bought and sold either are not products of labour or sell at prices quite out of proportion to the amount of labour embodied in them, e.g. land and objects of art. Land, under capitalism, has a price which, in its pure form, is merely the capitalisation of its rent. Land has no value as it is not the product of human labour. Paintings and antiques are indeed products of human labour but are not really commodities because they cannot be reproduced; the concept of "socially necessary labour" therefore has no meaning with reference to such articles. One silly objection is: why is a lump of gold from a meteorite valuable, when there is no labour embodied in it? Actually, this is a confirmation of the Labour Theory of Value since its value is the same as that of gold produced under normal conditions. If gold were to regularly fall from the skies then its value would drop to what is needed to collect it”. 3)           You failed to respond to my point that “If capitalists can just arbitrarily raise their prices or keep their prices high in the face of declining unit production costs then why don’t those capitalists that provide the inputs upon which other capitalists depend to manufacture their commodities, likewise raise the prices of THEIR commodities so that the unit costs of production of those other capitalists, instead of falling will be rising”.  If all capitalists, including those who produce intermediate goods as well as those who produce final goods, are able to just arbitrarily raise their prices, then this obviously negates the claim you make about prices in general steadily rising despite the falling costs of production (which would not be falling after all, in relative terms, since the prices of inputs would also be rising!)   4)           Since the costs of production include the wages bill that employers face, this would suggest a fall in the cost of production in the face of steadily rising commodity prices would translate into a steady fall in the pruchasing power of the working class.  In other words that the workers would be gettting poorer and poorer.   But this is not the case – at least not over the long run.  Over the long run workers’ living standards have generally risen.  Growth in living standards at the moment may be sluggish and even negative but this is less to do with capitalists arbitrarily raising prices in the face of falling production costs, than with the weak position of workers in today’s economic climate 5)           Relatedly I have asked you several times to explain what would be the point in a business raising its prices so high that it will deter customers from buying its product and encourage them to look to other suppliers.  Businesses will tend to pitch their prices at a level at which which they can feel reasonably confident that their product will be sold and that places a very significant limit on how much they can raise their prices.  Your response to this is to suggest that capitalists will tend to resort to price fixing, limiting competition between themselves whereby they seek to undercut each other in a price war.  But even if this were the case – and there are all sorts of barriers that make this difficult, though not impossibile, to achieve – this would still not get round the basic problem.  If some companies raised their prices then consumers, if they continued to purchase those commodities at the same level as before, would have less money available to spend on other commodities.  In other words, the market demand for those other commodities would fall and so the companies producing these commodities would be obliged to reduce prices to attract more custom.  Its a case of swings and roundabouts There are a number of additional points I could make but I think this will suffice for the moment.  I would greatly appreciate it if you could deal with what I have presented here on a point by point basis

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

ALB wrote:

Alan Kerr wrote:

@ LBird,No the alternative is not just democracy as such. The alternative to the market is in Marx’ Capital here.http://www.econlib.org/library/YPDBooks/Marx/mrxCpA1.html#I.I.133

As elaborated on in this article "A World Without Commodities" in this month's Socialist Standard:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2010s/2017/no-1357-september-2017/world-without-commodities

Thanks for the link, ALB,I can find mention of 'everything is social instead of individual', 'members', 'common holders of the wealth and resources of society', 'social relations', and,

SPGB article wrote:

This is what Marx sketches in his next example, where he describes an ‘association of free men’ who are ‘carrying on their work with the means of production in common’ so that the ‘labour-power of all the different individuals is consciously applied as the combined labour-power of the community’.

Yeah, 'association', 'production in common', 'combined' and 'community'… all fine.The only thing that I can't find is the word 'democracy'. Going by Alan's definition, these words and terms are just paying lip-service to 'social' concepts, because without the inclusion of Marx's democratic political underpinnings, the words are politically meaningless.Without any mention of democratic socialism, as the politically-binding method for all these social concepts, we're left, indeed, with Alan's trio of individualism, elitism or chaos, as our political choice of organising 'social', 'community', 'members', 'production in common', etc.That's my point. Alan seems to have confirmed what I thought that he meant, and you appear to be also confirming this lack of 'democratic socialism'. Unless you don't agree with the article, of course.Am I missing something?

 Can this be moved to another as it seems to be off topic here

[robbo203]

robbo203 wrote:

Let’s remind ourselves what the nub of this interesting debate is about.  The Marxist view is that increasing productivity, resulting from technological innovation, means a decline in unit costs and in the value content of individual commodities themselves.  This is because only living labour can create new values; machines only transfer the value already contained in them.  So as machines increasingly replace human labour, the effect should be a reduction in the value content of these commodities. That in turn should result in a lowering of prices since on average, over the long run, commodity prices broadly reflect their values  – the amount of socially necessary abstract labour required to produce them. That isnt happening, according to Michel so there must be some flaw in Marx's theory: " In fact, increasingly post-industrial, post-modern bourgeois-state-capitalism is abandoning, with the advent of ever-increasing automation, the limited parameters manufactured by socially necessary labor-time in favor of the unlimited parameters manufactured by conceptual-commodity-value-management, namely, arbitrary, socially constructed value, price and wage-determinations. "  According to Michel, the long run determination of market prices by labour values no longer really applies. It has been marginalised, rendered irrelevant and finally transcended by a mysterious new factor – namely the “creative power” of capitalists to arbitrarily assign prices to commodities just as they chose in their relentess desire to “accumulate profit, ad infinitum” (when did capitalists not desire to “accumulate profit, ad infinitum”, you might well ask!) .  So contrary to the expectation that increased productivity by increasing output should cause prices to fall, the opposite is true, he claims.  Prices are actually rising despite production costs falling (and I assume he is talking here of both prices and costs of production being adjusted for inflation).  As he puts it: “Marx was wrong to think that capitalists would lower prices when production costs went down. To circumvent this faulty Marxist logic, capitalists simply made deals among themselves within their specific industries to limit competition among themselves so as to keep profits high and ever-increasing”.  I have asked Michel for large-scale economy-wide data to back up this claim but he has yet to provide this data.  It’s easy enough to provide anecdotal evidence of individual prices outstripping their costs of production which may indeed be falling.  I have given examples of this myself in the case of certain branded “status goods”.  Their prices have risen sharply thanks in part to the aggressive marketing of such goods while the costs of producing them have fallen as result of outsourcing to various Third world countries where labour is much cheaper.  But in no way does this contradict the Marxian view that increasing productivity tends to cheapen the commodities being produced.  Nor does the fact the wage increases may temporally dip below price increases from time to time – causing living standards to drop – prove Michel’s basic point that the capitalists can just arbitrarily raise prices by exerting their “creative power”.  They can’t. Rather what this shows instead is the weakened bargaining position of workers vis-à-vis the capitalists – for example, at a time of economic recession.  In other words that would be misinterpreting what is happening as evidence to support his central argument. It doesn’t demonstrate the freedom of the capitalists to just arbitrarily raise prices to whatever they want but rather the relative lack of freedom of workers to resist the downward pressure on wages in an economic recession.   Not only that, there is a huge problem with his whole argument which Michel does not appear to see.  If capitalists can just arbitrarily raise their prices or keep their prices high in the face of declining unit production costs then why don’t those capitalists that provide the inputs upon which other capitalists depend to manufacture their commodities, likewise raise the prices of THEIR commodities so that the unit costs of production of those other capitalists, instead of falling will be rising? Why is it assumed that only the producers of final goods are able to circumvent the need to undercut their rivals by limiting competition between themselves but not the producers of intermediate goods – that is, the goods that constitute the inputs needed to make other goods? This makes no sense.  Are not the producers of intermediate goods also driven by the need to “accumulate profit, ad infinitum” ? So what is so special about the producers of final goods that enables them to hold down their costs of production but increase the price of the commodities they sell to whatever they want, which the producers of intermediate goods cannot do? Michel does not explain.  There is a further point to consider and I have pressed Michel on this but have yet to receive a satisfactory answer. The costs of production, include crucially, labour costs – the wages bill.  If these latter are slipping further and further behind rising prices (which have supposedly been arbitrarily raised by the capitalists whose “greed continually short-circuits Marx's elegant, scientifically quantifiable labor-time analysis” – at least in the advanced capitalist countries) then this begs all sorts of questions  – not the least of which is why have these capitalists chosen now in this supposed post-modern era we are living in, to assert their “greed” in this way and only in the advanced capitalist economies, not the third world economies where Michel concedes Marx’s theory is “still valid” Let’s look at this claim more closely.  The point of a business producing a commodity is to sell it and to realise a profit by doing so.  So what is the point of pitching the price of a commodity so high that it cannot be sold and particularly when all that will do is force consumers to turn to some other, cheaper, supplier?  If real wages are declining as part of the general decline in the costs of production then this would be even truer – workers would have even more reason to look around for the best possible bargain in the market.  As a capitalist you would need to reduce your prices accordingly so that the good in question is not beyond the pocket of your potential customer – if you are to attract their custom.  Otherwise you will just be left with a whole bunch of unsold goods and there is no point in that – is there?  If capitalists are truly motivated by the desire to accumulate profit as Michel says then it is absolutely essential that they sell their commodities in the first place and that means selling them at a price that is not going to encourage their customers to look elsewhere.  It seems to me that the only way in which he can sustain his argument and make it sound remotely plausible is if he were to argue that there are certain kinds of commodities that are simply indispensable to workers such that they cannot do without them and that the capitalists supplying these commodities can somehow conspire together with their commercial rivals to agree to push up the price of these commodities and not to break rank with each other – in other words to suspend the normal struggle between themselves over the size of the market share they command. In an increasingly globalised economy that seems even less unlikely but even if such a price fixing conspiracy could be organised and adhered to, this does not get round another very basic problem which Michel completely neglects to address.  The problem is this.   The opportunity costs of consumers having to pay more for these particular commodities means EITHER that they will have to buy less of these (now more expensive) commodities OR if they continue to purchase these commodities at the same volume as before, that these consumers will then have less money to  spend on other commodities.  That is to say, the market demand for these other commodities will fall and so the capitalists supplying these other commodities will be obliged to reduce their prices accordingly if they are not to be left with huge stockpiles of unsold goods at the end of the day.  Either way the outcome will be the same – namely to validate the basic point that you cannot just arbitrarily raise prices beyond what the market can sustain from the standpoint of the economy as a whole.  Certainly you can modify the pattern of demand but there is a zero sum game at work here to which Michel seems quite oblivious  To fill in the huge gaping holes in his argument, Michel introduces another factor – debtOf course, the working population is seemingly making more money, today, but this is not true, as prices have been increasing at a faster rate then wages/salaries, and compounded with an ever-increasing ability to BORROW, means that an illusion of wealth grounded in debt is enveloping and masking the true nature of living in post-industrial, post-modern capitalist society, opulent poverty. This illusion of wealth is masking a fundamental contradiction, a poverty clothed in opulence, where the majority of the working population are inundated with commodities and luxury goods, goods that they do not really own outright, but make monthly or bi-weekly payments upon, debt peonage/Debt slavery masked in seeming opulence.  Unless I have misunderstood him here, what he seems to saying is that the growing gap between falling wages and rising prices is something that is increasingly being filled by workers taking out loans and falling into debt.  Ironically, Michel himself talks of this development as signifying simply an “illusion of wealth” and, in so doing, unwittingly confirms the validity of the Marxian theory rather than repudiates it.  All debt does is delay the inevitable rather than banish it.  You can’t just conjure market demand out of thin air.  You can’t just spend your way out of a crisis as the Keynesians would have it with their talk of “demand management” and pump priming.  There remains still the key point about the labour theory of value which Michel simply skirts over but which is fatally damaging to his whole argument – namely that at the end of the day, the sum total of prices in a capitalist economy must equate with the sum total of values generated in that economy.  This is because value, as a magnitude signifying socially necessary abstract labour, only reveals itself in exchange – in exchange value or the proportions in which commodities exchange.  Some goods can indeed sell at a price above their notional value but the necessary corollary of this is that other goods must sell at a price below their notional value.  That means it is literally impossible that goods in general or in the  aggregate can sell at a price above their value.  Of course, it is quite true that the relative share of the social product that the workers receive in the form of their wages can vary upwards or downwards.  For instance, according to the Economic Policy Institute, between 1979 and 2009 U.S. productivity increased by 80 percent, while the hourly wage of the median American worker went up by only 10.1 percent.  ("The Sad But True Story of Wages in America", Lawrence Mishel and Heidi Shierholz, Economic Policy Institute, Issue Brief no.297, March 14, 2011).  In other words most of the gains in productivity went to the super rich – the top 1%.  While the real wages of workers grew by very little they nevertheless grew- thus disproving the suggestion that living standards have declined because capitalists can arbitrarily or permanently raise the prices that workers have to pay for goods above what workers are themselves paid in the form of wages.  The mistake that Michel makes is to assume that the capitalists have increased their wealth in the form of profits simply by putting up prices.  But profit is not made at the point of sale.  Rather, it is made at the point of production and is only realised at the point of sale.   In other words he is   misinterpreting the growing share of social product going to the capitalists as evidence for saying the labour theory of value is no longer relevant when what it is really signifying is an increase in the rate of exploitation which is precisely what the theory seeks to demonstrate.  The increased debt that workers are saddled with these days is simply a reflection of the increased share of the economic surplus appropriated by the financial capitalists and banking sector at the expense of the traditional industrial capitalists.  It is not a magic money tree that allows the system to bridge the gap between falling costs of production and the ever rising price of commodities brought about by the capitalists suddenly deciding to become terribly greedy in the last two or three decades or so.

 There is a usful link here which might throw more light on some of the  arguments presented above  https://libcom.org/library/marxian-economics-curriculum-1935-iww-work-peoples-college

[robbo203]

Let’s remind ourselves what the nub of this interesting debate is about.  The Marxist view is that increasing productivity, resulting from technological innovation, means a decline in unit costs and in the value content of individual commodities themselves.  This is because only living labour can create new values; machines only transfer the value already contained in them.  So as machines increasingly replace human labour, the effect should be a reduction in the value content of these commodities. That in turn should result in a lowering of prices since on average, over the long run, commodity prices broadly reflect their values  – the amount of socially necessary abstract labour required to produce them. That isnt happening, according to Michel so there must be some flaw in Marx's theory: " In fact, increasingly post-industrial, post-modern bourgeois-state-capitalism is abandoning, with the advent of ever-increasing automation, the limited parameters manufactured by socially necessary labor-time in favor of the unlimited parameters manufactured by conceptual-commodity-value-management, namely, arbitrary, socially constructed value, price and wage-determinations. "  According to Michel, the long run determination of market prices by labour values no longer really applies. It has been marginalised, rendered irrelevant and finally transcended by a mysterious new factor – namely the “creative power” of capitalists to arbitrarily assign prices to commodities just as they chose in their relentess desire to “accumulate profit, ad infinitum” (when did capitalists not desire to “accumulate profit, ad infinitum”, you might well ask!) .  So contrary to the expectation that increased productivity by increasing output should cause prices to fall, the opposite is true, he claims.  Prices are actually rising despite production costs falling (and I assume he is talking here of both prices and costs of production being adjusted for inflation).  As he puts it: “Marx was wrong to think that capitalists would lower prices when production costs went down. To circumvent this faulty Marxist logic, capitalists simply made deals among themselves within their specific industries to limit competition among themselves so as to keep profits high and ever-increasing”.  I have asked Michel for large-scale economy-wide data to back up this claim but he has yet to provide this data.  It’s easy enough to provide anecdotal evidence of individual prices outstripping their costs of production which may indeed be falling.  I have given examples of this myself in the case of certain branded “status goods”.  Their prices have risen sharply thanks in part to the aggressive marketing of such goods while the costs of producing them have fallen as result of outsourcing to various Third world countries where labour is much cheaper.  But in no way does this contradict the Marxian view that increasing productivity tends to cheapen the commodities being produced.  Nor does the fact the wage increases may temporally dip below price increases from time to time – causing living standards to drop – prove Michel’s basic point that the capitalists can just arbitrarily raise prices by exerting their “creative power”.  They can’t. Rather what this shows instead is the weakened bargaining position of workers vis-à-vis the capitalists – for example, at a time of economic recession.  In other words that would be misinterpreting what is happening as evidence to support his central argument. It doesn’t demonstrate the freedom of the capitalists to just arbitrarily raise prices to whatever they want but rather the relative lack of freedom of workers to resist the downward pressure on wages in an economic recession.   Not only that, there is a huge problem with his whole argument which Michel does not appear to see.  If capitalists can just arbitrarily raise their prices or keep their prices high in the face of declining unit production costs then why don’t those capitalists that provide the inputs upon which other capitalists depend to manufacture their commodities, likewise raise the prices of THEIR commodities so that the unit costs of production of those other capitalists, instead of falling will be rising? Why is it assumed that only the producers of final goods are able to circumvent the need to undercut their rivals by limiting competition between themselves but not the producers of intermediate goods – that is, the goods that constitute the inputs needed to make other goods? This makes no sense.  Are not the producers of intermediate goods also driven by the need to “accumulate profit, ad infinitum” ? So what is so special about the producers of final goods that enables them to hold down their costs of production but increase the price of the commodities they sell to whatever they want, which the producers of intermediate goods cannot do? Michel does not explain.  There is a further point to consider and I have pressed Michel on this but have yet to receive a satisfactory answer. The costs of production, include crucially, labour costs – the wages bill.  If these latter are slipping further and further behind rising prices (which have supposedly been arbitrarily raised by the capitalists whose “greed continually short-circuits Marx's elegant, scientifically quantifiable labor-time analysis” – at least in the advanced capitalist countries) then this begs all sorts of questions  – not the least of which is why have these capitalists chosen now in this supposed post-modern era we are living in, to assert their “greed” in this way and only in the advanced capitalist economies, not the third world economies where Michel concedes Marx’s theory is “still valid” Let’s look at this claim more closely.  The point of a business producing a commodity is to sell it and to realise a profit by doing so.  So what is the point of pitching the price of a commodity so high that it cannot be sold and particularly when all that will do is force consumers to turn to some other, cheaper, supplier?  If real wages are declining as part of the general decline in the costs of production then this would be even truer – workers would have even more reason to look around for the best possible bargain in the market.  As a capitalist you would need to reduce your prices accordingly so that the good in question is not beyond the pocket of your potential customer – if you are to attract their custom.  Otherwise you will just be left with a whole bunch of unsold goods and there is no point in that – is there?  If capitalists are truly motivated by the desire to accumulate profit as Michel says then it is absolutely essential that they sell their commodities in the first place and that means selling them at a price that is not going to encourage their customers to look elsewhere.  It seems to me that the only way in which he can sustain his argument and make it sound remotely plausible is if he were to argue that there are certain kinds of commodities that are simply indispensable to workers such that they cannot do without them and that the capitalists supplying these commodities can somehow conspire together with their commercial rivals to agree to push up the price of these commodities and not to break rank with each other – in other words to suspend the normal struggle between themselves over the size of the market share they command. In an increasingly globalised economy that seems even less unlikely but even if such a price fixing conspiracy could be organised and adhered to, this does not get round another very basic problem which Michel completely neglects to address.  The problem is this.   The opportunity costs of consumers having to pay more for these particular commodities means EITHER that they will have to buy less of these (now more expensive) commodities OR if they continue to purchase these commodities at the same volume as before, that these consumers will then have less money to  spend on other commodities.  That is to say, the market demand for these other commodities will fall and so the capitalists supplying these other commodities will be obliged to reduce their prices accordingly if they are not to be left with huge stockpiles of unsold goods at the end of the day.  Either way the outcome will be the same – namely to validate the basic point that you cannot just arbitrarily raise prices beyond what the market can sustain from the standpoint of the economy as a whole.  Certainly you can modify the pattern of demand but there is a zero sum game at work here to which Michel seems quite oblivious  To fill in the huge gaping holes in his argument, Michel introduces another factor – debtOf course, the working population is seemingly making more money, today, but this is not true, as prices have been increasing at a faster rate then wages/salaries, and compounded with an ever-increasing ability to BORROW, means that an illusion of wealth grounded in debt is enveloping and masking the true nature of living in post-industrial, post-modern capitalist society, opulent poverty. This illusion of wealth is masking a fundamental contradiction, a poverty clothed in opulence, where the majority of the working population are inundated with commodities and luxury goods, goods that they do not really own outright, but make monthly or bi-weekly payments upon, debt peonage/Debt slavery masked in seeming opulence.  Unless I have misunderstood him here, what he seems to saying is that the growing gap between falling wages and rising prices is something that is increasingly being filled by workers taking out loans and falling into debt.  Ironically, Michel himself talks of this development as signifying simply an “illusion of wealth” and, in so doing, unwittingly confirms the validity of the Marxian theory rather than repudiates it.  All debt does is delay the inevitable rather than banish it.  You can’t just conjure market demand out of thin air.  You can’t just spend your way out of a crisis as the Keynesians would have it with their talk of “demand management” and pump priming.  There remains still the key point about the labour theory of value which Michel simply skirts over but which is fatally damaging to his whole argument – namely that at the end of the day, the sum total of prices in a capitalist economy must equate with the sum total of values generated in that economy.  This is because value, as a magnitude signifying socially necessary abstract labour, only reveals itself in exchange – in exchange value or the proportions in which commodities exchange.  Some goods can indeed sell at a price above their notional value but the necessary corollary of this is that other goods must sell at a price below their notional value.  That means it is literally impossible that goods in general or in the  aggregate can sell at a price above their value.  Of course, it is quite true that the relative share of the social product that the workers receive in the form of their wages can vary upwards or downwards.  For instance, according to the Economic Policy Institute, between 1979 and 2009 U.S. productivity increased by 80 percent, while the hourly wage of the median American worker went up by only 10.1 percent.  ("The Sad But True Story of Wages in America", Lawrence Mishel and Heidi Shierholz, Economic Policy Institute, Issue Brief no.297, March 14, 2011).  In other words most of the gains in productivity went to the super rich – the top 1%.  While the real wages of workers grew by very little they nevertheless grew- thus disproving the suggestion that living standards have declined because capitalists can arbitrarily or permanently raise the prices that workers have to pay for goods above what workers are themselves paid in the form of wages.  The mistake that Michel makes is to assume that the capitalists have increased their wealth in the form of profits simply by putting up prices.  But profit is not made at the point of sale.  Rather, it is made at the point of production and is only realised at the point of sale.   In other words he is   misinterpreting the growing share of social product going to the capitalists as evidence for saying the labour theory of value is no longer relevant when what it is really signifying is an increase in the rate of exploitation which is precisely what the theory seeks to demonstrate.  The increased debt that workers are saddled with these days is simply a reflection of the increased share of the economic surplus appropriated by the financial capitalists and banking sector at the expense of the traditional industrial capitalists.  It is not a magic money tree that allows the system to bridge the gap between falling costs of production and the ever rising price of commodities brought about by the capitalists suddenly deciding to become terribly greedy in the last two or three decades or so.

[robbo203]

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

,If everybody paid at the cash register a price that was wage normalized, than would that not be a wageless society in that everyone effectively has the same buying power regardliess of their wage? 

No. Obviously.  Socialism does not mean "everybody gets paid the same".  Socialism is a society in which "payment " ( i.e. economic exchange, market transactions, buying and sellinng , money , barter etc etc) ceases to exist.  Period.  This has been said to you many times. Why do you continue to ask questions that presuppose something else?

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