Marx and Automation

[alanjjohnstone]

Purely in regard to Nike

Quote:

Yet NIKE owns no factories for manufacturing its footwear and apparel, which make up ~88% of its revenues. Instead, manufacturing is outsourced to third parties because of the cost advantages of doing so. Most raw materials in NIKE’s supply chain are sourced in the manufacturing host country by independent contractors

Nor has it a monopolistic control as the main customer

Quote:

Overseas manufacturing of products features in the strategies of rivals Under Armour Inc. (UA), VF Corporation (VFC), Lululemon Athletica Inc. (LULU), and Adidas AG (ADDYY) as well.

http://marketrealist.com/2014/12/overview-nikes-supply-chain-manufacturing-strategies/

[Anonymous]

Kind of a different commentary of marx and automation. this TED talk argues about the economic model assumptions in capitalism and from what I understand these are the same assumptions built into marx theory. Or more likely I'm ignorant about marx on this point. and I'm suggesting the TED tallk as a "notion" I think might be relevant, not a "conviction" that I think must be true no matter what else. ""When the crisis came, the serious limitations of existing economic and financial models immediately became apparent." "There is also a strong belief, which I share, that bad or oversimplistic and overconfident economics helped create the crisis."is https://www.ted.com/talks/james_b_glattfelder_who_controls_the_world/transcript?language=en#t-831623Robbo203, you 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!)  . . . 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 controlQuite 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

Companies can charge $5 to a consumer for a bottle of water because the consumer doesn't know right then and there at the exact time and location of the exchange a the beach concession stand how and were to get cheep water from the sky into their mouth right then and there at that exact time and location.  the next customer doesn't know either.  the first customer if she discovers there's a drinking fountain behind the sculpture that offers free water probably doesn't find that out before buying the water and if she does find out later it doesn't help her get cheep water when she is three blocks away visiting her friend in another neighborhood.  So when selling to a consumer the information advantage of the seller in a one seller to many buyers market allows high profits.  When the bottle water company buys plastic for making bottles it buys it repeatedly at large volume at the same location.  A company buying 500 tons of raw plastic to make bottles with isn't going to be fooled into not spotting free plastic on the other side of a sculpture for long and isn't going to let a 3 blocks walk deter it from shopping around for a better price. For large and repeated purchases like "business to business" it's almost impossible for one business to gain and maintain an information advantage over another business.  The exception is maybe for mergers and aquisitioins and other one time business purchase of another business which often depend on information assymetry to set the price of the stock buy out.  Nike doesn't "own" it's supply chain exactly, but it has stock in it's supply chain and people on the board of directors of the rubber company that represent Nike ownership shares and look out for nike.  Nike also has stock options and other ways of controlling their supply chain such as a "hedge fund" investment in the competitors to the nike owned supply chain. Outsourcing, as Klien's book will confirm, doesn't change the reality that Nike effectively controls the outsourced companies and the "outsourciing" is really a legal fiction to give Nike plausible deniablilty of crimes and wrongdoing done by the outsourced company.  NIke is happy to let people believe the rubber company using slave labor is independent of them and an outsourced part of their production process.  But since nike buys 99% of the rubber from that one company and has contractual agreements with that one rubber company, then it's effectively under the control and management of Nike.  You might think of the outsourced rubber company as a wage slave for Nike by analogy. 

robbo203 wrote:

 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 

LOL, tell it to the billion dollar advertising agencies who's job is to ensure customers do exactly the opposite of what you claim is "fairly obvious".  Tell it to apple who everyone agreed sold an less proceessing power and less ram for more money that those generic windows machines and made a fortune. Human utuility Value to the consumer and sale price are only loosely related in capital economics.  More often what's being sold is "status value" like I can't get a job if i walk into an interview as a designer with a PC laptop and having a mac laptop is a pre-requisite for working as a designer in San francisco.  You can't get the job without it. 

robbo203 wrote:

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 marketI 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 

I mostly agree with what you write here.  you can get rid of the word obliged if you want and it's not important to me.  My main disagreement is that advertisers don't try to convince people they are getting "value for money".  That's not what I learned in advertising 101 at the academy of art univeristy.  Advertising create an artificial demand for purchasing their products using any means or argument or trick that works.  Sometimes for some products they might make a "value for money" type commercial, but our professor said that is rarely good use of advertising efforts because consumers wouldn't trust an advertisement made by the company to give a fair explanation of value. If people want to know the utility value of a product they go on youtube and look at customer reviews not advertising.  Usually the commercials and advertising are about branding and building a loyal (aka caputured) market base of loyal consumers who buy for irrational reasons.DO NOT fall for the capitalist conception and pre-conceptioni that consumers are "rational actors".  if consumers were "rational actors" then a lot of things would be different from the reality we see.   Advertisers know consumers are not "rational actors", Marx maybe sometimes he seems to know that but sometimes like in his theory of labor he just ignores irrational consumption and waves his hands to say it all evens out some how to make no difference.  Advertsing is a zero sum game for the econonomy as a whole, but not a zero sum game for individual business. by analogy, trees grow taller and upward to capture light from other trees that are smaller and lower to the ground.  Growing taller for trees is a zero sum game.  But despite the zero sum nature of trees growing up they still do it. If you want to understand a forest you need to understand "trees growing up taller" better than just saying it's a zero sum game and ending the conversation.

robbo203 wrote:

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

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. translating the forest analogy back into the market analogy. . .this would say yes, the available money and profit to the other business as aggregates decreases if one business grows. But the result is some busines get bought out and consolidated or die.  At some point if enough business die there'll be a chance for a young startup to enter the market with a new technology or new business model, but that could take a while and you need to buy your bottled water or iphone today.  

---

Thanks for the interesting questions. I could be wrong about this and it's just opinion without much empiricle support or deep thinking on my part.  Empirical support cost lots and lots of effort and I'm focusing my effort on launching the "hours equals price project" which works on a completely different economic principle.  Deep thinking requires rigid adhereance to a complex and developed paradigm or conceptual model of reality such as marx or capitalism and doesn't have much validity outside the assumptions of that particular paradigm or conceptual model.  

[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

[Anonymous]

robbo203 wrote:

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

Robbo 203 is like Cassius Clay, he has a very good right jack. complete knock out immediately. In this whole thread, he had made a very good profound detailed analysis. He should write an article for the Socialist Standard, although this ideas are not new, they come from the revisionist left of France, old illusions presented as new illusions, they are like the Lacanian left who are speaking about a so called Post-Marxism

[Anonymous]

robbo203 wrote:

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"

Yeah well, like I said elsewhere, you and marx aren't wrong.  But you have to recognize the nature of the trees to undeststand the forest.  In this analogy money would be more like sunlight with different companies (trees) capturing different amounts of sunlight.  Trees just want to grow tall and take in as much sunlight as they can.    

robbo203 wrote:

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)

Well, I think you've missunderstood the analogy and how capitalism works.  In a capitalist market price of a specefic product doesn't go down just because aggregate demand goes down.  Nor does marginal profit on a product  go down because aggregate demand goes down necessarily.    Think of the trees and sunshine analogy again.  If one tree (company) grows tall (gains market share) and takes up all the sun (money), then it affects different trees differently.  one tree (rebock sports shoes) can't live in the shadow of a larger tree (nike sports shoes) and dies.  trees of the reboc species that sell sports shoes in cities with few nike stores still do fine.  Reboc shoe trees in the shadow of a Nike shoe tree might be able to survive if there's a lot of sunshine like a busy mall with lots of consumers.  So the price of the shoe doesn't change for reboc or nike which is usually set nationally for all markets (forests) to be the same.  Notice that trees compete for sunshine in many many places and some places aspent trees thrive and some places pine trees thrive and some places we have scrub brush and no trees.  that's how products and companies and such work.  think of a market as analogous to some small region of space like forest or a hill or a valley or an island.  think of individial trees as individual products and they come have species and such just like real trees.  individual species and types of trees have different innaleniable characterists like an aspen tree will always require more sunlight than a pine tree to produce a pound of wood, but it does it faster.  you might also want to bring in a leaf analogy with a reboc tree having leaves for each of it's specefic shoes in a store and one shoe type might be shaded by a nearby pine tree and never get bought, but another leaf might get sunlight and be enough to support the rest of the tree.  Trees are like stores and leaves are product lines in stores maybe?  

robbo203 wrote:

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

the range of an aspen grove might shrink if a lot of pine trees somehow establish themeselves in the market and take all the sun in that particular market leaving the aspen trees with only shadow.  Aspen trees require a lot of sun and don't tolerate cold weather.   An increase of pine trees in the middle of the aspen grove doesn't cause the aspen trees to lower the amount of sunlight they need to survive.   But it might kill off a few aspen trees allowing some low light shrub to establish themselves in a few years (vans shoes) and then vans shoes shrubs compete with nike pine tree stores.  Vans shoes kind of strangle the roots of big trees and can often climb up a tree like a vine and strangle the competition that way.  There's all sorts of wild interactions that take place in a marketplace (forest) when you stop looking at the forest as a whole and start to really see how the trees operate in relationship to their neighbors and the resources available.  I guess in summary. . .. Company = species of plant that consumes sun. ex: trees. Nike nationwideSunlight = money which if aggregated is aggegate demand, but actually falls unevenly on different stores/trees. speciefic store = Specefic tree like the tree on the cornerLeaves = specefic products in a specefic store. for example the "nike air" or the "rebock flight"I don't know if that's exactly right, but it's closer than aggegating everything and applying the aggregate economic analogy.    

[alanjjohnstone]

Quote:

Nike doesn't "own" it's supply chain exactly, but it has stock in it's supply chain and people on the board of directors of the rubber company that represent Nike ownership shares and look out for nike.  Nike also has stock options and other ways of controlling their supply chain such as a "hedge fund"

This is a claim you are making and i would like to see some evidence of it. Ownership of even those low in the feeding chain are recorded somewhere.But my impression of the sweated labour i have personally witnessed, not for the major brands, but for the fake copies, is that it depends on a front room with several sewing machines. As i posted, Nike is not the only major player and rivals such as Adidas do exist.Are you saying they too share directorships and controlling stock in "independent" sub-contractors and collude together?Then evidence should be produced for this assertion that the independent owners reduce their prices not out of competition with one another to gain contracts with the transnationals but because pressure is exerted from within those out-sourcers by its major stock-holders – Nike and others.And can we say a company like Foxxconn are insignificant and lack economic power that it's totally dependent on Apple investors. I don't think that is the reality, is it?Those who own the rubber plantations are not impotent and have formed thier own state-supported trade organisations to influence  the price of rubber which reflects with the price of oil because of artificial rubber and that is determined by world markets and not a solitary or even a cartel in the garments industry. You seem to endow some capitalist enterprises with a power they simply do not possess.

[Anonymous]

Sears is turning some of their store into pieces and there are predictions that shopping mall are going to become ghosts town. Corporations do shrink and are wiped out from the market like Pan American airways   Capitalism is a very unstable system   There is a phone company in Brazil that is already taking a big chunk of the smart phone market. The capitalists lovers become blind in front of the reality. Countries also shrinks the us is becoming a second level world power   That shit about the third world belongs to the past there is only one world. After WWII. England became a third level power and the Russians defeated the most powerful and advanced economy of Europe. There is nothing permanent in this society.  The Yankees can not kick butts like before. This is the century of Chinese capitalism 

[Anonymous]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Quote:

Nike doesn't "own" it's supply chain exactly, but it has stock in it's supply chain and people on the board of directors of the rubber company that represent Nike ownership shares and look out for nike.  Nike also has stock options and other ways of controlling their supply chain such as a "hedge fund"

This is a claim you are making and i would like to see some evidence of it. Ownership of even those low in the feeding chain are recorded somewhere.But my impression of the sweated labour i have personally witnessed, not for the major brands, but for the fake copies, is that it depends on a front room with several sewing machines. As i posted, Nike is not the only major player and rivals such as Adidas do exist.Are you saying they too share directorships and controlling stock in "independent" sub-contractors and collude together?Then evidence should be produced for this assertion that the independent owners reduce their prices not out of competition with one another to gain contracts with the transnationals but because pressure is exerted from within those out-sourcers by its major stock-holders – Nike and others.And can we say a company like Foxxconn are insignificant and lack economic power that it's totally dependent on Apple investors. I don't think that is the reality, is it?Those who own the rubber plantations are not impotent and have formed thier own state-supported trade organisations to influence  the price of rubber which reflects with the price of oil because of artificial rubber and that is determined by world markets and not a solitary or even a cartel in the garments industry. You seem to endow some capitalist enterprises with a power they simply do not possess.

Probably, he doesn't know about the millitary interventions, killings, and coup d'tats  of the US goverment and its corporation to  control and dominate the production and the plantation of rubber around the world, specially in South America ,and Brazil who was one of the biggest exporter of Rubber, and all the billions produced and stolen by Goodyear.Many natives of the jungle of Brazil were removed and killed in order to steal the rubber from that region, and partially the Vietnam war was in order to take control of the rubber plantations, althought they already had synthetic rubber which was invented by the German.  Before that the Japanese had total control of the total market of rubber in AsiaDuring WWII that struggle to obtain more rubber was intensified by Goodyear and Michelin, and the Canal of Panama also played an important role in the transportation of the raw material to produce rubber.Some big producers and planters of rubber have created a cartel to control the distribution, the production and the pricing of rubbers backed by the support of goverment and others organizations and others capitalists have also tried to destroy the cartel to take control of the market. The world is control by the market, The 2008 crisis was not a crisis of mismanagement and wrong decision, it was the natural act of the capitalist economu, it is part of ilaw of operations, and it was not a financial crisis, it was a crisis of super-prodiuction, it was not a shortage of commodities, on the contrary workers produced too much commodities for the capitalist class, and despite that hunger, misery, poverty and unemployment increased drastically

[Anonymous]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Quote:

Nike doesn't "own" it's supply chain exactly, but it has stock in it's supply chain and people on the board of directors of the rubber company that represent Nike ownership shares and look out for nike.  Nike also has stock options and other ways of controlling their supply chain such as a "hedge fund"

This is a claim you are making and i would like to see some evidence of it. Ownership of even those low in the feeding chain are recorded somewhere.But my impression of the sweated labour i have personally witnessed, not for the major brands, but for the fake copies, is that it depends on a front room with several sewing machines. As i posted, Nike is not the only major player and rivals such as Adidas do exist.Are you saying they too share directorships and controlling stock in "independent" sub-contractors and collude together?Then evidence should be produced for this assertion that the independent owners reduce their prices not out of competition with one another to gain contracts with the transnationals but because pressure is exerted from within those out-sourcers by its major stock-holders – Nike and others.And can we say a company like Foxxconn are insignificant and lack economic power that it's totally dependent on Apple investors. I don't think that is the reality, is it?Those who own the rubber plantations are not impotent and have formed thier own state-supported trade organisations to influence  the price of rubber which reflects with the price of oil because of artificial rubber and that is determined by world markets and not a solitary or even a cartel in the garments industry. You seem to endow some capitalist enterprises with a power they simply do not possess.

This analysis and report confirms what Alan has just said, and it shows the condition of our so called post-industrial world. https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2011/09/nike-s08.html

[Alan Kerr]

@Steve-SanFrancisco@Michel Luc Bellemare Steve, Today Crusoe needs to know how to share total labour between getting (1) means to work–wood to build shelter (2) means to subsist–food to eat today. It is Crusoe who knows to change way to share his total labour-time in a different way each day to stay alive. Can you show that Crusoe has this wrong? Can you show that Crusoe should see what is going on with trees when he stops looking at the forest as a whole? Can you argue that Crusoe should focus just on 1 and forget 2 or vice versa? How would that work out in practice? How then could Crusoe stay alive? You should explain that for us. That is if you are right about the market. When you explain how this can work with Crusoe. Then and only then can anyone take your argument seriously about the market. Michel Luc Bellemare can see this and so he has given up his argument I think. With you the penny has not yet dropped. The penny is about to drop we hope. And if your argument cannot make sense on Crusoe’s island then it cannot make sense anywhere. Then that is the end of your augment. Then the market is working. Then commodities do still tend to sell at price of production. 

[Anonymous]

Alan Kerr wrote:

@Steve-SanFrancisco@Michel Luc Bellemare Steve, Today Crusoe needs to know how to share total labour between getting (1) means to work–wood to build shelter (2) means to subsist–food to eat today. It is Crusoe who knows to change way to share his total labour-time in a different way each day to stay alive. Can you show that Crusoe has this wrong? Can you show that Crusoe should see what is going on with trees when he stops looking at the forest as a whole? Can you argue that Crusoe should focus just on 1 and forget 2 or vice versa? How would that work out in practice? How then could Crusoe stay alive? You should explain that for us. That is if you are right about the market. When you explain how this can work with Crusoe. Then and only then can anyone take your argument seriously about the market. Michel Luc Bellemare can see this and so he has given up his argument I think. With you the penny has not yet dropped. The penny is about to drop we hope. And if your argument cannot make sense on Crusoe’s island then it cannot make sense anywhere. Then that is the end of your augment. Then the market is working. Then commodities do still tend to sell at price of production. 

I don't know much about crusoe, but I suspect it doesn't involve advertising agencies or bottled water sales or coordinating with strangers across vast distances speaking different languages to organize mega projects.  You can decide how crusoe devides whatever he wants to devide.  I'm critiqueing real world capitalism as it currently exist in fully developed american markets. I'm not really sure of all the economic flows in the real world but It's pretty clear they don't match waht crusoe would expect.  Crusoe seems to have his own little private island economy and I think he's pretty lucky for it and hope it lasts for him as long as possible before modern multinational capital decides to turn his island into a rubber plantation. but you might consider this connundrum. . . Marx postulated his theory of labor value on the economics as he saw it, but he also postulated that capitalism contained the seeds of it's own destruction.  does he postulate what the theory of labor value would look like in an economy where the seeds of capitalism's destruction are more than just seeds and have grown to become economic sectors and major parts of the economy?  Maybe if the theory of Labor value and Marx and automation seem to break the paradigm, it's because of the reasons marx said that the paradigm would break?  ps. what about the marvin islands?  how about john gaults island?  Does john gault island work any different than crusoes? I've been told repeatedly that "socialist island" doesn't exist and has never been tried?  seems silly not to try it with so many islands.

[Alan Kerr]

@Steve-SanFrancisco Think of total forest rather than just trees. You’re getting it Steve. For us what is switching total labour between all those things in proportions that change all the time with needs ways and means? 1) Crusoe 2) Prison commissar 3) Please fill in the blank there. It will help us with your conundrum.

[Anonymous]

Lets get to the heart of the matter!1. According to Marx, surplus value derives from the human species immersed in production conforming to the social necessities of production. However, in order to generate surplus value, workers must be short-changed of an excess of surplus labor-time, continually.2. For capitalism to function, Capitalists must short-change workers of an excess of surplus labor-time, meaning, they must convince workers, both through argumentation and coercion, that they, i.e., their labor-power, is worth less than it actually is. Profit/Capital/Surplus Value, is predicated on workers accepting less than an equal exchange for their labor-time. Subsequently, this less than equal exchange, concerning labor-power, is about the machination/artificial fabrication of value, price and wage by those, whose power is able to convince workers they are worth less than they actually are. Since, capitalists, control the means of mental and physical production and reproduction, workers are, from womb to tomb, indoctrinated in the basic idea that they are worth less than they are. 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. The only way for this to happen! is that value, price and wage-determinations must be artificially and arbitrarily machinated at a lower value, price and wage, both conceptually and materially, than labor-power is actually worth in reality. 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. Economic laws do not do this! Capitalists consciously do this!THIS IS A FATAL FLAW IN MARX, WHICH STRIKES AT THE HEART OF HIS WHOLE ANALYSIS!!! THERE IS NO ESCAPING THIS FACT!!!, UNLESS, ONE MOVES AWAY FROM ALL REGULATORY ECONOMIC LAWS THAT GOVERN THE VALUE/PRICE/WAGE OF LABOR-POWER, AND ACCEPT THE FACT THAT PRICE, VALUE AND WAGE ARE MACHINATED/ARTIFICIALLY FABRICATED AFFAIRS, ONE IS TRAPPED IN A THEORETICAL CUL-DE-SAC, INCAPABLE OF EVER SEEING THE FOREST THROUGH THE TREES!   3. 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. It is never an equal exchange between workers and capitalists, workers are short-changed as a basic economic fact in a capitalist-system. How can any Marxist believe that prices, values and wages are genuine products of any autonomous economic law, when labor-power is the only commodity which constantly LOSES in the market-place, which is constantly short-changed of its actual value and price in the marketplace. If labor-power was exchanged in the market-place at its actual value and price, capitalism would cease to exist. Profit and Surplus Value would cease to exist.4. The only reason for this perpetually, unequal exchange of labor-power, the only reason labor-power continually LOSES in the market-place is that the capitalist-system is rigged. It is CONSCIOUSLY RIGGED, for workers, to continually be short-changed as to the actual value and price of their labor-power, and in general commodities. MEANING, that value, price and wage are things which are arbitrarily/artificially fabricated by capitalists, themselves, not by market mechanisms. That is, any notion of an invisible hand exerting seeming fairness in capitalist-exchanges is ludicrous. Such beliefs are false-consciousness(es) propagated by capitalist-economists like Adam Smith, to pacify the working population to accept that their unfortunate, economic-circumstances are the result of fair autonomous laws present in market-economies, which all citizens of the world are equally subject to, including capitalists. This is pure hog-wash, and the proof is in the English Pudding! The same people, i.e., capitalists, continually win, while, the working-population continually loses and gets short-changed on the value, price and wage of their labor-power. And this is not by chance, it is by conscious design, i.e., Arbitrary/Artificial FABRICATIONS perpetuated by capitalists in their specific industries, which is further backed-up and supported by the state-apparatus! Unfortunately, some marxist-socialists have drank Adam Smith's cool-aid, including Marx, brain-washed to believe that somehow this is not the case, and that the value, price and wage-determination, pertaining to labor-power, are not machinated affairs by those who control the means of mental and physical production and reproduction, i.e., capitalists.Belief in fair-economic-laws by which everyone, including capitalists, are equally subject to in capitalist market-economies, absolves capitalists, i.e., the perpetual winners of the rigged capitalist-system, of responsibility and culpability. It baths capitalists in an aura of just-merit bestowed unto them by the hand of fate, and not by their own conscious design and planning stimulated by an inherent, insatiable greed. Belief in fair, autonomous, economic laws exerting equal influence across all social stratums plays into the hands of Adam Smith and capitalist economists, it absolves them of responsibility and culpability, it lets capitalists off the hook via the alibi and the lulliby that the capitalist-system is based on certain just-merit! As a result, Marx, inadvertently, plays into the hands of Adam Smith and capitalist-economists, when he articulates such erroneous ideas as any governing autonomous, scientific economic laws operating in the market-place. Such an idea as socially necessary labor-time, which equitably determines values, prices and wages equitably across society and the capitalist-economy for all masks the backroom machinations that capitalism is so famous for. Behind the invisible hand, i.e., economic laws, lies capitalist-social-relationships by which capitalists socially interact with one another to better their individual, capitalist-enterprises and their profits. It is not the otherway around, as Adam Smith and Karl Marx would have us believe. This is the FATAL FLAW in Marx's analysis and this FATAL FLAW infects and produces the false/erroneous conclusions Marx arrives at in his analysis of Capital, such as the tendential law of the falling rate of profit. All seeming, autonomous, economic laws, present in the capitalist-system, are EFFECTS of real capitalist-social-interactions, engaged-in by capitalists, in the backrooms of the capitalist-system and in the state-apparatus to maximize profit at the expense of the working population.       THIS IS THE KNOCK-OUT PUNCH! AND MARX IS ON THE MAT FOR THE COUNT, FOLK!!!  (NO JOKE)    

[Anonymous]

MBellemare wrote:

Lets get to the heart of the matter!1. According to Marx, surplus value derives from the human species immersed in production conforming to the social necessities of production. However, in order to generate surplus value, workers must be short-changed of an excess of surplus labor-time, continually.2. For capitalism to function, Capitalists must short-change workers of an excess of surplus labor-time, meaning, they must convince workers, both through argumentation and coercion, that they, i.e., their labor-power, is worth less than it actually is. Profit/Capital/Surplus Value, is predicated on workers accepting less than an equal exchange for their labor-time. Subsequently, this less than equal exchange, concerning labor-power, is about the machination/artificial fabrication of value, price and wage by those, whose power is able to convince workers they are worth less than they actually are. Since, capitalists, control the means of mental and physical production and reproduction, workers are, from womb to tomb, indoctrinated in the basic idea that they are worth less than they are. 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. The only way for this to happen! is that value, price and wage-determinations must be artificially and arbitrarily machinated at a lower value, price and wage, both conceptually and materially, than labor-power is actually worth in reality. 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. Economic laws do not do this! Capitalists consciously do this!THIS IS A FATAL FLAW IN MARX, WHICH STRIKES AT THE HEART OF HIS WHOLE ANALYSIS!!! THERE IS NO ESCAPING THIS FACT!!!, UNLESS, ONE MOVES AWAY FROM ALL REGULATORY ECONOMIC LAWS THAT GOVERN THE VALUE/PRICE/WAGE OF LABOR-POWER, AND ACCEPT THE FACT THAT PRICE, VALUE AND WAGE ARE MACHINATED/ARTIFICIALLY FABRICATED AFFAIRS, ONE IS TRAPPED IN A THEORETICAL CUL-DE-SAC, INCAPABLE OF EVER SEEING THE FOREST THROUGH THE TREES!   3. 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. It is never an equal exchange between workers and capitalists, workers are short-changed as a basic economic fact in a capitalist-system. How can any Marxist believe that prices, values and wages are genuine products of any autonomous economic law, when labor-power is the only commodity which constantly LOSES in the market-place, which is constantly short-changed of its actual value and price in the marketplace. If labor-power was exchanged in the market-place at its actual value and price, capitalism would cease to exist. Profit and Surplus Value would cease to exist.4. The only reason for this perpetually, unequal exchange of labor-power, the only reason labor-power continually LOSES in the market-place is that the capitalist-system is rigged. It is CONSCIOUSLY RIGGED, for workers, to continually be short-changed as to the actual value and price of their labor-power, and in general commodities. MEANING, that value, price and wage are things which are arbitrarily/artificially fabricated by capitalists, themselves, not by market mechanisms. That is, any notion of an invisible hand exerting seeming fairness in capitalist-exchanges is ludicrous. Such beliefs are false-consciousness(es) propagated by capitalist-economists like Adam Smith, to pacify the working population to accept that their unfortunate, economic-circumstances are the result of fair autonomous laws present in market-economies, which all citizens of the world are equally subject to, including capitalists. This is pure hog-wash, and the proof is in the English Pudding! The same people, i.e., capitalists, continually win, while, the working-population continually loses and gets short-changed on the value, price and wage of their labor-power. And this is not by chance, it is by conscious design, i.e., Arbitrary/Artificial FABRICATIONS perpetuated by capitalists in their specific industries, which is further backed-up and supported by the state-apparatus! Unfortunately, some marxist-socialists have drank Adam Smith's cool-aid, including Marx, brain-washed to believe that somehow this is not the case, and that the value, price and wage-determination, pertaining to labor-power, are not machinated affairs by those who control the means of mental and physical production and reproduction, i.e., capitalists.Belief in fair-economic-laws by which everyone, including capitalists, are equally subject to in capitalist market-economies, absolves capitalists, i.e., the perpetual winners of the rigged capitalist-system, of responsibility and culpability. It baths capitalists in an aura of just-merit bestowed unto them by the hand of fate, and not by their own conscious design and planning stimulated by an inherent, insatiable greed. Belief in fair, autonomous, economic laws exerting equal influence across all social stratums plays into the hands of Adam Smith and capitalist economists, it absolves them of responsibility and culpability, it lets capitalists off the hook via the alibi and the lulliby that the capitalist-system is based on certain just-merit! As a result, Marx, inadvertently, plays into the hands of Adam Smith and capitalist-economists, when he articulates such erroneous ideas as any governing autonomous, scientific economic laws operating in the market-place. Such an idea as socially necessary labor-time, which equitably determines values, prices and wages equitably across society and the capitalist-economy for all masks the backroom machinations that capitalism is so famous for. Behind the invisible hand, i.e., economic laws, lies capitalist-social-relationships by which capitalists socially interact with one another to better their individual, capitalist-enterprises and their profits. It is not the otherway around, as Adam Smith and Karl Marx would have us believe. This is the FATAL FLAW in Marx's analysis and this FATAL FLAW infects and produces the false/erroneous conclusions Marx arrives at in his analysis of Capital, such as the tendential law of the falling rate of profit. All seeming, autonomous, economic laws, present in the capitalist-system, are EFFECTS of real capitalist-social-interactions, engaged-in by capitalists, in the backrooms of the capitalist-system and in the state-apparatus to maximize profit at the expense of the working population.       THIS IS THE KNOCK-OUT PUNCH! AND MARX IS ON THE MAT FOR THE COUNT, FOLK!!!  (NO JOKE)      

 You are not knocking out anybody, you are the one being knocked out, and the real flaw is your book and your argumentations which are totally wrong. In this message you have shown you real underwears, you are a  typical reactionary like others of the reactionaries who have attacked Marx, you are not advancing any progressive ideas.Your book in Amazon is like the Lone Ranger and who ever claimed that it is about Anarchism is totally wrong, unless you are making your own commentary, because there is no relationship between your book an Anarchism, even more, many real Anarchists would get offended with such stupidities, and some famous Anarchists attacked Marx, but they have recognized his economic contributionsYou are not in contact with the real world, and you are not related to the working class movement, and your conception of the working class is totally reactionary and recalcitrant, in our times Marx is being read more than in prior epochs, and his ideas are being spread on the internet. I have seen that because  I started in the working class movement when I was a very young personThese arguments are not new, and they are not your innovations, they have been written by many anti-communists of all kind, and you are not an  anarchists as you claim to be, and you claim to follow the ideas of Louis Althusser, and he was a Stalinists, and he was not an Anarchist and he never sustained any socialists principlesYour claim that some Marxists have been brainwashed by Marx, It is the same claim of the anti-communists who have spread the conceptions that communists are just doctrinaire.  You can write your ideas in a forum of right wingers and they will fit perfectly and they will applaud your argumentations. I can recommend you some of themI have been reading the same arguments since 1959 by the bourgeoisie economists and the pushers of anti-communism, and you are one of them

[Alan Kerr]

@Michel Luc BellemareThank you Michel,It’s good that you read Marx. It’s good to discuss this with you. But the fatal flaw is in what you say here.“2… The only way for this to happen! is that value, price and wage-determinations must be artificially and arbitrarily machinated at a lower value, price and wage, both conceptually and materially, than it is actually worth in reality.”Here, we need to think of both use-value and value.Since labour in use creates value, and a value greater than its own.Capitalist pays Value of labour-power.But for this capitalist receives Use-Value of labour.Assume here that worker gets full value for his commodity–labour-power.“Its value, like that of all other commodities, is determined by the working-time necessary to its production. If the production of the average daily means of subsistence of the labourer takes up 6 hours, he must work, on the average, 6 hours every day, to produce his daily labour-power, or to reproduce the value received as the result of its sale. The necessary part of his working day amounts to 6 hours, and is, therefore, caeteris paribus [other things being equal], a given quantity. But with this, the extent of the working day itself is not yet given.”(Marx)http://www.econlib.org/library/YPDBooks/Marx/mrxCpA10.html#Part III, Chapter 10Let the line A

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B = necessary working time.Here’s how the system is rigged.Make working day longer by 1, 3 or 6 hours beyond AB and we get working days1) A

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B-C2) A

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B—C3) A

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B

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CHere the working day is longer than just AB.1) Capitalist gets one hour for nothing = surplus value.2) Capitalist gets three hours for nothing = surplus value.3) Capitalist gets six hours for nothing = surplus value.

[Author]

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