What is economic growth?

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[LBird]

ALB wrote:

I don't think socialist society would or could or should try to measure "socially necessary labour time". It doesn't make sense as this is a category of an exchange economy (established by the workings of that economy).

[my bold]I think that this is perhaps an assumption that we don't share.If, for example, it was determined to be 'a category of social production' (rather than exchange economy), then it would 'make sense'. That is, 'sense' depends upon some wider social assumptions.

ALB wrote:

Marx does seem to have favoured labour-time accounting but this wouldn't be trying to measure (the equivalent of) socially necessary labour-time. To be useful, it would have to be actual labour-time, i.e the actual use of the resource labour-power of various kinds.

Yes, I agree with you, about how this could be 'useful'. But then (potential) 'actual labour-time' (of differing individuals) could be simply added together, to produce a forecast of 'socially necessary labour time'. That is, potential can be estimated (ie. measured), to allow us to determine whether any particular mooted production, given its 'socially necessary labour time', is worth doing, given other options for the use of that productive capacity.

ALB wrote:

Attempts to reproduce "socially necessary labour" in a non-capitalist society (such as that of the Dutch Council Communists in the 1930s) have been internally inconsistent and have in effect re-introduced the sort of circulating labour-money that Marx criticised in John Gray, Proudhon, etc.

I suspect that these attempts have been to produce some 'objective measure', which an elite can then employ. I think that we'd agree that these attempts will always fail (because they're simply attempts to produce 'labour-money', which is simply another term for 'objective measure'). Within socialism, we'd always have 'socially-objective measures'.

ALB wrote:

It would be possible to fix some arbitary average labour (and vote on what it should be) and use this as a unit of account but this would take us to the nightmare society envisaged by Michael Albert and his "Parecon" where people get to vote even on precisely what an individual can consume (individuals have to submit a list of what they want to some committee). On the other hand, it might appeal to some as his blueprint involves virtually non-stop voting.

Yes, I agree. But 'arbitrary average' implies an elite, not a vote, and this is precisely what I argued with the Pareconists (and some other group?) on LibCom, and where I first read your and alanjjohnstone's excellent rebuttals of that nonsense.Essentially, as you say, they are individualists, rather than democratic socialists, when discussing production/consumption. 'Voting' is about social production/consumption, not about individual preferences/tastes/capacities/desires/etc.

[Young Master Smeet]

LBird wrote:

Since this form of 'labour' is 'socially necessary', only the society that determines its own necessities can 'measure' its labour; and furthermore, only it can determine its 'measures'.

Socialism means the end of abstract labour, and its replacement with concrete labour, so that means the abolition of socially necessary labour time as any measure.  That also means the the end of commodities, and production towards definitee ends.

Chucky wrote:

(It is only where production is under the actual, predetermining control of society that the latter establishes a relation between the volume of social labour-time applied in producing definite articles, and the volume of the social want to be satisfied by these articles.)

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch10.htmAnd just to republish another one:

Chaz wrote:

Secondly, after the abolition of the capitalist mode of production, but still retaining social production, the determination of value continues to prevail in the sense that the regulation of labour-time and the distribution of social labour among the various production groups, ultimately the book-keeping encompassing all this, become more essential than ever.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch49.htm

Chaz wrote:

In the case of socialised production the money-capital is eliminated. Society distributes labour-power and means of production to the different branches of production. The producers may, for all it matters, receive paper vouchers entitling them to withdraw from the social supplies of consumer goods a quantity corresponding to their labour-time. These vouchers are not money. They do not circulate.

[robbo203]

ALB wrote:

I don't think socialist society would or could or should try to measure "socially necessary labour time". It doesn't make sense as this is a category of an exchange economy (established by the workings of that economy).

 Yes indeed since exchange is about the exchange of equivalents, SNLT being the measure of this equivalence.  Also, there seems to be some confusion about what SNLT actually is supposed to represent. Is it an average for the amount of labour time  it take to produce a particular type of commodity for industry as a whole or is it a case of what is "best practice" as some have argued,  Quite apart from that there are subtle variations in the commodity in question from one business to the next which makes comparison problematic and hence the business of arriving at some kind of average figure for the labour time involved I know there have been attempts to provide empirical evidence for the Labour Theory of Value but ultimately such attempts are foredoomed because of the nature of the theory itself.  Which is not to invalidate the theory,  Just because it cannot be empirically supported in a satisfactory sense does not mean it is not valid.  There are a number of useful proxy indicators we can  use from which we can infer the existence of surplus value e,g, the ratio of worker output in money terms to wages etc 

ALB wrote:

Marx does seem to have favoured labour-time accounting but this wouldn't be trying to measure (the equivalent of) socially necessary labour-time. To be useful, it would have to be actual labour-time, i.e the actual use of the resource labour-power of various kinds.Attempts to reproduce "socially necessary labour" in a non-capitalist society (such as that of the Dutch Council Communists in the 1930s) have been internally inconsistent and have in effect re-introduced the sort of circulating labour-money that Marx criticised in John Gray, Proudhon, etc.It would be possible to fix some arbitary average labour (and vote on what it should be) and use this as a unit of account but this would take us to the nightmare society envisaged by Michael Albert and his "Parecon" where people get to vote even on precisely what an individual can consume (individuals have to submit a list of what they want to some committee). On the other hand, it might appeal to some as his blueprint involves virtually non-stop voting.

 I am sceptical about this whole idea of labour time accounting as I am of the labour voucher scheme.  As your last para suggests it seems to be about tying in peoples productive contribution with their consumption entitlements on a quid pro quo basis.  Thats the slippery road back to an exchange economy and capitalism. Why else would you engage in labour time accounting if not to ascertain the amount of labour involved in producing a particular kind of good and in sense putting a price on it albeit measured in labour time units.  But even this would be extraordinarily difficult since you have to take into account  not just the final stage in the production of a good  liken say a car or a TV set where the good is assembled – but also also the preceding stages when the parts were manufactured  This is not to mention other considerations such as qualitative differences between different kinds of cars or indeed different kinds of labour.  How do you weight these different things?Better to scrap all these bureaucratic interventions and keep the production system as simple and as transparent as possible and preferably as self regulating as possible.  The idea of a socialist society as being an endless round of voting on everything under the sun – from scientific theories to how much labour it takes to produce a plasma TV set, send shudders in me. We will have no time to do anything else!

[Young Master Smeet]

Lbird,but the point is that Socialism is about achieving definite ends, not using the least labour possible: we might, like ancient peoples choose to throw labour unnecessarily at a task because we enjoy doing it and want to show how much labour we have.

[Bijou Drains]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

Lbird,but the point is that Socialism is about achieving definite ends, not using the least labour possible: we might, like ancient peoples choose to throw labour unnecessarily at a task because we enjoy doing it and want to show how much labour we have.

Much as it pains me, I must agree to some extent with L Bird (I assure you it is on this issue only) if we have a situation where labour can be allocated to a number of different project, then society, or the part of society that these projects impact on, must have some idea of the relative amounts of human endeavour involved in the different projects in order to be able to vote rationally on the choices at hand.Similarly in particular organisations where the availability of certain skills may for whatever reason be temporarily reduced, having some idea about the way in which these skills resources can be most beneficially allocated in a democratic fashion, would be essential.

[robbo203]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

Lbird,but the point is that Socialism is about achieving definite ends, not using the least labour possible: we might, like ancient peoples choose to throw labour unnecessarily at a task because we enjoy doing it and want to show how much labour we have.

 Thats a good point YMS.  Didnt Karl say something about labour becoming lifes "prime need" (Critique of the Gotha Prog),  So rather than economise on labour – ostensibly the purpose of labour accounting – we  might want to express ourselves more fully through our labour. Particularly in the face of automation and robotisation which is gathering pace today.  The idea of "fully automated luxury communism" has a certain appeal but it also has its drawbacks. Which ties in with the theme of this thread.  We need to be thinking of the kind of society we want to have at the end of the day and the problem with the capitalist concept of econoimic growth is that it is so utterly vacuous in that respect.  It just assumes more is better meaning it focusses on quantity rather than quality.  More workers digging more holes in the ground and then filing them in contributes to GDP growth and therefore is good even if nothing has been achieved as a result. The system is bereft of any grand vision of where we should be heading on the back of this engine of economic growth. Growth has become growth for its own sake

[robbo203]

Tim Kilgallon wrote:

 Much as it pains me, I must agree to some extent with L Bird (I assure you it is on this issue only) if we have a situation where labour can be allocated to a number of different project, then society, or the part of society that these projects impact on, must have some idea of the relative amounts of human endeavour involved in the different projects in order to be able to vote rationally on the choices at hand.

 There might be something in this but I dont think this amounts to what I would call a fully fledged across-the-board system of labour accounting which assigns  labour values to the products of industry generally and on a routine basis.  I dont see any merit in this latter proposal not least because the labour values it assigns  could be throughly misleading for all sorts of reasons  and consequently result in a misallocation of reosurces.  This is not to mention the bureaucracy involved. Again we also have to ask what is the purpose behind such a system?  Is the idea that we should abandon products that involve a high labour content for those that  involve a low labour content?  Or what? In some cases this could result in decline in quality  for the sake of (apparently) economising on labour.  It seems to me that the idea of assigning labour values to the products of industry in general  is going down the road that will eventuate in a situation where your consumption is directly linked to your contribution to society and where goods are priced in labour units and made available on a quid pro quo basis. The idea of assessing labour requirements for particular projects is, I suggest, another matter and  I woldnt disagree with what you say Tim.  I think something like our contemporary" job centres" will continue to exist in a socialist society except, of course,  that we wont be talking employment anymore.  Such centres adapted to the needs of a socialist society could be the primary sources of information concerning the availabity and kinds of skills required for these projects

[Dave B]

It is part of the human condition since the invention of the wheel to reduce the amount of effort required to produce an effect or use-value.    From the moment when society enters into possession of the means of production and uses them in direct association for production, the labour of each individual, however varied its specifically useful character may be, becomes at the start and directly social labour. The quantity of social labour contained in a product need not then be established in a roundabout way; daily experience shows in a direct way how much of it is required on the average. Society can simply calculate how many hours of labour are contained in a steam-engine, a bushel of wheat of the last harvest, or a hundred square yards of cloth of a certain quality. It could therefore never occur to it still to express the quantities of labour put into the products, quantities which it will then know directly and in their absolute amounts, in a third product, in a measure which, besides, is only relative, fluctuating, inadequate, though formerly unavoidable for lack of a better one, rather than express them in their natural, adequate and absolute measure, time. Just as little as it would occur to chemical science still to express atomic weight in a roundabout way, relatively, by means of the hydrogen atom, if it were able to express them absolutely, in their adequate measure, namely in actual weights, in billionths or quadrillionths of a gramme. Hence, on the assumptions we made above, society will not assign values to products. It will not express the simple fact that the hundred square yards of cloth have required for their production, say, a thousand hours of labour in the oblique and meaningless way, stating that they have the value of a thousand hours of labour. It is true that even then it will still be necessary for society to know how much labour each article of consumption requires for its production. It will have to arrange its plan of production in accordance with its means of production, which include, in particular, its labour-powers. The useful effects of the various articles of consumption, compared with one another and with the quantities of labour required for their production, will in the end determine the plan. People will be able to manage everything very simply, without the intervention of much-vaunted “value”. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/anti-duhring/ch26.htm Here he uses value in italics and in inverted comma’s because the content of value in socialism is the same; it is just that the form it takes is different.

[LBird]

Dave B wrote:

Engels wrote:

Society can simply calculate how many hours of labour are contained in a steam-engine, a bushel of wheat of the last harvest, or a hundred square yards of cloth of a certain quality. It could therefore never occur to it still to express the quantities of labour put into the products, quantities which it will then know directly and in their absolute amounts, in a third product, in a measure which, besides, is only relative, fluctuating, inadequate, though formerly unavoidable for lack of a better one, rather than express them in their natural, adequate and absolute measure, time.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/anti-duhring/ch26.htm

[my bold]Firstly, this is Engels, not Marx.I've pointed out often enough that there are massive differences between Marx and Engels on some issues.Secondly, and this is one of those differences, 'time' is not an 'absolute measure'. Engels, because of his 'materialism', always seeks out 'absolute', rather than Marx's 'socio-historic', ways of 'measuring'.'Time', used as an 'accounting' measure in a socialist society, will be a socially constructed 'production time', and will include notions that are not taken into account today, and are nothing to do with asocial, ahistoric, 'absolutes'.It's possible that one community might value a social project more highly than another community which might be asked to produce it, even though the former might take longer, simply because they enjoy the production process.That is, we could be confronted with asking two communities which prefers the production task, and to give us some estimate of their 'time'. One might calculate one million 'labour hours', and the other two million. But the latter might implore to be given the task, because they enjoy the work.So, no 'absolutes' here, just a choice – do we democratically assigned the task to the 'shorter' or 'longer'? Bourgeois notions of 'efficiency' will not predominate, I think.If a community enjoys building ships, how else do we 'value' that, other than by discussion, debate, consultation and voting?It's quite possible that every production will take longer in our 'efficient' society, when we ask how efficient is the task in producing pleasure.There is no 'absolute time', only 'socio-historic time'.

[Dave B]

Capital Vol. III Part VIIRevenues and their SourcesChapter 49. Concerning the Analysis of the Process of Production Secondly, after the abolition of the capitalist mode of production, but still retaining social production, the determination of value continues to prevail in the sense that the regulation of labour-time and the distribution of social labour among the various production groups, ultimately the book-keeping encompassing all this, become more essential than ever. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch49.htm

[robbo203]

Dave B wrote:

 It is true that even then it will still be necessary for society to know how much labour each article of consumption requires for its production. It will have to arrange its plan of production in accordance with its means of production, which include, in particular, its labour-powers. The useful effects of the various articles of consumption, compared with one another and with the quantities of labour required for their production, will in the end determine the plan. People will be able to manage everything very simply, without the intervention of much-vaunted “value”. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/anti-duhring/ch26.htm Here he uses value in italics and in inverted comma’s because the content of value in socialism is the same; it is just that the form it takes is different.

 Why will it be necessary for society to know “how much labour each article of consumption requires for its production” and how precisely will this information obtained? How for instance – to use Engels words  – will society be able to "calculate how many hours of labour are contained in a steam-engine, a bushel of wheat of the last harvest, or a hundred square yards of cloth of a certain quality" given that: 1) Final goods are the end result of a complex production chain going right back to, for example. the extraction of minerals ores where each stage along this chain involves the application of labour too that must be accounted for in the calculation of how many “hours of labour are contained in a steam engine” 2) Final goods are assembled out of parts that each have their own unique production chain history which greatly complicates the situation 3) Different kinds of labour have to be weighted differently. For instance, you cannot treat 1 hour of skilled labour as being equivalent to 1 hour of unskilled labour.  But what ratio would you use in that case? It seems to me that the whole notion of labour time accounting whereby society seeks to establish “how much labour each article of consumption requires for its production”, is so problematic and vulnerable to error as to be more or less useless and thus a waste of time and resources.  I really cannot see the point of the exercise.  If it is to ensure the efficient allocation of resources then there are other – better – ways of going about this involving stock control management and using criteria that focus on the relative scarcity of stock rather than its labour content.  That requires a system of production that is essentially self-regulating but what Engels seem to be envisaging here is not this but a system of apriori centralised planning.  Hence his reference to "the plan" i.e. a single society wide plan which in itself is totally unrealistic This tallies also with Marx’s statement concerning the nature of “planned production Secondly, after the abolition of the capitalist mode of production, but still retaining social production, the determination of value continues to prevail in the sense that the regulation of labour-time and the distribution of social labour among the various production groups, ultimately the book-keeping encompassing all this, become more essential than ever. Socialism from this perspective begins to sound more like a bureaucratic nightmare in which “book keeping” becomes more essential than ever along with “regulation” of labour time.  How exactly labour time is to be regulated in the context of freely associated labour is anybody’s guess Both Marx and Engels have provided us with many useful insights but some of their more speculative comments on the nature of socialist society were less than helpful in my opinion

[Young Master Smeet]

LBird wrote:

I would suggest that 'voting' would be an appropriate method for 'measuring'.So, I think we can 'measure socially necessary labour', and indeed will do so within socialism. This social estimation will not, of course, involve 'money'.

We couldn't vote on what socially necessary labour is needed, partly because there's a missing term: average (it doesn't matter if we use Mean or Mode, though I think mode is more apposite when dealing with labour values).  No commodity would represent the average time (or if it did, it would do so accidentally).  Imagine a thousand physically identical bars of soap, each one would represent a varying amount of real labour time (depending on the operatives, the conditions of the day and a thousand or more other factors that will induce variation by the second).A vote could assign an arbitrary value to the goods, but this would necessarily differ from the actual value, which would assert itself through informal markets and the like if we had labour vouchers.Moreover, some values couldn't be assigned, ther are physical limits: a bricklayer cannot lay out 1 million bricks an hour, that will never be possible.  Moreover, there are only 24 hours in the day, and will only ever be.  As I think Engels wrote:

Quote:

Apart from natural exhaustion through age, &c., I must be able on the morrow to work with the same normal amount of force, health and freshness as to-day. You preach to me constantly the gospel of “saving” and “abstinence.” Good! I will, like a sensible saving owner, husband my sole wealth, labour-power, and abstain from all foolish waste of it. I will each day spend, set in motion, put into action only as much of it as is compatible with its normal duration, and healthy development. By an unlimited extension of the working-day, you may in one day use up a quantity of labour-power greater than I can restore in three. What you gain in labour I lose in substance. The use of my labour-power and the spoliation of it are quite different things.

We most certainly would look at labour times invovled in actyivities, but I'd suggest not abstract labour: we'd look at how many hours of bricklayer, how many hours of dentist, how many hours of plumber, computer programmer (and teacher/trainer, to develop those skills if we find we're in short supply).  Yes, we'd keep an eye on that as fractions of the total available working population, and adjust activity in one area to make time available for another where necessary and desired, and that would be done through democratic free association of producers.

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