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作者：非文人 在 罕见奇谈 发贴, 来自 http://www.hjclub.org
Marxist economics are unfortunately quite tricky to grasp in a lot of detail. Part of the reason for this is that Marx was writing at a time when classical economics was in its prime. As a result he uses terms that while common at the time have since went out of favour amongst economists, and general public. It is, however, possible to gain a basic understanding of Marxist economics without too much difficulty. Although in so doing I'm perhaps making quite complex theories a little too simplistic. For this I apologize in advance.
The Commodity
Let's begin with the commodity for this is where Karl Marx begins in his best known work of political economy, "Das Kapital".
What is a commodity? This is how Marx defines the commodity:
"A commodity is, in the first place, an object outside of us, a thing that by its properties satisfies human wants of some sort or another. The nature of such wants, whether, for instance, they spring from the stomach or from fancy, makes no difference..."(Capital)
A commodity is thus an object outside of us, a thing of some sort or another. A commodity is also a social use-value, something that is made by someone yet consumed by someone else who may live many miles away, perhaps in a different country.
Use-Value and Exchange-Value
According to Marx every commodity has two properties: exchange- value and use-value.
The use value of a commodity refers to the fact that is has some sort of use, it serves some purpose or meets some want. Every commodity must have a use or it has no value and consequently is not a commodity.
Exchange-value refers to the ratio at which one commodity can be exchanged with another. In certain quantities all commodities can be exchanged for other other commodities. Even the most worthless commodity, when taken in big enough quantities, can be exchanged for the most valuable of commodities. Thus, a large quantity of corn or apples can be exchanged for a diamond.
The Labour Theory of Value
What exactly is it that is common to all these commodities that could determine how they are exchanged? There must be something that is common to all commodities which regulates how they are exchanged. Marx writes:
"Let us take two commodities, e.g. corn and iron. The proportion in which they are exchangeable, whatever those proportions may be, can always be represented by an equation in which a given quantity of corn is equated to some quantity of iron: e.g. 1 quarter corn = x cwt. iron. What does this equation tell us? It tells us that in two different things - in 1 quarter of corn and x cwt. of iron, there exists in equal quantities something common to both. The two things must therefore be equal to a third, which in itself is neither the one nor the other..."(Capital)
Marx argued that what they all have in common is the fact that they are all products of human labour. It is human labour that has created them and it is the amount of human labour that goes into them that determines value. He writes:
"The value of one commodity is to the value of any other, as the labour time necessary for the production of one is to the other."(Capital)
This, however, leaves the rather bizarre situation in which the lazy worker, taking their time about making a commodity, makes a commodity worth much more than the commodity made by a hard working efficient worker. If this was the case then employers would be sacking their diligent workers while telling the rest to go as slow as they can. Instead of Right-Wing politicians lambasting the poor for being lazy they would be lambasting them for being too hard working. This is not, however, what determines the value of a commodity. What determines the value of a commodity is the labour time socially necessary for its production. That is, the amount of labour time that is required to produce a commodity:
"under the normal conditions of production, and with the average degree of skill and intensity prevalent at the time"(Capital).
The worker cannot therefore simply laze around and at the end of the day have created commodities worth many times what they would normally be worth. Marx gives the example of the hand weavers when machinery was introduced. The new machinery enabled twice as much yarn to be weaved into cloth in the same amount of time that it took to do so by hand. Yet the hand weavers continued to take the same time the value of their commodity fell to half it's value before hand. Thus, the hand weaver had to work twice as hard and long just to gain the same money, they couldn't, and so machinery superseded hand work.
Surplus-Value and Mr. Money
As we have seen Marx believed that the exchange value of a commodity was determined by the labour time socially necessary in its production. This does not, however, explain where the profits of the capitalist come from. On first appearances it appears as if the worker is paid for their labour, indeed, that is how most economists put the matter. They are paid for a given period of their labour.But if the value of any commodity is determined by the amount of labour spent on it then it follows that if the labourer is paid for their labour then they should be paid the value of the commodities produced by it.
Thus, if a worker laboured let's say 10 hours a day and every hour they made a table, each table being worth £10. Once the capitalist had deducted their amount of money for the total capital advanced(money spent on raw materials etc) the worker would be left with their wage. If the capitalist put let's say £10 into total capital then the worker would be left with £100-£10=£90. But where would the capitalist get their profits from?
Mr. Money (the capitalist) isn't in this game for charity you know, despite what his apologists in the church and media might argue. He doesn't make shoes just so that poor children don't hurt their feet yet also he doesn't make guns and bombs simply for love of destruction. Whether he makes his money from shoes, clothes, cars, toasters or tanks makes little difference as the end result, the end objective, is always the same, profit.
Lets examine the circulation of commodities as this will perhaps illuminate the question of profit and surplus-value. The exchange of commodities can be represented by two simple equations:
C-M-C
M-C-M
The first equation shows a circulation of commodity - money - commodity, the second, shows a circulation of money - commodity - money. In the first case someone sells a commodity for money and then in turn purchases another commodity. This is what we all do, this is what the working-class do. We sell in order to buy, that is, we sell what appears to be our labour and buy commodities that have been produced by our labour. The second circuit involves someone using money to buy a commodity then selling it dearer. This is what the capitalist does. Yet, if all commodities are exchanged for their equivalents then from where do the profits of the capitalist come from? The answer must therefore lie outside of the sphere of circulation, that is, within the sphere of production.
But from where does this profit come from? We saw before that if the worker receives the same money as their labour produces in the form of commodities minus what the capitalist advances in total capital then exactly where does profit come from? Mr. Money beats the ground in frustration and cries. But the answer is simple, profit comes from surplus value. The capitalist does not purchase labour but labour power, the ability or capacity to labour possessed by most people. Labour power has a value just like every other commodity. The value of labour power is determined by the cost of subsistence, the money needed to buy all those products that the worker needs to reproduce their labour power and that of the next generation of workers. Let's now examine the production process now that Money has got wise to the system.
Mr. Money has at last worked it out. He will pay his workers for their labour power. He starts production in his factory once again with renewed enthusiasm, that is, he gets the workers to start work while he has a long lunch. His factory springs into action as the workers start producing furniture once again. Every day a worker in his factory makes 10 tables, a table for every hour spent labouring. Let's say that every tables value is represented by £10 (ten shiny coins or one bank note that states that payment will be given to the holder). That means that every worker makes £10 multiplied by 10 or £100 for Mr. Money Bags every day they labour. The worker is, however, only paid £2 for every hour spent working which means that they receive 10 multiplied by £2 or £20 a day. To find out the surplus value produced we simply take away the £20 that represents Variable Capital plus, let's say, the £20 that represents Constant Capital, from the £100 and we are left with £60 surplus-value. Once we take away other costs for the capitalist such as heating and light we are left with profit. This is how profit is arrived at.Mr. Money dances for joy.
To put it precisely (leaving money and market forces out of the equation) the capitalist finds on the market a commodity (labour power) whose use-value embodies more labour in the commodities that it produces than it as a commodity represents. There is thus surplus-value, an increment in the last phase of the M-C-M circuit, which results from the successful completion of the M-C-M circuit of capital. Money is not exchanged for money but for more money via the commodity of labour power that embodies more labour in the constant capital (means of production)than it itself contains.
Capital and Surplus-Value Continued
A capitalist is obviously someone who owns capital, hence the term, but what exactly is capital? In everyday speech the word capital is usually used to refer to money used for a business, or to start up a business, but Marx uses the term in a slightly different way.
Capital is used to refer to ownership of the means of production, that is, raw materials and machinery etc. A person who owns such things owns capital and is therefore a capitalist. Money is, or can, also be capital but it depends upon its circulation. If money is used simply to buy a commodity, for example, you buy a bag of potatoes in the local super-market, then this is obviously not capital. If on the other hand the money is used to buy capital goods, that is, things that can be used to make commodities and thereby surplus value, then it is capital. Capital can thus be defined as wealth used to generate more wealth or "money that begets money". For Marx all capital appears as money, be it capital considered historically, or be it capital in its contemporary circuits.
Marx also makes a distinction between capital. There is variable capital and fixed capital.
Fixed capital is that part of the total capital which is spent on things that in the process of production create no surplus-value. For example, things such as machinery, raw materials etc. Such things, in themselves add no more value, that is, they do not increase the exchange value of the product or the labour embodied within it any more than their own exchange-value or embodied labour. Hence they are called fixed capital. The labour embodied in them is reproduced within the finished commodity, it is transferred with it, thus its exchange-value is also reproduced in the given commodity but no more. For example, the machine used in production departs value on the commodity as it itself loses its use-value.
Variable capital refers to that part of total capital that is expended on purchasing labour power, that is, on workers wages. It is variable because the labour of the workers produces commodities which in turn have surplus-value, that is, they embody a greater quantity of labour time in their product than is represented by their own labour power. Variable capital therefore reproduces itself during the process of production and is added to, it varies to be precise. Hence it is called variable capital. Basically the worker embodies more labour in the commodities they labour upon than is contained in the commodities that are represented by their wage. You can't after all eat money, can you? It is variable capital that produces surplus-value and thereby profit for the capitalist.
Forms of Surplus-Value or Forms of Its Extraction
Surplus-value also comes in different forms. There is absolute surplus-value and relative-surplus value.
Absolute surplus-value
Absolute surplus value is linked to the length of the working day which during Marxs time was fiercely contested by labour and capital (it still is to a lesser extent). All workers require a given quantity of certain commodities in order to reproduce their labour-power and that of the next generation, that is, their children. Such commodities will more than likely be made up of certain commodities such as bread, milk, clothes, heating and shelter to name but a few. What these commodities are will of course vary from society to society and over time yet certain commodities are required regardless in order to reproduce labour power.
In order to produce such commodities it will of course take the expenditure of so many hours, minutes and seconds of labour power. Even the bread that fills hungry mouths is not found naturally occurring upon the earths surface. Let's say that this bundle of commodities, which will of course vary from society to society, takes approximately five hours to produce. This means that the worker must work on average about five hours, be it in the bakery, shoe factory or fire arms factory, to reproduce in the commodities of their labour an equal sum of value (labour time) as that represented by their wage.
Leaving aside the individual worker we must think now of the working-class as a whole. This way it will be easier to explain surplus-value. The working class, considered as a whole, can make all those commodities required, and which they now receive in payment for their work (via the conversion of their wage) in five hours. The capitalist, however, is not concerned with this fact. The fact that five hours of labour a day is enough for the working-class as a whole to reproduce their labour power, meet their basic needs, and provide for some of their wants, does not mean that they get away with only five hours a day. The capitalist pays for labour-power at its exchange value (five hours is required to make the commodities) and makes use of the use-value of labour power. The worker is thus set to work for 10 hours, 12 hours and even perhaps 14 or 16 hours.
Let's say that every hour of labour is represented by one gold coin. Our friend the capitalist, who has a furniture factory, employs 10 workers in his factory. Each worker works for approximately 10 hours every day and in each hour each worker makes 1 table. As a result 100 tables are made in a day, each table taking an hour to make. These tables thus represent 100 hours of labour, that is, 100 hours have went into their production. These tables therefore are equal in value to the sum of 100 gold coins, that is, this is their exchange-value. The worker is, as we know, paid for their labour-power. The commodities that make up the neccessaries of life for the worker only take 5 hours to make. The capitalist thus pays a sum of gold coins that represents in terms of value 5 (hours of labour) multiplied by 10 (number of workers). He thus pays a sum of gold coins equal in value to 50 hours of labour which equals 50 gold coins.
This sum of 50 gold coins is what Marx termed variable capital. As we saw the sum of 50 gold coins, representing 50 hours of labour, when put into action produced tables representing 100 hours of labour time. Thus we saw that it varied, it both created an equal sum of value to itself but also more, a surplus. We should not, however, fall into the trap of thinking that the surplus value, in the above example, equals 100-50 or 50 gold coins. Surplus-value equals surplus-value minus both variable and constant capital. The raw materials used in production, the wood, nails and screws all took labour to produce. Their value is tansferred in the process of production to the eventual commodity, that is, it is embodied in the completed commodity. Let's say for conveniencee sake that in this case contant capital was equal to 25 hours of labour time, or, 25 gold coins. We can now caculate surplus-value:
Surplus-value=100 gold coins minus 50+25
Surplus value=25 gold coins
or 25 hours of labour
With every extra hour worked so there is an increase in the mass of surplus-value. For example, is the capitalist was able to make their workers work 20 hours in a day (not uncommon in the Third World!) then the mass os surplus-value would be double, that is, 50 gold coins would be its sum because twice as much labour time would have went into the production of the increased volume of commodities. The mass of surplus-value increases, however, the rate of surplus value does not.
To find the rate of surplus-value we simply divide the surplus-value, in this case 100 gold coins, by the amount of variable-capital, in this case 50 gold coins. What we find is that the rate of surplus-value is 100%, that is, twice the value of the variable capital.
Once the capitalist has taken away other costs such as heating, electricity and distributional costs they are left with profit. Profit, according to Marxist economics, does not come from abstinence or risk taking, but from surplus value. The man or woman with no captial may abstain all they wish and never make any profit.
Relative surplus value
With absolute surplus-value the amount of surplus value increases proportionately to the number of hours that labour-power is set in motion. With each hour over the necessary labour time so extra surplus value is created and so more profit for the capitalist. The rate of surplus value, however, does not increase no matter how many hours worked. The worker could, if so compelled, work 24 hours in a day but the rate of surplus-value would remain exactly the same. The capitalist used to be able to make a real killing in terms of absolute surplus-value. They used to be able to make men, women and children, work virtually all of the day. Sometimes they would receive their meals while still working at their machine! In most Western capitalist societies such practices have ceased, at least, in their most extreme forms. The capitalist must thus seek to increase surplus value through increasing the rate of surplus value, this is called relative surplus-value.
The capitalist, or those that represent the capitalist, are constantly trying to make the whole process of production more efficient. By this what I mean is that they try to reorganize the process of production so that more commodities are created in a given time. They might do this by reorganization or by introduction of machinery or newer machinery. All such means of improving efficiency result in each individual commodity having less value, that is, less labour time embodied within it. As we now know the worker does not eat their wage but instead converts it into a given quantity and quality of commodities. If such commodities now have less value embodied within them, they take less time to produce, so their exchange value falls.
Once again we must consider the working-class as a whole, as an aggregate of individuals all sharing common interests and a common relationship to the means of production. It used to take about five hours of labour for the working-class to produce the commodities necessary for their reproduction, or to put it slightly differently, necessary labour amounted to five hours. Now, however, the amount of necessary labour time has fallen, due to increased productivity, to two and a half hours. As a result the exchange value of their labour power has also fallen as labour-power can now be reproduced more cheaply.
Let's now look at the individual worker once more. The worker as we outlined earlier receives about 5 gold coins for their labour power, but now they only receive about 2.5 gold coins. The raw materials used by the capitalist remain much the same, as does in this case the exchange value of the overall commodities. The worker, however, now only gets 2.5 gold coins a day for their labour-power. Now when we calculate the surplus value we find the following:
Surplus value = 100 gold coins minus constant capital 25 minus 25 gold coins of variable capital which equals 50 gold coins, 50 gold coins is thus the new surplus-value. The surplus-value has thus doubled, yet the hours worked remain the same, because quite simply the rate of surplus-value or rate of exploitation has increased.
All improvements in efficiency are ways of increasing the rate of surplus-value, particularly if they directly or indirectly impact upon the commodities that reproduce labour power.
Effects of Machinery on Surplus-Value and Profit
Why is it that the capitalist wishes to produce an individual commodity that has less value when this decreases the exchange value of the commodity? It seems rather antithetical to the capitalists interests to make commodities that are cheaper. The reason for this striving to decrease the value of the individual commodity is to be found in the competitive nature of capitalism. Individual capitalists and companies are in competition with other capitalists who are free to produce the same things as they are. In order to capture a bigger share of the market you must sell cheaper than your competitors. When confronted with two qualities of roughly equal standard people will choose the cheapest one. By reducing the cost of production so the capitalist sells more commodities than their rivals and makes a bigger profit. But what are the effects on the production of surplus-value?
When machinery is introduced by an individual capitalist it will in many cases increase the mass of surplus-value. Machinery increases the mass of surplus-value because in many cases it reduces the number of labour-powers (workers) employed. For example, it would take 100 workers many hours to make 1000 garments, give them a tool such as a needle and the time required will decrease, give them a sewing machine and this time will be further reduced. Not only will the time be reduced but so too will the number of labourers required. What this means with regard to surplus value is a decrease in the number of labour powers employed thus a fall in the amount of value that is represented by variable capital. More is produced in less time, their overall value remains the same, the surplus-value has thus increased.
Although in most cases machinery will reduce the numer of labour-powers employed it is still possible for the capitalist not to increase surplus-value by use of machinery yet at the same time to make a greater profit. How can this possibly be? Again we must look for answers in the competitive nature of capitalist production. Machinery may be introduced and not increase surplus-value, that is, it may not dispense with labour-power. What it will do, however, is cheapen each individual commodity by lessening its individual value. This now gives the capitalist an advantage over their compeititors in the market. They now sell their commodities cheaper than their competitors, selling more as a result, and thus gain more profit. Surplus-value, in its strict sense, is not added to by such a scenario although the end profit does indeed represent more value than the previous lesser sum of profit. Perhaps the best way to describe this is to say that profits have increased yet surplus-value has remained constant. This state of affiars is, however, only a temporary one as the capitalists compeititors will in turn introduce the same machinery. Thus the advantage is a temporary one, the long term creation of profit is made possible by the existence of surplus-value.
The composition of capital
Marx believed that over time the organic composition of capital would change, by this he meant that the ratio of variable capital to constant capital would change in favour of constant capital. As capitalism is a competitive system of production, capitalists must compete for market share, they must seek to lower the cost of their commodities relative to their other competitors. They do this through several methods: re-organising the process of production and utilizing machinery. By doing this they can afford to sell cheaper, thus selling more, but only for a time. After a time the methods and machinery become widespread within the particular branch of industry in which they are applied. But by doing this the composition of capital changes from being one of mostly variable capital to one of mostly constant capital. As we have already seen fixed capital does not produce surplus value, only variable capital varies, and as a result the rate of profit declines. Profits might grow but the rate of profit will decline.
How to calculate rate of profit:- lets say surplus-value (S) is £10, and the total capital (C) is £100, then the rate of profit is (S) over (C), or, 10 over 100, or, simply 10%.
Conclusion
Whether or not this future trend projected by Marx will manifest itself in capitalist society is still not yet decided, it has not yet happened, but there again the means of extracting surplus-value have not yet been exhausted. Even if you don't believe a single word of Marxs economic writings, or think that his theories are simply wrong it still doesn't take away from the central message, which is, the workers only get a small percentage of the wealth that they themselves create and this is unfair. As Marx so succinctly puts it:
"A house may be large or small; as long as the surrounding houses are equally small it satisfies all social demands for a dwelling. But let a palace arise beside the little house, and it shrinks from a little house to a hut. The little house shows now that its owner has only slight or no demands to make, and however high it may shoot in the course of civilization, if the neighbouring palace grows to an equal or even greater extent, the occupant of the the relatively small house will feel more and more uncomfortable, dissatisfied and cramped within its four walls."(Wage-Labour and Capital and Value,...)
There are many, many small houses still on the horizon and their number relative to the palaces would appear to be holding steady, perhaps even increasing in some societies. The only question is when will their occupants become so dissatisfied that they go outside of their little dwellings and demand their fair share?
作者：非文人 在 罕见奇谈 发贴, 来自 http://www.hjclub.org |
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樊弓、芦笛批马文的大体解剖
