ckaihatsu wrote:Okay, if wages aren't a commodity, what *are* they, then -- ?
What are wages paid-out *in return for* -- ?
Wages are the payment for labor.
< silly two-year comparison of wages with commodity prices snipped -- try
200 years >
You're talking after-the-fact -- the issue is the upfront financial *risk*.
Which the factory owner assumes by paying workers for labor that might end up producing a product that is not worth anything.
Instead of being *insulting*, maybe try *making your point* -- you keep tiptoeing around the *edges* of whatever it is you may want to say, so better to just say it. That's why we're here, etc.
I am very clear and direct: you chant absurd and disingenuous Marxist nonsense instead of learning something about business and finance from someone who self-evidently knows far more about them than you.
No, these liquidity crises have been *cylical* and *systematic*, in a way that *doesn't* parallel each new government debt issuance.
You again prove that you have no idea what you are talking about. Debt money is issued by private commercial banks, not the government.
(A better description would be the business 'boom-bust cycle'.)
No, a better description would be the asset-price-debt-money cycle.
That's a *socialist* position / politics, that *both* equity capital (workplaces), and rentier capital (land, etc.) can be controlled by the public / workers.
More accurately, the socialist position is that both can be
equally validly and
effectively controlled by the public/workers. But they can't, as I have explained to you so very clearly and patiently, so many times.
TTP -- it only makes *sense*.
No, it only makes sense if you refuse to know the relevant facts.
What good would it be for only the *real estate* to be de-privatized,
See? You
immediately have to conflate the land that was already there anyway with the improvements that had to be created by the entrepreneur's decision, initiative and labor. You have to pretend there is no essential difference between owning something that would not otherwise have existed because
you caused it to exist and merely owning others' liberty rights to use what
already existed with no help from you or any previous owner, and would otherwise have been available to use, just because the law says you do.
when it's the *production goods* that *matter* in our industrialized society?
The astronomical unimproved
value of land proves you wrong. It is the land that matters far more than the production goods because production goods can be replaced, their supply increased. Land's cannot.
If the workers *ignored* the factories / workplaces, they would have no bargaining power versus the employer, in negotiations,
Huh? If they ignored the factories, they would have nothing to negotiate with the employer
about. Hello? That is very much the point: they
CAN ignore the factories and their owners, and be no worse off than if the factories and the entrepreneurs who created them had never existed. By contrast, they CAN'T ignore the LANDOWNER because they have to pay him for permission to live, and they definitely
would be a lot better off if the
landowner had never existed.
GET IT???? and as long as they don't collectively control their own labor (as through striking and other labor actions), they're merely economically-exploited *raw inputs* into the capitalist commodity-making process.
GARBAGE. They already control their own labor: they can just walk away, and be no worse off than if the factory and its owner had never existed. They
CAN'T just walk away from the
LANDOWNER because he owns their liberty rights to work, shop, etc. -- i.e., to live -- in all the places the worker might want to walk away
to.
GET IT???No one's expecting or aiming to 'change the past' -- what happened, happened, and what's more to-the-point is how things are going to be from *here on out*.
No, you are pretending that the entrepreneur's and investor's decisions, initiative and labor that caused the production system to exist and operate
didn't happen.
Just as slaveowners owned slaves as property, and lords basically 'owned' serfs (on the land / estate),
By owning their
rights to liberty, as the landowner does.
BUT NOT THE FACTORY OWNER.GET IT?? today it's the *capitalists* who 'own' wage-labor, or wage slaves, through the medium of *industrial productivity* and the life-necessary commodities it produces.
GARBAGE. All the factory owner owns is an economic opportunity HE CREATED. He has NO POWER to deprive the worker of anything he would otherwise have. The worker can just ignore the factory owner and be no worse off.
Why do you always refuse to know such facts?
You cling to 18th-century politics, while industrialization has been around since the *19th century*, generally.
Oh, really? Name the 18th century politics that resembles mine.
Thought not.
Oh, sorry, I thought maybe you wanted to meet half-way, on the 'common ground' of *non-productive* capitalist organs. It's a *start*, at least.
I do. I am the one who has identified the correct way for socialists and capitalists to meet halfway.
You are the one who
won't meet halfway, and insist that rightful and wrongful ownership alike ALL be erased.
This isn't a sports score, or any other kind of *quantitative* thing, it's about *how committed* people are to 'contemporizing' society's mode of production.
No. It's about how committed people are to liberty, justice and truth -- which in your case is not in the least.
Again, the *technical* / technological aspect of *industrialization*, happens to imply *socialism* as the matching / appropriate form of social organization, for the best application of labor and (social) administration to the assembly-line production process.
No it does not, as history proves, and as I have proved here repeatedly. The technical, economic, and all other characteristics of production in all economies above the hunter-gatherer and nomadic herding stages imply geoism as the optimum form of social organization because it is
just -- it gets the incentives right -- and thus maximizes relief of scarcity.
Indentured servitude initially, and then later sharecropping.
Nope. Flat wrong. Agricultural wage labor characterized the situation of landless "free" citizens in many ancient economies, most notably Rome's.
Despite your being so argumentative,
I merely identify your errors, which are unfortunately legion:
though, note that 'wage' *implies* 'equity capital',
No it doesn't. Landowners pay workers wages in the total absence of any "capital" but the land.
because wages are paid out of incoming *revenue*, from sales of the product,
No they aren't. They are paid whether any revenue comes in or not, and whether anyone buys the product or not, because it is the owner who causes and is responsible for production, not the workers.
from prerequisite *production*,
Which is caused by the owner's decision, initiative and labor.
from wage labor as indexed to *equity capital*.
There is no such indexing.
No, you just *think* that you're correct
No, I have
proved that I am correct.
-- private ownership of factories *does* exploit the worker, because the product of the worker's labor is sold for more than what is paid as a wage to the worker who *produced* the product.
GARBAGE. The wage worker did not produce the product, he only contributed one factor, and was paid the full value of that factor. The product was indisputably produced by the decision, initiative and labor of the owner, which caused the product to exist rather than not exist. The wage worker was completely unable to cause the product to exist, whereas the entrepreneur and factory owner arranged for the required location, building, planning, machinery, supplies, training, raw materials, power, etc. to be applied to the production process
in addition to the wage worker's labor. Socialism consists in dishonestly pretending that none of those other factors exist.
Nothing here is 'my belief' -- note that I'm not talking about *myself* here at all.
Everything you have said is nothing but your proved-false beliefs.
Your own moralism over 'rightful' and 'wrongful' can't be backed up by real-world evidence
It most certainly can, by the indisputable facts of history. Justice is always rightful and always works because it
gets the incentives right, and injustice is always wrongful and never works because it gets the incentives wrong.
-- the worker *is* exploited by equity capital, effectively 'paying' the employer for the right to work each hour on the employer's private property, the workplace.
GARBAGE. How can the employer possibly be exploiting the worker when the worker would be worse off if the employer had never existed? It is the
LANDOWNER whom the worker must
ACTUALLY pay for permission to access the employment opportunities at the factory, and it is the
LANDOWNER whom the factory owner must pay for permission to access the nearby workforce. How many times do I have to identify that FACT for you before you will find a willingness to know it?
Your politics / position *overvalues* the operational / logistical role in the enterprise, of capital ownership and the management of capital as investment equity capital.
No it doesn't. It simply -- unlike socialism or capitalism -- is willing to know and respect the relevant facts of objective physical reality.
If the capital's owner's role was taken to be like that of *any other employee* in the enterprise, meaning *logistically*, then the capital owner would *not* have such a disproportionate influence / determining-role, in the *leadership* / stewardship of that enterprise.
The owner's role is
not like that of any other employee because he is the one who is
causing production to occur, and is thus responsible for it.
This is the very edge of the divide, in a sense, since all executive staff are 'internal labor' to the enterprise organization -- they *don't* produce the actual commodities that the company sells for a profit
Irrelevant: they are just managing the production
system that the entrepreneur created and the owner causes to operate.
-- and those staff are *salaried* / paid a wage, more-or-less, while the owner *isn't*.
Because the owner is devoting his
purchasing power to production in addition to his labor. You simply pretend that that contribution does not exist.
Capitalism's social convention of blessing capital quantities with increasing corporate determining *power* is just that -- a *convention*.
GARBAGE. It is recognition of and respect for the indisputable fact of objective physical reality that the owner is MAKING THE DECISIONS that cause the product to exist rather than not exist.
Ownership may make *great* decisions, or ownership may make *shitty* decisions, but in the end that ownership will *prevail* (as much as possible),
And will SHOULDER THE RESPONSIBILITY for those decisions.
while the rest of the executive staff, *and* the wage workers who produce the product,
I already proved to you that the wage workers only contribute one factor. It is the owner whose decision, initiative and labor cause the product to exist rather than not exist. He is therefore its producer, not the wage workers.
*don't* benefit from the success of the enterprise.
They are paid whether the enterprise is successful or not because they do not produce the product and are
not responsible for the success or failure of the enterprise.
Another way of phrasing this is why are we looking at ownership shares as the yardstick for 'influence on steering', while *not* looking at the company's *org chart* -- ?
We do look at the organizational chart. You obviously know nothing whatever about how actual business actually operates, because you have never held an actual job in one.
The top of the organizational pyramid, numerically, is far fewer than the *total* number of executives (and then also all the wage workers as well), yet *their* ownership-based decision-making is regarded as 'valid', and 'official', ultimately, while *all* staff is continuously contributing to the enterprise in *their* respective executive roles, over *their* respective domains.
And being paid whether the firm makes any profits or not. Seems you "forgot" that little detail.
I'll go so far as to say that this is an illustration of *financialization* -- the 'equity heaven' that *you* idealize is one where equity ownership is quite modest, and quite proportionate to the size and scope of the enterprise itself, which, fortuitously, happens to do *manufacturing*, making tangible, socially-needed *goods* (like shoes).
This is an *idealization* -- yes, at some point in economic history this *was* the case, and any one of us can be prone to *nostalgia* over such times, but here in the present (since the '80s), we've seen the rise of *financialization*, though still technically 'capitalism' in a monstrous kind of way.
I have explained the role of the debt-money system in financialization. You just refuse to understand it.
There's even a *dramatization* of this historical moment / development:
Seen it. That's finance capitalism based on debt money. I have explained to you multiple times why that is not what I am advocating.
We've covered this ground already --
Yes, and I proved you wrong.
yes, the rentier capitalist / landowner *extracts* rent from both the equity capitalist (land for factories / workplaces), *and* from the worker (housing for living),
For access to the factory.while the employer exploits the worker through private ownership of the means of mass industrial production --
How can the employer be exploiting the worker when the worker would be
worse off if the employer and his factory had never existed? How can simply offering the worker access to economic opportunity that he would not otherwise have "exploit" him? Why do you refuse to know the fact that the worker's disadvantageous bargaining position is imposed on him by the landowner, not the industrial employer?
how else is the worker to get the *products* of the factory, except by working for an exploitative wage -- ?
By working for the exact same wage in a geoist economy where he would not have to support rich, greedy, privileged, parasitic landowners.
When you say that the 'value of land is publicly created', are you talking about your *geoist* model, or are you talking about actual capitalist *history* -- ?
The reality in all systems that have exclusive tenure.
Actual history is about government-backed *genocide*, then subsequent labor, to make any and all land parcels into saleable (rentier) *commodities*.
"Publicly created" means by government and the community. Provision of secure, exclusive tenure is part of what government does that creates land value. It is always at the expense of all who would otherwise be at liberty to use the land, whether indigenous people removed by force or anyone else.
After the massacres and bloodshed we could say that the *initial* 'valuation' of land results from the initial (slave) *labor* that converted the land into *farmland*, and ready for planting.
Yes, we could say that -- if we intended to be incorrect and dishonest. If we intended to be correct and honest, we would say that the land's UNIMPROVED value came from the services and infrastructure government provides, the opportunities and amenities the community provides, and the physical qualities nature provides at that location.
1. I addressed this subtopic above, regarding executive staff.
And I proved you wrong.
Unfortunately you're *conflating* the factory owner, with his or her *capital*.
No, I am identifying the fact that the capital doesn't do or contribute anything except by the owner's decision, initiative and labor.
1a. We can examine the enterprise-logistical *individual role* of the capitalist person themselves, if you like, as over corporate decision-making, *or*
No we can't, because you refuse to know any of the relevant facts.
1b. We can examine the *economic role* of the capital *itself*, since the owner's capital isn't the same thing as the owner as an *individual person*.
No we can't, because you refuse to know the fact that the capital itself has no economic role except by its owner's decision, initiative and labor.
2. Nope -- only equity capital can economically exploit the labor commodity, by *employing* the worker.
GARBAGE. I have proved that the employer per se has
no power to exploit the worker, and cannot honestly be said to be exploiting those whom he is making
better off than they would be had he never existed.
< silly Marxist bull$#!+ snipped >
3. How are profits from investment capital even *possible*, then, if 'the landowner takes almost all the additional production the factory owner creates' -- ?
Three reasons:
1. There is a statistical distribution of profitability that results from many unpredictable factors, so while all firms intend to be profitable, some firms make profits while others suffer losses.
2. In finance capitalism, various kinds of monopoly such as IP, no-bid government contracts, regulated utility monopolies, etc. enable non-land rent seeking. The development and management of brands is a large part of this, as people perceive branded goods as more valuable and are willing to pay enough for them to make them (often highly) profitable. Landowners can't charge for use of brands, as they are not tied to location.
3. In most cases, the owners understand that the profits of production tend to be competed away, so they try to incorporate some form of rent seeking into their operations, even if it is just owning the land under their business premises.
Does revenue from the production of commodities, after paying out wages, go to the *equity owner*, or 100% to the *landowner* -- ?
The rent does not come out of revenue; it is paid before -- and whether -- any production even occurs.
You're mixing-up *agricultural production*, with *industrial production*.
No, I am not. Ricardo explained the Law of Rent using an agricultural example, but the same goes for any form of production.
4. The factory owner *economically exploits* the worker, expropriating surplus labor value
I have proved to you that he does not. The value of the worker's labor is the wage he is paid. Any surplus is created by the owner's contributions, not the workers'.
-- all based on the combined *imposition* of private property privilege from *all* private property owners.
I have proved to you that owning land is a privilege because it abrogates people's rights, while owning a factory is not because it does not.
Any given worker is consequently under duress to be employed at one-or-another workplace, for the sake of earning a wage, from work done, for the sake of procuring commodities for consumption, for the necessities of modern life and living.
The things we want to consume are not provided by the Tooth Fairy. Someone has to produce them by means of labor. That is just a fact of nature, not duress. The duress is applied by the
landowner, who demands the worker pay
him just for
permission to work and sustain himself.
For the worker it's not 'economic opportunity' as much as it's 'officially coerced work participation, at exploitative wages, to avoid the personal perils of joblessness, homelessness, and hunger'.
GARBAGE. It's economic opportunity because he would be even worse off without it. It is the need to pay the landowner just for
permission to work, shop, etc. that threatens the worker with homelessness, hunger, etc., not the opportunity the factory owner offers him.
GET IT??5. I don't think *any* politics calls for 'stealing factories',
Socialism does. You have advocated it explicitly.
since that implies a *bid for private ownership*, by those who would otherwise *not* have ownership.
No it doesn't. It only implies taking something from those who rightfully own it without making just compensation for what is taken.
Successfully 'stealing factories' would result in *a new definitive owner*, and that's certainly not the point of proletarian revolution
Yes it is: the new definitive owner is meant to be the collective.
-- the point of working-class revolution is not for a new 'cohort', shall-we-say, of private factory owners.
Right: it is to install a new cohort of
political factory owners.
Proletarian revolution is for a new *mode of production* altogether, to expand the 'public sphere', or 'commons', to include everything that's currently in *private* hands. ('Salarize all ownership.')
I.e., steal from those who rightly own what they created.
I'll note that the physical-material factories themselves, and all equipment within, was *physically produced* by wage labor in the past ('dead labor'), and *not* by your vaunted 'entrepreneur' capitalist.
Your claims are just objectively false. It was indisputably produced by the decisions, initiative and labor of the entrepreneurs and owners who caused it to exist rather than not exist.
False, but keep lying to yourself. You're a special snowflake. There is no one else like you.
- By litwin
- By ingliz