[Local Localist]

This thread is amazing. Genuinely the best clusterfuck I've seen on this website in a long time. #FreeShitArmy

[ckaihatsu]

It doesn't make sense, at least not to me.

Okay -- maybe the following will have some overlap with your understanding....

Neoliberalism and the state

Colin Jenkins provides (2014) a critique on the role of the capitalist state in the era of neoliberalism, using base and superstructure theory as well as the work of Nicos Poulantzas. Regarding developments in the United States during this era (roughly 1980–2015), Jenkins highlights the nature in which political parties and the political system itself are inherently designed to protect the economic base of capitalism and, in doing so, have become "increasingly centralized, coordinated, and synchronized over the past half-century." This, according to Jenkins, has led to a "corporate-fascistic state of being" that is challenging the equilibrium of this fragile relationship. His analysis specifically addresses the role of both major parties, Democrats and Republicans, in the United States:

It reminds us of John Dewey's claim that, 'As long as politics is the shadow cast on society by big business, the attenuation of the shadow will not change the substance.' In the US, the two-party political system has proven extremely effective in this regard. Aside from differences on social issues like abortion and gay marriage, as well as socioeconomic issues like unemployment insurance and public assistance, both parties ultimately embrace capitalist/corporatist interests in that they both serve as facilitators for the dominant classes: The Republican Party in its role as forerunner, pushing the limits of the capitalist model to the brink of fascism; and the Democratic Party in its role as governor, providing intermittent degrees of slack and pull against this inevitable move towards a 'corporate-fascistic state of being.[16]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_and_ ... _the_state

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Capitalism is a completely artificial construct. In capitalism, value is what we say it is...

viewtopic.php?p=15249572#p15249572

[late]

neoliberalism...

That doesn't appear to have a connection to the statement you are supposedly explaining.

Your statement on power oversimplifies matters.

[ckaihatsu]

I believe in the labour theory of value, and I believe that currency acts as a means of rationing finite goods and services to the population, so yes, in principle the total of all face values of the currency should indeed reflect total labour input. Money is, after all, just “congealed labour-power”, to use Marx’s phrase.

Here's where I'm at, Potemkin -- for the production of commodities to take place there has to be a combination of [1] capital, and [2] labor, correct -- ?


[11] Labor & Capital, Wages & Dividends

Spoiler: show

---


The M-C-M' process imbues the commodity with some kind of value, so that *revenue* (the M' part) results from the sale of the commodity (C).

The original money (M) goes to *both* equity capital investments ('fixed capital'), *and* to paying wages for wage labor ('variable capital'). But capital itself has requirements, namely F.I.R.E. -- finance, insurance, and real estate. Such costs of capital *decrease* the amount of capital remaining, as for active equity investment -- correct -- ?

What value / meaning, then, does the commodity C-value have, exactly -- it's the original M money, minus the F.I.R.E. capital overhead, minus wages paid, for capital investments in the commodity-production process, to produce the commodity C.

Does that newly-produced commodity C reflect *only* labor-input values, or does it reflect *both* labor-value *and* capital 'use value' (so-to-speak), minus 'F.I.R.E.' overhead costs -- ?

So at *that* point, would the commodity's resulting revenue / face-values -- M' -- reflect 'total labor input', as you posited -- ?

[ckaihatsu]

Either the Gov. or a bank just created the dollars out of thin air, so nobody lost anything they had before the transaction. Some did get things they didn't have before the transaction.

Those two sentences contradict each other. As I have pointed out, the loans given by a bank are indeed created out of nothing, but to avoid damaging the economy they must be destroyed by being repaid.

'To avoid damaging the economy' -- ?

I don't think you understand the *reasons* for Keynesian / MMT-type government deficit spending, as into the shadow banking system.

The U.S. economy (and the UK, etc.) is running on *fumes*, and is arguably nearly *insolvent*. Past 'QE' has all been defensive *attempts* to tread-water, to prevent endemic bankruptcies, by providing government funds to keep non-productive business entities *afloat* ('zombie banks' and 'zombie companies').

[ckaihatsu]

That doesn't appear to have a connection to the statement you are supposedly explaining.

*This* one:

Capitalism is a completely artificial construct. In capitalism, value is what we say it is...

viewtopic.php?p=15249572#p15249572

[If] capitalist 'value' is a social construction, then that's part of the *superstructure*, while the material reality and dynamics being *reflected* by such currency is the 'base' of society, or how it physically carries-out its production for itself.

"or how it physically carries-out its production for itself"?

Yeah, 'social organization' and the 'mode of production':





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Your statement on power oversimplifies matters.

You have a *critique* of Jenkins there -- ?

Do elaborate.

[late]

You have a *critique* of Jenkins there -- ?

Do elaborate.

You have been using language that doesn't fit within my understanding of economics.

That's not about neoliberalism.

A hundred years ago, TR went after monopolies and undue concentrations of power. That's going to happen again, now that the worker shortage is giving workers power. It will take time, but it's coming.

Which means your view is overly simplified.

If you aren't looking at this area by area, you are missing a lot. Neoliberalism peaked during the Cheney Presidency, in foreign affairs. You might want to say the Supreme Court is neoliberal, but it would be more accurate to call it White Supremacist, in my distinctly unhumble opinion.

There are a lot of groups with power, and when they aren't helping each other, they are stabbing each other in the back. It's a mess.

[ckaihatsu]

the worker shortage is giving workers power

Over 125,000 railroad workers are eager to strike and have begun to hold independent protests against the railroad unions, which are conspiring with the rail carriers to block a strike that would effectively shut down the US economy.

[...]

In other words, while the capitalist governments spent trillions to bail out the banks and corporations after the 2008 financial crash and again in 2020 at the onset of the pandemic, it is “impossible” to even heat the homes of workers in the world’s “richest” countries during the winter.

This movement has the power to stop the imperialist war, to implement policies necessary to stop the spread of COVID-19 once and for all, and redistribute the world’s wealth to meet the human needs of the international working class. But the spontaneous development of the class struggle is not enough to break the decades-long suppression of the workers’ movement by the trade union bureaucracies. This requires political leadership.

[...]

The working class is larger and more technologically advanced than ever before. But the task of workers engaged in each struggle is to broaden their fight, to tap into the immense social power of the international working class by unifying with other sections in struggle, to win allies among the mass of workers who are not organized in trade unions, and to reach across national boundaries in common struggle against transnational corporations. This means directing the struggles consciously as struggles not against this employer or that politician, but against the capitalist system as a whole.

This is the purpose of the International Workers Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees (IWA-RFC), founded by the International Committee of the Fourth International in May 2021, which aims to coordinate and draw together all the disparate struggles of the international working class into one unified world movement. Above all, what is needed is the building of a socialist leadership to direct the emerging struggles in the direction of a challenge to the capitalist system and imperialist war.

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/1 ... b-o05.html

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Which means your view is overly simplified.

What's 'my view', late -- ?

Base-and-superstructure -- ?

The dizzying extents of the far-left -- ?

(grin)

[late]

What's 'my view', late -- ?

Base-and-superstructure -- ?

The dizzying extent of the far-left -- ?

(grin)

This is just about the text you pasted. As a Boomer, the largest American generation ever, I am painfully, very painfully, aware that supply and demand underlies everything else.

You need Unions, and Union economists, and Union lobbyists, and lots more.

But it all comes down to supply and demand..

[ckaihatsu]

This is just about the text you pasted. As a Boomer, the largest American generation ever, I am painfully, very painfully, aware that supply and demand underlies everything else.

You need Unions, and Union economists, and Union lobbyists, and lots more.

But it all comes down to supply and demand..

Is it supply-and-demand, or is it *this*:

Capitalism is a completely artificial construct. In capitalism, value is what we say it is...

viewtopic.php?p=15249572#p15249572

I have *my own*, of course....


communist supply & demand -- Model of Material Factors

Spoiler: show

https://web.archive.org/web/20201211050 ... ?p=2889338


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[T]he spontaneous development of the class struggle is not enough to break the decades-long suppression of the workers’ movement by the trade union bureaucracies. This requires political leadership.

[late]

Is it supply-and-demand, or is it *this*:


late wrote:

Capitalism is a completely artificial construct. In capitalism, value is what we say it is...

Supply and demand factors influence the determination of value...

[ckaihatsu]

Would you accept *these* for the production costs, and for the initial determination of value (for the commodity):


labor and capital, side-by-side

Spoiler: show

material-economic exploitation

Spoiler: show

Spoiler: show

[ckaihatsu]

Or...

A worker who is sufficiently productive can produce an output value greater than what it costs to hire him.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surplus_value#Theory

[Steve_American]

1] Agreed. Please point out any false premises you think I have used.

2] Our thoughts about the world are not the world itself. They are a map of the world. And like any map, it must be simplified in order to be useful. As Einstein pointed out, our theories about the workd must be as simple as possible, but no simpler.

3] Agreed, but this is a separate issue. It’s a critically important issue, but is not relevant to the truth or falsehood of my argument.

4] Agreed.

5] Those two sentences contradict each other. As I have pointed out, the loans given by a bank are indeed created out of nothing, but to avoid damaging the economy they must be destroyed by being repaid.

6] But for this new money not to ruin the economy, the goods and services it represents must be available. The new money just mobilises those unused resources. It does not and cannot create them.

Lurker, you may need to see the last reply on page 2 to understand my reply here.

1] You keep asserting that forgiving student loans will damage the economy. As an assertion without a proof, it is a premise, and it is IMO, false.
. . It is false because the active economy needs to have the active dollars that it looses replaced in some way. This is just one of the ways this can be done.
. . MMT assumes that the $/capita should not fall, because when it falls it will soon trigger a recession, which will make it fall faster.
. . Dollars can be removed from the active economy in a few ways. They are by borrowers making payments on their loans (you have said as much), being moved overseas by buying more stuff than we sell, being saved with a US bond or parked in a savings acc., and functionally as the population grows, etc. Note that, US deficit spending that is matched with a bond sale doesn't add dollars to the active economy.
[I know that MS Econ. claims that it does. But, from 1990 or so until 2020 (=30 years) there were deficits almost every year (the national debt increased in every year) and yet inflation was low. MMt asserts this was because of the matching bond sales.]
. . Dollars are added to the active economy in a few ways. They are, when a bank makes a loan (you agree with this), when the Fed buys a US bond, when borrowers stop making payments because their loan was forgiven, etc. Also, when a foreigner buys a US a new US bond, because this allows an equal amount of deficit spending, which adds the dollars. This is dollars returning to the active economy.

2] I take Einstein's statement to be that you must not over simplify the model or map in your head or the theory you are making. Since, I have not seen what you are leaving out of you map to make it simpler, I can't say that you have over simplified for sure. However, because you are getting (IMHO) the wrong answer, I must assume that you have left out some important element that would have made your map conform to reality better, and then you would have gotten the right answer.

3] I'll agree, however you did agree that my point was critically important on a different front. And, I still am asserting that you claim that forgiving the student debt will harm the economy is false. BTW -- I have seen where Stephanie Kelton (a leading MMTer) has said that she has done a deep study on the effects on the economy of forgiving all student debt and that the net result was very good for the economy.

4] Skip because you agreed with me.

5] No they do not *directly* contradict each other. If you are referring to the assumed damage to the economy and how it damages someone, then you are assuming the damage which I reject. You have yet to more than assert that there will be damage. In this reply above I asked you to provide a proof of that assertion.

6] Although "ruin the economy" is stronger than your earlier "damage the economy", you are not disagreeing with what I said. I said that excess additions of dollars into the active economy doesn't damage the economy by causing inflation as long as there is unused labor and the other resources to do what the new money is intended to do. But, remember that businesses only invest in new plant to fill a need/demand already exists or they see it to soon exist (perhaps created by the comp. own advertising). So, adding new demands can cause more investment to meet those demands, and this grows the economy.

So, I'm waiting for your proof that the economy is going to be damaged by forgiving the student loans. Without this proof, you assertions carry no more weight than Truth to Power's assertions that increasing CO2 levels aren't causing climate change. After I see your proof, I *will* agree with it or show where it is wrong.

.

[Truth To Power]

Or...A worker who is sufficiently productive can produce an output value greater than what it costs to hire him.

Like any other production factor the producer arranges to apply to his production system.

GET IT???

[Truth To Power]

Supply and demand factors influence the determination of value...

Value is what something would trade for: the intersection of scarcity (supply) with utility (demand). That's all.

[ckaihatsu]

Like any other production factor the producer arranges to apply to his production system.

GET IT???

Do I understand that labor is *commodified* in the production process -- ?

Sure, I do. I've make *diagrams* of such:


labor and capital, side-by-side

Spoiler: show

material-economic exploitation

Spoiler: show

Spoiler: show

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Value is what something would trade for: the intersection of scarcity (supply) with utility (demand). That's all.

No -- this is after-the-fact. Anyone can ask what it took to *get* there to *begin* with, as in 'What were the production costs?'. M-C-M'.

Oh, look, everyone's yawned deeply about this already:


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Value is what something would trade for, so the market measures value.

Okay, you're saying that the market measures the day-by-day *fluctuations* in the value of a commodity, due to the balance between the forces of supply and demand.

Now -- what about the *costs of production*. If I use available funds to manufacture something, I'm going to be looking for pricing -- irrespective of subsequent supply-and-demand pricing fluctuations -- that gives me a *return* on my money.

This is my standing critique of capitalist 'money' / exchange-values, that it's having to do *triple duty*, which is impossible -- here's recently from another thread:


ckaihatsu wrote:

[T]he radial gradient of metropolitan upscale land values, outward, means that the real estate pricings / values are out-of-whack with the *utility* provided to renters / owners / users of land. In other words we're all led to believe by default that market real estate prices are 'valid', and that they somehow reflect the *use*, or utility, that people get out of each unit or parcel.

But this obviously can't be the case, because these market prices *fluctuate*, according to supply-and-demand, as you've covered. So if more people are economically 'demanding' pricier areas with their money, then the price goes *up*, as we're currently seeing. This pricing / valuation then has *little* to do with the cost of *creating* that unit or parcel, nor does it accurately reflect the sense of 'use value' to the purchaser / renter, in the sense of proportion-of-income (spent on rent).

Yet we're expected to believe that the one 'price' value can somehow represent *all three* variables / qualities at once, 'use', 'supply and demand', and 'construction', all at once.

viewtopic.php?p=15249613#p15249613

[late]

Value is what something would trade for: the intersection of scarcity (supply) with utility (demand). That's all.

Which is what I said.

[Truth To Power]

Do I understand that labor is *commodified* in the production process -- ?

Sure, I do.

No you don't. Watch:

I've make *diagrams* of such:
labor and capital, side-by-side

Spoiler: show

material-economic exploitation

Spoiler: show

Spoiler: show

See? You claim labor is not a commodity that the producer purchases just like any other factor he applies to production.

No -- this is after-the-fact. Anyone can ask what it took to *get* there to *begin* with, as in 'What were the production costs?'. M-C-M'.

Production cost is absolutely irrelevant to value, as Jevons proved over 150 years ago when he refuted the Labor Theory of Value.

Oh, look, everyone's yawned deeply about this already:

Because it is nonsense.