Ramsey improves on Barton's position, and essentially arrives at a recognition of constant and variable-capital, even though he continues to refer to them as fixed and circulating. That Ramsey arrives at these definitions, Marx says, shows the intrinsic necessity of progress towards them, in order to analyse the productive process and relations. It is the productive process itself which is the material basis for the categories of constant and variable capital, and the technical relations between them. And, on this basis, the question of the production of consumption goods, or the commodity-capital, is irrelevant, in terms of the demand for labour-power.
“The way, however, of realising the gross revenue in different commodities is not, as Ricardo has it, and Barton intimates it, the cause, but the effect of the immanent laws of capitalistic production, leading to a diminishing proportion, compared with the total amount of produce, of that part of it which forms the fund for the reproduction of the labouring class. If a large part of the capital consists of machinery, raw materials, auxiliary materials etc., then a smaller portion of the working class as a whole will be employed in the reproduction of the means of subsistence which enter into the consumption of the workers. This relative diminution in the reproduction of variable capital, however, is not the reason for the relative decrease in the demand for labour, but on the contrary, its effect.” (p 579-80)
In other words, in an economy where technology is more advanced, there will be a larger number of machines. These machines will act to raise productivity. The higher productivity, by definition, means that less labour is required to process a given amount of material, and produce a given amount of output. A greater proportion of total output will go to reproduce the processed material, and less to reproduce labour-power.
“Similarly: A larger section of the workers employed in the production of articles of consumption which enter into revenue in general, will produce articles of consumption that are consumed by— are exchanged against the revenue of—capitalists, landlords and their retainers (state, church etc.), [and a smaller) section [will produce] articles destined for the revenue of the workers. But this again is effect, not cause. A change in the social relation of workers and capitalists, a revolution in the conditions governing capitalist production, would change this at once. The revenue would be “realised in different commodities”, to use an expression of Ricardo’s.” (p 580)
As productivity rises, the rate of surplus value rises, and the mass of surplus value rises along with it. A greater proportion of revenue thereby goes to profits, interest and rent, relative to wages. This not only facilitates luxury consumption, by these exploiting classes, but also facilitates them using a larger portion of these revenues for the purpose of accumulation. It is nothing in the physical nature or requirements of production per se, that necessitates these processes, and distribution or revenues. They are purely historically determined, i.e. they flow from the social relations that exist under capitalism, as a specific and historically limited mode of production. They result from the fact that the means of production confront the workers as capital. As a result, it is the capital, irrespective of its ownership, i.e. whether it is owned by a private capitalist, state capitalist, or is socialised capital, such as a joint stock company or co-operative, which employs wage labour, not labour which employs capital, simply as means to facilitate its production.
No comments:
Post a Comment