Monday 21 October 2019

Theories of Surplus Value, Part III, Chapter 23 - Part 35

At the same time, Cherbuliez shares the same Ricardian view as James Mill that all taxes should be placed only on rent. But, Cherbuliez notes that, because its difficult to separate rent from profit, and impossible where the landowner is also the capitalist, he is driven to the conclusion of the Ricardian theory that all landed property should be nationalised, so that the rent is then collected by the state, which would then go to defraying taxes. He says, 

““Why do people not take a step further and abolish private ownership of land?” (p. 129) “The landowners are idlers who are maintained at the public expense without any kind of benefit to industry or to the general welfare of society” (p. 129). “What makes land productive is the capital employed in agriculture. The landowner contributes nothing to it. He only exists to pocket rent, which does not constitute a part of the profit on his capital, neither is it the product of labour nor that of the productive power of the soil, but the effect of the price of the agricultural products, which is increased by the competition of the consumers…” etc. (p. 129). “Since the elimination of the private ownership of land would in no way change the causes responsible for rent, rent would continue to exist, but the state would receive it, for all the land would belong to it and it would lease out arable sections of the land to private persons owning sufficient capital to exploit them” (p. 130). Rent would replace all state revenues. “Finally industry, liberated, released from all fetters, would take an unprecedented leap forward…” (p. 130).” (p 397-8) 

So, here we have the Ricardian view supporting the free development of capital. Today, we could make a similar case in relation to the parasitic nature of the money-lending capitalists, the share and bondholders who serve no useful social function, but who drain vast amounts of surplus value, as revenues, in the form of interest/dividends and capital transfers that could otherwise be used productively. If the provision of credit was in the hands of a National Investment Bank, the interest it obtained on loans would likewise go to defray taxes, and thereby free vast sums of money-capital for the accumulation of real capital. 

Marx comments, 

“But how does this Ricardian conclusion agree with the pious Sismondian wish to place “bonds” on capital and capitalist production? How does it agree with the lamentation: 

“Capital will ultimately rule the world if an upheaval does not halt the course which the development of our society is taking under the domination of the law of appropriation” (op. cit., p. 152). “Capital will eliminate the old social distinctions everywhere in order to replace them by this simple classification of men into rich and poor, the rich, who enjoy themselves and rule, and the poor who work and obey” (p. 153). “The general appropriation of productive wealth and of the products has always reduced the numerous class of proletarians to a position of subjugation and political impotence, but this appropriation was once combined with a system of restrictive laws which, by impeding the development of industry and the accumulation of capital, placed limits on the growth of the class of the disinherited, restricted their civil rights within narrow bounds and thus in different ways rendered this class harmless. Today, capital has broken part of these fetters. It is preparing to break all of them” (pp. 155-56). 

“The demoralisation of the proletarians is the second result of the distribution of wealth” (p. 156).” (p 398) 


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