There is a big difference between a period in which new technologies are introduced, which replace older technologies, and a period in which simply more of the same technology is rolled out. A spinning machine that does the work of 10 spinning wheels, each requiring a spinner, brings about a sharp rise in productivity, but when all spinning wheels have been replaced, and so only additional spinning machines are added to the existing stock, no such increase in productivity arises. The same could be said about the introduction of personal computers in offices, in place of numerous clerks each keeping paper records and accounts, and calculating on adding machines. This is the point Marx makes above, because, in the latter such periods, the increase in gross output, requires a greater proportion of additional labour than during periods where new technologies replace older technologies, and so where productivity continues to rise rapidly.
Indeed, in Theories of Surplus Value, Marx also distinguishes between periods in which gross output rises faster than net output, and periods where the opposite occurs. The former applies in conditions of boom and crisis, such as the 1960's, 70's and early 80's, whereas the latter applies in periods of stagnation and prosperity, such as the the late 1980's, 90's and 2000's, up to 2008.
In periods where productivity stops growing at such a rapid pace, labour starts to get used up, and that means that, first, the potential to expand the social working-day comes to an end, absolute surplus value cannot be expanded, and, as wages rise, relative surplus value also falls, squeezing profits. For Roberts, who follows Ricardo in the belief that capital accumulation is a function of the rate of profit, such conditions of squeezed profits would lead to a fall in accumulation, and Roberts equates such a fall with a period of crisis, though logically, if that were the case, the pressure on wages would ease, there would be unemployment, and profits would rise again, creating a self-regulating model of capitalism, in which crises of overproduction of capital became impossible.
But, Marx in numerous places, shows that this is not the case. For example, in Chapter 15, Marx describes how, precisely this condition of squeezed profits, due to rising wages, and a slower growth of productivity, results in the exact opposite. In the absence of new technologies to increase productivity, each individual capital is led to seek a solution via production on a larger scale so as to enjoy the benefits of a greater division of labour, as well as other economies of scale.
“The contradiction, to put it in a very general way, consists in that the capitalist mode of production involves a tendency towards absolute development of the productive forces, regardless of the value and surplus-value it contains, and regardless of the social conditions under which capitalist production takes place; while, on the other hand, its aim is to preserve the value of the existing capital and promote its self-expansion to the highest limit (i.e., to promote an ever more rapid growth of this value)...
A drop in the rate of profit is attended by a rise in the minimum capital required by an individual capitalist for the productive employment of labour; required both for its exploitation generally, and for making the consumed labour-time suffice as the labour-time necessary for the production of the commodities, so that it does not exceed the average social labour-time required for the production of the commodities. Concentration increases simultaneously, because beyond certain limits a large capital with a small rate of profit accumulates faster than a small capital with a large rate of profit. At a certain high point this increasing concentration in its turn causes a new fall in the rate of profit. The mass of small dispersed capitals is thereby driven along the adventurous road of speculation, credit frauds, stock swindles, and crises.”
(Capital III, Chapter 15)
So, as Marx says, here, capital is driven by competition to accumulate, in order to obtain competitive advantage, whether the rate of profit is rising or falling. But, Marx also set out why Ricardo was wrong, because what primarily drives capital to accumulate is this above requirement to be more competitive so as to hold on to, or seize additional market share. Each capital assumes that the market is expanding, and so is driven to accumulate in order to get its share of the larger market.
Marx, made that clear as against Ricardo, whose argument Roberts echoes.
“Although considerable rise or fall in market-prices affects the volume of production, regardless of it there is in agriculture (just as in all other capitalistically operated lines of production) nevertheless a continuous relative over-production, in itself identical with accumulation, even at those average prices whose level has neither a retarding nor exceptionally stimulating effect on production. Under other modes of production this relative overproduction is effected directly by the population increase, and in colonies by steady immigration. The demand increases constantly, and, in anticipation of this new capital is continually invested in new land, although this varies with the circumstances for different agricultural products. It is the formation of new capitals which in itself brings this about. But so far as the individual capitalist is concerned, he measures the volume of his production by that of his available capital, to the extent that he can still control it himself. His aim is to capture as big a portion as possible of the market. Should there be any over-production, he will not take the blame upon himself, but places it upon his competitors. The individual capitalist may expand his production by appropriating a larger aliquot share of the existing market or by expanding the market itself.”
(Capital III, Chapter 39)
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