The capitalist buys the labour-power of the worker, at its value, and that is equal to 5 hours, the labour-time required to produce the wage goods for the workers' reproduction. So, in these cases, not only is a surplus product produced, but also, a surplus value. The independent commodity producer appropriates their own surplus value, and the industrial capitalist simply appropriates it, along with the product of the wage-labourer. The part of the value of that product that represents the value of consumed materials, and wear and tear, then resolves into the fund for their replacement. Under simple reproduction, it represents the demand for Department I. Under expanded reproduction, it constitutes the majority and expanding part of that demand, with additional demand coming from capital accumulation, funded from a part of profit.
Of the remaining value of the commodity, a part resolves into the replacement of the consumed labour-power, and what is left is resolved into profit, available for the personal consumption of the capitalist, and the fund available for capital accumulation.
Understanding this difference between the cost of production of the end commodity, as the basis of its value, which is the method of marginalist economics, and also of the TSSI, as against Marx's method of determining the value of the commodity, and then, considering how it its value resolves into these different funds, required for reproduction, is vital to understanding Marx's determination of the rate of profit, and concepts of the tie-up and release of capital.
If we consider what wages really are, therefore, real wages, they are the value of those commodities required to reproduce the worker's labour-power, consumed in the labour process. If the worker is employed for 10 hours, then, during this 10 hours, they will consume a certain quantity of their own energy, as well as muscle, bone, sinews and so on that must be renewed by the consumption of adequate food, including the required proportions of protein, carbohydrate, fat and vital minerals. If the worker works for more than these 10 hours, or works more intensively, they will consume more of their labour-power that needs to be replaced.
Beyond a certain point, the amount by which the consumption of the workers' labour-power increases, and must be replaced (rise in the value of labour-power) becomes greater than the new value created in this additional time, so that surplus value rises at a slower rate, or even a negative rate. The balancing of these physical constraints form the material basis for the determination of the normal working-day.
A machine, no matter how well maintained, eventually wears out, or becomes obsolete. The latter applies whether the machine is ever used or not, whilst the former is a function of its use. The former is replaced as the value of wear and tear, but the latter (depreciation) is simply a capital loss that the owner must bear from their profits. The same is true of the worker. No matter how well maintained, the worker grows old, and must be replaced by a new worker. There is little demand, now, for the labour of buggy whip workers, just as there is little demand for spinning wheels. They become obsolete, and new types of concrete labour, just as with new types of machine, take their place. This was, also, described, by Marx, in The Civilising Mission of Capital.
So, a part of the value of labour-power involves not just the current maintenance cost of that labour-power, but the ability to produce its replacement, both in terms of the physical production of new generations of workers, but also the types of concrete labour required for new types of production. If we look at Marx's theory of value, therefore, as against that of Smith, marginalism or the TSSI, based on past cost of production, a crucial difference emerges, explained by Marx in Capital III. A cost of production theory says, if the value of the components (factors of production) of the value of the commodity rises, then the value of the commodity rises. This is also the basis of bourgeois explanations of inflation.
But, this is not the case. If the value of labour-power rises, this does not increase the value of the commodity produced by that labour-power. It rather changes the proportion in which the new value created by it divides into wages (necessary labour) and profits (surplus labour).
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