But, at least, compared to the position of the “Left” social-democrats and reformist socialists, the position of the conservative social-democrats is logically consistent. The “Left” social-democrats, and reformist socialists, accept the continuation of capitalism as “natural”, and a good thing, and, consequently, only seek to fulfil their social function as a mediating, administrative bureaucracy, tinkering with the mechanism of society, to ensure its continued smooth running. They seek to advance, or at least defend, the interests of labour within that process. The reformist socialists/Mensheviks/Stalinists, nominally, do not accept the continuation of capitalism, or see it as a good thing. They, nominally, seek socialism. However, in practice, their position is identical to that of the “Left” social democrats, because the date at which that socialism can arise is pushed further and further into the future, like the horizon, which never gets any closer, no matter how far you travel towards it.
The reason for that, as set out by Marx is that, so long as you accept the constraint imposed by capitalism, itself, as a system, you accept the inevitably subordinate position of labour vis-a-vis capital. That does not mean, as Marx describes, in Wage-Labour and Capital, Value, Price and Profit, as well as in Capital and Theories of Surplus Value, that workers real wages/living standards cannot rise, or even that, periodically, relative wages cannot rise. Relative wages (including the social wage), indeed, do rise periodically, as an inevitable consequence of the operation of capitalism, itself, over the long-wave cycle. The point at which capital accumulates extensively rather than intensively (for example 1850's, 1900's, 1960's) is the point at which the demand for labour-power begins to rise faster than the available supply/social working-day, causing not only nominal and real wages to rise, but also relative wages.
By definition, this point is, also, where the mass and rate of profit was at a cycle high, and so capital not only must, by its own laws, accept this rise in relative wages, and fall in relative profits, but can easily do so. Indeed, just as a rise in real wages can accompany a fall in relative wages, as a result of rising social productivity, so a fall in relative profits can go along with a rise in the mass of profit, driven by an expansion of gross output, arising from an increasing demand for wage goods. It is the difference between portion and proportion. A bigger pie means both labour and capital can get bigger portions, but that doesn't tell us what proportion of that bigger pie each gets relative to the other.
But, as Marx sets out in Capital III, Chapter 15, Theories of Surplus Value, Chapter 21, and elsewhere, this very expansion sows the seeds of its own destruction. In this expansionary phase, net output (surplus value) continuously falls, relative to gross output, even though the amount of net output/surplus value rises. Relative wages rise, driving demand for wage goods, and competition between capitals for this demand/market share, drives them to accumulate additional capital to increase their output. The fact that their rate of profit is falling does not, at all, detract from this requirement of competition to accumulate, both because although the rate of profit might be falling, the amount of profit is rising, and because, if they do not accumulate capital to expand their production others will, and so they would, then lose both market share and the mass of profit that goes with it.
The demand for labour-power rises further still, driving wages higher, reducing relative surplus value, and, as workers, then, demand reduced hours and increased holidays, also reduces absolute surplus value. Eventually, this squeeze on relative profits from a falling rate of surplus-value, means that the mass of surplus value itself stops growing. Capital has been overproduced relative to the available labour supply/social working-day, the rate of profit suddenly and sharply crashes, and, for the least efficient firms, and those with the smallest profit margins, profits turn to losses, they go out of business, and so the cycle moves from boom to crisis.
In the process, workers are laid off, reducing the bargaining power of labour. Wages fall. But, firms, also, now, turn, again, to labour-saving technologies, as seen in the 1920's, and 1970's, and a period of intensive rather than extensive accumulation begins, resulting in the periods of stagnation of the 1930's and 1980's, where relative wages fall, relative profits rise, and net output expands relative to gross output.
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