[PEN-L:1665] Re: Minimum wages in real terms
On Fri, 1 Dec 1995 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: For this kind of dramatic wage increase, workers can not rely on the state and will have to rely on their own collective strength (e.g. a general strike) and be prepared for the political/social/economic consequences. Not to forget the necessity of international cooperation and coordination among the workers of all these countries... +=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-+ |stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal | | if you agree copy these 3 sentences in your own sig| | more info: http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm | +=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-+ | Jim Jaszewski [EMAIL PROTECTED] PGP Public Key available. | | http://www.freenet.hamilton.on.ca/~ab975/Profile.html | +=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-+
[PEN-L:1666] Re: Minimum wages in real terms
On Fri, 1 Dec 1995, Paul Zarembka wrote: So, what is so radical about a $10 minimum wage, except that Reich is talking about $5.15? The capitalists are robbing the working class blind and Marxists tools of analysis help show that. Actually I am bit dismayed by the resistance to these calculations (yours and Jerry's). Raising the minimum wage to 86% of the present average is a revolutionary act. It's just not compatible with capitalism. Now that's fine with me - that's exactly where I'm coming from - but you've got to realize that this is a challenge to all that's sacred. Might as well demand social ownership of the means of production while you're at it. Doug Doug Henwood [[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Left Business Observer 212-874-4020 (voice) 212-874-3137 (fax)
[PEN-L:1667] Re: Aglietta
Thanks, Jerry, for picking me up on my comments on Aglietta - I wasn't very clear. The original 1970s work was indeed very much in the Marxist tradition. But I stand by my assertion that the focus shifted to a much less radical position in the 1980s. Hugo Radice [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:1668] Re: lean production
What are "lean production systems?" maggie coleman [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:1669] Re: Minimum wages in real terms
Doug, I'm sorry but you are still misreading me. I added a P.S. which implied "OK, if the minimum wage is increased to $10, let the average wage increase to $20 if need be". BOTH increases would take us back to 1950 or maybe only 1973 in terms of the labor time returned to workers from their work hours. THIS IS NOT RADICAL! (altho I don't mind being radical). IT ONLY TAKES US BACK TO AN EARLIER DATE of U.S. capitalism! If it worked then for U.S. capitalism, why not now? If we are Marxists are bashful about such a modest request, how are we going to be revolutionaries at any time in our lives? You said that a 86% minimum wage ($10) relative to average wages is not possible given average wages. I responded to let the AVERAGE wages rise also (of course, everything is in real terms). You come back with a repeat of your former statement and adding that " It's just not compatible with capitalism". I'm not normally an irritable person, but why cannot direct responses be made to what I messaged? Someone else made the statement that minimum wages are much higher in Europe. Let's get those numbers and see if capitalism fell into the ocean of a working class revolution (or of barbarism) there. Paul Zarembka On Sat, 2 Dec 1995, Doug Henwood wrote: On Fri, 1 Dec 1995, Paul Zarembka wrote: So, what is so radical about a $10 minimum wage, except that Reich is talking about $5.15? The capitalists are robbing the working class blind and Marxists tools of analysis help show that. Actually I am bit dismayed by the resistance to these calculations (yours and Jerry's). Raising the minimum wage to 86% of the present average is a revolutionary act. It's just not compatible with capitalism. Now that's fine with me - that's exactly where I'm coming from - but you've got to realize that this is a challenge to all that's sacred. Might as well demand social ownership of the means of production while you're at it. Doug Doug Henwood [[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Left Business Observer
[PEN-L:1670] Re: Minimum wages in real terms
Let me take a shot at this. The simple fact is that capitalism induces technical change by means of labor-saving, capital-using technology. This means that if the rate of exploitation stays constant (which is what you are arguing for, in essence, when you call for an output-pegged minimum wage), then profitability will decline drastically (this is of course ignoring endogeneity of wage-induced consumption to output and hence to the rate of profit, however I think it would take some pretty strong assumptions to show that a dollar in increased wages would lead to a dollar in increased profits) . Yes, perhaps capitalists would survive with a lower rate of profit, but it would make the system even more fragile and I suspect that the ruling class would be kind of -- how should I say it, offended? YFTR, Tavis On Sat, 2 Dec 1995, Paul Zarembka wrote: Doug, I'm sorry but you are still misreading me. I added a P.S. which implied "OK, if the minimum wage is increased to $10, let the average wage increase to $20 if need be". BOTH increases would take us back to 1950 or maybe only 1973 in terms of the labor time returned to workers from their work hours. THIS IS NOT RADICAL! (altho I don't mind being radical). IT ONLY TAKES US BACK TO AN EARLIER DATE of U.S. capitalism! If it worked then for U.S. capitalism, why not now? If we are Marxists are bashful about such a modest request, how are we going to be revolutionaries at any time in our lives? You said that a 86% minimum wage ($10) relative to average wages is not possible given average wages. I responded to let the AVERAGE wages rise also (of course, everything is in real terms). You come back with a repeat of your former statement and adding that " It's just not compatible with capitalism". I'm not normally an irritable person, but why cannot direct responses be made to what I messaged? Someone else made the statement that minimum wages are much higher in Europe. Let's get those numbers and see if capitalism fell into the ocean of a working class revolution (or of barbarism) there. Paul Zarembka On Sat, 2 Dec 1995, Doug Henwood wrote: On Fri, 1 Dec 1995, Paul Zarembka wrote: So, what is so radical about a $10 minimum wage, except that Reich is talking about $5.15? The capitalists are robbing the working class blind and Marxists tools of analysis help show that. Actually I am bit dismayed by the resistance to these calculations (yours and Jerry's). Raising the minimum wage to 86% of the present average is a revolutionary act. It's just not compatible with capitalism. Now that's fine with me - that's exactly where I'm coming from - but you've got to realize that this is a challenge to all that's sacred. Might as well demand social ownership of the means of production while you're at it. Doug Doug Henwood [[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Left Business Observer
[PEN-L:1671] Re: Minimum wages in real terms
Jerry made two points on Paul's point. Summarizing those two points I have expressed disagreement with the second, which was reproduced by Dan Epstein as: 2) Reduction in corporate profitability would cause capital out-migration. Then he offers the following comments: Is that so? Capital invested in, say, McDonalds or other service sector businesses would move their franchises elsewhere, outside of the US, if the minimum wage was dramatically increased? This begs t he questions: Does anyone know what percentage of minimum wage jobs are "tied to the land?" Of course, that is so. Because no capital moves anywhere if the move is not profitable. Have we demonstrated that the move (due to minimum wage rise) is profitable? Fikret Ceyhun Dept. of Economics e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Univ. of North Dakota voice: (701)777-3348 office University Station, Box 8369(701)772-5135 home Grand Forks, ND 58202 fax:(701)777-5099
[PEN-L:1673] Re: Can you suggest sources? (fwd)
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Can anyone with ready access to the information he needs please send it directly to Andrew Milne at the Carleton address listed above? Thanks,, Sid Shniad Hi. Just tripped across your upload of the Ideas transcript on New Zealand (Nov '94, IERN-L listserver archives) through a gopher search on 'Zealand'. Wondered if you might be able to help me. I'm a reporter working for a tiny rural Ontario, Canada newspaper, (*The Times of Minden*, Minden, Ontario, if that means anything to you). I woke up one morning a few months ago to discover my fellow Ontarians had elected a government whose idea of public housing is coin-operated hot air grates. Since then, I've been looking for cold, hard facts with which to dismantle incoming dogma from the rampaging right. What I'm looking for from you, if you've got the time to kick a few things my way (even names who might know, if you don't), is: (1) Information on comparative social spending in industrial nations around the world, how well it works, etc. (2) Unfiltered news on New Zealand, anything on what happened in Sweden in 1990, etc (Saw *Z*'s June 1995 article, but that's about all I know). Or, for that matter, any other likely starting points (please go slow, if you go at all -- my major was Biology). Oh yeah. And: (3) How does one subscribe to IERN-L? My gopher dumped a bunch of subscription messages on me, but no addresses to which to send them. Thanks. Andrew Milne -- "and rose reincarnate in the ghostly clothes of jazz in the goldhorn shadow of the band and blew the suffering of America's naked mind for love into an eli eli lamma lamma sabacthani saxophone cry that shivered the cities down to the last radio"-- Allen Ginsberg
[PEN-L:1672] Re: Minimum wages in real terms
Please let us base our discussion on correct numbers. Here they are: MINIMUM WAGE current 19501995CPICPI YEAR$ $ $ 1995=100;19950=100 19500.750.754.8415.5100.0 19510.750.704.4916.7107.9 19520.750.684.4017.0110.0 19530.750.684.3717.2110.8 19540.750.674.3417.3111.6 19550.750.674.3517.2111.2 19561.000.895.7217.5112.9 19571.000.865.5418.1116.6 19581.000.835.3818.6119.9 19591.000.835.3518.7120.7 19601.000.815.2619.0122.8 19611.150.935.9819.2124.1 19621.150.925.9319.4125.3 19631.250.986.3619.7127.0 19641.250.976.2719.9128.6 19651.250.966.1720.2130.7 19661.250.936.0020.8134.4 19671.401.016.5221.5138.6 19681.601.117.1522.4144.4 19691.601.056.7823.6152.3 19701.600.996.4224.9161.0 19711.600.956.1526.0168.0 19721.600.925.9626.9173.4 19731.600.875.6128.5184.2 19742.000.986.3131.7204.6 19752.100.946.0734.6223.2 19762.300.976.2936.6236.1 19772.300.915.9138.9251.5 19782.650.986.3241.9270.5 19792.900.966.2246.7301.2 19803.100.915.8553.0341.9 19813.350.895.7358.4377.2 19823.350.845.4062.0400.4 19833.350.815.2364.0413.3 19843.350.785.0266.8431.1 19853.350.754.8469.2446.5 19863.350.744.7670.4454.8 19873.350.714.5973.0471.4 19883.350.684.4176.0490.9 19893.350.654.2079.7514.5 19903.800.704.5284.0542.3 19914.250.754.8687.5565.1 19924.250.734.7190.2582.2 19934.250.714.5892.9599.6 19944.550.744.7895.2614.9 19954.550.704.55100.0 645.7 Respectfully submitted Fikret Ceyhun Dept. of Economics e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Univ. of North Dakota voice: (701)777-3348 office University Station, Box 8369(701)772-5135 home Grand Forks, ND 58202 fax:(701)777-5099 On Fri, 1 Dec 1995, Paul Zarembka wrote: Doug, I think you missed my calculation. Yes, I'll accept the $4.89 as the 1950 minimum wage in 1995 $, BUT the labor time to produce what can be purchased with that wage is far lower today. If productivity is 140% higher, then 120 minutes required to produce the daily wage then requires only 50 minutes today. Furthermore, the big downward movement has been since 1973 (in terms of the exchange value of labor power declining in units of labor time). So, what is so radical about a $10 minimum wage, except that Reich is talking about $5.15? The capitalists are robbing the working class blind and Marxists tools of analysis help show that. Actually I am bit dismayed by the resistance to these calculations (yours and Jerry's). Paul Zarembka P.S. on your reference to average private sector wages--drive it up to $20 and the capitalists would no worse off (who cares anyway) than in 1950 in terms of labor hours they get as surplus. On Fri, 1 Dec 1995, Doug Henwood wrote: I'm all for a sharply higher US minimum wage, but Paul Z's numbers are a bit otherworldly. The 1950 minimum of $0.75 would be $4.89 in 1995 dollars, inflated by the CPI-U, or $6.26 if it were the same percentage of the average wage (54%) as it was then. A $10 minimum would be 86% of the average private sector hourly wage - not likely anytime before the Revolution. Doug
[PEN-L:1674] Re: Minimum wages in real terms
On Sat, 2 Dec 1995, Tavis Barr wrote: The simple fact is that capitalism induces technical change by means of labor-saving, capital-using technology. This means that if the rate of exploitation stays constant (which is what you are arguing for, in essence, when you call for an output-pegged minimum wage), then profitability will decline drastically... No. The rate of profit r=s/(C+v)=s/v / (C/v + 1)=s/v / [C(s/v+1)/(s+v) + 1]. That is, with s/v, the rate of exploitation, fixed, the rate of profit only goes down drastically when C/(s+v) does up drastically--when the labor time invested in constant capital rises drastically with respect to total labor hours. There is no motivation for a drastic rise in C/(s+v) in this discussion. Indeed, the real minimum has already been above $7 in 1995 prices (1968, see Fikret's posting of a very useful list of real minimum U.S. wages), without even considering productivity changes which lowers "v" when real wages are fixed. Paul Zarembka
