I enjoyed reading this and agreed with much of it. I commented while I read. Some of my comments and questions below were answered by subsequent paragraphs, but I left them anyway.
> On Jun 16, 2026, at 16:38, Anthony Teso via groups.io > <[email protected]> wrote: > > The Marxist view of modern society starts with a critique of how mainstream > sources frame class. Organizations such as Pew or Brookings view class as a > hierarchy of income, education, and occupational status, with lower, middle, > and upper tiers. But this perspective is only about results, not about > relations. Marxism is about relationships. The fundamental issue is your > relationship to the means of production and who benefits from others' labor. > Income brackets are only superficial. The real challenge is to see these > patterns as signs of deeper exploitation, and then to ask a tougher question: > how is this relationship now structured, and why is a clearly exploited class > less able than ever to act? > > Now wealth is so concentrated, class divisions are obvious. The richest 1 > percent hold almost a third of all wealth in the U.S., and the bottom 50 > percent have very little. But these numbers are just about how wealth is > distributed. What counts is that the big boys control the means of > production. Some professionals and small business owners are wealthy but > don't have large numbers of workers. The real capitalist class is much > smaller, maybe nine hundred billionaires and the big investors who own most > of the corporate stock. Today ownership looks social because investment > groups, not families, own big firms, but in reality it is still private. > Hence, the term “patrimonial” is only partly right and also incomplete. There > are still some powerful people, but they work within a large, impersonal > management network. The key point is to understand the distance between the > political personal and the unemotional character of the economy. > > This group is often referred to as the professional-managerial class, or the > new petty bourgeoisie. These managers form a group that exists between the > owners and the workers. Don't all managers exist between owners and workers? > They don’t own the means of production, but they control how work is done and > how value is distributed. This group includes senior managers, technical > experts, and coordinators. Wright says they have power over others and that > capital exploits them because they get paid more and sometimes get equity. I still see PMC as a poorly-defined category. I was arguably in the PMC for the latter half of my wage-earning life. The only place in the world where the person doing my job was in a union was in Finland. Would I be a proletarian in Finland but not in the US? As an alternative to PMC theory, subsumption and deskilling explains how towering hierarchies of workers and managers get constructed and are practically all essential to delivering the commodity or service. > The number of productive workers has fallen, and this group has become more > important. Its politics reflect its special situation. And this is why it is > so important in today’s culture wars. You cannot understand its politics > solely through its role in production. Attacking the PMC or grouping it with > the working class misses what is really going on. > > Most people in the workforce, some sixty percent, belong to the working > class, meaning they have to sell their labor, whether it is considered > productive or not. The basic relationship is still there, but the > organization has changed. Three facts show this change. First, union > membership has declined. In 2025, only ten percent of workers are in unions > and only 5.9 percent in the private sector, > compared to 20.1 percent overall in 1983. The class is still there, but it > has lost much of the structure that allowed it to function as a class. > Second, there is a significant gap between unions in the public and private > sectors: 32.9 percent of public workers are in unions, compared with 5.9 > percent of private workers. This last sentence compares apples and oranges: Private sector unionization is around 5.9% of *all* wage and salary earners, but the rate of public-sector unionization is 32.9% of all *public-sector* wage and salary earners. If we normalize the public-sector unionization rate to that of all earners, it will be close to 4.1%, as you wrote above. 5.9% plus 4.1% adds up to 10%. > That means organized labor now mostly works in government jobs, especially in > education and protective services. You had it correct in the earlier sentence that "ten percent of workers are in unions and only 5.9% in the private sector." Your 60% figure has me thinking. Musk and Bezos likely draw a salary, just like Trump. But these wage and salary earners are presumably not in the 60% that you identify as the working class. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics put the percentage of wage and salary workers in the workforce at 89%. That means a couple of things. 1. About 29% of wage and salary earners do not have to sell their labor to live. 2. The percentage of the working class that is unionized is more than 10%, up to 16%. I am skeptical about #1 but think #2 is likely correct. > This has brought the working class into close association with the state, and > many of the workers are now also public employees, a fact that detractors are > wont to use against them. Third, the top 10 percent now account for nearly > half of all consumer spending, the largest share since 1989. The system is > increasingly reliant on rich people spending money, which means most workers > have lost power as consumers even as they continue to create value. > > The facts are clear and troubling. The working class is real, and the > exploitation is worse than it has been in a hundred years. The big question > is now: how can a divided class act together? Two important differences > matter: productive versus nonproductive labor, and structural versus > associational power. The productive/unproductive distinction is not just > about job types but also about how value is produced, and it helps explain > the divide between structural and associational power. Understanding the > value form is key to understanding what has happened to unions. > > The mistake is the same for the workerists and for the critics of the PMC, > just in different ways. They see the division between productive and > unproductive work as if it divides the population into separate classes. The > workerists insist that only productive workers constitute the real working > class, while the rest are on the sidelines, particularly in manufacturing and > logistics. I'm not sure what this means. Are you saying that workerists insist that manufacturing and logistics workers don't create suplus value? > PMC theorists claim that those in unproductive, coordinating roles are a > separate class with their interests, so that professionals are foes or > unreliable allies. Both are wrong in dividing social classes out of a > distinction Marx made about how value is counted. Better, argues Neue Marx > Lektüre, is to see productive versus unproductive labor as a matter of the > relation of work to capital’s growth, not of who works or their relation to > production. A worker can switch from productive work to unproductive work > without moving from one class to another because class is a matter of having > to sell your labor, not the specific work you do. The labor expended in the US war industries is "productive" in the sense that these workers create surplus value for the corporation, but this is "cost-plus" surplus value from the government and not from the market. It is the productive destruction of labor time. Baran and Sweezy viewed US post WWII military spending as a permanent economic stimulus that monopoly capital requires to sustain demand. These workers lack much structural power outside of a war. I'm not sure of the importance of the Marxist distinction between productive and unproductive work in the context of working-class power. Health insurance clerks create surplus value by denying people healthcare; public high-school teachers do not create surplus value. As you point out, a health-insurance claims adjuster might try to do something useful and become a high-school teacher without leaving the working class. And high-school teachers are more likely to engage in workplace and political action than claims adjusters. > > This difference indicates that the proletariat includes more than just > productive workers, and it must be acknowledged. It doesn’t set class > membership. It sets class capacity. Structural power is a function of > position in the circuit of capital, not class position. This difference > should not be used to restrict the working class to productive workers alone, > but it is nonetheless important. It doesn't say who in the class, but it does > affect what the class can do. Structural power is not simply a matter of > class position but of location in the flow of capital. The worker in a key > position, productive or not, has real power. They’re still workers, just > someone on the edge. A care worker, gig worker, etc. has very little power. > Structural power is about position in the system. Class membership is about > selling your labor. This is a major error in the left's strategy today: > confusing structural power and class membership. Structural power is greatest > at the choke points of capital circulation. The lowest densities are in > finance, professional services, and food service—the dispersed periphery and > the unproductive but high-status coordinating layer. If I am making parts on a machine for sale in the market, that's productive. What about the fork lift drivers who delivers unformed chunks of metal and take away finished parts? The truck driver who delivers raw materials and takes finished products? Behind this are people who schedule repair of equipment, order fuel, acquire materials and schedule shipment of finished products? All of this is a division of labor imposed by capital subsumption, and some of these divisions result in functions that might be called PMC. Like management. But with PMC, it is nearly impossible to draw the line where the working class ends and the PMC begins. > Associational power has been most enduring where structural power is > strongest. It has collapsed where structural power was weakest or where the > loyalty rents of the coordinating stratum rendered organization unnecessary > for workers and impossible for capital. The two power forms correlate in > their distribution, but they decay for different reasons and at different > rates. The value form explains the pattern. > > In short, the decline of union power was not incidental. It was a deliberate > effort to cut the link between the foundations of workers’ power and their > capacity to act together. The PATCO bust, offshoring, strike limits, and > subcontracting—each was aimed at places where workers could use their > position to gain leverage. Capital didn't bother with the weak spots. It went > to the strong points and mostly succeeded except in the public sector where > unions are still strong. There are a few things to consider here, I think, beyond a deliberate effort to subvert workers power. 1. The natural movement of capital within a country. I lost my job at ARMCO Steel in 1980 because ARMCO stopped investing in the plant. This money was not available because there were other, more lucrative places to invest it. This process has happened in steel production in much of the west. Germany did much to preserve its industry the longest, but the natural movement of capital is to where it finds the highest return, and steel was not growing like electronics or even real estate in the US at that time. 2. The neoliberal movement of jobs out of countries. When I proposed a project to my employer a couple of years before I retired, the question came back "why do it in California? Why not do it India?" US tech jobs are the latest to be offshored, but tech workers hardly used their position to gain leverage in terms of associational power. They were too expensive. Tech jobs are being offshored because it's cheaper elsewhere. 3. The circumvention of environmental laws. China and much of the east lack the environmental laws found in the US. I think the assault on workers power accelerated from a combination of these three processes, but the attack on workers power began in the late 1940s with Taft Hartley and accelerated in the 1970s with finacialization. > > This is where the argument will likely face the most rigorous testing and > where a careful reader will probably question it first. Public sector workers > are wage workers and part of the working class, but their work is largely > outside the direct production of surplus value. They are paid from state > revenue, which is raised by taxes—that is to say, by surplus value collected > elsewhere. This boundary remains contested; even Marx did not resolve it, and > the debate about what counts as productive labor has continued since the > 1970s. It is used here to explain leverage, not because it is the only > possible view, but because of the distinction between labor traded for > capital and labor paid from revenue. It is better to be upfront about this > choice than to hide it. > > Let’s not be taken in by the facile notion that all public-sector work is > unproductive, because that’s not universally true. In fact, many > state-related jobs touch the market: city utilities that sell services, > transit agencies that collect fares, public hospitals that bill insurance, > and, particularly, numerous public services run by private companies under > government contracts. This type of work produces surplus value or furnishes > services for sale, even when the worker wears a public uniform. In practice, > there is a spectrum. Some jobs are core state jobs, funded only by taxes, > e.g., teachers and social workers. Some are public enterprises that compete > in the market. Some are completely privatized contractors. To me, practically all of these are unproductive. Collecting a fare to a subsidized public-transit system is not creating surplus value, I don't think. > > This spectrum helps us understand the different kinds of strike power in the > public sector, according to where jobs sit in terms of value creation. Public > workers, who are paid solely from tax revenue and do not produce surplus > value, have power that is primarily political rather than economic. When the PATCO workers struck, they shut down vital economic processes. If unions chose to defy Taft-Hartley and launch sympathy strikes and secondary boycotts, the power of these "unproductive workers" would have been immediately evident. It seems clear that the structural power is decisive in workers power rather than the productive/unproductive dichotomy. > The power of a teachers' strike, for example, is not that it stops profiting > but that it disrupts social life and questions the legitimacy of the > government. A transit worker takes the fares and faces the market. They have > political and economic power. They can upset daily life and the flow of > money. A private contractor working for the state, like a corrections > officer, has economic power because their strike hurts the company's profits, > but there is still a political side to it. The position of a public worker > along this value spectrum doesn’t determine whether they have power, but it > does influence the nature of that power and where it is relevant. > > Another challenge to this argument is the idea that the flow of capital, > especially in logistics, creates structural power. Critics say that warehouse > and transport workers move things that have already been made, that their > work is about circulation rather than production, and that it is therefore > unproductive. If structural power were only about the production of surplus > value, then logistics workers wouldn’t have the leverage the argument claims > they do. This seems inconsistent, since these workers are very powerful, yet > their jobs are designated as unproductive by value-form standards. Dock workers, warehouse workers, truckers, and forklift drivers produce surplus value for companies that own them, and logistics is as important as the lathe or foundry to realizing the surplus value of the final product in the marketplace. > > The answer is to stop seeing structural power only in terms of the production > of surplus value but to see it as part of the total circulation of capital. > Capital does not grow by creating surplus value alone; it must be realized > through selling. If goods are produced but never sold, the value is not > realized and is a loss. Production and selling are both integral parts of the > process, and capital may be tied up at either step. This is a very important > point from vol. II of Marx, often overlooked, and it addresses this issue. > Marx even says that moving goods to consumers is production because it adds > value to the product by getting it to where it’s needed. On the other hand, > jobs that consist of buying and selling are unproductive. So even by Marx’s > standards, logistics work is not merely unproductive. If a logistics company sells a product, it employs workers to perform the function at a lower cost than the service price to create surplus value. Mark Zuckerberg's valet is an unproductive worker, but the driver from the cab company that takes the valet to work is productive. > > If we call logistics work unproductive, it still has real structural power. > Halting the sale of goods is as damaging to capital as halting their > production. A warehouse worker does not have to generate surplus value to > harm capital; they only have to stop the process of turning goods into money. > If capital can't sell, it can't grow. So the criticism is invalid. Structural > power is not only about production but also about the entire flow of capital. > That's why fights at Amazon and in logistics matter; they're about rebuilding > the collective. All these points lead to one thought. The wage relation > determines the class membership. Structural power is about where you sit in > the whole flow of capital, which includes both production and sales. The > productive/unproductive split is another matter, just concerning the stage of > production. These three things are to be separated. For example, the power of > a logistics worker is a function of their position in the system; the power > of a public school teacher is a function of being outside the flow of capital > and affecting social life instead; their power is therefore political, not > economic. Whether the work creates surplus value does not answer the other > questions. The bulk of the criticisms stem from conflating these three > distinct concepts. Reducing two of the three axes to one > > The bottom line is clear. Now the organized part of the working class has > collective power directed against the state, not capital. I think I disagree with your conclusion. The Oil, Chemical and Atomic workers have their collective power directed at energy capital, fossil capital in particular. They may not use it to help slow global warming, but they have the potential to confront employers with their power. They lack the class consciousness to do so. The public-employee unions are much more integrated into the Democratic Party political system. The relationship is symbiotic and not merely cooperative: I get or keep you in office, you get me a job or a better job. > Their strikes are not for profit, but for society and the legitimacy of > government. I think that their strikes are for wages, benefits and working conditions like other labor unionists. > This gives them political power but also makes them vulnerable to assaults > from capital and local politics, as well as attacks on public workers. > Private sector workers in logistics and utilities still have real power, but > they are not well organized. Building class power means more unions but also > connecting collective action with real leverage where that still exists. It > is much more complicated than just reviving unions, and public-sector unions > are not the best place to start such a campaign. > > I understand the point. The left often argues over whether the coordinating > group is a friend or a foe or whether the only real working class is the > productive core. But those are the wrong questions. The wage relation defines > class membership. What matters is where the class can still use its power > within the system. This is not the focus of the workerists or the PMC > theorists. The U.S. has a clear class structure but very little working-class > action because the mechanisms for turning position into power have been > dismantled where they count most. It is not a question of class > consciousness. It is a question of a clear class structure and a weak class > force. Fixing this is about rebuilding the right forms, not just changing the > way we analyze things. Concretely, what do you see being done? thanks, Mark -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. 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