Pat Mason suggests if "capital intensity" has risen, then maybe there isn't as much room as one would expect for a minimum-wage increase despite increases in labor productivity. (That is, wages can't increase as much as productivity without hurting the profit rate.) Doug Henwood wonders how empirically relevant this is. So do I. There's another way of looking at this, at a lower level of abstraction (involving the distribution and realization of surplus-value as profit): back in the 1950s, the relative monopoly position of US capitalists in the world economy was stronger than it is now. That means that the amount of money profit income realized in the US has fallen relative to the amount of surplus-value produced in the US, along with the ability of US-based capitalist operations to push rising wage costs onto consumers in the form of higher prices. This scenario, if true, would also suggest that wages cannot rise as much as labor productivity has risen without squeezing profits. in pen-l solidarity, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] Econ. Dept., Loyola Marymount Univ. 7900 Loyola Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90045-8410 USA 310/338-2948 (daytime, during workweek); FAX: 310/338-1950 "It takes a busload of faith to get by." -- Lou Reed.
