Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] underconsumptionism
The ultimate reason for all real crises always remains the poverty and restricted consumption of the masses as opposed to the drive of captialist production to develop the productive forces as though only the absolute consuming power of society constituted their outer limit (Capital vol. III, Moscow, 1959, pp. 472-73) ; quoted in The Development of Capitalism in Russia. Comment Capital can never employed all the proletarians, all the time or most of the time, and this is a built in restriction on consumption, even during period of expanding consumption. This mass of non-producing consumers allows the capitalist to set wages. (Non-producing classes is what Marx calls it is the top portion of the material quoted above). Lets try and get behind under consumption as an ism. Under consumption as an ism is a distinct body of politics. The calling card of every Social Democrat has always been and remains the battle cry of raise the consuming capacity of the masses. It is the ideology of under consumption of the masses, as an ism, that establishes the political unity between capital and its various production units being strangled by a break in circulation; the social democrats and their efforts to win the masses to preservation of capitalism. The social democrats American brand, are neatly lining up behind President Obama, demanding to raise the consuming capacity of the masses, with an $800 million spending package promising jobs. Under consumption as an ism is actually a coherent thought and ideology. Under consumption as an ism is pure social democratic ideology and politics. One ought not raise concession battles to the level of an ism. For one to say for instance, the financial crisis of 2008 is ultimately related to restricted consumption of the masses is just silly. Capital can never continuously employed all the proletarians and this is a built in restriction on consumption, even during boom times or during periods of expanding consumption. Society faces a permanent, unrelenting crisis in/of fixed capital, which can no longer be mitigated by market expansion or deepening by credit extension. Unlike during the time of Marx the falling rate of profit cannot today be overcome on the basis of quantitative market expansion. During Marx crisis could be mitigated through market expansion and the creation of a real world market with colonies. Marx use of the term world market meant an outline of a world market. Today there is a for real world market. In 1850 and 1860 there was not. Dead labor consumes living labor in the absolute sense. During the time of Marx dead labor consumption of living labor was mitigated through conversion of a sea of humanity from serfs to modern proletarians and the employed working class expanded in absolute terms. The entire system expanded. Advanced robotics and computerized production process introduces a new quality in to the game. Capital is hitting the historical wall Permanent overcapacity in virtually every industry and not just overproduction or under consumption is the new reality and this did not exist in 1870. Permanent overcapacity finds capital feeding on itself in search of profits. Not surplus value but profits or valueless wealth. Valueless wealth is impossible and cannot stand for long. WL. Let us suppose that the whole of society is composed only of industrial capitalists and wage-workers. Let us furthermore disregard price fluctuations, which prevent large portions of the total capital from replacing themselves in their average proportions and which, owing to the general interrelations of the entire reproduction process as developed in particular by credit, must always call forth general stoppages of a transient nature. Let us also disregard the sham transactions and speculations, which the credit system favours. Then, a crisis could only be explained as the result of a disproportion of production in various branches of the economy, and as a result of a disproportion between the consumption of the capitalists and their accumulation. But as matters stand, the replacement of the capital invested in production depends largely upon the consuming power of the non-producing classes; while the consuming power of the workers is limited partly by the laws of wages, partly by the fact that they are used only as long as they can be profitably employed by the capitalist class. The ultimate reason for all real crises always remains the poverty and restricted consumption of the masses as opposed to the drive of capitalist production to develop the productive forces as though only the absolute consuming power of society constituted their limit. _http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch30.htm_ (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch30.htm) Vol 3 Chapter 30. This
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] underconsumptionism
waistli...@aol.com 01/20/2009 6:32 AM The ultimate reason for all real crises always remains the poverty and restricted consumption of the masses as opposed to the drive of captialist production to develop the productive forces as though only the absolute consuming power of society constituted their outer limit (Capital vol. III, Moscow, 1959, pp. 472-73) ; quoted in The Development of Capitalism in Russia. Comment Capital can never employed all the proletarians, all the time or most of the time, and this is a built in restriction on consumption, even during period of expanding consumption. This mass of non-producing consumers allows the capitalist to set wages. (Non-producing classes is what Marx calls it is the top portion of the material quoted above). Lets try and get behind under consumption as an ism. Under consumption as an ism is a distinct body of politics. The calling card of every Social Democrat has always been and remains the battle cry of raise the consuming capacity of the masses. It is the ideology of under consumption of the masses, as an ism, that establishes the political unity between capital and its various production units being strangled by a break in circulation; the social democrats and their efforts to win the masses to preservation of capitalism. ^^^ CB: Agree. The Keynesian Social Democrats, who come to dominate Social Democracy after the Russian Revolution ( Before the Russian Revolution, the Social Democrats were the Marxists, in Germany in the first place, where the Kautsky led Social Democratic Labor Party had had Engels as a member, had lots of members of Parlianment. Then most Social Dems became renegades from Marxism around WWI. After the Russian Revolution, the next wave of Social Democracy was based on Keynes' theory which was based on the part of the truth of capitalism which is expressed in the Marxist theory of under-consumptionism, or literally from the quote from Marx, restricted consumptionism. The social democrats American brand, are neatly lining up behind President Obama, demanding to raise the consuming capacity of the masses, with an $800 million spending package promising jobs. Under consumption as an ism is actually a coherent thought and ideology. Under consumption as an ism is pure social democratic ideology and politics. One ought not raise concession battles to the level of an ism. For one to say for instance, the financial crisis of 2008 is ultimately related to restricted consumption of the masses is just silly. Capital can never continuously employed all the proletarians and this is a built in restriction on consumption, even during boom times or during periods of expanding consumption. Society faces a permanent, unrelenting crisis in/of fixed capital, which can no longer be mitigated by market expansion or deepening by credit extension. Unlike during the time of Marx the falling rate of profit cannot today be overcome on the basis of quantitative market expansion. During Marx crisis could be mitigated through market expansion and the creation of a real world market with colonies. Marx use of the term world market meant an outline of a world market. Today there is a for real world market. In 1850 and 1860 there was not. Dead labor consumes living labor in the absolute sense. During the time of Marx dead labor consumption of living labor was mitigated through conversion of a sea of humanity from serfs to modern proletarians and the employed working class expanded in absolute terms. The entire system expanded. Advanced robotics and computerized production process introduces a new quality in to the game. Capital is hitting the historical wall Permanent overcapacity in virtually every industry and not just overproduction or under consumption is the new reality and this did not exist in 1870. Permanent overcapacity finds capital feeding on itself in search of profits. Not surplus value but profits or valueless wealth. Valueless wealth is impossible and cannot stand for long. WL. Let us suppose that the whole of society is composed only of industrial capitalists and wage-workers. Let us furthermore disregard price fluctuations, which prevent large portions of the total capital from replacing themselves in their average proportions and which, owing to the general interrelations of the entire reproduction process as developed in particular by credit, must always call forth general stoppages of a transient nature. Let us also disregard the sham transactions and speculations, which the credit system favours. Then, a crisis could only be explained as the result of a disproportion of production in various branches of the economy, and as a result of a disproportion between the consumption of the capitalists and their accumulation. But as matters stand, the replacement of the capital invested in
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] underconsumptionism (not the ultimate cause of crisis)
In a message dated 1/20/2009 11:02:19 A.M. Eastern Standard Time, _charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us_ (mailto:charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us) writes: The ultimate reason for all real crises always remains the poverty and restricted consumption of the masses as opposed to the drive of captialist production to develop the productive forces as though only the absolute consuming power of society constituted their outer limit (Capital vol. III, Moscow, 1959, pp. 472-73) ; quoted in The Development of Capitalism in Russia. WL Capital can never employed all the proletarians, all the time or (ALL OF THE PROLETARIAN) most of the time, and this is a built in restriction on consumption, even during period of expanding consumption. This mass of non-producing consumers allows the capitalist to set wages. (Non-producing classes is what Marx calls it is the top portion of the material quoted above). Reply Sorry, but the first sentence needed correction. Why can the capitalists (bourgeois property) NOT employ all the proletarians all of the time or all of the proletarian most of the time? The answer cannot be because of the restricted consumption of the masses. What brings our society to revolution (the ultimate crisis of all crisis) is not the restricted consumption of the masses, but rather bourgeois private property, or rather revolution in the mode of production, beginning with a revolution in the productive forces of society. New classes are formed by the introduction of new productive equipment, that compels society to reorganize itself around the expanding new means of production. The productive forces come into conflict with the existing social relations of production, then a period of revolution unfolds. Here is the ultimate source of all crisis, in all societies founded on the private property form. Stated another way, crisis of overproduction or the crisis embodied in the falling rate of production as a tendency of capitalist production are simply the face - an expression of something else. That something else is the meaning of bourgeois private property. All crisis have as their ultimate source property; private ownership of the means of production, not the restricted consumption of the masses. This statement runs counter to the quote above. Anyone familiar with Marx knows that his outline of the science of society states in no uncertain terms that revolution is always the result of change - qualitative changes, in the means of production. However, one cannot explain any crisis on the basic changes in the means of production. One has to study the peculiar crisis one is addressing. The ultimate cause of crisis is not the restricted consumption of the masses. Is this statement proof of anti-communism and anti-Marxism? Of course not. WL This email was cleaned by emailStripper, available for free from _http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm_ (http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm) **A Good Credit Score is 700 or Above. See yours in just 2 easy steps! (http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/10075x1215855013x1201028747/aol?redir=http://www.freecreditreport.com/pm/default.aspx?sc=668072%26hmpgID=62%26bcd=De cemailfooterNO62) ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] underconsumptionism (not the ultimate cause ofcrisis)
In this quote, Marx is not talking about revolutionary transformation necessarily, but rather about the regular crises within capitalism still. Such crises may be involved in a revolutionary transformation as a sort of trigger, but Marx is not claiming that underconsumption is the ultimate cause of revolution. Of course, poverty does contribute to revolution, but that's not the point in this particular quote. waistli...@aol.com 01/20/2009 4:45 PM In a message dated 1/20/2009 11:02:19 A.M. Eastern Standard Time, _charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us_ (mailto:charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us) writes: The ultimate reason for all real crises always remains the poverty and restricted consumption of the masses as opposed to the drive of captialist production to develop the productive forces as though only the absolute consuming power of society constituted their outer limit (Capital vol. III, Moscow, 1959, pp. 472-73) ; quoted in The Development of Capitalism in Russia. WL Capital can never employed all the proletarians, all the time or (ALL OF THE PROLETARIAN) most of the time, and this is a built in restriction on consumption, even during period of expanding consumption. This mass of non-producing consumers allows the capitalist to set wages. (Non-producing classes is what Marx calls it is the top portion of the material quoted above). Reply Sorry, but the first sentence needed correction. Why can the capitalists (bourgeois property) NOT employ all the proletarians all of the time or all of the proletarian most of the time? The answer cannot be because of the restricted consumption of the masses. What brings our society to revolution (the ultimate crisis of all crisis) is not the restricted consumption of the masses, but rather bourgeois private property, or rather revolution in the mode of production, beginning with a revolution in the productive forces of society. New classes are formed by the introduction of new productive equipment, that compels society to reorganize itself around the expanding new means of production. The productive forces come into conflict with the existing social relations of production, then a period of revolution unfolds. Here is the ultimate source of all crisis, in all societies founded on the private property form. Stated another way, crisis of overproduction or the crisis embodied in the falling rate of production as a tendency of capitalist production are simply the face - an expression of something else. That something else is the meaning of bourgeois private property. All crisis have as their ultimate source property; private ownership of the means of production, not the restricted consumption of the masses. This statement runs counter to the quote above. Anyone familiar with Marx knows that his outline of the science of society states in no uncertain terms that revolution is always the result of change - qualitative changes, in the means of production. However, one cannot explain any crisis on the basic changes in the means of production. One has to study the peculiar crisis one is addressing. The ultimate cause of crisis is not the restricted consumption of the masses. Is this statement proof of anti-communism and anti-Marxism? Of course not. WL This email was cleaned by emailStripper, available for free from _http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm_ (http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm) **A Good Credit Score is 700 or Above. See yours in just 2 easy steps! (http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/10075x1215855013x1201028747/aol?redir=http://www.freecreditreport.com/pm/default.aspx?sc=668072%26hmpgID=62%26bcd=De cemailfooterNO62) ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] underconsumptionism (not the ultimate cause ofcrisis)
Every single regular crisis of capital, in particular, is the direct result of the bourgeois property form. Allow me to emphasize regular as meaning cyclical - not the revolutionary transformation (more accurately transition) from one mode of production to anther. Actually, regular crisis or cyclical crisis of capital means bourgeois property as the mode of producing commodities. The appearance of crisis in the financial, agricultural or industrial sectors, at any given point in time, always have its peculiar cause, which in the first and last instance is a break in circulation or in laypersons terms, crisis due to the character of bourgeois production. Bourgeois property is the cause of crisis in a system of capitalist commodity production. Sorry if I wrote in a manner to lead one to believe I was not speaking of crisis. Adding not the ultimate cause of crisis to the thread was meant to indicate I was speaking of crisis. I am not talking of revolutionary transformation but the source of crisis. Under consumption is not the source, root cause or taproot, of the crisis of bourgeois property or the bourgeois mode of production or commodity production on the basis of bourgeois property relations. The conflict immanent in the bourgeois form of property is expressed in the commodity form, with all its implications, and the commodity form of bourgeois mode of producing is the cause - direct and ultimate, source of all crisis expressed as breach in circulation and most certainly regular crisis. In my reading of Chapter 30 in Vol. 3, I take Marx to be speaking in a specific context. If Marx means that the ultimate source of all crisis - regular and cyclical, in the bourgeois mode of commodity production or the conflict inherent to the bourgeois property form, is under consumption of the masses, then I disagree with Marx. Marx is not God. Or to be treated as a God whose every utterances is to be clung to, or quoted out of context. . Its no big thing. WL. In a message dated 1/20/2009 5:09:24 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, _charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us_ (mailto:charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us) writes: In this quote, Marx is not talking about revolutionary transformation necessarily, but rather about the regular crises within capitalism still. Such crises may be involved in a revolutionary transformation as a sort of trigger, but Marx is not claiming that underconsumption is the ultimate cause of revolution. Of course, poverty does contribute to revolution, but that's not the point in this particular quote. _http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis_ (http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis) This email was cleaned by emailStripper, available for free from _http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm_ (http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm) **A Good Credit Score is 700 or Above. See yours in just 2 easy steps! (http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/10075x1215855013x1201028747/aol?redir=http://www.freecreditreport.com/pm/default.aspx?sc=668072%26hmpgID=62%26bcd=De cemailfooterNO62) ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] underconsumptionism; (refutation by Marx and Lenin)
Apologies for the length of this, but I was challenged to produce some quotes ... --- On Tue, 1/20/09, Charles Brown _charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us_ (mailto:charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us) wrote: You quoted the quote from Lenin. If you'd turned the page and read on, you would have found the following: 'These propositions all speak of the contradiction we have mentioned, namely, the contradiction between the unrestricted drive to expand production and limited consumption—and of nothing else. Nothing could be more senseless than to conclude from these passages in Capital that Marx did not admit the possibility of surplus-value being realised in capitalist society, that he attributed crises to under-consumption, and so forth.' This should serve as an alert on this issue. Here is Marx in Book 2, Chapter 20: 'It is sheer tautology to say that crises are caused by the scarcity of effective consumption, or of effective consumers. The capitalist system does not know any other modes of consumption than effective ones, except that of sub forma pauperis or of the swindler. That commodities are unsaleable means only that no effective purchasers have been found for them, i.e., consumers (since commodities are bought in the final analysis for productive or individual consumption). But if one were to attempt to give this tautology the semblance of a profounder justification by saying that the working-class receives too small a portion of its own product and the evil would be remedied as soon as it receives a larger share of it and its wages increase in consequence, one could only remark that crises are always prepared by precisely a period in which wages rise generally and the working-class actually gets a larger share of that part of the annual product which is intended for consumption. From the point of view of these advocates of sound and “simple” (!) common sense, such a period should rather remove the crisis. It appears, then, that capitalist production comprises conditions independent of good or bad will, conditions which permit the working-class to enjoy that relative prosperity only momentarily, and at that always only as the harbinger of a coming crisis.' In a footnote to this passage, Engels remarked: 'Ad notam for possible followers of the Rodbertian theory of crises'. Rodbertus had argued that: 'capital accumulates and production increases without there being a sufficient number of purchasers for the products, for the capitalists do not wish to consume more and the workmen are not able to do so.' In Anti-Duhring: 'unfortunately the under-consumption of the masses, the restriction of the consumption of the masses to what is necessary for their maintenance and reproduction, is not a new phenomenon. It has existed as long as there have been exploiting and exploited classes. Even in those periods of history when the situation of the masses was particularly favourable, as for example in England in the fifteenth century, they under-consumed. They were very far from having their own annual total product at their disposal to be consumed by them. Therefore, while under-consumption has been a constant feature in history for thousands of years, the general shrinkage of the market which breaks out in crises as the result of a surplus of production is a phenomenon only of the last fifty years; and so Herr Dühring's whole superficial vulgar economics is necessary in order to explain the new collision not by the new phenomenon of over-production but by the thousand-year-old phenomenon of under-consumption. ... The under-consumption of the masses is a necessary condition of all forms of society based on exploitation, consequently also of the capitalist form; but it is the capitalist form of production which first gives rise to crises. The under-consumption of the masses is therefore also a prerequisite condition of crises, and plays in them a role which has long been recognised. But it tells us just as little why crises exist today as why they did not exist before.' The problem which devotees of underconsumptionism have is explaining how capitalism works at all, since the workers can NEVER buy back the full value of what they produce. The entire system should die at birth because the workers won't be able to buy everything. The trick for getting out of this problem is to postulate 'third parties' who manage to buy the unsold goods. Luxemburg, Baran and Sweezy etc take this route. Malthus gives this kind of explanation, which Marx discusses in Theories of Surplus Value Let's look at the quote in context. Here is the whole paragraph: 'Let us suppose that the whole of society is composed only of industrial capitalists and wage-workers. Let us furthermore disregard price fluctuations, which prevent large portions of the total capital from replacing themselves in their
[Marxism-Thaxis] underconsumptionism
M-TH: underconsumptionism Charles Brown CharlesB at CNCL.ci.detroit.mi.us Thu Oct 1 10:26:53 MDT 1998 Previous message: M-TH: Re: LI-CRG: money imbroglio Next message: M-TH: underconsumptionism Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] James, Once again you cut off part of the quote. The aspect in which Lenin most directly contradicts the point of your argument, compounding my suspicion of your dishonesty. Here is the original exchange again with the fuller quote from Lenin, which you cut short a second time below: ___ James Heartfield wrote the folloiwng in response to my statement: Charles: Why would the bourgeois always be seeking new markets and yet discouraging consumption ? This is not Marxist logic. James H. 'On the problem of interest to us, that the home market, the main conclusion from Marx's theory of realisation is the following: capitalist production, and consequently, the home market, grow not so much on account of articles of consumption as on account of means of production. In other words, the increase in means of production outstrips the increase in articles of consumption.' Lenin, Development of Capitalism in Russia, p 54 _ Charles : But in the same passage Lenin went on to say: For capitalism, therefore, the growth of the home market is to a certain extent independent of the growth of personal consumption, and takes place mostly on account of productive consumption. BUT IT WOULD BE A MISTAKE TO UNDERSTAND THIS INDEPENDENCE AS MEANING THAT PRODUCTIVE CONSUMPTION IS ENTIRELY DIVORCED FROM PERSONAL CONSUMPTION: THE FORMER CAN AND MUST INCREASE FASTER THAN THE LATTER (AND THERE ITS INDEPENDENCE ENDS), BUT IT GOES WITHOUT SAYING THAT, IN THE LAST ANALYSIS, PRDUCTIVE CONSUMPTION IS ALWAYS BOUND UP WITH PERSONAL CONSUMPTION. MARX SAYS IN THIS CONNECTION: ...WE HAVE SEEN (BOOK II, PART III) THAT CONTINUOUS CIRCULATION TAKES PLACE BETWEEN CONSTANT CAPITAL AND CONSTANT CAPITAL...(MARX HAS IN MIND CONSTANT CAPITAL IN MEANS OF PRODUCTION , WHICH IS REALISED BY EXCHANGE AMONG CAPITALISTS IN THE SAME DEPARTMENT). IT IS AT FIRST INDEPENDENT OF INDIVIDUAL CONSUMPTION BECAUSE IT NEVER ENTERS THE LATTER. BUT THIS CONSUMPTION DEFINITELY LIMITS IT NEVERTHELESS, SINCE CONSTANT CAPITAL IS NEVER PRODUCED FOR ITS OWN SAKE BUT SOLELY BECAUSE MORE OF IT IS NEEDED IN SPHERES OF PRODUCTION WHOSE PRODUCTS GO INTO INDIVIDUAL CONSUMPTION (DAS KAPITAL, III, 1, 289, RUSS. TRANS., P242; OR MOSCOW 1959 P.299-300) emphasis added by Charles. So, when we read the whole passage we see that Lenin and Marx agree with us not James H. in this thread. (end of original exchange) ___ You may be insulted, but you are the one who did something that would raise reasonably suspicions in anybody's mind. Why did you leave out the portion of the quote from Lenin that immediately follows what you quoted and very much contradicts what you were quoting Lenin for ? Either you did it on purpose or it is a big oversight (in a daze). Why did you do it again in your post below ? Cutting off the portion of the quote of Marx by Lenin that cuts against your argument the strongest. As for you being insulted by my posts and not reading them, that would be like a wrongdoer being insulted when their wrong is pointed out. It is a further fraudulence, fraudulent posturing. Perhaps others will read my posts exposing your half-quoting and discount your arguments accordingly. It is not a matter of you being insulted. It is a matter of you cleaning up your act. In the quote from Mattick below first I point out that neither you nor Mattick claim that Marx did not say it. Secondly,you act as if Mattick is somekind of authority who can reverse the plain meaning of Marx's words in the quote: The ultimate reason for all real crises always remains the poverty and restricted consumption of the masses... You and Mattick can try to twist that all you want, but it's meaning is clear. Ultimate reason means ultimate cause. So when you try to say Marx didn't make this part of whatever theory of crisis he putforth, you just can't do it. As has already been said about 50 times on this thread, the well known fact that Marx is always analyzing contradictions means that the law of the tendency of the rate of profit to fall is also part of his analysis of the cause. You keep dishonestly portraying what others and I are saying as if we don't include the latter. That is more evidence of your dishonesty. You blatantly half quote your opponents as well as Lenin. Charles Brown From the market to the Marxit Then Charles quotes Lenin went on to say: For capitalism, therefore, the growth of the home market is to a certain extent independent of the growth of personal consumption, and takes place mostly on account of productive consumption. BUT IT WOULD BE A MISTAKE TO UNDERSTAND THIS