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chapter 11: the rate and mass of surplus-value p.417-426
first i'd like to talk about how i approach writing these snippets, which is that i read the required chapter, ponder it for a while and take note of things that i want to mention, then start drinking until i want to write. and then probably listen to this album
while i actually write. this combination of being drunk and having incoherent electronica blaring at me is making it very difficult to recall the very technical outlaying of laws of the capitalist mode of production that marx lays out in this chapter. but the challenge is part of the fun.
first law: the Mass of Surplus Value is the mass of labor multiplied by the rate of exploitation
second law: the limit of the working day (24 hours), or of the endurance of human bodies, sets an absolute limit on the rate of exploitation. this comes with a corollary: the number of workers within a society does not necessarily directly relate to how much surplus value can be realized. that is, even in a labor-rich environment the capitalist might increase his profits through increasing the rate of exploitation instead of hiring on more hands.
the third law is: the limit of surplus value realized during production of a commodity is dependent upon the quantity of variable capital (labor) employed in that production.
Marx leaves us with a contradiction, he says that capital needs a vast quantity of variable capital to realize a vast sum of value - lots of exploited labor for lots of profit - yet there is a tendency within the capitalist mode production to reduce the amount of variable capital used, and rely more on the 'dead labor' of technology. the movement through which this contradiction will be investigated later. im excited.
at the end of this short chapter is a very interesting look at how the capitalist mode of production creates a capitalist mode of thought. marx discusses how within society it becomes apparent or natural that the worker should living labor will subordinate itself to dead labor. the fact that a factory exists creates a 'right' for men to work within it at all hours and all times. demand conjures supply.
Marx quotes a fourth generation scottish factory owner, a job creator from a most venerable family of job creators, who bemoans the 10 hour-workday law because it will 'reduce by a fifth the value of all british machinery'. as if the men who who worked within the factories were presumed a part of them as the steel and concrete!
first i'd like to talk about how i approach writing these snippets, which is that i read the required chapter, ponder it for a while and take note of things that i want to mention, then start drinking until i want to write. and then probably listen to this album
while i actually write. this combination of being drunk and having incoherent electronica blaring at me is making it very difficult to recall the very technical outlaying of laws of the capitalist mode of production that marx lays out in this chapter. but the challenge is part of the fun.
first law: the Mass of Surplus Value is the mass of labor multiplied by the rate of exploitation
second law: the limit of the working day (24 hours), or of the endurance of human bodies, sets an absolute limit on the rate of exploitation. this comes with a corollary: the number of workers within a society does not necessarily directly relate to how much surplus value can be realized. that is, even in a labor-rich environment the capitalist might increase his profits through increasing the rate of exploitation instead of hiring on more hands.
the third law is: the limit of surplus value realized during production of a commodity is dependent upon the quantity of variable capital (labor) employed in that production.
Marx leaves us with a contradiction, he says that capital needs a vast quantity of variable capital to realize a vast sum of value - lots of exploited labor for lots of profit - yet there is a tendency within the capitalist mode production to reduce the amount of variable capital used, and rely more on the 'dead labor' of technology. the movement through which this contradiction will be investigated later. im excited.
at the end of this short chapter is a very interesting look at how the capitalist mode of production creates a capitalist mode of thought. marx discusses how within society it becomes apparent or natural that the worker should living labor will subordinate itself to dead labor. the fact that a factory exists creates a 'right' for men to work within it at all hours and all times. demand conjures supply.
Marx quotes a fourth generation scottish factory owner, a job creator from a most venerable family of job creators, who bemoans the 10 hour-workday law because it will 'reduce by a fifth the value of all british machinery'. as if the men who who worked within the factories were presumed a part of them as the steel and concrete!
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c_man
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yeah he generally assumes it to be some precious metal throughout, and i'd be really interested in seeing someone work out in a marxian way what the difference is that we dont have a commodity with a clear value (as in Socially Necessary Labor Time, which for precious metals would be the labor involved in extraction, transportation, overseers for the slaves, and so on) attached to it
fake edit: just kidding, overseers for slaves are not workers and do not produce value
fake edit: just kidding, overseers for slaves are not workers and do not produce value
Scrree
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chapter 12: the concept of relative surplus-value 430-438
first off, fuuuuuuuck 19th century english currency. 6 s. x 10 = 6 d god what
second, this chapter is tiny and absolutely packed with interesting assertions from marx. if absolute surplus value comes from the capitalist paying the laborer for their necessary labor time, but then having them work beyond that, so that more absolute surplus value can be added to the commodity by having the laborer stay an hour longer. then relative surplus value is the capitalist lowering the value of labor by creating cheaper means of reproduction of labor. that is: paying the worker less because they needs to spend less to live and reproduce.
marx notes that this is different from simply not paying the laborer the necessary value of their labor - giving them less than they need to survive - because should 'theoretically' be impossible within the laws of the capitalist mode of production. all commodities are assumed to be purchased and sold at the price of their value, the exploitation of the worker is fair and just, harmony is impossible.
this segues into a phenomena common in the capitalism - increases in productivity. the capitalist shall always seek to increase the productivity of 'his hands', for it allows him to sell dear compared to his competitors and so realize greater profit. yet even this natural profit is value annexed from the laborer - the worker can create value of their means of reproduction in a shorter span of time, but the capitalist 'merely' asks they keep on as long as before, and so siphons more surplus value from the working day.
this answers the riddle of why a class solely dedicated to profit through exchange of goods nonetheless continually seek the lowering of prices of goods.
ii feel like i lack the vocabulary to express how impressive i find marx's scientific analysis of capitalism. like, i originally wrote that it was great how he 'remained objective' in how he deals with the capitalist as individuals who 'bear the laws of the capitalist mode of production' - he avoids blaming a conspiracy of capitalists despite the reality of class struggle but fuck is that a weird d&d sentence. he is somehow viewing the entire situation, from both the ideal and material, and parsing out the theoretical constructs that is the form of capitalism while relating it and being cognizant of the actual existing history and all of it's aberrations. is this dialectics?
first off, fuuuuuuuck 19th century english currency. 6 s. x 10 = 6 d god what
second, this chapter is tiny and absolutely packed with interesting assertions from marx. if absolute surplus value comes from the capitalist paying the laborer for their necessary labor time, but then having them work beyond that, so that more absolute surplus value can be added to the commodity by having the laborer stay an hour longer. then relative surplus value is the capitalist lowering the value of labor by creating cheaper means of reproduction of labor. that is: paying the worker less because they needs to spend less to live and reproduce.
marx notes that this is different from simply not paying the laborer the necessary value of their labor - giving them less than they need to survive - because should 'theoretically' be impossible within the laws of the capitalist mode of production. all commodities are assumed to be purchased and sold at the price of their value, the exploitation of the worker is fair and just, harmony is impossible.
this segues into a phenomena common in the capitalism - increases in productivity. the capitalist shall always seek to increase the productivity of 'his hands', for it allows him to sell dear compared to his competitors and so realize greater profit. yet even this natural profit is value annexed from the laborer - the worker can create value of their means of reproduction in a shorter span of time, but the capitalist 'merely' asks they keep on as long as before, and so siphons more surplus value from the working day.
this answers the riddle of why a class solely dedicated to profit through exchange of goods nonetheless continually seek the lowering of prices of goods.
ii feel like i lack the vocabulary to express how impressive i find marx's scientific analysis of capitalism. like, i originally wrote that it was great how he 'remained objective' in how he deals with the capitalist as individuals who 'bear the laws of the capitalist mode of production' - he avoids blaming a conspiracy of capitalists despite the reality of class struggle but fuck is that a weird d&d sentence. he is somehow viewing the entire situation, from both the ideal and material, and parsing out the theoretical constructs that is the form of capitalism while relating it and being cognizant of the actual existing history and all of it's aberrations. is this dialectics?
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Scrree posted:is this dialectics?
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Constantignoble
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roseweird posted:maybe i'm just a bit distracted this week, but i'm finding it very hard to let go of an idea of money as an abstraction of the state's legal/military/police guarantee of its system of ownership, to focus even temporarily on marx's idea of money as absolutely rooted in a commodity acting as universal equivalent... i'm hoping that it will become clearer after reading more on circulation and perhaps reading what he has to say about paper money.
commodity, state, credit, and various other related forms are all money, but they're different kinds of money. they have different origins, functions, and behaviors, and correspond to different aspects of society. commodity money -- typically gold, but assets like other precious metals can play a role -- might be said to operate at the base, with the forms of money that don't themselves have/store value arising from the superstructure's institutions.
being as capitalists are out for value, "real" money is what capitalists would most dearly want in an ideal world, and what they are assumed to use in the highly abstracted model of capitalism Marx works with, but as we all know, reality involves webs of social faith and the like that allow the metal barrier to be transcended in the near term. and when crisis strikes and the real reasserts itself over speculative euphoria, we see a corresponding "flight to value."
it doesn't make sense to make "ronpaul" jokes because marxists never advocate for a gold standard; they just acknowledge that it's still money, and will continue to be money as long as they system of production and accumulation on the basis of exchange value persists, regardless of what legal contrivances bourgeois states cook up to mask the relation or otherwise attempt to break free of it. hence why the assets of banks and central banks, where not other financial assets like foreign currencies, tend to take the form of gold -- even to this day, it's a factor in capital adequacy, reserves, and so on, to say nothing of its role as a countercyclical indicator, etc.
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chapter 13: Co-operation p. 439-454
another chapter detailing the labor process, not just between man and the world like chapter 7, but between collective labor and the capitalist mode of the production. the key argument is that labor naturally develops into a more efficient, 'economy of scale' production system when it is brought together and put to one use. 10 men are much more than ten times faster than one man when it comes to unloading or loading a truck due to being able to toss or hand items, keep up a continuous flow of work, etc. under previous modes of production it was only in exceptional circumstances of state directed action - pyramids/great wall of china/roman road system - that this concentration of labor had been achieved.
marx describes this increased productivity as a 'gift of labor' that is given freely to the capitalist, as legally the capitalist is merely arranging multiple separate contracts with separate individuals and then 'just so happens' to work them together. likewise, the fact that it is under capitalism that laborers are historically brought together to work as a united group creates the illusion that the capitalist mode of production is the inherent source of this explosive productivity. thus the liberal welching of 'we need capitalism or else there wont be enough clothes in the world!' as if coming under collective ownershop would turn the sewing machines into thread and needle.
this is why i want to study more of the history of the soviet union, which achieved incredibly large scale production and efficiency without the use of capitalist profit motive.
Marx says that any significant group of people will require a directing authority in order to make the most effective use of their efforts, how terrifically totalitarian.
another chapter detailing the labor process, not just between man and the world like chapter 7, but between collective labor and the capitalist mode of the production. the key argument is that labor naturally develops into a more efficient, 'economy of scale' production system when it is brought together and put to one use. 10 men are much more than ten times faster than one man when it comes to unloading or loading a truck due to being able to toss or hand items, keep up a continuous flow of work, etc. under previous modes of production it was only in exceptional circumstances of state directed action - pyramids/great wall of china/roman road system - that this concentration of labor had been achieved.
marx describes this increased productivity as a 'gift of labor' that is given freely to the capitalist, as legally the capitalist is merely arranging multiple separate contracts with separate individuals and then 'just so happens' to work them together. likewise, the fact that it is under capitalism that laborers are historically brought together to work as a united group creates the illusion that the capitalist mode of production is the inherent source of this explosive productivity. thus the liberal welching of 'we need capitalism or else there wont be enough clothes in the world!' as if coming under collective ownershop would turn the sewing machines into thread and needle.
this is why i want to study more of the history of the soviet union, which achieved incredibly large scale production and efficiency without the use of capitalist profit motive.
Marx says that any significant group of people will require a directing authority in order to make the most effective use of their efforts, how terrifically totalitarian.
Scrree
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ive been watching mark blyth's videos on the 2008 economic crisis and the eurocrisis
i guess i would call it the left wing of bourgeois economics.he kind of casually brings up that liberal democracies are a form of dictatorship of the bourgeois that is useful because it legitimizes their rule and creates a safe outlet for political unrest, but only as an aside in his explanation of why the EU felt the need to completely destroy the greek economy for literally no reason.
at the end of the first video filmed in 2012 he suggests that the us/euro governments are going to aggressively go after fraudulent bankers and tax scammers in order to find funding and restore credibility to the system, and then in 2015 he's surprised they did nothing of the sort. its like ugh dude that's the whole point, the bourgeois have lost the need to support liberal democracies in order to defuse the risk of actually existing socialism, social democrats are social facists
i guess i would call it the left wing of bourgeois economics.he kind of casually brings up that liberal democracies are a form of dictatorship of the bourgeois that is useful because it legitimizes their rule and creates a safe outlet for political unrest, but only as an aside in his explanation of why the EU felt the need to completely destroy the greek economy for literally no reason.
at the end of the first video filmed in 2012 he suggests that the us/euro governments are going to aggressively go after fraudulent bankers and tax scammers in order to find funding and restore credibility to the system, and then in 2015 he's surprised they did nothing of the sort. its like ugh dude that's the whole point, the bourgeois have lost the need to support liberal democracies in order to defuse the risk of actually existing socialism, social democrats are social facists
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chapter 14: The Division of Labor and Manufacture p. 455-481
I actually read this chapter a couple days ago, but completely stalled out when I tried to write a post on it because its the perfect example of Marx covering a dozen things in a very short amount of test, and i didn't want to just summarize it but didn't know how to write about it otherwise.
ill just post(!) about two highlights for me, the first of which is that I was somewhat surprised that he described it as the 'capitalist system of manufacture'. marx considers it embryonic compared to industrial capitalism, but it is a form that creates and maintains bourgeois dictatorship and thought. i want to go into details on the time period he identified as 'manufacture', the mid 16th to late 18th centuries, but other than the broad strokes of 'colonial ventures in america hyper-capitalize europe. inflation skyrockets, and wages in england, and the british empire sets out on the path of being the most effective killers ever realized on this world' my knowledge is thin on specifics.
er, to get back on point, i think it's interesting that there can be multiple 'stages' of capitalism with different characteristic but some same universal elements. it creates the possibility that 'industrial capitalism' might (or might have already) led way to something else. It's important to not fall into the teleology of absolutely defined 'stages' though, and i might be misunderstanding marx's argument due do not having finished the book.
the second point of interesting is the phrasing and tone of how Marx describes the laborer within the manufacture system: dissected, crippled, atomized. the all-encompassing laborer detailed in chapter 7 is shackled and sharpened to a thin point of use for the capitalist. it makes me wonder why there seemed to be a general enthusiasm for taylorism among the bolsheviks (not accusing them of any sin, just ignorance on my part)
next chapter is a real doozy, but ill finish it aND post about it!! I swear!
I actually read this chapter a couple days ago, but completely stalled out when I tried to write a post on it because its the perfect example of Marx covering a dozen things in a very short amount of test, and i didn't want to just summarize it but didn't know how to write about it otherwise.
ill just post(!) about two highlights for me, the first of which is that I was somewhat surprised that he described it as the 'capitalist system of manufacture'. marx considers it embryonic compared to industrial capitalism, but it is a form that creates and maintains bourgeois dictatorship and thought. i want to go into details on the time period he identified as 'manufacture', the mid 16th to late 18th centuries, but other than the broad strokes of 'colonial ventures in america hyper-capitalize europe. inflation skyrockets, and wages in england, and the british empire sets out on the path of being the most effective killers ever realized on this world' my knowledge is thin on specifics.
er, to get back on point, i think it's interesting that there can be multiple 'stages' of capitalism with different characteristic but some same universal elements. it creates the possibility that 'industrial capitalism' might (or might have already) led way to something else. It's important to not fall into the teleology of absolutely defined 'stages' though, and i might be misunderstanding marx's argument due do not having finished the book.
the second point of interesting is the phrasing and tone of how Marx describes the laborer within the manufacture system: dissected, crippled, atomized. the all-encompassing laborer detailed in chapter 7 is shackled and sharpened to a thin point of use for the capitalist. it makes me wonder why there seemed to be a general enthusiasm for taylorism among the bolsheviks (not accusing them of any sin, just ignorance on my part)
next chapter is a real doozy, but ill finish it aND post about it!! I swear!
Constantignoble
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Scrree posted:next chapter is a real doozy, but ill finish it aND post about it!! I swear!
bless you, and godspeed
fwiw when you get up to volume 2 i'm gonna try to read along and match your pace, because i've never actually done that one cover to cover
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chapter 15: machinery and large-scale industry (part 1) p. 492-508
ive decided i'll make more broken up smaller posts going through this chapter, since marx makes ten interesting points every five pages and if id like to write them down before i forget them.
okay so: leading in from his discussion of manufacture - humans using and becoming extremely limited tools at a specific point in an assembly-line style process - marx goes on to elucidate how machine-industry naturally arose from that mode of production. early machines where some specific sequences of human's working in a serial fashion brought together and recombined into one tool. the discovery and adaption of a new 'prime motivator' - source of energy: coal and steam - then let these 'sequences realized in one thing' grow from their "dwarf-like" original, man powered shapes into true machinery.
robert c allen's
british industrial revolution in global perspective further explains why it was england that had the right material conditions for the birth of machine industry. the cost of hiring a laborer in 17th century england were some of the highest in europe, and thus in the world, at the same time that incredible amounts of capital were flowing into the country through the slave trade and colonization. a labor-dear and capital-flush environment is necessary for machines, as the first, completely terrible models of steam engines that were barely profitable in england proper couldnt be used to turn a profit in say, france, where labor cost was significantly cheaper.
this rolls into my last point which is marx has absolutely terrible sources when it comes to asia. i forgive him for it because studying china in 19th century england is like studying russia in 20th century america, but everytime he mentions the 'ancient asiatic mode of production' i want to cringe. during the manufacture period (1550-1780) the stagnant oriental kingdom of china doubled it's population from 150m to 300m people while maintaining a generally higher standard of living than europe. i remember someone years ago posting here about how engel's got mad at marx because when he should have been writing the fourth volume he was spending time doing research on russian and indian village communes, so, not like he was completely unaware of the poverty of his sources.
ive decided i'll make more broken up smaller posts going through this chapter, since marx makes ten interesting points every five pages and if id like to write them down before i forget them.
okay so: leading in from his discussion of manufacture - humans using and becoming extremely limited tools at a specific point in an assembly-line style process - marx goes on to elucidate how machine-industry naturally arose from that mode of production. early machines where some specific sequences of human's working in a serial fashion brought together and recombined into one tool. the discovery and adaption of a new 'prime motivator' - source of energy: coal and steam - then let these 'sequences realized in one thing' grow from their "dwarf-like" original, man powered shapes into true machinery.
robert c allen's
british industrial revolution in global perspective further explains why it was england that had the right material conditions for the birth of machine industry. the cost of hiring a laborer in 17th century england were some of the highest in europe, and thus in the world, at the same time that incredible amounts of capital were flowing into the country through the slave trade and colonization. a labor-dear and capital-flush environment is necessary for machines, as the first, completely terrible models of steam engines that were barely profitable in england proper couldnt be used to turn a profit in say, france, where labor cost was significantly cheaper.
this rolls into my last point which is marx has absolutely terrible sources when it comes to asia. i forgive him for it because studying china in 19th century england is like studying russia in 20th century america, but everytime he mentions the 'ancient asiatic mode of production' i want to cringe. during the manufacture period (1550-1780) the stagnant oriental kingdom of china doubled it's population from 150m to 300m people while maintaining a generally higher standard of living than europe. i remember someone years ago posting here about how engel's got mad at marx because when he should have been writing the fourth volume he was spending time doing research on russian and indian village communes, so, not like he was completely unaware of the poverty of his sources.
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chapter 15: machinery and large-scale industry (part 2) p. 509-544
i read this section quite a while ago, but when i was looking up images or videos to include i saw that 'Male Baby Chickens Thrown Live Into Grinder' video and just Got Real Sad
this section half a history and testimony to the suffering of the british working class 1800-1865, and half furthering the theory laid out earlier in the chapter. if theres one thing i took away from it it'd be that i have a new understanding why imperialism is the 'highest' form of capitalism. because it can only exist while supported by the lower forms. all of the exploitation, degradation and raw human suffering that afflicted england has simply, albeit not without some missteps and errors, shuffled around and grown in scope until the entire world has been covered in its grasp.
it hasnt ever ended. im still sad about those chickens. full communism now
i read this section quite a while ago, but when i was looking up images or videos to include i saw that 'Male Baby Chickens Thrown Live Into Grinder' video and just Got Real Sad
this section half a history and testimony to the suffering of the british working class 1800-1865, and half furthering the theory laid out earlier in the chapter. if theres one thing i took away from it it'd be that i have a new understanding why imperialism is the 'highest' form of capitalism. because it can only exist while supported by the lower forms. all of the exploitation, degradation and raw human suffering that afflicted england has simply, albeit not without some missteps and errors, shuffled around and grown in scope until the entire world has been covered in its grasp.
it hasnt ever ended. im still sad about those chickens. full communism now
Chthonic_Goat_666
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Thanks for the thread, it's been a while since I read vol. 1. Going through 2 now and there's a lot of interesting stuff but also pages and pages of boring calculations 
. Is that Mark Blyth guy particularly famous? I saw a different video of his elsewhere recently....
. Is that Mark Blyth guy particularly famous? I saw a different video of his elsewhere recently....
Scrree
Scrree
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he's a ultraleft liberal economist who doesnt worship finance, and who published a scathing critique of austerity politics right as they were destroying Europe. he' hangs out with yannis varoufakis and was part of the 'radical remain' in the brexit discourse - stay in the EU to avoid it's collapse while recognizing it's need of radical reform.
i find it funny because, despite not mentioning class or class struggle in any of his talks, he has basically reached the communist manifesto backwards and ass-up. instead of 'the proletariat have nothing to lose' he's reached 'the bourgeois have everything to lose if they don't mollify the poor'. basically every time he speaks he mentions that the last time the poor were fucked so bad in europe it created antagonisms so bad that they led to WW2, and can we not do that again please?
figure 1: a marx haunted brain
so yeah ultimately a reformist, consistently erases class etc. but an entertaining public speaker and good source of debunking for the various bourgeois myths around austerity and the causes of liberal dysfunction.
i find it funny because, despite not mentioning class or class struggle in any of his talks, he has basically reached the communist manifesto backwards and ass-up. instead of 'the proletariat have nothing to lose' he's reached 'the bourgeois have everything to lose if they don't mollify the poor'. basically every time he speaks he mentions that the last time the poor were fucked so bad in europe it created antagonisms so bad that they led to WW2, and can we not do that again please?
figure 1: a marx haunted brain
so yeah ultimately a reformist, consistently erases class etc. but an entertaining public speaker and good source of debunking for the various bourgeois myths around austerity and the causes of liberal dysfunction.
cars
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i did that once. like i was a bad marxist and then stopped thinking of things that way, and then came all the way back around to endorsing envy as a controlling aspect of human nature that needed to be placated through severe social leveling, and then realized like what does that gain me over just being a bad marxist again but slightly less lazy about it? i mean among other things the other way around, the 'save people from their bad parts' way, gives you a grossly paranoid pov about people's motives and it's a big waste of energy.
swampman
swampman
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Constantignoble posted:in this book kliman spells out how he calculates a MELT on the basis of available BEA/NIPA data, so that's probably a good starting point
Scrree
Scrree
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let me try to handle the entire chapter at once, uh, let me keep a slow pace of work and basically forget the whole thing ,forcing a reread, uh, let me finish the damn thing.
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chapter 15: machinery and large-scale industry:
section 1: THE DEVELOPMENT OF MACHINERY
two interesting points – a machine cannot be defined as ‘a tool where human power is replaced by some other motive force’ because then an oxen driven plough is a machine while a circular loom set by hand is a mere tool. a machine is defined, in economic terms by marx, as a mechanism that has absorbed multiple operations previously performed by handicraftsmen into a single unit that, when set into motion, performs them simultaneously. thus the former work of multiple tool-using people are combined into a single motion driven by a single person, and the complex, singularly focused machine assumes supremacy over it's own driver.
the other point is that the history of machinery is continually falsified to create a narrative of a series single inventors who serve as a fountainhead for progress. imperfect spinning machines were used in italy before they were 'invented' in england, and the first introductory step of machinery in every field is to take the tools created and refined by the craftsmen of the field and combine them together. i believe that one of the reasons why this inventor-genius myth exists is because, beyond bourgeois individualism, the anglo patent system requires its participants damn their both their predecessors and successors, and say with divine pride from nothing i made this, and all you've done is stolen this from me.
quote: "Machinery... operates only by means of associated labour, or labour in common."
section 2: THE VALUE TRANSFERRED BY MACHINERY TO THE PRODUCT
unless ive grossly misunderstood this chapter, the ways machinery produces profit for the capitalist is to that, to the first adapter of a new machine, the value (and thus price) of the product is so much lower than all of their competitors that they're able to grab incredible profit while that 'machine gap' still exists. on a larger scale, machinery reduces the 'necessary labor time for the reproduction of labor power' by pushing down the value of goods, and thus capitalists are able to stagnate or even lower wages and annex even more of the worker's day – the prime example being the bourgeois reaction to the repeal of the corn laws where, with true celebratory joy, the factory owner matched the cut to bread prices with a cut to wages.
marx also cuts off some nitpick criticisms about the changing value of machinery in an evolving industry, and proves that machinery. even when it has the same price as the wages it displaces, has less labor endowed into itself than the hands it replaces. he ends with an observation: while commonly known that the adaptation of machinery can be stunted by low labor costs and the use of barely subsisting 'wretches', it is less recognized that the use of machinery is fundamental to the creation of the poor. around the factories are an ever increasing mass of workers thrown into the surplus army and a whole slew of 'handicraft' works spring up from their deprivation and 'ability' to work for the barest scrap.
quote: "In England women are still occasionally used instead of horses for hauling barges, because the labor required to produce horses and machines is an accurately known quantity, while that required to maintain the women of the surplus population is beneath all calculation."
section 3: THE MOST IMMEDIATE EFFECTS OF MACHINE PRODUCTION ON THE WORKER
marx further creates three further divisions for this section, which are:
a) Appropriation of Supplementary Labour-Power by Capital. Employment of Women and Children
b) Prolongation of the Working Day
c) Intensification of Labour
which about sums it the up.
during this chapter marx points out a key contradiction that his theory is revealing. in a single working day, it is impossible for a capitalist to ring more surplus labor out of two workers than twenty-four, yet the development of machinery and industrial capitalism unceasingly drives towards simultaneous increase of productivity and decrease of working hands. capitalism undercuts its own profit while simultaneously increasing productivity. this is a core contradiction of capitalism which "drives the capitalist, without his being aware of the fact" and then marx says he'll actually analysis this in 'part one' (editorial note: actually chapter 15) of volume three of capital. marx you goddamn tease!!
quote: "But they lacked the specifically Christian qualities which would have enabled then to preach the slavery of the masses in order that a few crude and half-educated parvenus might become 'eminent spinners', 'extensive sausage-makers' and 'influential shoe-black dealers'."
section 4: THE FACTORY
after examining how machinery was developed, it's place in the capitalist mode of production, and it's effect on the working class marx writes that it is time to examine machinery in its most complete and developed form, the factory system.
he uses two contradictory quotes from dr. ure, a notable fuckwit, to illustrate the 'two sides' of the factory. dr. ure describes the factory as both a 'combined co-operation of work-people tending a system of machines impelled by a central power.' and a 'vast automaton, combined of various mechanical and intellectual organs'. these are obviously not the same thing, and marx makes the point that the former is common to any mode of production using machinery, while the latter, with it's annexation of the human minders into the raw material of the system, is characteristic of the capitalist mode of production.
this section is a real horror show; most of it is spent detailing the various ruinations inflicted upon factory workers, and the foremost is there complete dependance and submersion into a system they have no agency in. workers, from birth until death, are worked by the machines as much as they work them. marx is careful to point out that the concentration of machinery and great increases in productivity form a rational social mode of production, and that it is the capitalist privatization that turns that into 'systemic robbery of what is necessary for life'.
quote: "In the factory, we have a lifeless mechanism that is independent of the workers, who are incorporated into it as living appendages."
section 5: THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN WORKER AND MACHINE
brief history of the luddite movement and how machinery was used to systemically break the back of the labor within the manufacture system. the earliest factory owners heap the greatest praise on the steam engine and how it allows skilled labor is replaced by unskilled and forces children to provide for their parents. where the expelling of workers is gradual it leads to a slow and morbid bleed, the prime example being the english hand weavers who spent an entire generation working on below poverty wages and only substituted due to charity. and where the introduction of machinery is sudden, like the indian cotton weaver. the 'temporary inconvenience' of unemployment turns into the most temporal inconvenience of death (marx actually uses that pun, its great)
he then takes a brief look at the england cotton crisis of 1860-65 and points out that, despite all the rhetoric of 'shared burden' in times of trouble it was only the very smallest factory who got pushed out of the market, and most of the larger firms were able to keep consistent profit by pushing down wages and refining their machinery.
the point of this section is, i think, that technology is not the result of some kind of neutral advancing of the sciences, but a mechanism that is primarily developed within class struggle to, when it is developed by the capitalist class, further the suppress the power of labor. the end of this section really needs to be read to be believed because its marx simply eviscerating dr. ure by quoting all his babbling contradictions back to back. academic grift has a long and storied history indeed
quote: "'The misery hardly finds a parallel in the history of commerce. The bones of the cotton-weavers are bleaching the plains of India."'
section 6: THE COMPENSATION THEORY, WITH REGARD TO THE WORKERS DISPLACED BY MACHINERY
the compensation theory is one of those 'say's law' type bourgeois economic miracles which states that: when machinery displaces laborers and throws them into unemployment an amount of capital equal to the wages of the laborers is 'set free' for the capitalist who will inevitably invest the profit into industry and thus reemploy the discarded workers. this is of course, complete nonsense, as when laborers are 'set free' from there wages the value that is being replaced by machinery is value that would have gone towards reproducing their labor power, that is, purchasing the means of subsistence. reduced demand for means of subsistence will, on a large scale, lead to unemployment in those fields as sales slack. thus, in the exact opposite way bourgeois economists predict, the introduction of machinery and large scale unemployment can cause a systemic crisis over-production/under-consumption.
marx points out a quantifying factor that machinery generally does not just improve productivity-per-worker, but absolute productivity as well, and generally to an incredible degree. the english economy transforming from producing 100,000 garments with 10,000 workers to 400,000 garments with 5,000 workers will require the amount of cotton growers overseas to quadruple, and as the slaves/sugar/rum triangle asserts, supplying cotton growers can be a very lucrative business.
so we have a system where shocks to the domestic economy can be overcome by foreign trade and reciprocal exchange for raw materials (alongside political and military action to cheapen those raw materials to the greatest extent). there is another factor which marx points out, that those thrown from the sphere of production will flow into the sphere of servitude; the number of domestic servants, butlers, and maids grew consistently since the start of the industrial revolution, and by marx's time actually outnumbered both industrial or agricultural workers (as separate groups).
quote: "Therefore, since machinery in itself shortens the hours of labour, but when employed by capital it lengthens them; since in itself it lightens labour, but when employed by capital it heightens in intensity; since in itself it is a victory of man over the forces of nature but in the hands of capital it makes man the slave of those forces; since in itself it increases the wealth of the producers, but in the hands of capital makes them into paupers, the bourgeois economist simply states that the contemplation of machinery in itself demonstrates with exactitude that all these evident contradictions are a mere semblance, present in everyday reality, but not existing in themselves, and therefore having no theoretical existence either."
section 7: REPULSION AND ATTRACTION OF WORKERS THROUGH THE DEVELOPMENT OF MACHINE PRODUCTION. CRISIS IN THE COTTON INDUSTRY.
despite its innate drive towards reducing the number of laborers and maintaining a reserve army of unemployed, the growth of the factory system can and often does lead to an absolute increase in the number employed workers. this increase is caused by the explosive growth in the magnitude of the factory system itself, so that while each article of production requires ever less labor, the rate of production is so high that more hands are needed to handle the flood. ideologically, this creates a situation where employment for the laborer and profit for the capitalist seem to be 'naturally' linked, and some bourgeois dink might proclaim that it is the worker's best interest to pray for a 'job creators paradise' to lure the master's money.
marx points out that once the point is reached where the technical basis for machine production - iron/energy/transportation - have been revolutionized by machine production the only limits presented to the growth of capital "are the availability of raw resources, and the extent of sales outlets". growth is infinite up to the point the market can bear (theoretically, climate change is systemic externalities coming home to roost par excellence). what the market can bear is a variable and often misinterpreted thing, and so capitalism (marx uses the english textile industry to illustrate) takes on a boom/bust cycle whereby years of growth and overproduction are checked by years of stagnation and depression.
obviously marx is going to deal with capitalism's cyclical crises in more depth later, but he lays out the basic thesis for the 'development of underdevelopment' here: there is an international division of labor where industrial countries require an immense amount of raw materials and so use political and military power to deindustrialize and open the markets of previously unincorporated lands (or ship out the 'supernumerious' population to create a new market, marx states that australia was essentially founded on the principles of supplying england wool).
on the home front a crisis of capitalism in no way means the suffering of capitalists. a few of the smaller firms may stumble and fall, but profits can be buoyed by cut wages, and an experimental attitude is taken try and tease out money from air. marx relays how during the 1860-65 crisis some entrepreneurs layered their yarn with so much cheap and heavy size (protective coating) that they could brag about selling their finished yarn for less than the price of the cotton the bought, and still made a profit.
quote: "A new and international division of labour spring up, one suited to the requirements of the main industrial countries, and it converts one part of the glove into a chiefly agricultural field of production for supplying the other part, which remains a pre-eminently industrial field. "
section 8: THE REVOLUTIONARY IMPACT OF LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY ON MANUFACTURE, HANDICRAFTS, AND DOMESTIC INDUSTRY
while certain industries are famous for their rapid and complete mechanization - coal, metalwork, textiles - the industrial mode of production does not stop at the factory door, but sweeps over the whole country through the iron law of competition. as a result, various transitional forms of production appear. 'mechanized handicraft or manufacture' arise in marginal areas, and for what they lack in organization and large capital investment they make up in acute exploitation. example industries are lace making, where factory-produced lace is sent out to 'cottage factories', where (almost universally) women and children sit packed like sardines in small, foul smelling huts, for finishing. and brickmaking, where the moulders (skilled workers) contract to the company with their own crew, a group of seven or so dependents who rely on the moulder for work, and who might live and sleep tumbled together into a small two room cottage.
an aside here to marx's sources. he quotes numerous critics of the factory system who cannot help but honestly report the horrific misery their fellow man is subjected to for the sake of profit, but in the most these critics, while useful in their findings, are short-sighted moralists. there is a pervasive lumping of 'women, young persons, and children' into a single category, and the most emphasized inhumanity of all is the 'moral degeneration' of working women in their interactions with working men. it should come to no surprise that among the first reforms of the new industrial society is the sanctioning (more from history and publicity than practice) of women from the workplace and the public realm.
marx's analysis in the final part of the this section is an interesting one. for all the talk of how capitalism revolutionizes and upends production, how it is ever changing and adapting, and how deeply liberals fetishize the concept of 'creative destruction', it is a fact that capitalists tend towards complacency unless their hand is forced by crisis or change brought by class struggle. for every act of legislation regarding the working day or safety standards, the factory owners threw up their hands and proclaimed that it would make their business simply impossible, and lead to the ruination of the country, but then found out once legislation was passed that the 'impossible' became surmountable with only minor mechanical refinement and development. capitalism's ability to 'surpass any obstacle' is real, but the corollary is that without obstacles it is perfectly fine to stew in it's own juices and extract as much rent as possible from the misery it rests on.
this might be bias from my own perspective in the modern era (complete scam company thernosis valued at $9bil, tumblr actually bought at $1.1bil, uber valued more than goddamn honda lol) but that seems like the right read. likewise marx states that once legislation rationalizes practice to the capabilities of production, the extreme exploitation of the mechanized handicraft/cottage industry are "put to the wall" since they rely so heavily on immiserated labor. thus why they are inherently 'transitional forms'. given the history of imperialism one could argue that weren't so much removed as much as exported to subaltern countries, but id need to study the actual conditions of those places before strongly making that claim.
quote: "Factory legislation, that first conscious and methodical reaction of society against the spontaneously developed form of it's production process, is, as we've seen, just as much the necessary product of large-scale industry as cotton yarn, self-actors, and the electric telegraph."
section 9: THE HEALTH AND EDUCATION CLAUSES OF THE FACTORY ACTS. THE GENERAL EXTENSION OF THE FACTORY LEGISLATION IN ENGLAND
marx view on healthcare reform, paraphrased: 'the bourgeoisie are a spiteful fuckers who wouldnt spent a penny save a limp. more in volume 3' seems about right.
marx's views on education are more surprising. he first points out that in most causes the required educational requirements are completely only on paper, but even when schooling does happen he critiques both the half-year schooling/half-year factory work most poor children are placed through and the more middle class 'all-day schooling' consistently throughout the year. the education he praises is that 'which combines education and gymnastics with manual labor'. he cites robert owen as having shown that "the germ of the future of education is present within the factory system", and that this is the only method of education that can produce fully developed human beings. i earnestly dont know enough to endorse or critique this view, but its interesting.
that 'fully developed human' bit is key to marx's criticism here. he states that the key distinction that separates the technical/mechanical mode of production from all others that before it is that it never considers the current state of production as the definite one, and thus it is inherently revolutionary. thus the human that naturally should develop, and be developed, this system is an individual that has broken free of the old division of labor, and who is 'absolutely available for any kind of labor required of him'. however, the capitalist mode of production produces vulnerable individuals who are thoughtfully dependent on their specific work, and can be thrown into the 'unemployable surplus' at any moment. capitalism is fundamentally unable to provide the full development, full employment, and full subsistence that its own technical base demands. this is an absolute contradiction within the capitalist mode of production.
the latter half of this section mostly deals with state failures to regulate. the first is of child labor, where for a long time the state dare not venture into the realm of 'paternal authority' that capitalism had, through divestment of land and threat of starvation, conquered long ago. likewise even when regulations are put into the books, enforcement is often another story. "In the year 1865 there were 3,217 coal mines in Great Britain, and twelve inspectors." says all that needs to be said there.
still, marx predicts that factory legislation will hasten the consolidation of many small firms into several larger ones, and likewise merges a fractious and disunited work force into a consolidated proletariat. the 'safety values' of the cottage industries will disappear, and the contradictions within capitalism will grow, ripening conditions for the next form of society.
i am now reflecting on how, since the deinustrialization of the 80's there has been an absurd focus on entrepreneurship in america. absurd in the foremost because it is statistically known that most attempts to start a business will fail miserably, and is in most cases only a viable option for those who already have capital to spare. likewise, the rise of 'independent contractor coordination' companies like uber point to a steady if miserable revival of a kind of 'service handicrafts'. truly, the end of the twentieth century rolled right back into the start of the nineteenth.
quote:
"You take my life
When you do take the means whereby I live." - Billy Shakespeare
section 10: LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY AND AGRICULTURE
the last section, and marx starts it off by basically saying 'i'll deal with agriculture more later, heres a couple basics.' which i appreciate because fuck this chapter is long and full of so much stuff. he covers the basics: mechanization in agriculture is a prerequisite of the industrial revolution, it is not as injurious to the health of the workers as urban industry, but as a force it dissolves the entire peasant social of production, and so creates incredible chaos and class antagonism. the general dispersion of the peasant class weakens their ability to resist and leads to their defeat (at least, in england), and they are forced into the cities as impoverished laborers.
that is all as i expected, but marx also devotes about half of this short section to the soil, which surprised me. " disturbs the metabolic reaction between man and the earth" and so "hinders... the lasting fertility of the soil." there is no tractor utopianism here, there must be a regulative law of social production, a consciously planned force and method, to compel the systemic restoration of the soil from the damage of industrial agriculture. the exploitation of the land and soil are intrinsically linked to the exploitation of the worker, and capitalism can only thrive of the ruination of both.
quote: "Capitalist production, therefore, only develops the techniques and the degree of combination of the social process of production by simultaneously undermining the original sources of all wealth - the soil and the worker."
section 1: THE DEVELOPMENT OF MACHINERY
two interesting points – a machine cannot be defined as ‘a tool where human power is replaced by some other motive force’ because then an oxen driven plough is a machine while a circular loom set by hand is a mere tool. a machine is defined, in economic terms by marx, as a mechanism that has absorbed multiple operations previously performed by handicraftsmen into a single unit that, when set into motion, performs them simultaneously. thus the former work of multiple tool-using people are combined into a single motion driven by a single person, and the complex, singularly focused machine assumes supremacy over it's own driver.
the other point is that the history of machinery is continually falsified to create a narrative of a series single inventors who serve as a fountainhead for progress. imperfect spinning machines were used in italy before they were 'invented' in england, and the first introductory step of machinery in every field is to take the tools created and refined by the craftsmen of the field and combine them together. i believe that one of the reasons why this inventor-genius myth exists is because, beyond bourgeois individualism, the anglo patent system requires its participants damn their both their predecessors and successors, and say with divine pride from nothing i made this, and all you've done is stolen this from me.
quote: "Machinery... operates only by means of associated labour, or labour in common."
section 2: THE VALUE TRANSFERRED BY MACHINERY TO THE PRODUCT
unless ive grossly misunderstood this chapter, the ways machinery produces profit for the capitalist is to that, to the first adapter of a new machine, the value (and thus price) of the product is so much lower than all of their competitors that they're able to grab incredible profit while that 'machine gap' still exists. on a larger scale, machinery reduces the 'necessary labor time for the reproduction of labor power' by pushing down the value of goods, and thus capitalists are able to stagnate or even lower wages and annex even more of the worker's day – the prime example being the bourgeois reaction to the repeal of the corn laws where, with true celebratory joy, the factory owner matched the cut to bread prices with a cut to wages.
marx also cuts off some nitpick criticisms about the changing value of machinery in an evolving industry, and proves that machinery. even when it has the same price as the wages it displaces, has less labor endowed into itself than the hands it replaces. he ends with an observation: while commonly known that the adaptation of machinery can be stunted by low labor costs and the use of barely subsisting 'wretches', it is less recognized that the use of machinery is fundamental to the creation of the poor. around the factories are an ever increasing mass of workers thrown into the surplus army and a whole slew of 'handicraft' works spring up from their deprivation and 'ability' to work for the barest scrap.
quote: "In England women are still occasionally used instead of horses for hauling barges, because the labor required to produce horses and machines is an accurately known quantity, while that required to maintain the women of the surplus population is beneath all calculation."
section 3: THE MOST IMMEDIATE EFFECTS OF MACHINE PRODUCTION ON THE WORKER
marx further creates three further divisions for this section, which are:
a) Appropriation of Supplementary Labour-Power by Capital. Employment of Women and Children
b) Prolongation of the Working Day
c) Intensification of Labour
which about sums it the up.
during this chapter marx points out a key contradiction that his theory is revealing. in a single working day, it is impossible for a capitalist to ring more surplus labor out of two workers than twenty-four, yet the development of machinery and industrial capitalism unceasingly drives towards simultaneous increase of productivity and decrease of working hands. capitalism undercuts its own profit while simultaneously increasing productivity. this is a core contradiction of capitalism which "drives the capitalist, without his being aware of the fact" and then marx says he'll actually analysis this in 'part one' (editorial note: actually chapter 15) of volume three of capital. marx you goddamn tease!!
quote: "But they lacked the specifically Christian qualities which would have enabled then to preach the slavery of the masses in order that a few crude and half-educated parvenus might become 'eminent spinners', 'extensive sausage-makers' and 'influential shoe-black dealers'."
section 4: THE FACTORY
after examining how machinery was developed, it's place in the capitalist mode of production, and it's effect on the working class marx writes that it is time to examine machinery in its most complete and developed form, the factory system.
he uses two contradictory quotes from dr. ure, a notable fuckwit, to illustrate the 'two sides' of the factory. dr. ure describes the factory as both a 'combined co-operation of work-people tending a system of machines impelled by a central power.' and a 'vast automaton, combined of various mechanical and intellectual organs'. these are obviously not the same thing, and marx makes the point that the former is common to any mode of production using machinery, while the latter, with it's annexation of the human minders into the raw material of the system, is characteristic of the capitalist mode of production.
this section is a real horror show; most of it is spent detailing the various ruinations inflicted upon factory workers, and the foremost is there complete dependance and submersion into a system they have no agency in. workers, from birth until death, are worked by the machines as much as they work them. marx is careful to point out that the concentration of machinery and great increases in productivity form a rational social mode of production, and that it is the capitalist privatization that turns that into 'systemic robbery of what is necessary for life'.
quote: "In the factory, we have a lifeless mechanism that is independent of the workers, who are incorporated into it as living appendages."
section 5: THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN WORKER AND MACHINE
brief history of the luddite movement and how machinery was used to systemically break the back of the labor within the manufacture system. the earliest factory owners heap the greatest praise on the steam engine and how it allows skilled labor is replaced by unskilled and forces children to provide for their parents. where the expelling of workers is gradual it leads to a slow and morbid bleed, the prime example being the english hand weavers who spent an entire generation working on below poverty wages and only substituted due to charity. and where the introduction of machinery is sudden, like the indian cotton weaver. the 'temporary inconvenience' of unemployment turns into the most temporal inconvenience of death (marx actually uses that pun, its great)
he then takes a brief look at the england cotton crisis of 1860-65 and points out that, despite all the rhetoric of 'shared burden' in times of trouble it was only the very smallest factory who got pushed out of the market, and most of the larger firms were able to keep consistent profit by pushing down wages and refining their machinery.
the point of this section is, i think, that technology is not the result of some kind of neutral advancing of the sciences, but a mechanism that is primarily developed within class struggle to, when it is developed by the capitalist class, further the suppress the power of labor. the end of this section really needs to be read to be believed because its marx simply eviscerating dr. ure by quoting all his babbling contradictions back to back. academic grift has a long and storied history indeed
quote: "'The misery hardly finds a parallel in the history of commerce. The bones of the cotton-weavers are bleaching the plains of India."'
section 6: THE COMPENSATION THEORY, WITH REGARD TO THE WORKERS DISPLACED BY MACHINERY
the compensation theory is one of those 'say's law' type bourgeois economic miracles which states that: when machinery displaces laborers and throws them into unemployment an amount of capital equal to the wages of the laborers is 'set free' for the capitalist who will inevitably invest the profit into industry and thus reemploy the discarded workers. this is of course, complete nonsense, as when laborers are 'set free' from there wages the value that is being replaced by machinery is value that would have gone towards reproducing their labor power, that is, purchasing the means of subsistence. reduced demand for means of subsistence will, on a large scale, lead to unemployment in those fields as sales slack. thus, in the exact opposite way bourgeois economists predict, the introduction of machinery and large scale unemployment can cause a systemic crisis over-production/under-consumption.
marx points out a quantifying factor that machinery generally does not just improve productivity-per-worker, but absolute productivity as well, and generally to an incredible degree. the english economy transforming from producing 100,000 garments with 10,000 workers to 400,000 garments with 5,000 workers will require the amount of cotton growers overseas to quadruple, and as the slaves/sugar/rum triangle asserts, supplying cotton growers can be a very lucrative business.
so we have a system where shocks to the domestic economy can be overcome by foreign trade and reciprocal exchange for raw materials (alongside political and military action to cheapen those raw materials to the greatest extent). there is another factor which marx points out, that those thrown from the sphere of production will flow into the sphere of servitude; the number of domestic servants, butlers, and maids grew consistently since the start of the industrial revolution, and by marx's time actually outnumbered both industrial or agricultural workers (as separate groups).
quote: "Therefore, since machinery in itself shortens the hours of labour, but when employed by capital it lengthens them; since in itself it lightens labour, but when employed by capital it heightens in intensity; since in itself it is a victory of man over the forces of nature but in the hands of capital it makes man the slave of those forces; since in itself it increases the wealth of the producers, but in the hands of capital makes them into paupers, the bourgeois economist simply states that the contemplation of machinery in itself demonstrates with exactitude that all these evident contradictions are a mere semblance, present in everyday reality, but not existing in themselves, and therefore having no theoretical existence either."
section 7: REPULSION AND ATTRACTION OF WORKERS THROUGH THE DEVELOPMENT OF MACHINE PRODUCTION. CRISIS IN THE COTTON INDUSTRY.
despite its innate drive towards reducing the number of laborers and maintaining a reserve army of unemployed, the growth of the factory system can and often does lead to an absolute increase in the number employed workers. this increase is caused by the explosive growth in the magnitude of the factory system itself, so that while each article of production requires ever less labor, the rate of production is so high that more hands are needed to handle the flood. ideologically, this creates a situation where employment for the laborer and profit for the capitalist seem to be 'naturally' linked, and some bourgeois dink might proclaim that it is the worker's best interest to pray for a 'job creators paradise' to lure the master's money.
marx points out that once the point is reached where the technical basis for machine production - iron/energy/transportation - have been revolutionized by machine production the only limits presented to the growth of capital "are the availability of raw resources, and the extent of sales outlets". growth is infinite up to the point the market can bear (theoretically, climate change is systemic externalities coming home to roost par excellence). what the market can bear is a variable and often misinterpreted thing, and so capitalism (marx uses the english textile industry to illustrate) takes on a boom/bust cycle whereby years of growth and overproduction are checked by years of stagnation and depression.
obviously marx is going to deal with capitalism's cyclical crises in more depth later, but he lays out the basic thesis for the 'development of underdevelopment' here: there is an international division of labor where industrial countries require an immense amount of raw materials and so use political and military power to deindustrialize and open the markets of previously unincorporated lands (or ship out the 'supernumerious' population to create a new market, marx states that australia was essentially founded on the principles of supplying england wool).
on the home front a crisis of capitalism in no way means the suffering of capitalists. a few of the smaller firms may stumble and fall, but profits can be buoyed by cut wages, and an experimental attitude is taken try and tease out money from air. marx relays how during the 1860-65 crisis some entrepreneurs layered their yarn with so much cheap and heavy size (protective coating) that they could brag about selling their finished yarn for less than the price of the cotton the bought, and still made a profit.
quote: "A new and international division of labour spring up, one suited to the requirements of the main industrial countries, and it converts one part of the glove into a chiefly agricultural field of production for supplying the other part, which remains a pre-eminently industrial field. "
section 8: THE REVOLUTIONARY IMPACT OF LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY ON MANUFACTURE, HANDICRAFTS, AND DOMESTIC INDUSTRY
while certain industries are famous for their rapid and complete mechanization - coal, metalwork, textiles - the industrial mode of production does not stop at the factory door, but sweeps over the whole country through the iron law of competition. as a result, various transitional forms of production appear. 'mechanized handicraft or manufacture' arise in marginal areas, and for what they lack in organization and large capital investment they make up in acute exploitation. example industries are lace making, where factory-produced lace is sent out to 'cottage factories', where (almost universally) women and children sit packed like sardines in small, foul smelling huts, for finishing. and brickmaking, where the moulders (skilled workers) contract to the company with their own crew, a group of seven or so dependents who rely on the moulder for work, and who might live and sleep tumbled together into a small two room cottage.
an aside here to marx's sources. he quotes numerous critics of the factory system who cannot help but honestly report the horrific misery their fellow man is subjected to for the sake of profit, but in the most these critics, while useful in their findings, are short-sighted moralists. there is a pervasive lumping of 'women, young persons, and children' into a single category, and the most emphasized inhumanity of all is the 'moral degeneration' of working women in their interactions with working men. it should come to no surprise that among the first reforms of the new industrial society is the sanctioning (more from history and publicity than practice) of women from the workplace and the public realm.
marx's analysis in the final part of the this section is an interesting one. for all the talk of how capitalism revolutionizes and upends production, how it is ever changing and adapting, and how deeply liberals fetishize the concept of 'creative destruction', it is a fact that capitalists tend towards complacency unless their hand is forced by crisis or change brought by class struggle. for every act of legislation regarding the working day or safety standards, the factory owners threw up their hands and proclaimed that it would make their business simply impossible, and lead to the ruination of the country, but then found out once legislation was passed that the 'impossible' became surmountable with only minor mechanical refinement and development. capitalism's ability to 'surpass any obstacle' is real, but the corollary is that without obstacles it is perfectly fine to stew in it's own juices and extract as much rent as possible from the misery it rests on.
this might be bias from my own perspective in the modern era (complete scam company thernosis valued at $9bil, tumblr actually bought at $1.1bil, uber valued more than goddamn honda lol) but that seems like the right read. likewise marx states that once legislation rationalizes practice to the capabilities of production, the extreme exploitation of the mechanized handicraft/cottage industry are "put to the wall" since they rely so heavily on immiserated labor. thus why they are inherently 'transitional forms'. given the history of imperialism one could argue that weren't so much removed as much as exported to subaltern countries, but id need to study the actual conditions of those places before strongly making that claim.
quote: "Factory legislation, that first conscious and methodical reaction of society against the spontaneously developed form of it's production process, is, as we've seen, just as much the necessary product of large-scale industry as cotton yarn, self-actors, and the electric telegraph."
section 9: THE HEALTH AND EDUCATION CLAUSES OF THE FACTORY ACTS. THE GENERAL EXTENSION OF THE FACTORY LEGISLATION IN ENGLAND
marx view on healthcare reform, paraphrased: 'the bourgeoisie are a spiteful fuckers who wouldnt spent a penny save a limp. more in volume 3' seems about right.
marx's views on education are more surprising. he first points out that in most causes the required educational requirements are completely only on paper, but even when schooling does happen he critiques both the half-year schooling/half-year factory work most poor children are placed through and the more middle class 'all-day schooling' consistently throughout the year. the education he praises is that 'which combines education and gymnastics with manual labor'. he cites robert owen as having shown that "the germ of the future of education is present within the factory system", and that this is the only method of education that can produce fully developed human beings. i earnestly dont know enough to endorse or critique this view, but its interesting.
that 'fully developed human' bit is key to marx's criticism here. he states that the key distinction that separates the technical/mechanical mode of production from all others that before it is that it never considers the current state of production as the definite one, and thus it is inherently revolutionary. thus the human that naturally should develop, and be developed, this system is an individual that has broken free of the old division of labor, and who is 'absolutely available for any kind of labor required of him'. however, the capitalist mode of production produces vulnerable individuals who are thoughtfully dependent on their specific work, and can be thrown into the 'unemployable surplus' at any moment. capitalism is fundamentally unable to provide the full development, full employment, and full subsistence that its own technical base demands. this is an absolute contradiction within the capitalist mode of production.
the latter half of this section mostly deals with state failures to regulate. the first is of child labor, where for a long time the state dare not venture into the realm of 'paternal authority' that capitalism had, through divestment of land and threat of starvation, conquered long ago. likewise even when regulations are put into the books, enforcement is often another story. "In the year 1865 there were 3,217 coal mines in Great Britain, and twelve inspectors." says all that needs to be said there.
still, marx predicts that factory legislation will hasten the consolidation of many small firms into several larger ones, and likewise merges a fractious and disunited work force into a consolidated proletariat. the 'safety values' of the cottage industries will disappear, and the contradictions within capitalism will grow, ripening conditions for the next form of society.
i am now reflecting on how, since the deinustrialization of the 80's there has been an absurd focus on entrepreneurship in america. absurd in the foremost because it is statistically known that most attempts to start a business will fail miserably, and is in most cases only a viable option for those who already have capital to spare. likewise, the rise of 'independent contractor coordination' companies like uber point to a steady if miserable revival of a kind of 'service handicrafts'. truly, the end of the twentieth century rolled right back into the start of the nineteenth.
quote:
"You take my life
When you do take the means whereby I live." - Billy Shakespeare
section 10: LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY AND AGRICULTURE
the last section, and marx starts it off by basically saying 'i'll deal with agriculture more later, heres a couple basics.' which i appreciate because fuck this chapter is long and full of so much stuff. he covers the basics: mechanization in agriculture is a prerequisite of the industrial revolution, it is not as injurious to the health of the workers as urban industry, but as a force it dissolves the entire peasant social of production, and so creates incredible chaos and class antagonism. the general dispersion of the peasant class weakens their ability to resist and leads to their defeat (at least, in england), and they are forced into the cities as impoverished laborers.
that is all as i expected, but marx also devotes about half of this short section to the soil, which surprised me. " disturbs the metabolic reaction between man and the earth" and so "hinders... the lasting fertility of the soil." there is no tractor utopianism here, there must be a regulative law of social production, a consciously planned force and method, to compel the systemic restoration of the soil from the damage of industrial agriculture. the exploitation of the land and soil are intrinsically linked to the exploitation of the worker, and capitalism can only thrive of the ruination of both.
quote: "Capitalist production, therefore, only develops the techniques and the degree of combination of the social process of production by simultaneously undermining the original sources of all wealth - the soil and the worker."
Scrree
Scrree
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dont worry you dont have to read that long and arduous post (but please do). i know what yall really come for
c_man
c_man
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it makes me happy that you're still doing this. i really loved vol 1 of capital!
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Flying_horse_in_saudi_arabia
Flying_horse_in_saudi_arabia
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Same.
Scrree
Scrree
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i appreciate the support! even if i dont post for a while; (thread title here)!!
the reading is pretty easy but the writing can take forever if i let myself become lax, and its the writing (rambling as it can be) that really helps me stabilize marx's analysis my head and develop my own stray, tangential thoughts into critique-able ideas.
the reading is pretty easy but the writing can take forever if i let myself become lax, and its the writing (rambling as it can be) that really helps me stabilize marx's analysis my head and develop my own stray, tangential thoughts into critique-able ideas.
Scrree
Scrree
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chapter 16: Absolute and Relative Surplus-Value
this chapter is really interesting because, after the very historical and event-driven (and long) previous chapter, this one basically reevaluates and restates some of the theoretical basics that makes marxism work as a theory. capitalism is a system of production of surplus value, or to reverse the rhetoric, the production of surplus value is the purpose of the capitalism. understanding the two ways surplus value can be appropriated - relatively: with the fall of the price of necessary labor-time leading to reduced wages paid from the same temporal expense of work, or absolutely: where the capitalist simply demands more time and labor power for the same wage.
these theoretical definitions are important because they dictate the actions of the capitalists; they are driven, through the intermediary processes of profit and competition, to accomplish the annexation of surplus labor through these two means.
marx also points out that the theory of capital only applies to a capitalist society. relative surplus value can appear a useless tool if you assume that any time excess of the necessary labor-value is simply absolute surplus-value, but as revealed in the previous chapters there are always limits, both social and physical, to the amount of labor-time that can be extracted from each worker per day, and the idea of relative surplus-value is absolutely critical to understanding how capitalists surpass these limits.
there's a lot in this chapter about the technical basis for production, not just capitalist but in general, how different climates and environments produce different costs and modes of productions. it's pretty vague though, and other than obvious stuff like "the nile's incredible fertility explains how surplus labor could be channeled into the pyramids" i don’t quite buy into marx's explaination that temperate environments produce the 'highest diversity of products and desires' and thus the highest level of economic development. to me the answer to 'how did europe become capitalist' is 'america's emptying, pillaging, and enslavement', but this is petty arguing because marx is talking broadly and generally right, just maybe placing incorrect emphasize due to the having inaccurate data.
marx ends this chapter with a complete savaging of john stuart mill, which is simply incredibly entertaining. the forum's theory on propaganda and persuasion - that its never about specific points of conflict but instead generalized world views and accepted belief systems - makes me feel like one the big projects of the post-wwII liberal academia was to widen the gap between the marxist viewpoint and the 'mainstream' one. i had never heard of ricardo, a rare economist marx praises for having any desire for truth, before reading this book, but all of the figures marx slams for producing incoherent science are textbook 'great men of history'.
liberal history is that of a very serious and meaningful debate between reactionaries and reformists that never changes anything while fleeting at the edge of vision are these terrible subaltern beasts known as socialists; who simply do not extinguish no matter how many times the snake's head is crushed. to abandon the liberal consensus requires one to jettison the entirety of the 'history and theory' they've learned through their life. the only goal of the modern academic institutions is to produce a group of people who are highly capable of overlooking the truth for the sake of convenience when it is demanded of them.
quote: "On a level plain, simple mounds look like hills; and the insipid flatness of our present bourgeois is to be measured by the altitude of it's 'great intellects'."
this chapter is really interesting because, after the very historical and event-driven (and long) previous chapter, this one basically reevaluates and restates some of the theoretical basics that makes marxism work as a theory. capitalism is a system of production of surplus value, or to reverse the rhetoric, the production of surplus value is the purpose of the capitalism. understanding the two ways surplus value can be appropriated - relatively: with the fall of the price of necessary labor-time leading to reduced wages paid from the same temporal expense of work, or absolutely: where the capitalist simply demands more time and labor power for the same wage.
these theoretical definitions are important because they dictate the actions of the capitalists; they are driven, through the intermediary processes of profit and competition, to accomplish the annexation of surplus labor through these two means.
marx also points out that the theory of capital only applies to a capitalist society. relative surplus value can appear a useless tool if you assume that any time excess of the necessary labor-value is simply absolute surplus-value, but as revealed in the previous chapters there are always limits, both social and physical, to the amount of labor-time that can be extracted from each worker per day, and the idea of relative surplus-value is absolutely critical to understanding how capitalists surpass these limits.
there's a lot in this chapter about the technical basis for production, not just capitalist but in general, how different climates and environments produce different costs and modes of productions. it's pretty vague though, and other than obvious stuff like "the nile's incredible fertility explains how surplus labor could be channeled into the pyramids" i don’t quite buy into marx's explaination that temperate environments produce the 'highest diversity of products and desires' and thus the highest level of economic development. to me the answer to 'how did europe become capitalist' is 'america's emptying, pillaging, and enslavement', but this is petty arguing because marx is talking broadly and generally right, just maybe placing incorrect emphasize due to the having inaccurate data.
marx ends this chapter with a complete savaging of john stuart mill, which is simply incredibly entertaining. the forum's theory on propaganda and persuasion - that its never about specific points of conflict but instead generalized world views and accepted belief systems - makes me feel like one the big projects of the post-wwII liberal academia was to widen the gap between the marxist viewpoint and the 'mainstream' one. i had never heard of ricardo, a rare economist marx praises for having any desire for truth, before reading this book, but all of the figures marx slams for producing incoherent science are textbook 'great men of history'.
liberal history is that of a very serious and meaningful debate between reactionaries and reformists that never changes anything while fleeting at the edge of vision are these terrible subaltern beasts known as socialists; who simply do not extinguish no matter how many times the snake's head is crushed. to abandon the liberal consensus requires one to jettison the entirety of the 'history and theory' they've learned through their life. the only goal of the modern academic institutions is to produce a group of people who are highly capable of overlooking the truth for the sake of convenience when it is demanded of them.
quote: "On a level plain, simple mounds look like hills; and the insipid flatness of our present bourgeois is to be measured by the altitude of it's 'great intellects'."
Chthonic_Goat_666
Chthonic_Goat_666
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the last 7 chapters of vol.2 are a nightmare to me 
Constantignoble
Constantignoble
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Scrree posted:dr. ure, a notable fuckwit
ah, but if you give him the SLAB, he can teach you the language of the people of Lefein
Constantignoble
Constantignoble
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for real though, just finished the ch15 summary and that was great, thanks. (i remember lapsing into skimmery towards the end of the chapter because i just wanted to hit the next damn checkpoint already)
it jogs a lot of stuff, and reminds me that it's worth returning to the source on occasion to read it with new eyes, in the fresh light of the various other things one studies in the intervening years
ed: this was also reinforced by a paper on Capital i read recently that i may write a little blurbpost about
it jogs a lot of stuff, and reminds me that it's worth returning to the source on occasion to read it with new eyes, in the fresh light of the various other things one studies in the intervening years
ed: this was also reinforced by a paper on Capital i read recently that i may write a little blurbpost about
Edited by Constantignoble ()
Scrree
Scrree
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Constantignoble posted:for real though, just finished the ch15 summary and that was great, thanks. (i remember lapsing into skimmery towards the end of the chapter because i just wanted to hit the next damn checkpoint already)
it jogs a lot of stuff, and reminds me that it's worth returning to the source on occasion to read it with new eyes, in the fresh light of the various other things one studies in the intervening years
ed: this was also reinforced by a paper on Capital i read recently that i may write a little blurbpost about
thanks! the chapter 15 summary was choppy as heck because i did each section bit by bit, but by the end I definitely felt like i fell into something like a stride.
i reread the chapters a couple times, and sometimes my impression i get on my second read through is very different from the first, even if the time between them is only a couple days. its a book to chew on for sure.
is the effort post you put in the anti-imperialism thread the thing you were talking about?
Scrree
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chapter 17: Changes of Magnitude in the Price of Labour-Value and in Surplus-Value
another highly technical chapter where marx handles a complex issue by dividing it into different parts and examining each side of the theory. i was originally thinking of summarizing each section like i did in chapter 15, but they really arent long enough to justify that treatment and id just end up rephrasing what marx says but worse.
so: the crux of this chapter is that if it is assumed that all commodities are sold at their value, and that the price of labor-power can occasionally rise above, but never fall below, its value, then the only theoretically consistent way that the relationship between labor price and surplus value can be changed is through altering the length of the working day, the intensity of labor performed, or the productivity of the labor process.
a thing that surprised me about this chapter is how marx abstracts the intensity of labor into length of labor (and earlier in the book complex labor into simple) without seeing the need to justify himself much. if 10yards of linen miles of nylon become 11 miles due to a 10% increase in intensity, that is qualitatively different from an extra 1 mile produced from a mechanical improvement, but is qualitatively the same as the nylon weavers(?) going from 10 to 11 hours with no increase in pay. the difference is that the intensive nylon is created through the expenditure of more labor power, and thus contains more value (since the definition of value of congealed labor power), but the productive nylon is the same amount of value spread out to a greater number of containers. intensity = 'condensed time' ≠ productivity in the marxian sense.
of course, the issue with trying to imagine scenarios like this is that marx is not analyzing a singlelinen nylon factory, but an entire mode of production with its own social regulations. he mentions that increases of intensity/length of the working day can actually increase the true price of labor power because the cost of labor power is the cost of the means to reproduce itself, and increased exertion will required increased 'inputs', even in terms of raw calories.
what immediately jumps out is how this relates to marx's earlier concepts of absolute and relative surplus value. increasing the length of the working day and intensity of work are both ways of increasing absolute surplus-value/exploitation, but both are subject to the absolute laws of the human condition. competition might drive entire populations to the point of exhaustion, and eventually will cause a collapse as it undermines the body of the workers and thus the systemic source of profit. an increase in productivity does not necessitate a burden on the laborer - although it does create a higher demand for raw material, and unless properly managed the unvalued bounty of the earth that serves as the eternal externality to the capitalist system might be overstrained and put into danger of systemic collapse...
i dont really know where this post is going so ill make two more observations. the first is that marx does point out a scenario where laborer and capitalist can achieve mutual benefit: if a great rise in productivity causes a decrease in the means of subsistence for the worker, but due to organized resistance the price the capitalist pays for labor is kept above the new minimum price, then the benefits of productivity will be captured by both the laboring and owning classes. im pretty sure one of marx's next tasks in this book is to prove this situation necessarily ephemeral, but is a possible outcome of the development of capitalism.
the second is marx's statement that under a socialist mode of production where the workers control the means of production, the amount of 'necessary labor', the cost of reproducing labor, will have to increase because the worker will not only take on the burden of reproducing their own capabilities, but the systemic reproduction of the socialist institutions - the state, investments, education, etc. just as the primary 'non-productive' expenditure of the bourgeois, beyond drugs and mansions, is maintain its own coercive and ideological apparatus. this is obvious, but i thought it was interesting since marx doesnt talk about the details of socialism much, and it heads off a whiny criticism of actually-existing-socialism - 'well the workers were still taxed to maintain the state so it has to be state capitalist!'.
another highly technical chapter where marx handles a complex issue by dividing it into different parts and examining each side of the theory. i was originally thinking of summarizing each section like i did in chapter 15, but they really arent long enough to justify that treatment and id just end up rephrasing what marx says but worse.
so: the crux of this chapter is that if it is assumed that all commodities are sold at their value, and that the price of labor-power can occasionally rise above, but never fall below, its value, then the only theoretically consistent way that the relationship between labor price and surplus value can be changed is through altering the length of the working day, the intensity of labor performed, or the productivity of the labor process.
a thing that surprised me about this chapter is how marx abstracts the intensity of labor into length of labor (and earlier in the book complex labor into simple) without seeing the need to justify himself much. if 10
of course, the issue with trying to imagine scenarios like this is that marx is not analyzing a single
what immediately jumps out is how this relates to marx's earlier concepts of absolute and relative surplus value. increasing the length of the working day and intensity of work are both ways of increasing absolute surplus-value/exploitation, but both are subject to the absolute laws of the human condition. competition might drive entire populations to the point of exhaustion, and eventually will cause a collapse as it undermines the body of the workers and thus the systemic source of profit. an increase in productivity does not necessitate a burden on the laborer - although it does create a higher demand for raw material, and unless properly managed the unvalued bounty of the earth that serves as the eternal externality to the capitalist system might be overstrained and put into danger of systemic collapse...
i dont really know where this post is going so ill make two more observations. the first is that marx does point out a scenario where laborer and capitalist can achieve mutual benefit: if a great rise in productivity causes a decrease in the means of subsistence for the worker, but due to organized resistance the price the capitalist pays for labor is kept above the new minimum price, then the benefits of productivity will be captured by both the laboring and owning classes. im pretty sure one of marx's next tasks in this book is to prove this situation necessarily ephemeral, but is a possible outcome of the development of capitalism.
the second is marx's statement that under a socialist mode of production where the workers control the means of production, the amount of 'necessary labor', the cost of reproducing labor, will have to increase because the worker will not only take on the burden of reproducing their own capabilities, but the systemic reproduction of the socialist institutions - the state, investments, education, etc. just as the primary 'non-productive' expenditure of the bourgeois, beyond drugs and mansions, is maintain its own coercive and ideological apparatus. this is obvious, but i thought it was interesting since marx doesnt talk about the details of socialism much, and it heads off a whiny criticism of actually-existing-socialism - 'well the workers were still taxed to maintain the state so it has to be state capitalist!'.
Constantignoble
Constantignoble
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Scrree posted:is the effort post you put in the anti-imperialism thread the thing you were talking about?
yep!
Scrree
Scrree
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chapter 18: Different Formulae for the Rate of Surplus-Value
a tiny, tiny chapter im ashamed to say i took so long to write about. seriously, its like 3 pages.
marx plays a funny here because it's not so much 'different' formulas but 'heres mine and heres other economists and theirs is dead wrong'. the non-marxist method for determining a rate of exploitation was to divide the surplus labor (which, marx notes, was always left nebulously undefined) by the entirety of the working day. this creates an equation where the laborer is always exploited by a fraction of the total time worked, so 6 hours surplus labor divided by a 12 hour working day = 50% exploitation.
marx's method is to take the surplus-value generated during the production process (a theoretically quantifiable and definable amount) and divide it by the amount of value paid to the laborer. this formula - surplus-capital over variable capital, or surplus-labor time over necessary-labor time - rejects the claim that the capitalist has inherent right to the working day, and creates the output of 6 hours necessary labor, 6 hours surplus = a 100% rate of exploitation. this is the chapter where marx moves past the scientific (but still useful) jargon and says 'yeah, all this boils down to unpaid labor/paid labor'.
this difference in formula has several political ramifications. in terms of propaganda its one thing to "... start giving them the mind-blowing truthbombs from Karl Marx such as the fact that factory owners expect profit from labourers in order to hire them."(1) and quite another to say that the source of all profit comes from uncompensated labor, and is effectively stealing from those who don't have by those who have. and this can be proven scientifically, although everything and nothing is believed to scientific these days...
in terms of marxism as a theory and its explanatory power, it changes the definition of capital from adam smith's 'capital is control over labor' to 'capital is control over unpaid labor'. marx makes the point that bourgeois economists are always finding ways to spin specifically antagonist social relationships into 'cooperative arrangements formed by free-association'. the willingness to gleefully destroy productive forces deemed unprofitable can be seen in the broken generation of workers who suffered the neoliberal reaction of the 80's, and attests to the failure and (intentional?) ignorance of the attempts to reform capitalism piece by peace.
a tiny, tiny chapter im ashamed to say i took so long to write about. seriously, its like 3 pages.
marx plays a funny here because it's not so much 'different' formulas but 'heres mine and heres other economists and theirs is dead wrong'. the non-marxist method for determining a rate of exploitation was to divide the surplus labor (which, marx notes, was always left nebulously undefined) by the entirety of the working day. this creates an equation where the laborer is always exploited by a fraction of the total time worked, so 6 hours surplus labor divided by a 12 hour working day = 50% exploitation.
marx's method is to take the surplus-value generated during the production process (a theoretically quantifiable and definable amount) and divide it by the amount of value paid to the laborer. this formula - surplus-capital over variable capital, or surplus-labor time over necessary-labor time - rejects the claim that the capitalist has inherent right to the working day, and creates the output of 6 hours necessary labor, 6 hours surplus = a 100% rate of exploitation. this is the chapter where marx moves past the scientific (but still useful) jargon and says 'yeah, all this boils down to unpaid labor/paid labor'.
this difference in formula has several political ramifications. in terms of propaganda its one thing to "... start giving them the mind-blowing truthbombs from Karl Marx such as the fact that factory owners expect profit from labourers in order to hire them."(1) and quite another to say that the source of all profit comes from uncompensated labor, and is effectively stealing from those who don't have by those who have. and this can be proven scientifically, although everything and nothing is believed to scientific these days...
in terms of marxism as a theory and its explanatory power, it changes the definition of capital from adam smith's 'capital is control over labor' to 'capital is control over unpaid labor'. marx makes the point that bourgeois economists are always finding ways to spin specifically antagonist social relationships into 'cooperative arrangements formed by free-association'. the willingness to gleefully destroy productive forces deemed unprofitable can be seen in the broken generation of workers who suffered the neoliberal reaction of the 80's, and attests to the failure and (intentional?) ignorance of the attempts to reform capitalism piece by peace.
toutvabien
toutvabien
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Scrree posted:chapter 7: The Labor Process and the Valorization Process p. 281-306
i've been slow as shit lately but i DID read this yesterday! baby stepsss
Scrree
Scrree
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its big: book. keep up!
toutvabien
toutvabien
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got thru ch.8-9 this week.
i'm gonna need to watch some helpful youtubers explain (/repeat) the nitty gritty of the math to me probably, but i got the gist i think??
i'm gonna need to watch some helpful youtubers explain (/repeat) the nitty gritty of the math to me probably, but i got the gist i think??
swampman
swampman
Dont Mess With Sucess
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In all honesty i dont think Im ever going to read Capital. If that means I'll be stupid forever, that doesnt change my master plan / life goals anyway 
karphead
karphead
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i ended up reading ben fine's "marx's capital" which sums up all 3 volumes in a 75 page essay. cya suckers!