Once again, on productive labour and Cockshott

Doesn't criterion 2 mean that any service job is unproductive?

Yes, in service the labor of the worker is consumed directly. IE, if I get on a bus, I am not consuming something the bus driver made, I'm directly consuming his labor.
However, if I am riding the bus with my chickens to bring them to market or to slaughter, part of the labor of the bus driver goes into the value of the chickens (provided it is the SNLT for transporting chickens).
Marx goes into this in some detail in Capital Vol 2 (currently reading):
"…there are certain independent branches of industry in which the product of the productive process is not a new material product, is not a commodity. Among these only the communications industry, whether engaged in transportation proper, of goods and passengers, or in the mere transmission of communications, letters, telegrams, etc., is economically important."
"However, what the transportation industry sells is change of location. The useful effect is inseparably connected with the process of transportation, i.e., the productive process of the transport industry. Men and goods travel together with the means of transportation, and their traveling, this locomotion, constitutes the process of production effected by these means. The useful effect can be consumed only during this process of production. It does not exist as a utility different from this process, a use-thing which does not function as an article of commerce, does not circulate as a commodity, until after it has been produced. But the exchange-value of this useful effect is determined, like that of any other commodity, by the value of the elements of production (labour-power and means of production) consumed in it plus the surplus-value created by the surplus-labour of the labourers employed in transportation. This useful effect also entertains the very same relations to consumption that other commodities do. If it is consumed individually its value disappears during its consumption; if it is consumed productively so as to constitute by itself a stage in the production of the commodities being transported, its value is transferred as an additional value to the commodity itself."
marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1885-c2/ch01.htm

Now we may be wondering, well, labor power is a means of production and so don't services, consumed by a laborer, go into the value of his labor power? Yes, but I think this must be where the circuit breaks: the value of labor power does NOT go into the commodity, only the value of the labor performed with that labor power. So the circuit we are considering (and I think Cockshott is describing both in his writing on capitalism and his labor token scheme) when we make a distinction between "productive" and "unproductive" economy is just the one from commodity production to commodity consumption. If you aren't producing commodities, you still have to consume them, so you are necessarily living off of someone else's labor. In Cockshott's labor token scheme, this translates to teachers, doctors, police, etc. being funded through taxes.

The tricky part is that there are loads of edge cases and nuances to whether or not a specific example of labor is productive or not.

Very nice find! I had completely forgotten about that passage in volume 2.

gr8 thread

Yes, that is exactly what it means.

Specifically, Adam Smith does not recognize as productive:

Marx, on the other hand, argued against this position of Adam Smith:
marxists.catbull.com/archive/marx/works/1863/theories-surplus-value/ch04.htm
>> … neither the special kind of labour nor the external form of its product necessarily make it “productive” or “unproductive”. The same labour can be productive when I buy it as a capitalist, as a producer, in order to create more value, and unproductive when I buy it as a consumer, a sender of revenue, in order to consume its use-value, no matter whether this use-value perishes with the activity of the labour-power itself or materialises and fixes itself in an object.

The defining quality of productive labour (according to Marx) is that it replaces the fund from which it is acquired (i.e. produces extra value):

The mistake of Adam Smith (according to Marx) is the belief that commodity (whatever is produced for exchange) must be "material":

1. Cockshott had made many arguments. Thread about the one from the OP. There is not a single mention of prostitution. Stop trying to derail the thread.

2. Doublethink. How can any "solid theory" simultaneously argue for two opposite things?

3. Tautology. As long as meaning of "surplus value" is not agreed upon (and we clearly have this situation here, as you claim existence of some "real surplus"), explaining "productive labour" through "surplus value" cannot explain anything.

4. Distortion. Capital v.3 c.17 does not discuss "some forms", but one very specific. For very specific reason.

It is also not "clearly stated", as it is only one of the possible interpretations (the one I not necessarily agree with). If you agree with it, then you might want to use the opportunity to actually argue that it is a correct one.

5. Wordsoup. What does "always generally" even mean? Is it always or generally? Should material product be required in all cases, or only in most?

Also, what is this "real surplus" that you speak of? When and where did Marx (or whoever you agree with) ever argue for necessity of "surplus value" being expressed a "real surplus"?

The idea of surplus value (in Capitalist mode of production) is that it is the labour wage-labourer did not get paid for. I.e. "measurable surplus" is expressed (for Capitalist) in the money he pockets as a profit, which is perfectly measurable in all cases. Nor does it matter for Capitalist what the money were paid for.

So for whom, from what viewpoint, money paid for service "would only exist on paper"? Who and where claimed that? You seem to imply that this was "described by Marx in volume 3", but where exactly?

You need to elaborate, and provide quotes with explanations.

6. The discussion is not about prostitution.
Stop trying to derail the thread

7. It is the height of hypocrisy to say that accusation of "only factory workers are the real proletariat" is false, as you yourself right here, in this very post I'm replying to, openly claim that surplus value is not extracted from the service sector. I.e that service sector is not exploited by Capitalists.

To finish my critique, you are posting gibberish that has nothing to do with Marxism. I'm guessing you are literally inventing stuff as you go.

If your intent was to demonstrate the difference between the material product and service, you need to do it better.

Just like service, material product also be consumed directly. If you go a shop and acquire boots there to walk around, are you not consuming them directly? If you buy a cake and eat it, is it not the very same direct consumption?

>> "…there are certain independent branches of industry in which the product of the productive process is not a new material product, is not a commodity. Among these only the communications industry, whether engaged in transportation proper, of goods and passengers, or in the mere transmission of communications, letters, telegrams, etc., is economically important."
Please clarify your interpretation of the bolded bit. Is it A or B?

A) transportation service "is not a new material product, [which is why it] is not a commodity"
B) transportation service "is not a new material product, is not a [material] commodity"

If it is A, then how do you explain Marx himself saying that transportatoin is "like any other commodity", or that surplus-value was created?
>> But the exchange-value of this useful effect is determined, like that of any other commodity, by the value of the elements of production (labour-power and means of production) consumed in it plus the surplus-value created by the surplus-labour of the labourers employed in transportation.

If it is B, then does it not thoroughly contradict the idea that service is not productive?

Now this is the kind of thread I wanted out of this whole debacle. Cheers OP.

This entire discussion of Cockshott's definition of productive labor began in the other thread where you accused him of not being a Marxist.

Take your fucking meds. People have repeatedly addressed your points and you simply ignore the answers and repeat yourself. At this point, you're shitting up multiple threads with your mental illness.

>marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch17.htm

Here is an idea, OP: You keept on mentioning that chapter, but why don't you actually read it?
In other words, Marx argued in that chapter "that labour employed by merchants could not count as productive, since buying and selling was not itself a productive activity" (as Cockshott put it).

Did you not notice tl;dr quotes from it that I provided to illustrate arguments that support Cockshott's position? If you find them lacking, then say it and present proper quotes.

How Cockshott put it can be easily seen in the OP: Adam Smith's definition is the correct one. I would prefer to deal with this before discussing other things Cockshott put, as it is basic concept everything else revolves around.

I'd like to clarify two things here:

1) not "labour employed by merchants". As it is pointed out in v.3/c.17, the labour that is discussed is specific kind of labour, the one that directly deals with the trade (mercantile labour). I.e. there is only (potential) argument for one and only one type of non-material labour being non-productive.

2) are you saying this (if true) proves that Adam Smith's definition is the correct one? I.e. mercantile labour being non-productive proves that entire service sector is non-productive?

This is false on several counts. Strike out "(potential)", Marx makes the argument. The argument doesn't have the form that Marx merely makes an assertion about that type and then gives the reader his word that he is right, he says why it is the case with that type of work. And this reasoning also applies to other work. See the distinction Marx makes at the end of the quote about work in transport from Volume 2 that was posted in
"If it (Marx means the useful effect of being moved from one place to another) is consumed individually its value disappears during its consumption; if it is consumed productively so as to constitute by itself a stage in the production of the commodities being transported, its value is transferred as an additional value to the commodity itself."
Only the transport work that goes into the production of things that are owned and controlled by the capitalists Marx counts as potentially growing surplus value, not transport per se (not even if the transport makes profit). Surplus value is not the same as profit. Increasing surplus value is a macro phenomenon, an individual capitalist making profit does not necessarily squeeze surplus value out of his workers, since he might get it out of the macro surplus value pie.

No, the boots went into circulation first.

The cake also briefly circulated. Basically, if you buy a cake off a shelf, it was a commodity. If you hire someone to come over and cook you a cake, it's a service.

He's talking about commodities or intermediate products that are transported. He's pointing out that transport, communications, etc. are industries that straddle both the service and production sectors.

Some contribution on this: in Volume 2, Marx says that, essentially, price negotiation and haggling are a simple energy expenditure in the process of transformation, not energy expenditure in the process of production:
"To effect a change in the state of being costs of time and labour-power, not for the purpose of creating value, however, but in order to accomplish the conversion of value from one form into another. The mutual attempt to appropriate an extra slice of this value on this occasion changes nothing. This labour, increased by the evil designs on either side, creates no value, any more than the work performed in a judicial proceeding increases the value of the subject matter of the suit. Matters stand with this labour — which is a necessary element in the capitalist process of production as a whole, including circulation or included by it — as they stand, say, with the work of combustion of some substance used for the generation of heat. This work of combustion does not generate any heat, although it is a necessary element in the process of combustion. In order, e.g., to consume coal as fuel, I must combine it with oxygen, and for this purpose must transform it from the solid into the gaseous state (for in the carbonic acid gas, the result of the combustion, coal is in the gaseous state); consequently, I must bring about a physical change in the form of its existence or in its state of being. The separation of carbon molecules, which are united into a solid mass, and the splitting up of these molecules into their separate atoms must precede the new combination, and this requires a certain expenditure of energy which thus is not transformed into heat but taken from it. Therefore, if the owners of the commodities are not capitalists but independent direct producers, the time employed in buying and selling is a diminution of their labour-time, and for this reason such transactions used to be deferred (in ancient and medieval times) to holidays."
Costs of Circulation marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1885-c2/ch06.htm
So all labor necessary to bring the commodity to the point of sale is productive labor that enters the value of the commodity, and the sale process itself (here Marx means the haggling, financial transaction, etc) is a loss of labor. This makes intuitive sense: whether you haggle for a minute or for a week, or whether a debit transaction takes a second or five minutes, the value of the commodity won't increase. However, shelf stocking and things of that nature are still productive, and enter all sold products fractionally. This is really discussing a separate kind of unproductive labor, not a service.

Reminder that the more you argue with OP the more time you're simply wasting.

Most of OP's arguments are made in bad faith and attempt to debate strawman accusations that nobody even proposed, i.e.:

Not sure what the other volunteer was thinking, the thread got reported and someone voiced their complaints in the mod feedback thread but I don't see how this deserves the anchor.

derp. did you even read the post directly above yours? OP isn't simply arguing about Marxist theory - he's strawmanning and trying to accuse Cockshott of being some kind of pseudo-Marxist. People have been debunking his statements this whole time but he won't shut up.

This thread is a divergent discussion, so there's no reason to anchor it. Only really leftytrash and American Politics are containment threads.

people other than OP are making good posts ITT imo

As I'm being repeatedly accused of strawmanning I am forced to request you to clarify what exactly makes you think Marx argues that mercantile labour is non-productive.

I mean, if you fully agree with the (i.e. if debunking it would be sufficient to persuade you that you are wrong), you can simply say it and I can proceed to refuting this position. But if it is incomplete or if you'd like to present an argument that is better, then provide quotes + your interpretation of them.

Specifically, what reasoning?

Are you saying that since it's difference between mercantile capital and industrial capital, then any capital that is not industrial is not productive? Or is it some other reasoning?

Firstly, your interpretation of Marx's words is based on assumption that "commodity" can only mean physical objects (i.e. not service), is it not?

I mean, if we assume that Marx did not also reject his notion of commodity as "purely social mode of existence … which has nothing to do with its corporeal reality", if service labour can exist as commodity, then quoted text does not suggest that Marx abandoned his ideas from ToSV and embraced Adam Smith's interpretation of productive labour - as "commodities being transported" may also include non-material things, service-as-commodity. An example would be a firm chartering cruise liner with the intent to profit from selling individual tickets to passengers.

Secondly, even if we assume that text refers only to physical commodities, then text does not cover all the possibilities. Aforementioned firm does not fit in either individual consumption (it does not use cruise liner in any way other than to make profit), nor in transport of physical goods.

I.e. we'll have to assume that text merely contrasts buying transport as a passenger with buying transport of physical goods that will be re-sold, so as to demonstrate the difference - as it does not say it exhausted all possibilities, that the only way for transport to be productive is to transport physical goods.

I would like to be 100% clear on this:
Are you saying, Surplus Value is not the profit in Capitalist mode of production?

Or is it general income that you are talking about?

I would really like you to elaborate on the meaning of your words here.

Would you agree that if individual (who also functions as Capitalist) robs a bank or wins in a casino, then neither money he stole nor the money he won would count as "profit" he acquires from Capitalist mode of production?

Because if you do, then you need to explain how the method of "getting it out of macro surplus value pie" (whatever you mean by it) is a part of Capitalist mode of production.

I disagree.

Subsequent mention of "goods and passengers", as well as "transmission of communications, letters, telegrams" unambiguously proves the opposite. It is the entire transport/communication sector that is being talked about as providing commodities, not only transport of physical goods.

And so we have fourth term that needs to be defined (currently: productive labour, surplus value, and commodity).

The only addition here is the introduction of "circulation" as something that only physical goods can do - which is what (as you seem to suggest) makes service ineligible as commodity.

AFAIK, Marx uses "circulation" to refer to transformation of money into capital and back:

marxists.catbull.com/archive/marx/works/1885-c2/ch01.htm
Karl Marx: Capital vol. 2, Chapter I - The Circuit of Money Capital
>> First stage: The capitalist appears as a buyer on the commodity- and the labour-market; his money is transformed into commodities, or it goes through the circulation act M — C. …
>> Third Stage: The capitalist returns to the market as a seller; his commodities are turned into money; or they pass through the circulation act C — M.
I.e. it is the act of trade - selling and buying.

However, this cannot be unique to physical goods, as service passes through the same circulation: Capitalist pays for labour/commodities used in production of service (M-C), Capitalist receives money for service provided (C-M). I.e. such circulation cannot be used to separate service from physical goods, as you suggest.

So what "circulation" are you talking about? I would like you to elaborate on this "circulation" you talk about, as the meaning you ascribe to circulation is unclear.

Because he literally says this, you idiot.

"In order to simplify the matter (since we shall not discuss the merchant as a capitalist and merchant’s capital until later) we shall assume that this buying and selling agent is a man who sells his labour. He expends his labour-power and labour-time in the operations C — M and M — C. And he makes his living that way, just as another does by spinning or making pills. He performs a necessary function, because the process of reproduction itself includes unproductive functions. He works as well as the next man, but intrinsically his labour creates neither value nor product. He belongs himself to the faux frais of production."
marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1885-c2/ch06.htm

If you intend to barge into discussion, read it before posting. It is Capital v.3 c.17 that we are talking about.

Moreover, if you are using "creates neither value nor product" as an argument, you have to assume that productive labour is defined by creation of "value or product" - adopt Adam Smith's definition of productive labour (in full or partially), as ToSV-definition (1st criteria in OP) requires only profitability for the buyer of labour.

However, the whole discussion is about which definition of productive labour is correct one. I.e. you are trying to use Adam Smith's definition as correct one to prove that Adam Smith's definition is correct.

This is circular reasoning, is it not?

But user, aren't you hyped for the part of the discussion where I say that technocrats don't argue for experts allocating consumption items to individuals, but that individuals should obtain them with their energy credits, and then OP will say that the only way I could know about this is that I must be a technocrat myself, and that since I'm a technocrat, I want to decide what each individual will consume?

No.
Then read the sentence right after that.

I hope that was enlightening for you.

Big if true.

It doesn't, actually.

Too many words for you?

Care to name any actual commodities that don't physically exist?

Labor power is in a different market from other commodities, the labor market. The labor market does not follow the same rules as the general market for commodities. Our total money represents, essentially, the total value of all the stuff we have. So if you aren't making stuff, you're necessarily diverting money from the people who do make the stuff.

I would like to be 100% clear on this:
Are you saying that this bit refers only to transport of physical goods that were/are produced as commodities?
>> communications industry, whether engaged in transportation proper, of goods and passengers, or in the mere transmission of communications, letters, telegrams, etc.,
Because if you don't, then your attempt to claim that Marx did not refer to the entire transport sector as producing commodities does not hold water. And if you do, then accusations of intellectual dishonesty will become much more convincing even for less educated readers.

I'm merely keeping track of how one distortion (inevitably) snowballs into redefining of entire Marxist theory.

We started with Marx supposedly rejecting his definition of Productive Labour in ToSV, which necessitated redefining of Surplus Value, and this led to Commodity no longer including service - which caused invention of new (completely different, even if very vague) meaning for Circulation.

A few more such "discoveries", and the "strawman" of only industrial wage-workers being True Proletariat just might make appearance (without any prompting from me!). Though, I can't honestly expect this thread to last until the rule of experts will be presented as "real" Communism.

What "physical existence" would that be?

If we follow discussion we had, if we look at "physical goods" in the context we discussed, then lack of "physical existence" is nothing but Adam Smith's understanding of "not real" productivity (i.e. failing to meet second criteria): "services which perish generally in the very instant of their performance, and does not fix or realise itself in any vendible commodity".

I.e. you are asking me to name what service sector produces. Which is kinda weird, imo.

Either way, non-exhaustive list:
- communications of all sorts
- medical service (not pharmaceutics)
- education (not just for kids, but everything from training/couching to consulting)
- media sold without physical carriers (movies in cinema/music in concert halls/downloaded games)
- transportation (the one that does not transport industrial cargo, as that "fixes itself in vendible commodity")

NB: I hope, you will not go post-modernist and try to add new meaning to "physical existence" (like "phenomena that are observable") without explaining how it relates to the discussion.

From your overly vague text one can only divine that your "circulation" might refer to some ambiguous and unknown difference between labour market and "general" market.

But then we are left with the conundrum: where does service belong to? After all, your "circulation" supposed to differentiate service from physical goods - while the difference you presented is the one between Labour Power and other (regular) commodities. Apparently, service is (sold as) Labour Power.

Let's see what Marx has to say about it:

Karl Marx: Capital vol.1, Chapter VI - The Buying and Selling of Labour-Power
marxists.catbull.com/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch06.htm
This is close enough to service for me to accept that this is what you meant (even if you didn't deign to openly state it; I understand that being cryptic is extremely important for you now).

However, this is followed by:
>> But in order that our owner of money may be able to find labour-power offered for sale as a commodity
I.e. Marx clearly considered that labour-power can be commodity. Which is also suggested by you, as not-labour market is said to sell other commodities.

I would like you to explain how exactly you intend to prove that service is not a commodity by saying that it is labour-power - which is a commodity, if sold. This one might be tricky even for you.

Finally, you still didn't explain what exactly this "circulation" of yours is. As you didn't provide any quotes to demonstrate how others use this term, am I to guess that this is your own term, the one you personally invented?

If so, your "explanation" is insufficient, as it is limited to implying that your "circulation" is linked to some unknown difference between "general" market and labour market.

Since it's stumbled into the thorny area of whether the service sector is 'the real proletariat' quite explicitly now, I feel as if I can now post this article to cover any points which were missed about that silly idea that Marx didn't address unproductive labour.
wsws.org/en/articles/2002/02/corr-f25.html

> wsws.org/en/articles/2002/02/corr-f25.html
*Sigh*

I can't say it adds something really new to the discussion, as it relies on the same stuff I already mentioned (Theories of Surplus Value and labour-power being commodity). But it does elaborate more upon both and adds some analysis (which then goes into direction that I would consider a bit off-topic for current discussion).

NB: To prevent misunderstanding, article talks about productivity (in technological sense), while "(un/non)productive labour" (in Marxist sense) is mentioned indirectly:

The former doesn't lead to the latter. Commodities don't have as part of their definition to always deliver surplus value to the capitalist class; so if it is denied that services bring surplus value to the capitalist class, it doesn't follow that services can't be commodities.

Throughout this thread, you have failed to distinguish between profit increasing for the capitalist class in aggregate, and what's profitable for a capitalist. Hence your failure to grasp how Marx revised his description of what generates surplus value.

Not gonna respond to this autistic wall of text, I only posted things ITT because I saw an opportunity to post relevant and informative stuff. You're just bitching about nothing now.

Wow. I have NEVER seen people argue so uselessly… This is the most quintessentially "Enlightened Marxist Scholar" thread I have ever seen. I mean… just…. you guys are literally arguing over a POTENTIAL innacuracy in an interpretation of an interpetration.
This disproves NOTHING, even if it is true! A mistake in a theory doesnt destroy it. It is (AT MOST) just that, a mistake, and none of you explain how this mistake completely BTFOs PenisProjectile.
Not ignoring how absolutely trivial this seems altogether…

If you talking about this thread, then "led to" means "as attempt to differentiate service sector by claiming that it can't produce surplus was proven insufficient (>>2699481), additional quality needed to be presented - which was the claim that service is not a real commodity".

I.e. "you don't understand v.3 c.17"? Okay. Explaining what I misunderstood about "profit increasing for the capitalist class in aggregate" will easily demonstrate my mistake.

I'll even present something that might be of use in pointing out my mistake: AFAIK, profit earned by Capitalist (i.e. when the individual functions as Capitalist) is based on his property rights which are used as a leverage to make wage-labourer surrender unpaid labour (surplus). Only indirectly (i.e. through surplus value) can profit of Capitalist be affected by whatever other circumstances affect Capitalists.

Apparently, there is a limit to how much one can weasel away from.

And yet you explicitly asked me "to name any actual commodities that don't physically exist". For what reason? For what reason you did not follow up? If your argument was not pre-emptively refuted by my answer, there has to be something.

You've been caught being unambiguously untrue (deliberately or not) three times in one post:
1) while claiming that Marx did not refer to transport sector as creating commodities (despite him obviously doing it)
2) while attempting to ascribe to "circulation" different meaning (despite there being nothing to suggest that it has other meaning)
3) while arguing that service is not a commodity by saying that it is sold as labour power (despite labour power being explicitly referred to as commodity if sold)
That's hardly "nothing".

Thanks for taking your time and posting here just to say that this thread doesn't matter.

It's actually even dumber than how you are describing it. OP is not about Cockshott being wrong about reality, but wrong in attributing some aspect of how he describes reality of capitalism to Marx. When confronted with quotes from Capital II and III that seem to confirm how Cockshott presents later Marx, OP switches to the well-those-were-published-after-the-death-of-Marx-so-we-cannot-be-sure-if-he-would-have-wanted-that-wording defense, even though it also applies to the quote that OP clumsily uses to argue his position, and the manuscript it's from is quite a bit older than the other sources, which is why Cockshott, who uses that source himself to illustrate the change, speaks of a development in Marx here.

I can't find that claim in that post.
Do you think that the profit source for him (a singular specific person who is a capitalist) is limited to his wage-labourers (only those under his command)?

It is symptomatic that you have to keep constantly lying - even about posts in this very thread - just to keep your charade going.

What claim in what post. The quote is about multiple posts. Read the thread, if in doubt.

>>AFAIK, profit earned by Capitalist (i.e. when the individual functions as Capitalist) is based on his property rights which are used as a leverage to make wage-labourer surrender unpaid labour (surplus).
"Capitalist" (as a term in Marxism) refers to the role people take in production process, not some acquired quality that will define all aspects of their whole existence forevermore.

I.e. you are not talking about "him", but completely different thing. Your question is more correctly presented as:
> Do you think that a specific person who at some point functioned as a capitalist can't acquire money some other way?
And the answer is, obviously, "not necessarily".

Also, I would to point you to bit in (which already addressed this specific point, but was - predictably enough - left unanswered):

Let's go through this again:
"When confronted with quotes from Capital II and III that seem to confirm how Cockshott presents later Marx…"

>marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1885-c2/ch01.htm
also
He was already called out in the first reply and Cockshott's article already referred to the difference between Theories of Surplus Value and Volume III.
"…OP switches to the well-those-were-published-after-the-death-of-Marx-so-we-cannot-be-sure-if-he-would-have-wanted-that-wording defense, even though it also applies to the quote that OP clumsily uses to argue his position…"
The quote in the OP is from Theories of Surplus Value, a work published by Kautsky based on non-published writings by Marx.
"…and the manuscript it's from is quite a bit older than the other sources…"

...

Seriously?

How many times did this happen?
Four times: >>2700426 >>2701759

How many times did this happen?
Once:

Was this made in reply to "quotes from Capital II and III that seem to confirm how Cockshott presents later Marx"?
No, it was not. The post it was a reply to quoted only Cockshott. It did not provide a single quote from Marx.

I.e. not only do we have an implied constant use of flawed argument to "debunk" quotes, we do not have a single instance of such use. On top of it, the only time it was used, it was a response to attempts to claim that ToSV was Not Real Marx. I.e. it did not even introduce attacks on source as an argument, but simply pointed out that such shitty arguments work both ways. And it was our sage/shit-poster who started using Not Real Marx as an argument against Marx's works.

Let me repeat again:
You are constantly lying.

Given your repeated mentions of mental illness, I'm suspecting it is a cry for help. Unfortunately, this is anonymous board and I cannot call psychiatric assistance to your location.

>>>the claim that service is not a real commodity
A mystery for the ages. Perhaps future Marxist scholars will figure it out.
The term "real commodity" only shows up in your post, where you hallucinate about some hypothetical opponent making such a statement.
No, it's a question about micro-macro. Capitalists make profit as a group by sucking surplus value out of workers. Do you believe that an individual capitalist's profit comes from the surplus value he sucks out of his (and only his) workers?

< AKSHUALLY Capitalists don't earn money from their businesses
Cockshott-posters need to be banned on sight.

Keep your irony to yourself, and answer in a straight manner: Do you believe that an individual capitalist's profit comes from the surplus value he sucks out of his (and only his) workers? Do you believe that a difference in profit between two capitalists can be explained in full by the difference of the ratios of surplus value each of them gets out of the workers they employ?

How do you go from your nonsensical concept of capitalist profit (which you refuse to explain) to falling rate of profit?

Or are you saying that Marx did not argue for inevitable collapse of Capitalism?

There seems to be a pattern: you don't answer questions, but always demand answers. It's like you are uneducated retard who can't do anything else.

Firstly, "belief" is a wrong term. We are either discussing economic theory of Marxism - in which case it is objective fact that someone wrote something and we know it true. Or we are discussing if Marxist theory correctly describes reality, and then we must use scientific method, not "belief".

Secondly, there is no "individual capitalist". Marxist theory talks about capitalist as an abstract category.

If we are talking about actual specific person getting some or all of his income as capitalist, then this share of his income can be only derived through the unpaid labour of his workers. If in some specific context we are talking about surplus value created by other workers, then even this surplus value can be acquired only through unpaid labour of his workers.

Due to anarchy of production market economy is - in essence - a casino. It does not refute anything if blind luck permits one specific individual functioning as Capitalist to benefit from circumstances more than the other specific individual functioning as Capitalist.

The mechanism through which they both derive income remains the same. Income they get is always in the form of unpaid labour of their workers, even if the specific value this unpaid labour brings in is different.

Had you finally been educated?

Both the first reply in this thread as well as the original blog entry by Cockshott already referred to Capital III, Chapter XVII. So, what is supposed to be your argument here, is it: "There are two sections of texts by Marx that show Marx changed his mind, however only one of them was brought up before I said something about the age of the manuscripts that doesn't in any way work as an argument for why a statement in Theories of Surplus Value that seems to be in conflict with statements from later manuscripts should take precedence over them and *breathes* therefor it's only fair that we pretend the other passage doesn't exist, and moreover you are all very mean to me (a radical self-taught scholar!) and that means I'm actually right"?

? ctrl+f falling rate of profit: 1 result (your post). Is that you: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racter
Marx dealt both with individual capitalists and capitalists in the aggregate. Read Capital Volume III, chapters 8 to 10.
The question was:
The question was not whether the individual capitalist's workers have a role in him receiving profit, it was about the size of the profits of individual capitalists, and whether that can be directly related to the amounts of surplus value capitalist A sucks out of his workers compared with what capitalist B sucks out of his own.

I advise you to actually read chapters 8 to 10 (Volume III) before you even attempt to answer this.

nah

Do you not agree that sage/shit-poster is constantly lying, strawmanning, slandering, and using cheap sophistry to distort or - at least - obfuscate Marxism?

bump

Would you mind actually contributing to the discussion by providing an answer to the following question: Do you believe that profit data about two capitalists is sufficient to figure out who of the two sucks more surplus value out of the workers they individually employ?

Discussion implies two participants. You refuse to answer my questions, do not make follow-ups on nor explain your questions. You do not actually ask anything, nor do you have any arguments to prove. You are just wasting everyone's time.

Discussion implies honest argumentation. And yet you literally accuse me of the dishonest argumentation that was used by you and only by you. I.e. you do not even make a token attempt at pretending that you intend to have any debate.

Fuck off. We do not have any discussion here, as you do not participate in it.

You missed a question in a post that wasn't even fifty words long, impressive.
ctrl+f dishonest: 5 hits, as far as I can tell these are 4 posts by OP (that is you, right?) and one post containing a quote where OP says that.

I did not accuse OP of dishonesty as I think OP is lacking in capacity to quite follow what people are actually saying, so OP is going to misrepresent others regardless of whether OP has malicious intent.

Cockshott is wrong. As luxemberg explains in the accumulation of capital:

[Adam] Smith…did not differentiate the twofold character of value-creating labour.… Failure to differentiate between the two aspects of commodity-producing labour as concrete and useful labour on the one hand, and abstract and socially necessary labour on the other, indeed forms one of the most important characteristics of the theory of value as conceived not only by Smith but by all members of the classical school.

Disregarding all social consequences, classical economics recognized that human labour alone is the factor which creates value, and it worked out this theory to that degree of clarity which we meet in [David] Ricardo’s formulation. There is a fundamental distinction, however, between Marx’s theory of value and Ricardo’s, a distinction that has been misunderstood not only by bourgeois economists but also in most cases by the popularizers of Marx’s doctrine: Ricardo, conceiving as he did, of bourgeois economy in terms of natural law, believed also that the creation of value, too, is a natural property of human labour, of the specific and concrete labour of the individual human being.

This view is even more blatantly revealed in the writings of Adam Smith who for instance declares what he calls the “propensity to exchange” to be a quality peculiar to human nature, having looked for it in vain in animals, particularly in dogs. And although he doubted the existence of the propensity to exchange in animals, Smith [inconsistently] attributed to animal as well as human labour the faculty of creating value, especially when he occasionally relapses into the Physiocratic doctrine.

The labourers and labouring cattle, therefore, employed in agriculture, not only occasion, like the workmen in manufactures, the reproduction of value equal to their own consumption, or to the capital which employs them, together with its owner’s profits, they regularly occasion the reproduction of the rent of the landlord. (Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations [New York: Modern Library, 1937], 344–45)

Smith’s belief that the creation of value is a direct physiological property of labour, a manifestation of the animal organism in man, finds its most vivid expression here. Just as the spider produces its web from its body, so labouring man produces value—labouring man pure and simple, every man who produces useful objects—because labouring man is by birth a producer of commodities in the same way human society is founded by nature on the exchange of commodities, and a commodity economy is the normal form of human economy.

It was left to Marx to recognise that a given value covers a definite social relationship which develops under definite historical conditions. Thus he came to discriminate between two aspects of commodity-producing labour: concrete individual labour and socially necessary labour. When this distinction is made, the solution of the money problem becomes clear also, as though a spotlight had been turned on it.

Marx had to establish a dynamic distinction in the course of history between the commodity producer and the labouring man, in order to distinguish the twin aspects of labour which appear static in bourgeois economy. He had to discover that the production of commodities is a definite historical form of social production before he could decipher the hieroglyphics of capitalist economy. In a word, Marx had to approach the problem with methods of deduction diametrically opposed to the classical school, he had in his approach to renounce the latter’s faith in the human and normal element in bourgeois production and to recognise their historical transience: he had to reverse the metaphysical deductions of the classics into their opposite, the dialectical.

Attached: shaikh.png (1049x604, 633.02K)

Gee, thanks.

About what specifically?

There are three position:
1) (full Marx): Smith's 1st criteria only
2) (revised Marx): Smith's 1st criteria only, unless it's mercanitle labour
3) (full Smith): Both 1st and 2nd criteria have to apply

Which one do you support and why? The quote seems to suggest #1, but as any wall-of-text quote given without explanation in full tradition of LeftCom-posters it is subject to many interpretations.

Let's bump this.