[PLUG-TALK] Re: [PLUG] PLUG meeting

Russ Johnson russj at dimstar.net
Tue Dec 10 04:39:52 UTC 2002


Jeme A Brelin wrote:

>1 a (1) : a stock of accumulated goods especially at a specified time and
>in contrast to income received during a specified period; also : the value
>of these accumulated goods (2) : accumulated goods devoted to the
>production of other goods (3) : accumulated possessions calculated to
>bring in income
>
>By definition (1), capital is the accumulated goods contrasted with
>income, i.e. profit.  It is goods accumulated beyond that which is
>consumed or, indeed, consumable in a specified time.  Hence, a capitalist
>is a profiteer.
>
Profit and income are not the same thing. You said so yourself. Income 
is simply the money received. It says nothing about what the costs were, 
or if they exploited labor to get the income. My point is that 
capitalists and capitalism are NOT inherently evil, and NOT inherently 
greedy. 

>By definition (2), capital is simply goods used in production of other
>goods.  Surely you don't mean to say that a capitalist organization is one
>which controls or owns the means of production.  If that were true, then
>production itself could only be carried out by capitalists and a
>community-operated factory would be capital and so the community would be
>capitalist.  By that definition, the Soviet Union and the Paris Commune
>are capitalist entities.  I think you'd agree that that is a
>contradiction, so that definition clearly does not apply to your
>definition of "capitalism".
>
Actually, that could be exactly what I mean. They are NOT mutually 
exclusive concepts. A capitalist could own the means of production. So 
could the communists. Just because capitalism is one means to that end 
does not mean it's the only one. 

>By definition (3), capital is accumulated possessions calculated to bring
>income.  That's pretty loose, I'd say.  This leads to the above
>contradiction because income could be anything for which one trades and so
>ANY means of exchange is capital and, therefore, anyone who uses a means
>of exchange is a capitalist.  So anyone who has every used money is a
>capitalist (or was during the time of acquiring or spending money)?  I
>don't think that's true and I don't think anyone else does, either.
>
Why not? Capital is a thing which one uses to acquire the means to 
produce. A capitalist is one who does that with the capital. The fact 
that socialism contains facets of capitalism is irrelevant. Our 
capitalist society contains many aspects of socialism. They are not 
mutually exclusive.

>So a capitalist is a profiteer.
>
No, because the definition of profiteer is, "one who makes what is 
considered an unreasonable profit 
<http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=profit> 
especially on the sale of essential goods during times of emergency".

A capitalist does not necessarily do that. It's possible for a 
capitalist to be a profiteer, but a capitalist is not a profiteer by 
definition.

>>While I agree that *SOME* capitalist exploit the labor of others, not
>>all of them do. Just because some of them do does not make it a bad
>>system.
>>    
>>
>
>How is profit generated WITHOUT exploiting labor?
>
Here is where I think the logic is flawed. If I understand your 
position, you feel that anyone working for another is exploited labor. I 
don't agree. I believe it's entirely possible to work for another, and 
not be exploited.

The VC's provided the capital to start the business I work for. I do 
work for the business. When the business is profitable, the VC's make a 
return on their money. They took a risk that our product(s) would be 
successful. If nobody took that risk, then the product either wouldn't 
be produced, or it would take much longer for the product(s) to come to 
market.

Part of what the capital pays for is labor. When you can provide a 
service, and someone else is willing to pay you for it, that's not 
exploitation. By your definition (as I understand it) even labor in a 
commune is exploited. 

>So I can amend the question to be "how is profit generated without
>exploiting labor or using state power to inflict artifical scarcity?"
>
Give me an example of "artificial scarcity". 

>>"What the market will bear." is a good axium. It works better for the
>>"others" you speak of when there is competition. You can't sell your
>>widgets for more than the other guy, in a free market. For a good
>>example of this, see Wal*Mart.
>>    
>>
>
>Wal*Mart is a good example of what, exactly?
>
They sell for less, so the price at other shops goes down, or the other 
shops go out of business. Wal*Mart is an example of  a free market, in 
action. The fact that they can buy in large quantities, lowering their 
own costs, and pass those savings on is an example.

Granted, there has been some noise about labor and their practices with 
hours. I haven't heard anything about their wages. I was in the retail 
sector for quite a few years, prior to Wal*Mart coming to Oregon. I can 
tell you first hand, retail does not pay much above minimum wage, no 
matter who the employer is. That's one of the reasons I'm not in retail 
anymore.

As I was relating to you in another message, I started out in bottom 
rung jobs, and I've worked my way up. I believe that anyone who puts 
their mind to it can do the same. But ONLY if they do the work. No one 
is going to hand them a job that pays $50k a year without some work up 
front.

>Wal*Mart sells many items at a loss to drive out competition to become the
>ONLY viable retail outlet in a community.
>
I find it hard to believe they would try that in a community the size of 
Eugene. Even Cottage Grove, with only ~8000 residents, and one Wal*Mart, 
would have a hard time with ONLY Wal*Mart.

>  Wal*Mart, like every other
>capitalist establishment, pays its workers as little as possible to
>maximize profits.
>
And there's nothing wrong with that, in theory. No one is FORCING anyone 
to work for Wal*Mart. That's another control on the market. When labor 
is scarce, then wages go up. During the late '90's, labor was scarce.

>  In particular, Wal*Mart works very hard to achieve high
>worker insecurity by dumbing down every job so that no person is skilled
>and valued
>
Again, there's nothing wrong with that. If I owned a store and wanted to 
make sure I could replace people easily, then I'd do the same thing. At 
the same time, there ARE positions that require a certain amount of 
brains and training. People will either work up to those positions, or 
move on.

> and actively discouraging (often by straight intimidation)
>labor organization.  Wal*Mart takes advantage of a poor and uneducated
>class by selling shoddy goods at low prices, advocating a false economy
>that encourages repeat business and ultimately hurts the customer.
>
I believe you would find that Wal*Mart sells the same stuff as most 
other retail establishments. The only exception I've found is music. 
They edit that. However, I can go into Wal*Mart and find the same brand 
and part numbers as I do in Fred Meyer, JC Penny's, WinCo, Sears, 
Bi-Mart, Joe's Hardware, etc. If Wal*Mart is selling shoddy goods, so is 
everyone else.

As far as organized labor, I read in the paper a week or two ago that 
employees at several Wal*Marts in the PNW are considering joining a 
union. In a world such as ours, the news will eventually get out. 

>>>I would argue that the value of an item is the lowest price at which you
>>>would be able to part with it.  That's not greedy.
>>>      
>>>
>>And in a free market, the price will find a level between cost and
>>greed.
>>    
>>
>
>Why should there be any price above cost?
>
If it costs me $2 to build a widget, and I sell it for $2, why would I 
build widgets, and how would I feed my family?  What's my motivation?

>>Supposedly, MS is losing money on each sale of the XBox. Does that
>>make them not greedy?
>>    
>>
>
>No, they are a corporation.  They are exploiting one market in order to
>gain dominance in another.
>
To which two markets do you refer?

>Have you actually READ The Wealth of Nations?
>
No.

>>From Chapter 7:
>
>    "The price of monopoly is upon every occasion the highest which can be
>got. The natural price, or the price of free competition, on the contrary,
>is the lowest which can be taken, not upon every occasion indeed, but for
>any considerable time together. The one is upon every occasion the highest
>which can be squeezed out of the buyers, or which it is supposed they will
>consent to give; the other is the lowest which the sellers can commonly
>afford to take, and at the same time continue their business.
>
OK. For the most part, I agree with that. 

>     The exclusive privileges of corporations, statutes of apprenticeship,
>and all those laws which restrain in particular employments, the
>competition to a smaller number than might otherwise go into them, have
>the same tendency."
>
I'm having trouble untangling that paragraph.

-- 
Russ Johnson
Stargate Online
http://www.dimstar.net

Love is the delusion that one woman differs from another -- Murphy's Laws on Sex n°58






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