In defense of sweatshops? Do cappies not read Marx at all?

[RadioRaheem84]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjsshqyAFh8

Are cappies this serious? Penn and Teller's appropriately titled Bullshit show defends the use of sweatshops by companies like Wall Mart because the alternative for the natives in those lands would be even worse. Prostitution, slave labor, worse pay, living off the land, etc.

Don't sweatshops also raise the prices of things around town since the merchants know the native now have money? I agree that they "improve" the life around a once desolate city but they don't improve the status of the worker. Slaves in the 1800s were better off than slaves in the 1700s. It didn't change the fact that they were still slaves.

You know one of things that I am beginning to understand and that the capitalists fail to understand is that Marx never critiqued capitalism as a force of complete old school slavery and destitution but of one where class antagonisms were severely blurred and the proletariat would subsist to just working to meet the needs of the elite few. It is just an evolutionary process where the upper class have perfected their establishment. Marx was actually impressed with the level it brings "civilization" to nations that were once feudal.

Do cappies not read Marx at all? Do they just assume that we think capitalism (even at an advanced stage) just turns everything into an absolute waste?

[Stranger Than Paradise]

What a stupid idiot that man is. Absolutely ridiculous, his actual quote was "the common misconception about Walmart is that they are exploiting workers in third world countries".

[GPDP]

Penn and Teller are lolbertarians, the epitome of capitalist ideologues and bullshit producers. I am not at all surprised by this.

[RadioRaheem84]

Libertarians like the former Milton Friedman credit capitalism for bringing about democratic change and prosperity because the misery of those conditions fostered the need for change. This was his defense of Pinochet's Chile. That it later brought about the conditions for democracy once the economy reached an advanced stage.

Ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. :rolleyes:

[RadioRaheem84]

How would you guys combat the argument that labor unions monopolize the labor supply?

[Muzk]

with a fist

[chegitz guevara]

How would you guys combat the argument that labor unions monopolize the labor supply?

That the tiny numbers of unionists couldn't possibly enforce a monopoly.

[Psy]

How would you guys combat the argument that labor unions monopolize the labor supply?
I've been arguing something similar with a free-market supporter, I have pointed out their own contraction. They argue are unions artificially cause a scarcity in labor thus increases wages above market price, I point out that means capitalism is zero sum as the workers can't increase their standard of living without taking surplus capital away from the capitalist and vice versa, I then keep forcing them to argue both points at the same time trying to make them to see the contraction in their logic of unions being bad for rising wages above market costs and their idea that capitalism is not being zero sum. I also throw in over production pointing out that if the market is saturated by produced goods and has a surplus of workers there is nothing the free market can do itself to over come this crisis and has historically only ever overcome crises of overproduction with help from the state.

[blake 3:17]

How would you guys combat the argument that labor unions monopolize the labor supply?

First, they don't. Second, why shouldn't they? I don't think the problem is that business people don't understand how economics and exploitation function, but whose side they are on.

The other part of this is that many workers in the Third World do seek this work out. It beats unemployment and starvation. The question of how sweatshop labour came to this position is written in blood -- people driven off the land, breaking up of commons, colonialism that destroyed indigenous forms of production and reproduction, ecological devastation which ruins potential for basic subsistence.

The economics prof in the video is actually right about a lot of stuff, but how that they came to be, and alternatives to super exploitative manufacturing or assembly work aren't on the table.

[RadioRaheem84]

Good point. The structural agreements set up by the IMF actually wreck local economies in favor of larger foreign business to come in and set up shop.

[BlackCapital]

Good point. The structural agreements set up by the IMF actually wreck local economies in favor of larger foreign business to come in and set up shop.

Exactly. The effects of NAFTA in Mexico are a good example of this. After it was passed the US was able to flood the Mexican markets with cheaper, state subsidized agricultural products which nearly entirely wiped out local farming and agricultural industries in rural Mexico, forcing them into sweatshops or other extremely miserable working conditions. Pen and Teller would probably argue they were better off because they were paying less then before for these goods, effectively ignoring the entire other side of the equation.

[Dejavu]

They argue are unions artificially cause a scarcity in labor thus increases wages above market price, I point out that means capitalism is zero sum as the workers can't increase their standard of living without taking surplus capital away from the capitalist and vice versa,Here is the problem. Most people arguing for the free market do not accept Marx's definitions of 'surplus value,''constant capital.' or 'variable capital.' You will never come to an understanding with them unless you guys discuss whether Marx's LToV was valid or not in the first place. Otherwise, its like you guys are thinking on two different frequencies and will never understand the point the other is making.



. I also throw in over production pointing out that if the market is saturated by produced goods and has a surplus of workers there is nothing the free market can do itself to over come this crisis and has historically only ever overcome crises of overproduction with help from the state.I doubt you actually have evidence for this. The only time there was mass unemployment is due to activity and distortions in the market that the state as induced in the first place. Throughout most of the U.S. history except for the brief periods of state induced war and policy interventionism the market was able to compensate for any short falls ( even for the depression of 1920 (http://www.meltingpotproject.com/mpp/2009/02/the-great-depression-of-1920.html)).

Consider the situation now. We have an 'overproduction' by way of misallocation of capital in our current collapsed bust. The market wants to correct this by liquidating the bad firms but the state is preventing this from happening because they fear the unemployment that will rise out of it. But its not like these were productive jobs in the first place , they were wasting resources , quite obviously. There is no real loss , there is a gain in terms of freeing up the capital and labor for better productive uses. I.e. those jobs should not exist and they are only kept there because of the state. This, and other factors, mainly low interest rates and artificial expansion of money and credit, set up another failure bound to happen only to have people blame it on that miserable free market and clamor for the state to 'do something.' lol.

[Mälli]

Have you seen the one they talk about socialism? It pissed me off so bad!

[Psy]

Here is the problem. Most people arguing for the free market do not accept Marx's definitions of 'surplus value,''constant capital.' or 'variable capital.' You will never come to an understanding with them unless you guys discuss whether Marx's LToV was valid or not in the first place. Otherwise, its like you guys are thinking on two different frequencies and will never understand the point the other is making.

True but they are arguing surplus value when they argue unions hurt capitalists, I point out if value comes from exchange then unions can't possibly hurt capitalists as the exchange between labor and production would then be totally independent from the exchange of produced commodity and consumer, as soon as you say there is a link you start saying that value does not comes exchange but from production not exchange.;



I doubt you actually have evidence for this. The only time there was mass unemployment is due to activity and distortions in the market that the state as induced in the first place. Throughout most of the U.S. history except for the brief periods of state induced war and policy interventionism the market was able to compensate for any short falls ( even for the depression of 1920 (http://www.meltingpotproject.com/mpp/2009/02/the-great-depression-of-1920.html)).

No since there has been many periods of over-production before the depression of 1920's going back to around the 1770's where capitalists hit a brick wall as feudalism mode of production meant most of the population was self-sufficient peasants (they had to be self-sufficient so landed aristocracy could exploit their labor by simply taking their labor without giving anything in return except the right to live on their land) thus has no need for capitalist products let alone the means to buy them and what little money they had usually went artisans that stagnant amount of capital meant they didn't over-produce as they never grew their means of production thus had no growth (thus a rate of profit of zero, they were simply exchanging their labor for money).





Consider the situation now. We have an 'overproduction' by way of misallocation of capital in our current collapsed bust. The market wants to correct this by liquidating the bad firms but the state is preventing this from happening because they fear the unemployment that will rise out of it. But its not like these were productive jobs in the first place , they were wasting resources , quite obviously. There is no real loss , there is a gain in terms of freeing up the capital and labor for better productive uses. I.e. those jobs should not exist and they are only kept there because of the state. This, and other factors, mainly low interest rates and artificial expansion of money and credit, set up another failure bound to happen only to have people blame it on that miserable free market and clamor for the state to 'do something.' lol.
This is not the case we have a drop in production across the board just like in the 1920's and 1970's, the jobs being lost are productive it is simply that the markets can support the level of productivity in the system as the only way the market it self can solve the crisis is to rest the level of fixed capital liquidating it to the point there is once again scarcity thus the market solution to the crisis is to create artificial scarcity.

[Dejavu]

True but they are arguing surplus value when they argue unions hurt capitalists, I point out if value comes from exchange then unions can't possibly hurt capitalists as the exchange between labor and production would then be totally independent from the exchange of produced commodity and consumer, as soon as you say there is a link you start saying that value does not comes exchange but from production not exchange.;They accept surplus value as Marx defined it?:confused:
That's interesting, I don't know of any serious economists or people with economic knowledge ( other that a few Marxists) that actually accept it as valid. I am interested in talking to them about this. Is there anyway I can talk to the people you talk to?


No since there has been many periods of over-production before the depression of 1920's going back to around the 1770's where capitalists hit a brick wall as feudalism mode of production meant most of the population was self-sufficient peasants (they had to be self-sufficient so landed aristocracy could exploit their labor by simply taking their labor without giving anything in return except the right to live on their land) thus has no need for capitalist products let alone the means to buy them and what little money they had usually went artisans that stagnant amount of capital meant they didn't over-produce as they never grew their means of production thus had no growth (thus a rate of profit of zero, they were simply exchanging their labor for money).Can you provide a study charting this massive overproduction you keep on alluding to? (Preferably peacetime and not wars because we know a lot of market activity gets distorted in war time). The rest of your comment really did not make a lot of sense to me but maybe because I am having a hard time understanding the point. Are you making the statement that people consumed less in the 18th century than in the 19th century? Ok, but so what? How is this related to overproduction? After feudalism people had a chance to have a greater surplus of wealth than they previously had and they bought stuff being produced in the emerging economy gradually setting the framework for higher living standards in general which really paid off in the 20th century.


This is not the case we have a drop in production across the board just like in the 1920's and 1970's, the jobs being lost are productive it is simply that the markets can support the level of productivity in the system as the only way the market it self can solve the crisis is to rest the level of fixed capital liquidating it to the point there is once again scarcity thus the market solution to the crisis is to create artificial scarcity.If there is a drop in production, then that is not overproduction. I thought that's what we were talking about? The rest of this really makes no sense to me , I can't make out what you're trying to say. Perhaps you can rephrase it?
A free economy does not prevent over or under production, such phenomena are part of the market but what it does do is respond to poor entrepreneurship quite effectively ( as shown dealing with the 1920 depression, which was largely the result to WW1 and statist activity). The prices of the surplus goods are lowered to match demand and there is eventual redistribution of capital. A firm will typically go under or severely downsize by freeing up resources. If this process is hampered ( like by a state) then the correction still comes , but it usually is more severe due to artificial compounding.

[Psy]

They accept surplus value as Marx defined it?:confused:
That's interesting, I don't know of any serious economists or people with economic knowledge ( other that a few Marxists) that actually accept it as valid. I am interested in talking to them about this. Is there anyway I can talk to the people you talk to?

No they view surplus value (or as they call it profits) as coming from exchange itself but they have a hard time defending the idea that surplus value comes from exchange while saying unions hurt capitalists since they admit the labor market is also an exchange meaning workers simply selling their labor would create surplus value under the theory that surplus value comes from exchange.



Can you provide a study charting this massive overproduction you keep on alluding to? (Preferably peacetime and not wars because we know a lot of market activity gets distorted in war time). The rest of your comment really did not make a lot of sense to me but maybe because I am having a hard time understanding the point. Are you making the statement that people consumed less in the 18th century than in the 19th century? Ok, but so what? How is this related to overproduction? After feudalism people had a chance to have a greater surplus of wealth than they previously had and they bought stuff being produced in the emerging economy gradually setting the framework for higher living standards in general which really paid off in the 20th century.
If there is a drop in production, then that is not overproduction. I thought that's what we were talking about? The rest of this really makes no sense to me , I can't make out what you're trying to say. Perhaps you can rephrase it?

My point was not just peasants consumed less in the 18th century but in the 18th century early capitalists had a crisis of overproduction, peasants not only didn't have the means to buy much of the products of the early capitalists but didn't have much demand since they were for the most self-sufficient since that is how the landed aristocracy exploited surplus out of them.



A free economy does not prevent over or under production, such phenomena are part of the market but what it does do is respond to poor entrepreneurship quite effectively ( as shown dealing with the 1920 depression, which was largely the result to WW1 and statist activity). The prices of the surplus goods are lowered to match demand and there is eventual redistribution of capital. A firm will typically go under or severely downsize by freeing up resources. If this process is hampered ( like by a state) then the correction still comes , but it usually is more severe due to artificial compounding.
Again the overproduction of the early capitalists of the 18th century shows otherwise, that it is a phenomena of productive forces being too great to maintain scarcity of commodities to consumers.

[Dejavu]

Psy, I just have a couple questions:

1) Do you or they understand the difference between interest and profit?

2) I don't see any evidence to support your claim of massive overproduction in the 18th century. Maybe you can source me to some data?

[Psy]

Psy, I just have a couple questions:

1) Do you or they understand the difference between interest and profit?

Yes and no, remember when you have a view that value is created from exchange it means there is no difference from a bank charging interest on loan and a factory selling goods.



2) I don't see any evidence to support your claim of massive overproduction in the 18th century. Maybe you can source me to some data?

Panic of 1792 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1792)
Panic of 1796-1797 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1796-1797) of course bourgeois economists don't see it as a crisis of overproduction, of course the fact capitalists were engaged in risky speculation means overproduction existed in the market as capitalists could not find good enough returns in more secure investments (basically when there are bubbles in a market it means capitalists are reacting to a falling rate of profit).

The 19th century saw the market get much more volatile with a crisis of overproduction about every 10 years, capitalism never really had a significant period of stability (the long boom after World War 2 is actually the longest period of uninterrupted growth for capitalism) and has been going from crisis to crisis basically from day one. Think about that for a minute, even when capitalists were faced with a mostly non-industrialized world they faced crises of overproduction and a falling rate of profit.

[Invincible Summer]

Apologists for sweatshops - "It's better than the alternatives" - wouldn't say the same if they were in the sweatshop labourers' situation.

Yes, it's better relative to prostitution and outright slave labour, but it's still barely better than factory work in the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. In other words, it's still fucked, and just because it's "out of sight, out of mind" and involving minorities, these libertarian fucks don't give a shit

[Dooga Aetrus Blackrazor]

I'll play devil's advocate here. Forcing businesses to raise the standards of workers in third world nations will most likely cause them to move development to other third world countries.

So if we remove a sweatshop from one country, the workers there will be, for the most part. In addition, allowing low wages to exist does boost the economy more than higher wages (as it allows companies to higher more employees at lower wages, thus expanding and improving.

We need to eliminate sweat shops. But what is our plan? Closing them down, sacrificing them for the "long term revolutionary goals," or something else?

[Psy]

I'll play devil's advocate here. Forcing businesses to raise the standards of workers in third world nations will most likely cause them to move development to other third world countries.

So if we remove a sweatshop from one country, the workers there will be, for the most part. In addition, allowing low wages to exist does boost the economy more than higher wages (as it allows companies to higher more employees at lower wages, thus expanding and improving.

We need to eliminate sweat shops. But what is our plan? Closing them down, sacrificing them for the "long term revolutionary goals," or something else?

The solution is simple, nationalize them and use the power of state to industrialize.