Birth of the middle class and the canard that Marx was wrong....

[RadioRaheem84]

It is my understanding that a lot of liberal economists like to say Marx was wrong because of the creation of a strong middle class that formed out of the working class during the Golden Years of Capitalism (1945-1975). Their interpretation of Marxism must be one that is fixed and determinative where no person can ever leave their class or that by the very nature of the system itself it will allow for any changes.

But Marx himself said in the Manifesto that the bourgeoise who later became the ruling class sprung out of the serfs during the Middle Ages. So here Marx is saying that new classes can form out of old ones.

Also the economists and historians always leave out the violent labor struggle for better working conditions and higher pay, the massive state intervention to alieviate class antagonisms, etc.

They also like to point out the growing "middle class" in Asia but isn't this middle class different than the ones that sprung up during the early half of the 20th century? The new middle class seems to be more of a managerial, administrative and financial class rather than the strong unionized manufacturing base middle class that grew out of the working class.

[Sudsy]

I think middle-class is more defined by income. The middle class are more privileged than the working class but the middle class could still be considered proletariat because they do not own the means of production and are still needed by the bourgeois to produce wealth. It just seems the middle class are better paid proletariat because their labour is labour of the mind, like managing positions.

[svenne]

This is mostly a difference in understanding the world. A lot of marxists see it through the lens of the first book of Capital, where -- in an abstract capitalism -- there exists only two classes, with each one having very specific goals. This is obviously not the case in the world of really existing capitalism, which the liberals attack. However, when the right-wing talks about class, it's almost always about income and cultural habits. The big difference being Marx talks about classes from how you relate to the means of production: either you own them, or you have to work to create surplus value. The problem here is that some people do help create surplus value, but as managers and the like (well, Marx even talks about " not the individual worker but rather a socially combined labour capacity that is more and more the real executor of the labour process as a whole", where he includes "one working more with his hands, another more with his brain, one as a manager, engineer. or technician, etc., another as an overlooker, the third directly as a manual worker, or even a mere assistant". While this is from the chapter on productive labor in Results of the direct production process, it still shows that labor doesn't have to be just by the hand, and also that we maybe shouldn't talk about individual workers). Add onto that the fact that there exists several different "forms" of workers: we have the good ol' manly man working in the factory; but we've also got a lot of female dominated things, like cleaners; and what people sometimes call the precariat: without much of a love for their work, they go from one way of earning their money to another. Of course these three kinds of workers (and there exists more, as we also have reproductive workers, whom makes it possible for the productive worker to even survive) doesn't always have the same interest in the short run, and their preferred form of action against capital and/or to defend their paycheck differs. I would be extremely disappointed in the world if call center workers continued doing their thing, but under a workers council. Communists have a habit of latching onto the most advanced sector of the working class, be it car workers in the 1970s or whatever is most militant today, and trying to make this into the communist party (understood as the most militant sector of the class, rather than an ordinary party), as they also function as the hegemonic part of the working class.

Well, point is: the liberals don't understand Marx, a lot of marxists doesn't understand Marx, and there's a difference between abstractions and the real world.

[Comrade #138672]

A stronger labour aristocracy and more super-profits?

I don't see how it refutes Marxism, but it is something which I would also like to understand better.

[subcp]

The Fordist compromise and linking wages to productivity is what led to the creation of a better paid strata of workers in the post-war boom. Since 1968-1973, the link between productivity and wages have been 'decoupled'; productivity has continued to rise since then, but wages have not risen with them; hence the term 'post-Fordist' to describe production and the capital relationship since the 1970's. Those well paid layers of the proletariat relative to the rest of the working-class never stopped being proletarians; longshoremen, auto workers, etc.

Rising wages in the peripheral nations is due to the extremely low level of wages to begin with and super high levels of exploitation (due to the use of a large amount of labor- variable capital- and advanced technical processes and manufacturing technology; extraction of relative surplus value) to start with.

The 'middle class' is Marxist parlance refers to artisans, small shopkeepers, intelligenstia, etc. Bela Kun wrote a good article about the Marxist conception of the middle class:

http://marxists.org/archive/kun-bela/1918/05/04.htm

[a_wild_MAGIKARP]

What liberals usually call the "middle class" is an illusion. It isn't really a class, just a slightly richer part of the working class.

Their logic is "this guy makes $45k a year (selling his labour to a capitalist), and that guy over there makes $20k (also selling his labour to a capitalist), therefore they are part of different classes" - it doesn't work like that. At least not to Marxists.
Neither of them own the means of production, and both are being exploited, just to a different degree.

I don't know anything about this new "middle class" in Asia, but it sounds like they're probably just the petty bourgeoisie, the actual middle class.

[Zukunftsmusik]

Rosa Luxemburg explains in Reform and Revolution how capital depends on people flowing from the working class to the "middle class"/petit-bourgeoisie in order for "big capital" to take up "small capital's" new forms of production etc.

[Fionnagáin]

"Middle class" is just another way of saying "labour aristocracy"- or, more often, "aspiring labour aristocracy". It's a sociological rather than social category, methodological rather than political. In Britain, the same strata were collectively referred to as the "respectable working class", although in the last few decades attitudes have shifted more towards the America, with "working class" becoming increasingly interchangeable with "working poor".

[Tim Cornelis]

What liberals usually call the "middle class" is an illusion. It isn't really a class, just a slightly richer part of the working class.

Their logic is "this guy makes $45k a year (selling his labour to a capitalist), and that guy over there makes $20k (also selling his labour to a capitalist), therefore they are part of different classes" - it doesn't work like that. At least not to Marxists.
Neither of them own the means of production, and both are being exploited, just to a different degree.

I don't know anything about this new "middle class" in Asia, but it sounds like they're probably just the petty bourgeoisie, the actual middle class.


"Middle class" is just American for "labour aristocracy"- or, more often, "aspiring labour aristocracy". It's a sociological rather than social category, methodological rather than political.

Defining the "middle class" does not prove the liberals wrong. They insist Marx said the poor would remain poor while the rich get richer, liberals said the poor get richer and the rich get richer, thus Marx was wrong.
I don't think this prediction by Marx is inherent to Marxism, and thus nor does the emergence of a rising middle class prove Marxism is wrong. It is perfectly compatible with Marxism to say rising productivity plus class struggle leads to a wealthier working class.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

The growth of the Middle Class in the USA was matched by the USA increasing exploitation of the 3rd world Working Class.

Great, a steel worker makes a middle class salary. Well, where does he get his bananas from? Guatemala. Where does he get his coffee from? Colombia. Why are the prices so low for his gasoline? British control of Iranian production. Just to make sure the economy remains stable, there's a constant trickle of impoverished immigrants (even back in the 50s) willing to take the terrible jobs for terrible pay.

[Lucretia]

It is my understanding that a lot of liberal economists like to say Marx was wrong because of the creation of a strong middle class that formed out of the working class during the Golden Years of Capitalism (1945-1975). Their interpretation of Marxism must be one that is fixed and determinative where no person can ever leave their class or that by the very nature of the system itself it will allow for any changes.

But Marx himself said in the Manifesto that the bourgeoise who later became the ruling class sprung out of the serfs during the Middle Ages. So here Marx is saying that new classes can form out of old ones.

Also the economists and historians always leave out the violent labor struggle for better working conditions and higher pay, the massive state intervention to alieviate class antagonisms, etc.

They also like to point out the growing "middle class" in Asia but isn't this middle class different than the ones that sprung up during the early half of the 20th century? The new middle class seems to be more of a managerial, administrative and financial class rather than the strong unionized manufacturing base middle class that grew out of the working class.

Middle class defined how, please? Thanks.

[Rooiakker]

When everyone is destitute, revolution spurs from desperation. When you give the illusion of advancement by selecting your managers to earn more, you create counterrevolutionary pride in the "middle class". It gives the poor false hopes, while creating an army of supporters for the capitalist for giving them "The Good Job."