Percentage of Proles?

[La Comédie Noire]

What are the figures on the percentage of proles in the world as of right now?

[syndicat]

I believe it is 3 billion. I believe this is what Michael Parenti claims. The proletarian class is 62% of the population in the USA, according to Michael Zweig's "The Working Class Majority."

[Janus]

Haven't seen many estimates of the world proletariat population but for the US, it's somewhere between 70-80%.


Originally posted by SW
If you accept the Marxist definition of class, then out of the roughly 145 million people who are considered to be part of the U.S. workforce, only about 2 to 3 percent are part of the capitalist class--in the sense that they exercise substantial control over the means of production or the important institutions of society. Some 70 to 75 percent of the workforce belongs to the working class, and the remainder are part of the middle class.

Myth of a classless America (http://www.socialistworker.org/2003-2/464/464_06_Classless.shtml)

[Soterios]

85%

[JazzRemington]

I'm not sure about the world, but in 2005 the total population was 293,410,000. According to the current Statistical Abstract, 141,730,000 were employed. By comparison, 15,718,000 were self-employed (incorporated and unincorporated). 7,591,000 individuals were unemployed. There is a surplus of about 128,371,000 individuals who could either be employers, home makers, prison workers, etc.

It was difficult to find statistics for 2005 for number of employers, but I did find numbers of the number of employer firms in 2004 (from the U.S. Census Bureau), which amounted to about 5,885,784. We can only with caution use these numbers in our work.

To summarize our findings: in the 2005 US population we have about 48% are employed, 5% were self-employed, 2% were employers. The rest were other unemployed or had some job that was not counted by the Statistical Abstract or the U.S. Census Bureau.

Note: we use "employed" here because we can't find statistics for terms like "proletariat" and "bourgeoisie." Since "employed" is a synonym for selling one's labor-power, we can assume it's a good enough umbrella term for "proletariat."

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 03, 2007 03:51 pm
Since "employed" is a synonym for selling one's labor-power, we can assume it's a good enough umbrella term for "proletariat."
I gotta disagree.

For example, "employed" people includes corporate executives, cops, prison guards, supervisors, and various other class enemies. Plus various layers of well-heeled middle-class professionals who might go other way, depending, but are definitely not all part of the working class. These people are all employees, and sometimes even officially referred to as "workers".

And people who are not employed or self-employed may be bosses, investors, children/students, unemployed workers. Or that category "homemakers" you mention: that's not a class. A homemaker married to an executive has a different social class than one married to a worker.

I mean, c'mon: the children and unemployed spouses of workers aren't part of the class? That'd be a modern redefinition, I think.

So going from official statistics to an estimate of the number of workers (Marxist definition) is a lot more complicated than that. It'd take a lot of work to do it; but who knows, maybe the different estimates mentioned by Syndicat and Janus take some of this into account....

[JazzRemington]

For example, "employed" people includes corporate executives, cops, prison guards, supervisors, and various other class enemies. Plus various layers of well-heeled middle-class professionals who might go other way, depending, but are definitely not all part of the working class. These people are all employees, and sometimes even officially referred to as "workers".

As I said, being employed implies selling one's labor power, which implies not having effective control or ownership of the means of production. Thus, it is the closest thing to being a proletariat as I could find with the Statistical Abstract. The numbers given include a further break down into what kind of employment people are in, such as industrial, service, public administration, but does not give examples of jobs that are within such areas. Even if we remove the professions you have listed, the number would not change much, except go down a little.

There were numbers for wage/salary workers, and they amounted to about 41% of the population (as opposed to the broad term "employment," which had 48%).


And people who are not employed or self-employed may be bosses, investors, children/students, unemployed workers. Or that category "homemakers" you mention: that's not a class. A homemaker married to an executive has a different social class than one married to a worker.

I ahve included amount of unemployed individuals (the Statistical Abstract also had a section noting number of people with a job but not working, but I chose to over look this as I figured such numbers were combined with the appropriate tables). Bosses I can assume is lumped into employer firms, investors are possibly self-employed, and children/students are possibly unemployed. I am not sure, but I can probably find statistics on number of students (at all levels of education).

But I mentioned home-maker because some Sociological books as well as research papers on the employment make-up of the world count this as a form of employment (albeit an unpaid form).


So going from official statistics to an estimate of the number of workers (Marxist definition) is a lot more complicated than that. It'd take a lot of work to do it; but who knows, maybe the different estimates mentioned by Syndicat and Janus take some of this into account....

Possibly in regards to the world, but I would have to see where they got their results from and how they reached them. One can't just say "there are some million proletarians in the world" without backing such a statement up. At least I provided where I got the numbers and how I reached my conclusion, noting the short-comings as well.

But in any rate, what I wrote above does not take try to disprove that the proletariat is a minority. Even if we did adjust the figures for employment to mach more closely the definition of "proletariat", the number would still show the category having an overwhelming majority hand in the economic structure of the U.S. (at least).

[syndicat]

Radical political economists are generally in agreement that the plutocracy -- the dominant owners of capital -- are about 2% of the population. The small business class -- people who own capital and have some employees but have to manage workers directly themselves -- is another 6% according to Howard Sherman (in "Radical Political Economy"). Managers, according to Howard Sherman, are 12%. The proletarian class isn't just those who sell their capacity for work. The elite corporate lawyers, middle managers, engineers, supervisors, etc. do that. The proletarian class are those who sell their labor power but also are subject to management power and do not participate in management control of other workers.

Michael Zweig's "The Working Class Majority", based on an analysis of Bureau of Labor Standards tallies of different occupations, says 62% for the working class. The managers and top professionals, small business class, and plutocracy taken together are roughly 25% of the population in the USA. There is another group of about one-eighth who are in a gray area. they have some autonomy but are still subject to management -- writers, teachers, programmers, social workers, commercial artists. Some would say they are in a "contradictory class location". They have university degrees and more autonomy in their work than the proletarians usually do, so they share that in common with the "coordinator" or bureaucratic class above them. But they often form unions and struggle with management, like workers. If we regard this group as a part of the working class, that brings the working class to about 75% in the USA.

The labor/capital divide isn't the only basis of class division because class is about power over social production, and there is the bureaucratic hierarchy that provides another basis of class division. So ownership and bureaucratic power are really two separate bases of class power.

[Rawthentic]

So ownership and bureaucratic power are really two separate bases of class power.
I was liking your post up to here. I would actually say that the bureaucracy is not another class, but they administer and protect the capitalist system. If by this bureaucracy you mean the middle men and managers, then they fall into the petty-bourgeoisie.

[syndicat]

I would actually say that the bureaucracy is not another class, but they administer and protect the capitalist system. If by this bureaucracy you mean the middle men and managers, then they fall into the petty-bourgeoisie.

The petit bourgeoisie's class position is based on ownership. These are people who own small businesses. The managers are a distinct class. You can see this if you reflect on the fact that under state ownership, as in the old Soviet Union. this class existed and were in fact the dominant class, even tho property was owned by the state, and there wasn't private accumulation of wealth.

Also, social-democratic politics tends to empower the coordinator or bureaucratic class. That's because they pursue statist policies, which build up the state bureaucracy, whose position is not based on ownership. Moreover, state programs often come into being in response to popular protest and class struggle. This is how the "social wage" is created. But the administration of the various regulatory and social service parts of the state is controlled by the coordinator class. This class has its own conflicts with the capitalists, who try to shrink the regulatory and social wage functions of the state, when they get the chance. The coordinator class is thus part of the base of the social-democratic parties.

[Rawthentic]

No, ascendant capitalism replaced many of the former petty-bourgeoisie into "managers and overseers" to use Marx's terms.

And the Russian Revolution did not fall because of "statist policies."

[syndicat]

No, ascendant capitalism replaced many of the former petty-bourgeoisie into "managers and overseers" to use Marx's terms.

And the Russian Revolution did not fall because of "statist policies."

if the old petit bourgeoisie shrinks, is a declining class, but the newly emergent class of managers and professionals has a different role and a different relationship to other classes in social production, they are different classes.

I didn't say the Russian revolution "failed" solely because of the policies of the Bolsheviks that led to the emergence of coordinator class dominance. The huge size, illiteracy, poverty and disorganization of the peasantry played a role also. But the Russian revolution failed in a peculiar way, through the emergence of a new coordinator class regime based on state property and expropriation of the caitalists. You need to explain this peculiar way it failed, and referring to "adverse material conditions" is not sufficient. Even more relevant, the particular program followed by the Bolsheviks would lead to a coordinatorist regime even under more favorable material circumstances.

[Janus]

Possibly in regards to the world, but I would have to see where they got their results from and how they reached them. One can't just say "there are some million proletarians in the world" without backing such a statement up. At least I provided where I got the numbers and how I reached my conclusion, noting the short-comings as well.
Well, SW puts the US labor force at around 145 million (it's around 150 million now). They estimate 2-3% are part of the capitalist though they don't make any mention of how they arrived at their figure of 70-75% proletariat composition after that. However, I would estimate that managers, shop owners, and other petit bourgeois would make up around 20-30% of said workforce leaves you with a percentage somewhere in the 70's.

[Leo]

Worldwide, the estimated world population is around 6 billion, workers in industry, agriculture and services are roughly 3 billion, and 1.8 billion is unemployed so roughly speaking, it is 4.8 billion over 6 billion, that makes 80%. Of course in the rest of the remaining 1.2 billion, there is children, small land owners, artisans, the petty-bourgeoisie, high-up bureaucrats, big land owners and big capitalists, in a numerically descending order.

[VukBZ2005]

To consider managers as not a part of the working class is just ridiculous. A manager is also selling his labor-power. He does not own Capital and he does not possess property, so to make up the claim that a "techno-managerial" class exists is to deny the idea that class is based upon one's relation of the means of production.

A class does exist between the capitalist class and the working class; When a person owns Capital, possesses property that constantly reproduces that Capital, and uses workers to reproduce Capital from that property and does not have the ability to expand his business from that property to other properties, that person is a small capitalist and is a part of the small capitalist class.

That being said, when we are not using the definition of Class as it is being based upon income or upon one's position in a workplace, we can safely say, that in the case of the United States, the working class makes up between 85%-90% of the entire population.

[Rawthentic]

Syndicat, I actually agree with your analysis, as it looks at least.

[syndicat]

To consider managers as not a part of the working class is just ridiculous. A manager is also selling his labor-power. He does not own Capital and he does not possess property, so to make up the claim that a "techno-managerial" class exists is to deny the idea that class is based upon one's relation of the means of production.

Class cannot be defined soley by "one's relation to the means of production." That's because class is a social power relationship. It's about power of some people over others in social production. Class is a structure that separates the population into groups with antagonistic interests.

Ownership of means of production is not the only such structure. Monopolization of decision-making and expertise related to management of the labor process is a power relation between the top professionals and managers (including corporate lawyers, top engineers, top accountants, etc) and the proletarians. The proletarian class is not defined only by selling labor power but also by not having or sharing in the power over other workers in social production.

Moreover, failing to acknowledge the coordinator class (managers and top professionals) means you'll not understand the nature of the dominating class in the old Soviet Union.

Also, without a theory of this class, you'll not be in a position to develop a program for how to avoid this class consolidating its power over the working class in a revolution.

[Janus]

To consider managers as not a part of the working class is just ridiculous. A manager is also selling his labor-power. He does not own Capital and he does not possess property, so to make up the claim that a "techno-managerial" class exists is to deny the idea that class is based upon one's relation of the means of production.
That depends on the type of management we're talking about. Senior managers usually own a portion of said corporation as opposed to lower level managers/supervisors who do not.

[Severian]

Originally posted by Communist FireFox+June 04, 2007 04:23 pm--> (Communist FireFox @ June 04, 2007 04:23 pm) To consider managers as not a part of the working class is just ridiculous. [/b]
Oh fer crying out loud. You trying to tell me my boss is a worker, too? Marxism is a tool for the class struggle, not an excercise in abstract sociology.


To consider managers as part of the working class is just ridiculous.

Fixed.


Sindicat
The proletarian class are those who sell their labor power but also are subject to management power and do not participate in management control of other workers.

OK, I liked your post, overall, a lot, but I have a couple disagreements. One involves this sentence. You could easily end up defining even some lawyers, for example, back into the working class this way.

E.g. low-ranking lawyers who are managed by the partners, and probably don't have much if any role in managing employees.

'Course, I'd suggest lawyers and whatnot don't live just by selling their labor-power; they've got an artificial professional certification to sell, giving them an enforced monopoly over certain kinds of jobs.


Michael Zweig's "The Working Class Majority", based on an analysis of Bureau of Labor Standards tallies of different occupations, says 62% for the working class. The managers and top professionals, small business class, and plutocracy taken together are roughly 25% of the population in the USA. There is another group of about one-eighth who are in a gray area. they have some autonomy but are still subject to management -- writers, teachers, programmers, social workers, commercial artists.

Seems to me there are others who fall into that gray area between the working class and its enemies. There are exploited toilers who aren't wage-workers, still, in the U.S. Many of them would fall under "self-employed" or in some statistics even "small business people". The Socialist Worker article mentions that most businesses in the U.S. have no employees other than their owner.

A truck owner-operator, for example, owns a significant chunk of means-of-production, and is formally a small businessperson - but has a lot more in common with workers than with bosses. Often belongs to truckers' unions, and should.

These "self-employed" exploited producers do have a "contradictory class location" as you say about some professionals.


If we regard this group as a part of the working class, that brings the working class to about 75% in the USA.

I don't think we have to regard these "gray area" social layers as part of the working class. We do need to regard them as potential allies of the working class.

At times it's politically useful to approach them as fellow workers, as with inviting them to join unions. But in terms of theory and strategy, it's also important to keep in mind their equivocal class position is likely to lead them in some other directions.


So ownership and bureaucratic power are really two separate bases of class power.

Well, different anyway. I think Voz has a good point about them not being entirely separate.

I'd argue that's even true of the USSR, etc., where the owner-class was not present. The bureaucracy was still a conduit for the pressure of world capitalism, and couldn't have sustained itself except in the context of a capitalist world. (Basically a variant of the objective conditions explanation which you partially acknowledge.)

[Naxal]

I don't have any statistics on me at the moment, nor would I trust many of them- how many workers are there in the USA when they don't know how many illegal immigrants are there? How many workers are there in Dehli or Calcutta when they don't even know their exact populations? And China- there's all those children who don't actually exist, at least not according to government records that is.

But, where exactly do the peasants fit into this? Traditionally, taking a very orthodox Marxist view of things, the peasantry and the Proletariat are two very different things- are we counting them as part of the Proletariat now? Because the last statistics I saw, only 50% of the world are urbanised. If 2% are the Capitalists/Landowners/etc then you've got a maximum of 48% who can be defined as Proletariat. Then you've got to subtract 'class enemies' who are probably about, hell, it depends so much, say 3-5%, if you take the middle that's 44% left.

My numbers and calculations could be all fucked up, but the base question is- where do the peasantry fit into these calculations? And if my calculations are even vaugely right, the Proletariat are a minority group.

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 19, 2007 10:08 pm
Traditionally, taking a very orthodox Marxist view of things, the peasantry and the Proletariat are two very different things- are we counting them as part of the Proletariat now? Because the last statistics I saw, only 50% of the world are urbanised. If 2% are the Capitalists/Landowners/etc then you've got a maximum of 48% who can be defined as Proletariat.
Agricultural wage-workers and well, other wage workers in rural areas are part of the working class.

The peasantry are a spectrum of classes. They range from some who are nearly proletarian, hanging on to a small plot of land (or sometimes renting it) while getting most of their income from working other people's land (or other jobs), to small-time exploiters who ruthlessly gouge agricultural workers and/or tenant farmers. There's a lot of fuzzy lines and gray areas.

The same is true of terms like "family farmers" used in the U.S.


I don't have any statistics on me at the moment, nor would I trust many of them- how many workers are there in the USA when they don't know how many illegal immigrants are there?

Estimates vary, (http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0516/p01s02-ussc.html) but it ain't a total mystery. I'd go with the Pew Center's number as the best guess, their methods are better.

And estimating total working class is necessarily easier than estimating the least-documented part of the working class.

Perfect knowledge is impossible, but that's no excuse for giving up and proclaiming things unknowable.

[BreadBros]

Oh fer crying out loud. You trying to tell me my boss is a worker, too? Marxism is a tool for the class struggle, not an excercise in abstract sociology.

In some cases, yes. What I have in mind is, for example, a manager at a small fast-food restaurant. He/she has more responsibility than a worker and probably gets paid a bit more. Yet for all intents and purposes they operate as just another proletarian, selling their wage labor and doing the same tasks as you. Another example would be a shift leader of some sort. They are fully proletarian but in practice they operate as a "boss" or "manager" of some sort. I think that might've been what FireFox is saying and I think its a valid point since increasingly capital is (physically) divorced from labor and proletarians are often left to "manage" other workers while still performing their own tasks.

[syndicat]

OK, I liked your post, overall, a lot, but I have a couple disagreements. One involves this sentence. You could easily end up defining even some lawyers, for example, back into the working class this way.

E.g. low-ranking lawyers who are managed by the partners, and probably don't have much if any role in managing employees.

'Course, I'd suggest lawyers and whatnot don't live just by selling their labor-power; they've got an artificial professional certification to sell, giving them an enforced monopoly over certain kinds of jobs.

Credentials and these certification systems is part of what gives them their power as part of a distinct class.

But even young lawyers can be Taylorized into routine, highly supervised work for firms, where they are employees. In this case I'd say they fall in that "gray area" we were talking about.

But lawyers do in fact participate in the control of the working class, as do engineers and accountants. Lawyers defend the interests of the corporations, they play a role in things like breaking unions, and in defending management's "rights" against the workers.

Self-employed people who are actually largely under the control of management, like truck owner-operators, I tend to view as a part of the working class.

Self-employed people not directly under management that way, but who have no employees, are also in a kind of gray area as well, between the working class and the small business class (who have employees). You're not a capitalist if you don't stand in the labor/capital relation to employees.

[Janus]

What I have in mind is, for example, a manager at a small fast-food restaurant. He/she has more responsibility than a worker and probably gets paid a bit more. Yet for all intents and purposes they operate as just another proletarian, selling their wage labor and doing the same tasks as you. Another example would be a shift leader of some sort. They are fully proletarian but in practice they operate as a "boss" or "manager" of some sort.
Which is why one must differentiate between a simple supervisor and an actual manager, that is separate the actual power from the mere title. Those who actually contribute valuable labor such as various team leaders, foremen i.e. low-level managers or those who are simply given the title are essentially wage laborers while upper-level mangement who simply monitor or do nothing are not.

[Severian]

Originally posted by BreadBros+June 20, 2007 04:04 am--> (BreadBros @ June 20, 2007 04:04 am)
Oh fer crying out loud. You trying to tell me my boss is a worker, too? Marxism is a tool for the class struggle, not an excercise in abstract sociology.

In some cases, yes. What I have in mind is, for example, a manager at a small fast-food restaurant. He/she has more responsibility than a worker and probably gets paid a bit more. Yet for all intents and purposes they operate as just another proletarian, selling their wage labor and doing the same tasks as you. [/b]
Yes, in some cases "assistant manager" is basically just a scam to put workers on straight salary and cheat them out of overtime pay.

Then there are lead people who in many factories etc. are included in the union, correctly....but really, their situation's pretty contradictory. I wouldn't vote for one as union steward.

But Firefox said "managers" in general, and it's the logical conclusion of the bizarre, but on this board common, position that anyone who gets a salary is working-class.


Sindicat
In this case I'd say they fall in that "gray area" we were talking about.

Maybe so.


But lawyers do in fact participate in the control of the working class, as do engineers and accountants.

Good point - the nature of their "work" does matter.


Self-employed people not directly under management that way, but who have no employees, are also in a kind of gray area as well, between the working class and the small business class (who have employees). You're not a capitalist if you don't stand in the labor/capital relation to employees.

That was my basic point. I think it's important to think about potential allies of the working class, and for the working-class movement to act in solidarity with all the oppressed and exploited.

[Djehuti]

I have no idea how many proles there are in the world, probably far less percentage than if we focus on the industrialized world only.

In sweden we have around:
82% proles, of wich some (I guess approx 8%) participate in ideology production and/or excecutes formal or informal power over other proles (psychiatrists, teachers, police, journalists etc). Some, such as police officers are not on our side, while others such as teachers often have the same class interests as we do and might very well stand on our side in a class-conflict.

11% bosses.

7% company owners, employers etc. Of these some are self-employed and some (such as the person running the small fast-food stand at the corner) are in fact working proles since their means of production are owned by the bank, through loans etc.


In these statistics unemployed, many students, pensioner and kids are not included. Only those who are in the labour market are included. Most of those not included in the statistics should be counted as proles as well.