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You can lower the tone of a discussion without necessarily having an aggressive tone.
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Feb 13, 2015 16:35
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asdf32 posted:With the main points of ignorance being what? You said it yourself and I'm not going to sully my lips with your words, asdf32.
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Feb 13, 2015 17:09
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Somewhat more on topic, with regards to productive vs. unproductive labor in Marxism, is there any analysis of how unproductive labor is, uh, screwed over (for the lack of a better word) in capitalism? I know Marxist exploitation isn't present but attempts among commercial workers (such as Walmart) to union suggest something is. The preponderance of public sector unions suggests something similar even though governments almost never make a profit. As an another example, the pursuit of superprofits by firms requires the employment of scientists and engineers but currency, and the value it represents (I think I'm using these terms right?), is mostly appropriated by the capitalist. That's not exploitation but it's certainly something.
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Feb 13, 2015 18:26
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A lot of this is just a methological hole that exists in Marx. Having a labour theory of value that is focused on industrial production leads Marx down the occasional blind alley; he didn't really conceive fully of the idea of big industrial nations that are nonetheless largely service economies or think a lot about the tensions therein. So whatever the Marxist response, you'll have to be doing a bit of thinking for Marx he didn't do for himself.
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Feb 13, 2015 19:11
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Oh that's funny I was just about to ask Disinterested what his objections to LTV were (he brought it up in another thread): is your main objection the problems with services being a major source of profits rather than physical commodity production or do you have other elements which mean you reject it?
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Feb 13, 2015 19:13
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namesake posted:Oh that's funny I was just about to ask Disinterested what his objections to LTV were (he brought it up in another thread): is your main objection the problems with services being a major source of profits rather than physical commodity production or do you have other elements which mean you reject it? I think it just doesn't function. I would say the principle problem of all practical communist economics has always been establishing value and a lot of it stems from this mistake. Marx wants to say that there is some objective way of determining value, but to me that is absurd. The fundamental proposition that value is a virtual concept dependent on the subjective desires of individuals seems to me very difficult to supplant even if you don't like capitalism. Although, of course, labour theories of value appear in classical economics strongly, as in Ricardo.
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Feb 13, 2015 19:17
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I've always seen it not as a denial of the impact of subjective desire (because this absolutely does cause prices to change) but as a means of determining the underlying systems which allows production on a societal level to exist. Relative price theories of value have a different problem where individuals may put different weightings on commodities but it still doesn't give them a universal base to start evaluating how much relatively more or less they value something, essentially how do you determine the value of a currency and maximising your utility without being presented with pre-existing prices? Then how are prices generated if people are unsure of what their currency is actually worth, etc, etc. LTV starts before the goods themselves are made and tried to be sold by examining the conditions of production that exist before prices come into existence. The creation and delivery of non-physical commodities definitely creates problems for LTV but I honestly don't think the transformation problem (of value to price) is really that damning, especially compared to its competition.
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Feb 13, 2015 19:28
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namesake posted:I've always seen it not as a denial of the impact of subjective desire (because this absolutely does cause prices to change) but as a means of determining the underlying systems which allows production on a societal level to exist. Relative price theories of value have a different problem where individuals may put different weightings on commodities but it still doesn't give them a universal base to start evaluating how much relatively more or less they value something, essentially how do you determine the value of a currency and maximising your utility without being presented with pre-existing prices? Then how are prices generated if people are unsure of what their currency is actually worth, etc, etc. LTV starts before the goods themselves are made and tried to be sold by examining the conditions of production that exist before prices come into existence. I still think marginal utility has basically stolen Marx's homework here. Ed: Just leaving work, I'll get back to you, prod me if I don't. Disinterested fucked around with this message at 19:36 on Feb 13, 2015 |
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Feb 13, 2015 19:30
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In Marxism still alive news: http://www.spoon-tamago.com/2015/02/09/kakumei-teki-himote-doumei-the-revolutionary-grouping-of-men-that-women-are-not-attracted-to/ quote:On February 14th, Kakumei-teki himote doumei (革命的非モテ同盟) — literally, “Revolutionary Alliance of Men That Woman Are Not Attracted To”– will gather in Shibuya, an area of Tokyo popular with young couples, to protest Valentine’s Day and its roots in what they call “romantic capitalist oppression.”
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Feb 13, 2015 20:52
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namesake posted:The creation and delivery of non-physical commodities definitely creates problems for LTV I dunno about that. Services are plainly still commodities, albeit with limits on the time and place of use. For example, compare a visit from a professional carpet cleaning company with some single-use rug doctor-type product, or watching a play in the theater vs. viewing a DVD at home (or even a film in a movie theater), etc. The physical object in these cases can essentially be abstracted away in the sense that you're still effectively consuming the fruits of labor expended for its exchange value, albeit living rather than embodied. Disinterested posted:Marx wants to say that there is some objective way of determining value, but to me that is absurd. The fundamental proposition that value is a virtual concept dependent on the subjective desires of individuals seems to me very difficult to supplant even if you don't like capitalism. I'd argue the definition of "value" as always and everywhere subjective is the real thing that's difficult to supplant, and taken on its own terms the LTV holds together extremely well. Are you familiar with any of the debates in value theory among Marxists over the last two decades or so? Because the TSSI has managed to answer all the old objections handily. Aeolius fucked around with this message at 02:16 on Feb 14, 2015 |
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Feb 13, 2015 20:54
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JeffersonClay posted:In Marxism still alive news: is this... anime marxism???
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Feb 13, 2015 23:08
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JeffersonClay posted:In Marxism still alive news: Also let me take this chance to thank all of you who tried to explain the foundations of Marxism in very simple terms again and again. I actually learned a lot, it was not all in vain.
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Feb 14, 2015 10:22
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JeffersonClay posted:In Marxism still alive news: 
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Feb 14, 2015 11:13
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Helsing posted:So I'm not crazy about carrying water for Stalinism but we need to set the record straight on some things. Though it's important to note that Germany was ravaged worse in WWI and then had their economy deliberately sabotaged following that and were the "greatest fighting force in history" 2 decades later. As an aside one takeaway is the importance of human capital. Physical capital can be ravaged by war but countries with the fundimentals to support it typically spring back to high standards of living remarkably quickly. Just like Germany, and, well most all the European powers as they repeatedly pounded each other for several centuries. Also war, as WWII is notable for in many areas, can be a mobilizing force in terms of economic development. The entire globe shunned consumer goods production and mobilized all their resources into heavy industry at a time when heavy industry was the technological thing. So WWI doesn't really figure into the equation given how it impacted comparable states and also came prior to the time period in question. Though certainly WWII turning cities like Stalingrad into rubble do not benefit the economy. Though per the above I'd slightly caution how much you weigh this fact. Aeolius's source from earlier (which I failed to dig up), showed little decline in economic output throughout the war. Edit: Found a good source:  quote:So yes the record of the USSR here does favourably compare with Japan's. Stalin certainly didn't have any moral objection to conquering new territory but he wasn't in a position to do so until the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact came into being, which only happened after the USSR had developed a significant industrial base. Well here is one big point: being agrarian doesn't make growth harder - it makes it easier. Replacing low skilled argriculture with basic industrial activity is the most straightforward path to economic growth. And note that while the Soviet Union was highly agrarian overall it had several well developed cities with high levels of human and physical capital with longstanding ties and close geographic proximity to the industrialized west. So at the beginning of the period in question they: 1) Had good access to modern capital and technology 2) Had lots of resources and raw materials 3) Had a generally low skill agrarian economy Far from making it unlikely, these things set up some absolutely perfect conditions for rapid economic growth. Honestly it's hard to underestimate the importance of any of them. Consider Japan lacked both 1 and 2 at the start of their industrialization and China lacked 1. quote:Now on the population front things could have been worse given that other countries lost comparable or even higher percentages of their populations during fighting (though adding in the deaths from the Civil War gives a pretty stark picture of how horrible conditions in Russia were by the time the Soviets consolidated their power) but the overall picture is a pretty bleak one, even more so considering the Soviets also went through a series of internal power struggles during the 1920s before Stalin consolidated his control toward the end of the decades. The contrast between "poor agrarian backwater" and "superpower with a space program" is a legitimately remarkable one (and generally a sign of how amazing the 20th century was technologically). But there is no contrast to be drawn between "poor agrarian backwater" and "rapid economic growth". Those things actually go hand-in-hand. In terms of their overall ascension I'll just re-iterate how important their size, population and access to resources was for that to happen. They're the same reasons the U.S. ascended in the west and why it's not all that amazing that it happened, despite the fact that the Europeans also looked down their noses at the rural backwater across the Atlantic for the whole 19th century. quote:The Soviets didn't outproduce the Third Reich by setting up "single workshop[s] with a handful of people". You're either being really disingenuous here or you genuinely don't understand the scale of Soviet industrialization and are talking out of your rear end. That was a car factory in 1915. The point was that they already had access to this (cutting edge at the time) technology within their borders prior to the revolution. quote:There are plenty of reasons to criticize the Soviet economy but the idea that it's growth wasn't remarkable or extremely impressive by world historical standards is ridiculous. So first, the golden era of soviet growth from 1928-1970, a time period coinciding with the end of the revolution has the Soviet Union second behind Japan (a country sharing in WWII devastation). Being second in economic growth over any time period that long is a great thing, but besides being bested by Japan in that time frame, its significantly slower than subsequent examples of growth that came after it, particularly the Asian economies which sustained faster growth over the same lengths of time starting a couple decades later. Other examples like Botswana have done the same thing. In general, as I've said a couple times in this thread, I don't think the soviet examples generalizes that well. The Soviet Union thrived during the period when it could initially capitalize its agrarian population, and put them to work in new factories. When that path ran out , stagnation coincided. A Reassessment of the Soviet Industrial Revolution posted:The era of high speed growth ended, however, when the economy reached Y2, and (Aeolies's source from earlier which I just found agian, http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/mharrison/archive/noticeboard/bergson/allen.pdf) By the 70's the U.S. was going through some painful transitions where old heavy industry like steel and cars was getting replaced by newer technology like electronics and services. This meant closing down old established factories and this was the path which the Soviet Economy was ultimately unable to follow. By contrast other examples, particularly the Asian economies offer examples of faster trade driven growth that has spanned both labor substitution and more advanced development. So the Soviet Union may be a historic high performer, but that doesn't mean it's a great example to generalize from in a modern economic context. This is all of course focusing on the economic realities, not the political issues which accompanied Soviet growth. quote:Wait, so you're saying the USSR had a "health state"? Really? The Soviet State was absolutely healthy in the sense that it achieved exactly the things it set out to achieve for a long period of time. Other economies have grown while certainly not ignoring market signals or comparative advantage. It's amazing you would suggest that trade driven growth is the result of ignoring market signals or comparative advantage. And again, the thing that allowed the Soviet Union to grow despite low trade was its size and resources. Small countries must harness trade and comparative advantage today to possibly modern standards of living. quote:You're ignoring the forest for the trees here. The USSR's development record cannot be looked at in isolation from its historical situation or the massive wars it was engaged in. Again, there are broadly two time period. One time period, prior to WWII where economic isolation was just simply less of a factor, and after WWII where the Soviet sphere of influence included roughly half the planet. Yeah it's sort of a bummer that they couldn't trade more, but "they were isolated" is a statement which requires a huge asterix. quote:Personally I would not want to emulate the political structure of the USSR and I agree with you that it isn't altogether clear how much we can separate the Soviet economy from Soviet politics. However, the record of Soviet development is notable because it suggests there's way more room for manoeuvre when it comes to developing economic policies than what many people would think. Oh that's pretty easy. They didn't contain the (comparative) technological or human capital which say Moscow had at the start of the revolution, and their governments just didn't get it together. Like I said above, I give the Soviet state a lot of credit. quote:Ok. So you agree that European imperialism was an example of capitalism then? What I consider at stake is the extent to which we can draw from their example. Because I think there are better examples, because I think their example doesn't generalize well and because I think their example brings significant political risks (which you did the best job of outlining) I think the answer is "not much". asdf32 fucked around with this message at 19:23 on Feb 14, 2015 |
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Feb 14, 2015 19:15
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asdf32 posted:With the main points of ignorance being what? You have displayed such a massive array of ignorance it's hard to pick anything in particular, but I still find your bizarre assertion that Adam Smith, Freud, Aristotle etc. were no longer relevant the funniest. You then tried to redefine 'relevant' as 'can be directly applied as originally stated', and then, after it was pointed out that you actually can do that with quite a lot of stuff from Smith and Aristotle, just dropped it like you generally drop topics after having been clowned on them. Your general ignorance of the writings of Marx, you know, the topic of the thread, is also always good for a laugh.
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Feb 15, 2015 17:34
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Obdicut posted:You have displayed such a massive array of ignorance it's hard to pick anything in particular, but I still find your bizarre assertion that Adam Smith, Freud, Aristotle etc. were no longer relevant the funniest. You then tried to redefine 'relevant' as 'can be directly applied as originally stated', and then, after it was pointed out that you actually can do that with quite a lot of stuff from Smith and Aristotle, just dropped it like you generally drop topics after having been clowned on them. The point to my use of the word relevant in that way is that there are literally people, in this thread, who think Marx is still the place to go to understand contemporary economics or politics. They want to use his writings as a guide for actual policy. Saying "frued is irrelevant" may stand out to people that see him quoted in textbooks or hear his terms being thrown about. But the point is that Freud really truly has been completely set aside by mainstream psychology and as far as I know there is no movement to revive his works in practice. So if you don't like the word "irrelevant" to describe someone whose writings, however historically significant, have now been almost completely supplanted or rejected by their field what word do you like ? I use that word with a qualifier and have been consistent the entire thread. Darwin and Keynes would be somewhere in-between. The core of their theories are still being put into practice but have been significantly expanded on and refined. A key difference here is that there is no special importance to the original work. No one actually studies The Origin of Species unless they're deliberately trying to get a historical context. asdf32 fucked around with this message at 20:00 on Feb 15, 2015 |
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Feb 15, 2015 19:53
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asdf32 posted:The point to my use of the word relevant in that way is that there are literally people, in this thread, who think Marx is still the place to go to understand contemporary economics or politics. They want to use his writings as a guide for actual policy. america is not the world
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Feb 15, 2015 20:11
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asdf32 posted:The point to my use of the word relevant in that way is that there are literally people, in this thread, who think Marx is still the place to go to understand contemporary economics or politics. They want to use his writings as a guide for actual policy. No, they don't. quote:Saying "frued is irrelevant" may stand out to people that see him quoted in textbooks or hear his terms being thrown about. But the point is that Freud really truly has been completely set aside by mainstream psychology and as far as I know there is no movement to revive his works in practice. He really hasn't been set aside, and many of the things he developed--hell, the entire individual therapist model--is still completely relevant. Again, this is just you being ignorant. quote:So if you don't like the word "irrelevant" to describe someone whose writings, however historically significant, have now been almost completely supplanted or rejected by their field what word do you like ? I use that word with a qualifier and have been consistent the entire thread.[/quote[ People do study the Origin of Species, actually. Again, this is just your ignorance. People also study "Wealth of Nations". They also study all those other people you cited and said were irrelevant. it is mind-boggling how ignorant you are and how little you perceive your own ignorance. I'm really, really just astounded by it. You keep asserting things that are just bafflingly wrong. Or you just have this insanely strange view of how science works, which means that when Adam Smith says something and then someone else puts that in an econ textbook, really, the exact concept that Adam Smith put down, not a refinement nor anything else but just what he said, but uses modern language, that that's him being 'supplanted'. Or, say, this quote: "Owing to this struggle for life, any variation, however slight and from whatever cause proceeding, if it be in any degree profitable to an individual of any species, in its infinitely complex relations to other organic beings and to external nature, will tend to the preservation of that individual, and will generally be inherited by its offspring" How has that idea been 'supplanted'? Obdicut fucked around with this message at 00:26 on Feb 16, 2015 |
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Feb 16, 2015 00:18
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History makes a point of studying everything though. It might help if you could demonstrate an ability to identify anything that was relevant in the past which is not relevant, or is substantially less relevant today.
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Feb 16, 2015 01:18
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asdf32 posted:History makes a point of studying everything though. No. Not in history. You study Adam Smith's ideas--many of which are foundational--in economics. You study Darwin's theory of evolution--which again, is foundational--in Biology. I'm not talking about history. I'm talking about actually studying these people in the disciplines where they are foundational. And, again, not just studying, but learning the foundational, unsupplanted ideas and structures of the discipline, like the ones I've quoted to you. Again, to anyone who actually studies these things or know anyone who does, you just are displaying your ignorance. Is it really, really impossible for you to accept the idea that you're just ignorant and wrong about this? What is stopping you from understanding this? People chimed in about how the people you're saying aren't relevant are actually studied. I've showed you direct quotes from each of the people, substantial, foundational quotes, that obviously show that what they thought and expounded is still relevant. And yet you just keep parroting this ever-quavering definition of 'relevant' and just looking like a fool. quote:It might help if you could demonstrate an ability to identify anything that was relevant in the past which is not relevant, or is substantially less relevant today. Thing that was 'relevant' in the past but not relevant today: Belief in phlogiston. This actually was supplanted, by the discovery of oxygen. Thing that was 'relevant' in the past: the idea of any form of mathematics as being complete and consistent. Smashed by Godel, further interred by Keene. What you don't get is that in many places, especially in the social sciences but also in the hard, some things are never supplanted--like Darwin--only added to. I forget, is English not your first language? Is that the hangup here?
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Feb 16, 2015 01:51
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Why can Phlogiston Theory become irrelevant but Darwinism can't?
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Feb 16, 2015 02:39
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asdf32 posted:Why can Phlogiston Theory become irrelevant but Darwinism can't? Because Phlogiston Theory is fundamentally wrong, but Darwinism is fundamentally right. This really isn't difficult to grasp. What is challenging about this?
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Feb 16, 2015 02:46
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Nothing.
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Feb 16, 2015 02:53
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I think you broke him, Obdicut.
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Feb 16, 2015 05:35
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asdf32 posted:Why can Phlogiston Theory become irrelevant but Darwinism can't? Just wanted to say that this is hilarious  Sorry, as you were.
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Feb 16, 2015 10:55
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Obdicut posted:Because Phlogiston Theory is fundamentally wrong, but Darwinism is fundamentally right. I think, perhaps, it would be better to say "in line with/informing current research" than "right" or "wrong" to be honest, or we'll just see him pivot back on this point by saying "Well, Marx was wrong so he's clearly irrelevant"
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Feb 16, 2015 10:58
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V. Illych L. posted:I think, perhaps, it would be better to say "in line with/informing current research" than "right" or "wrong" to be honest, or we'll just see him pivot back on this point by saying "Well, Marx was wrong so he's clearly irrelevant" Yeah, the analogy is imperfect because phlogiston and evolution are both hard scientific theories. Marx didn't have a single coherent theory, the way that Darwin did, except perhaps the stage version of history, the class-based advancement through class struggle model. To the extent that theory is testable, it's not looking so good for it. However, in talking about his stuff, Marx made a lot of really astute observations, like that the worker increases the wealth gap between himself and Capital with every hour that he works. This is still true, and right, or informing current research, or whatever.
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Feb 16, 2015 12:35
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Obdicut posted:However, in talking about his stuff, Marx made a lot of really astute observations, like that the worker increases the wealth gap between himself and Capital with every hour that he works. This is still true, and right, or informing current research, or whatever. So is historical materialism, theories of false consciousness, etc.I don't think anyone is doing sociology, post-colonial studies, anthropology, gender studies etc. without some ideas from Marx at the back of their mind, or without thinking in the terms of some heavily Marxist-influenced intellectuals like Foucault.
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Feb 16, 2015 12:41
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Obdicut posted:However, in talking about his stuff, Marx made a lot of really astute observations, like that the worker increases the wealth gap between himself and Capital with every hour that he works. This is still true, and right, or informing current research, or whatever. It's absolutely not true. The thing you just said, like Marx's crisis theory or value theory has been completely rejected or set-aside by mainstream economics. Disinterested posted:So is historical materialism, theories of false consciousness, etc.I don't think anyone is doing sociology, post-colonial studies, anthropology, gender studies etc. without some ideas from Marx at the back of their mind, or without thinking in the terms of some heavily Marxist-influenced intellectuals like Foucault. Well to be clear, to the extent Marx overlaps with philosophy or sociology that's a different story. I hope it's obvious that I'm focusing on economic aspects. Those fields are inherently more durable and nothing I can say or prove takes away meaning a contemporary reader may derive from him in those respects. Though in your examples to what extent are they using Marx to deliberately draw a historical narrative? Even in the hard sciences it can be useful to tell a story through history. This is one reason why Darwin is still taught, because telling the story of his discovery is a good way introduce the subject. I'm saying there is still a pretty clear distinction between this type of historical relevance and claiming that The Origin of Species is still a contemporary source in biology. V. Illych L. posted:I think, perhaps, it would be better to say "in line with/informing current research" than "right" or "wrong" to be honest, or we'll just see him pivot back on this point by saying "Well, Marx was wrong so he's clearly irrelevant" Yes of course that's my implication. Though just to be clear, it's not the irrelevant part I think is important. I don't have any problem recognizing Marx as an important piece of history and like I've pointed out, this means lots of people reading his works. It's the part where some people are still trying to revive his economics, and/or build an ideology surrounding them which I find to be exactly as creepy as strict adherence to the NAP. So if everyone agreed that Marx isn't useful for "informing current research" or contemporary economic policy that would be great, regardless of how fantastic they may think he is overall.
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Feb 16, 2015 16:29
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Disinterested posted:So is historical materialism, theories of false consciousness, etc.I don't think anyone is doing sociology, post-colonial studies, anthropology, gender studies etc. without some ideas from Marx at the back of their mind, or without thinking in the terms of some heavily Marxist-influenced intellectuals like Foucault. In fact, even when those theories are being resoundingly attacked, that still makes them extremely relevant. For example, I think that false consciousness is a deeply flawed, ironically classist theory. But it is a well-articulated theory and therefore attacking it, deconstructing it, etc. is a good critical foundation. It's sort of like Locke, Hobbes, and Rousseau: you may virulently disagree with any or all of them, but they help to define the questions and the challenges of a philosophy of human nature. Which is why people still study them, because their thoughts are still directly relevant.
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Feb 16, 2015 16:30
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Obdicut posted:In fact, even when those theories are being resoundingly attacked, that still makes them extremely relevant. For example, I think that false consciousness is a deeply flawed, ironically classist theory. But it is a well-articulated theory and therefore attacking it, deconstructing it, etc. is a good critical foundation. It's sort of like Locke, Hobbes, and Rousseau: you may virulently disagree with any or all of them, but they help to define the questions and the challenges of a philosophy of human nature. Which is why people still study them, because their thoughts are still directly relevant. If "relevant" means "anything that's still talked about ever including things which are only talked about because they are so wrong", then we, or I, need a new word. Basically you've defined relevance as the length of the Wikipedia article on the subject. Is that what you're actually going for?
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Feb 16, 2015 16:37
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Obdicut posted:In fact, even when those theories are being resoundingly attacked, that still makes them extremely relevant. For example, I think that false consciousness is a deeply flawed, ironically classist theory. But it is a well-articulated theory and therefore attacking it, deconstructing it, etc. is a good critical foundation. It's sort of like Locke, Hobbes, and Rousseau: you may virulently disagree with any or all of them, but they help to define the questions and the challenges of a philosophy of human nature. Which is why people still study them, because their thoughts are still directly relevant. I think false consciousness holds up fairly well, and to say it's classist isn't ironic in any way considering it is built upon a conceptions of class interest and identity. asdf32 posted:If "relevant" means "anything that's still talked about ever including things which are only talked about because they are so wrong", then we, or I, need a new word. Basically you've defined relevance as the length of the Wikipedia article on the subject. Is that what you're actually going for? The word you're looking for is accurate or correct, dolt. 'Are the economic predictions of classical Marxism a [self-sufficiently] correct model for the present, knowing what we know today' - No. 'Are the economic predictions of classical Marxism still relevant to today' - Yes. Congratulations I solved your problem.
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Feb 16, 2015 16:43
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asdf32 posted:It's absolutely not true. The thing you just said, like Marx's crisis theory or value theory has been completely rejected or set-aside by mainstream economics. It really hasn't. Mainstream economists absolutely accept that the larger the power differential between capital and labor--the more that capital is able to force wages down, which scales with lack of regulation--the greater the share of divided income goes to capital, and less goes to labor. This is also completely intuitive, so I'm not sure, again, why this is presenting you with problems. This leads to a problem of a shrinking domestic market for anything other than those things necessary to reproduce from day to day--again, an observation of Marx's. Here are three modern, orthodox economic papers that use this idea as a given, a background assumed fact: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.3982/ECTA8416/abstract http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1094202599900777 http://restud.oxfordjournals.org/content/60/1/35.short By the way, when you asked why phlogiston can be supplanted but Darwinism can't, were you just making fun of your argument, after you'd realized how badly you hosed it up? asdf32 posted:If "relevant" means "anything that's still talked about ever including things which are only talked about because they are so wrong", then we, or I, need a new word. Basically you've defined relevance as the length of the Wikipedia article on the subject. Is that what you're actually going for? That's not what I said, though. They're not talked about because they're 'so wrong', they're talked about because they're compelling and well-worked out arguments that, if you have an alternate explanation, you have to be able to rhetorically counter. You are terrible at reading what I actually write. If it's tactical--if you're deliberately misreading me to make a strawman--it just makes you look like you can't comprehend pretty straightforward stuff. Disinterested posted:I think false consciousness holds up fairly well, and to say it's classist isn't ironic in any way considering it is built upon a conceptions of class interest and identity. Well, it is ironic if you look at Adorno's stuff, since he basically only values 'high art' and completely discounts, in fact, attacks, the subversive art the comes from the lower class and alienated experience. In general, dividing up some human experience into 'true' and some into 'false' when it comes to enjoyment of either aesthetics or social stuff is incredibly problematic and generally leads either to aesthetes like Adorno declaring jazz and rock and roll to be horrible because they're commercial or to lumpen-philosophers declaring that all high art is just cultural showing off designed to signal social status and cordon off the upper classes by habitus. Lost, then is the actual human moments of enjoyment, and most of the social engagement of it. Obdicut fucked around with this message at 16:57 on Feb 16, 2015 |
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Feb 16, 2015 16:49
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Also, Marx's take on the Labour Theory of Value is entirely unproblematic in mainstream economics, given free-market conditions. Most modern economists don't really use it for a lot, but that has to do with what sort of questions they ask rather than the validity of the theory
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Feb 16, 2015 16:53
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Point to the Marx part. A study isn't Marxist because the topic is inequality, class, or "any problem with capitalism". V. Illych L. posted:Also, Marx's take on the Labour Theory of Value is entirely unproblematic in mainstream economics, given free-market conditions. Most modern economists don't really use it for a lot, but that has to do with what sort of questions they ask rather than the validity of the theory You mean that if we assume an efficient market then price basically equals value produced by labor? Disinterested posted:I think false consciousness holds up fairly well, and to say it's classist isn't ironic in any way considering it is built upon a conceptions of class interest and identity. Actually I can get behind this.
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Feb 16, 2015 17:05
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asdf32 posted:Point to the Marx part. A study isn't Marxist because the topic is inequality, class, or "any problem with capitalism". Heh. First of all, again with you making a strawman: I didn't claim those essays were Marxist. In fact, I explicitly said they were orthodox. So... why do you do that? Suddenly, bafflingly, out of nowhere claim that I said that the papers are Marxist? Are you just terrible at expressing yourself, or are your thought processes on this so disordered that if I say "Here is an orthodox economist using an observation about capitalism from Marx" you think that means that person is a Marxist? The Marx part is exactly what I said above and you said had been rejected: That in the capital-labor split of profits, capital will run away with a larger and larger share because, under capitalism, capital allows you to realize and concretize gains whereas laborers mainly spend money on class reproduction. As I said, this is an accepted fact in each of those articles, which you can see pretty easily. But since you need everything hand-fed to you (after which you spit it out and wail), here you go: quote:Entrepreneurial persistence and turnover have important implications for wealth concentration and inequality. When the persistence is high and the turnover is low, few families are able to experience long periods of entrepreneurial tenure during which they accumulate wealth at higher rates. Therefore, a restricted number of families accumulate levels of assets far above the levels accumulated by other families, and this mechanism generates a distribution of wealth which is much more concentrated than the resulting distribution of wealth in the absence of entrepreneurial activities. And: quote:Too often the assumption is that policy variables like the real value of the minimum wage cannot be relevant to top 1 percent incomes as they are, by definition, nonbinding on high wages. Yet one person’s income is another person’s cost. If a declining value of the minimum wage, or increased effectiveness in blocking union organizing, keeps wages in check at, say, Walmart, then it is hardly a shock that this could well lead to higher pay for corporate managers and higher returns to Walmart shareholders (for example, Draca, Machin, and Van Reenen, 2011, offer evidence that in the UK, higher minimum wages reduce firm profit- 2011, offer evidence that in the UK, higher minimum wages reduce firm profitability—but with no signifi cant impact on employment). Obdicut fucked around with this message at 17:24 on Feb 16, 2015 |
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Feb 16, 2015 17:16
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Obdicut posted:[callling me out for asking for the "Marx part"] quote:The Marx part is exactly what I said above and you said had been rejected: That in the capital-labor split of profits, capital will run away with a larger and larger share because, under capitalism, capital allows you to realize and concretize gains whereas laborers mainly spend money on class reproduction. Except when they don't because of minimum wage or unions apparently.
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Feb 16, 2015 17:33
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asdf32 posted:Except when they don't because of minimum wage or unions apparently. Yes. Exactly. I'm glad you've finally got it. So, in other words, those authors are using the Marxist observation about profit-sharing in the capitalist-labor split and the failure to attain capital in the laboring classes due to the necessity of spending to reproduce class, and showing how these observations function under the political system that we have. In addition, several of the paper address another Marxist observation: that the government in capitalist countries will tend to support the capitalist class: that deregulation, depression of wages, no worker protection will tend to be sought by the capitalist class and due to their economic power, will be able to exert outsize political influence. Edit: And remember, I was calling you out for your weird, dumb claim that I was saying these papers are Marxist> In addition, I was calling you out because the papers obviously, on the face of them, use Marx's analysis of labor-capital profit-splitting. Really, it's just completely obvious. That I had to pull out quotes, again, just shows your ignorance, as does now your predictable, sad fallback into "Well capitalism is moderated by a political system!" Obdicut fucked around with this message at 17:42 on Feb 16, 2015 |
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Feb 16, 2015 17:38
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No they're using contemporary observations to draw their own non-Marxist conclusions such as "in the UK, higher minimum wages reduce firm profit- 2011, offer evidence that in the UK, higher minimum wages reduce firm profitability—but with no significant impact on employment". Some of Marx's predictions are wrong but some, like "there will be crisis in capitalism" aren't. Here Marx gets the causes wrong. I.E. Phlogiston theory is wrong because it claims a specific causal mechanism that doesn't actually exist, not because combustion isn't a thing. Modern studies of combustion don't somehow bolster Phlogiston theory any more than modern conclusions about inequality or class are necessarily Marxist.
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Feb 16, 2015 17:54
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asdf32 posted:No they're using contemporary observations to draw their own non-Marxist conclusions such as "in the UK, higher minimum wages reduce firm profit- 2011, offer evidence that in the UK, higher minimum wages reduce firm profitability—but with no significant impact on employment". But again, I'm not claiming that they're Marxist. Again, why do you do this? It really makes you look like an idiot. I didn't claim they were Marxist, nor did I claim their conclusions were Marxist. Instead, I said that one of their assumptions was something that was made concrete by Marx, which shows that Marx is still highly relevant: his ideas are still fundamental to a modern understanding of capitalism. It's important to remember here that Marx and Adam Smith are really, really similar in their analysis of capitalism as an economic system. Marx almost entirely picks up from Adam Smith, rather than refuting him. This is, again, something you'd know if you actually read the subject you're attempting to discuss like a human being who actually wanted to understand, rather than just humiliate himself through horrible arguments. quote:Some of Marx's predictions are wrong but some, like "there will be crisis in capitalism" aren't. Here Marx gets the causes wrong. I.E. Phlogiston theory is wrong because it claims a specific causal mechanism that doesn't actually exist, not because combustion isn't a thing. Modern studies of combustion don't somehow bolster Phlogiston theory any more than modern conclusions about inequality or class are necessarily Marxist. Your analogy doesn't work, I think because you don't actually understand what the papers are saying. The 'cause' is incredibly simple, and Marx doesn't get it wrong. The division of profits, under capitalism, favors capital for a broad range of reasons, but the most important one being that labor spends income on class reproduction and has almost no opportunity to enter the capitalist class; those that do still are at a much higher risk of failure than those who start in the capital class. Therefore, as those papers say/acknowledge, the tendency under capitalism is for established capital to gain wealth at a much higher rate than labor. Marx also didn't just say 'there will be crisis in capitalism'.
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Feb 16, 2015 18:00
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