Wednesday, September 9, 2026
<
" As use values, commodities are, above all, of different qualities, but as exchange values they are merely different quantities, and consequently do not contain an atom of use value. If then we leave out of consideration the use value of commodities, they have only one common property left, that of being products of labour. "<
" As use values, commodities are, above all, of different qualities, but as exchange values they are merely different quantities, and consequently do not contain an atom of use value. If then we leave out of consideration the use value of commodities, they have only one common property left, that of being products of labour. "<
Only white people can end racism and yes, they can do it !
Only white people can end racism and yes, they can do it !<
Labor Power Monday, February 27, 2023 Only white people can end racism and yes, they can do it ! Only white people can end racism and yes, they can do it ! By Charles Brown There is a paradox of Black History. It's biggest liberation events are in the conduct of White people, not Black people. Victories against white supremacy are changes in the conduct of white people, not changes in the conduct of Black people and other people of color ; changes in the conduct of white people toward Black people as in no longer abusing them as slaves when slavery was abolished. Ceasing and desisting from Jim Crow . That's Black History, but it's mainly White people acting differently. Black people may have fought them or inspired the White people to do it , but the change was in White people's conduct. Black liberation history is made when white people give up portions of their white supremacy.
So, Obama inspired a large minority of white people to overcome their racism , or take their anti-racism to a new level, take affirmative action, change their conduct and vote for a Black man for _President_, a major symbolic position of leadership in American politics and culture . This is the Black historic achievement of Obama, a big one.
Consider Lyndon B. Johnson , major historical actor in the achievements of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960's . We celebrate Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks, Little Rock Arkansas high school children facing mobs. Johnson had been a segregationist Senator. The change in his conduct was extraordinary. This is not to praise him as a man so much as to point out the objective fact that it is _change_ in _his_ conduct that is critical.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150272821854944&set=a.194636964943.26841.16832619943&type=1&theater Today in Black History: In 1966, Andrew Brimmer is the first African American to be appointed to the Federal Reserve Board
In a sense, white people are the only ones who can dismantle racism, because racism is something they do. Black people don't do racism. How are Black people going to go make white people stop doing racism ? They can't. Can't go over and put your hands on them and make them stop. Only white people can end racism. The choice is up to White people, and yes, they can do it ! <
http://take10charles.blogspot.com/2024/06/only-white-people-can-end-racism-and.html
Labor Power Monday, February 27, 2023 Only white people can end racism and yes, they can do it ! Only white people can end racism and yes, they can do it ! By Charles Brown There is a paradox of Black History. It's biggest liberation events are in the conduct of White people, not Black people. Victories against white supremacy are changes in the conduct of white people, not changes in the conduct of Black people and other people of color ; changes in the conduct of white people toward Black people as in no longer abusing them as slaves when slavery was abolished. Ceasing and desisting from Jim Crow . That's Black History, but it's mainly White people acting differently. Black people may have fought them or inspired the White people to do it , but the change was in White people's conduct. Black liberation history is made when white people give up portions of their white supremacy.
So, Obama inspired a large minority of white people to overcome their racism , or take their anti-racism to a new level, take affirmative action, change their conduct and vote for a Black man for _President_, a major symbolic position of leadership in American politics and culture . This is the Black historic achievement of Obama, a big one.
Consider Lyndon B. Johnson , major historical actor in the achievements of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960's . We celebrate Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks, Little Rock Arkansas high school children facing mobs. Johnson had been a segregationist Senator. The change in his conduct was extraordinary. This is not to praise him as a man so much as to point out the objective fact that it is _change_ in _his_ conduct that is critical.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150272821854944&set=a.194636964943.26841.16832619943&type=1&theater Today in Black History: In 1966, Andrew Brimmer is the first African American to be appointed to the Federal Reserve Board
In a sense, white people are the only ones who can dismantle racism, because racism is something they do. Black people don't do racism. How are Black people going to go make white people stop doing racism ? They can't. Can't go over and put your hands on them and make them stop. Only white people can end racism. The choice is up to White people, and yes, they can do it ! <
http://take10charles.blogspot.com/2024/06/only-white-people-can-end-racism-and.html
24-25-26 white race riot continues: 'Tidal wave of white supremacy': Trump blasted over removal of slavery criticism at military cemetery
'Tidal wave of white
supremacy': Trump blasted over removal of slavery criticism at military cemetery
<
https://l.smartnews.com/p-8syPoNEI/YSuMTV
https://l.smartnews.com/p-8syPoNEI/YSuMTV
Tuesday, September 8, 2026
<
the SCO summit,Chinese President Xi Jinping said that the 10 member countries should "prioritise security" and prevent external interference in the affairs of other nations. He also announced initiatives including a new centre for international artificial intelligence (Al) cooperation. Xi said the Eurasian bloc should take on a bigger global role in technology and security. A key lesson from the bloc's 25 years of cooperation was "finding the right way to coexist without alliance, confrontation or targeting any third party".<
"Its most significant achievement has been its steady growth into a new type of regional cooperation organisation that now spans the widest territory, encompasses the largest population and holds the greatest development potential in the world," Xi said. <
However, the world was at a crossroads, with rivalries between dialogue and confrontation, win-win cooperation and zero-sum competi-tion, and multilateralism versus unilateralism. Xi said countries had to "prioritise security and create a universally secure environment" , and prevent external forces from interfering in the internal affairs of other countries to safeguard regional stability. In Cairo, where Xi held talks with his Egyptian counterpart Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi, he presented a four-point proposal for peace and a new security architecture in the Middle East, which reflects Egypt's influence in the region. It encourages regional countries to take charge of their own security by resolving differences through dialogue, promoting a vision of security combining development and peace, focusing on economic growth and regional cooperation as a bedrock for stability, and supporting the United Nations and respecting national sovereignty.
the SCO summit,Chinese President Xi Jinping said that the 10 member countries should "prioritise security" and prevent external interference in the affairs of other nations. He also announced initiatives including a new centre for international artificial intelligence (Al) cooperation. Xi said the Eurasian bloc should take on a bigger global role in technology and security. A key lesson from the bloc's 25 years of cooperation was "finding the right way to coexist without alliance, confrontation or targeting any third party".<
"Its most significant achievement has been its steady growth into a new type of regional cooperation organisation that now spans the widest territory, encompasses the largest population and holds the greatest development potential in the world," Xi said. <
However, the world was at a crossroads, with rivalries between dialogue and confrontation, win-win cooperation and zero-sum competi-tion, and multilateralism versus unilateralism. Xi said countries had to "prioritise security and create a universally secure environment" , and prevent external forces from interfering in the internal affairs of other countries to safeguard regional stability. In Cairo, where Xi held talks with his Egyptian counterpart Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi, he presented a four-point proposal for peace and a new security architecture in the Middle East, which reflects Egypt's influence in the region. It encourages regional countries to take charge of their own security by resolving differences through dialogue, promoting a vision of security combining development and peace, focusing on economic growth and regional cooperation as a bedrock for stability, and supporting the United Nations and respecting national sovereignty.
Monday, September 7, 2026
Obama's dark skin and white skin color privilege<
Barack Obama's mother was white, and he was raised by white people. Is he white or Black ?
There is a sense in which Obama was raised white but became Black by learning and moving to Black people later in life. Importantly, Obama is brown skinned! He can't be white. It doesn't work both ways in the American system. Light skinned people can be Black, but dark skinned people can't be white. This asymmetry is the crux of the white supremacy here.
Barack Obama's mother was white, and he was raised by white people. Is he white or Black ?
There is a sense in which Obama was raised white but became Black by learning and moving to Black people later in life. Importantly, Obama is brown skinned! He can't be white. It doesn't work both ways in the American system. Light skinned people can be Black, but dark skinned people can't be white. This asymmetry is the crux of the white supremacy here.
The fall of American Late 20th Century Exceptionalism
Until the 1970s, US capitalism shared its spoils with American workers. <
Skip to site navigation (Press enter) [Marxism-Thaxis] Imperialist booty and the wages of opportunism in the long run
Thu, 20 Jan 2011
http://readersupportednews.org/off-site-opinion-section/102-102/4659-the-myth-of-american-exceptionalism-implod
The myth of 'American exceptionalism' implodes
Until the 1970s, US capitalism shared its spoils with American wage-workers. But since 2008, it has made them pay for its failures <
A homeless encampment known as Tent City in Sacramento, California A homeless encampment known as Tent City, in Sacramento, California, in 2009. Since the 1970s, real wages stopped growing and the gap between rich and poor expanded as the US economy slowed down after decades of growth.
Photograph: Rich Pedroncelli/AP
One aspect of "American exceptionalism" was always economic. US workers, so the story went, enjoyed a rising level of real wages that afforded their families a rising standard of living. Ever harder work paid off in rising consumption. The rich got richer faster than the middle and poor, but almost no one got poorer. Nearly all citizens felt "middle class".
A profitable US capitalism kept running ahead of labour supply. So, it kept raising wages to attract waves of immigration and to retain employees, across the 19th century until the 1970s.
Then everything changed. Real wages stopped rising, as US capitalists redirected their investments to produce and employ abroad, while replacing millions of workers in the US with computers.
The US women's liberation moved millions of US adult women to seek paid employment. US capitalism no longer faced a shortage of labour. US employers took advantage of the changed situation: they stopped raising wages. When basic labour scarcity became labour excess, not only real wages, but eventually benefits, too, would stop rising. Over the last 30 years, the vast majority of US workers have, in fact, gotten poorer, when you sum up flat real wages, reduced benefits (pensions, medical insurance, etc), reduced public services and raised tax burdens.
In economic terms, American "exceptionalism" began to die in the 1970s. The rich, however, have got much richer since the 1970s, as every measure of US income and wealth inequality attests. The explanation is simple: while workers' average real wages stayed flat, their productivity rose (the goods and services that an average hour's labour provided to employers). More and better machines (including computers), better education, and harder and faster labour effort raised productivity since the 1970s.
While workers delivered more and more value to employers, those employers paid workers no more. The employers reaped all the benefits of rising productivity: rising profits, rising salaries and bonuses to managers, rising dividends to shareholders, and rising payments to the professionals who serve employers (lawyers, architects, consultants, etc).
Since the 1970s, most US workers postponed facing up to what capitalism had come to mean for them. They sent more family members to do more hours of paid labour, and they borrowed huge amounts. By exhausting themselves, stressing family life to the breaking point in many households, and by taking on unsustainable levels of debt, the US working class delayed the end of American exceptionalism – until the global crisis hit in 2007.
By then, their buying power could no longer grow: rising unemployment kept wages flat, no more hours of work, nor more borrowing, were possible. Reckoning time had arrived. A US capitalism built on expanding mass consumption lost its foundation. The richest 10-15% – those cashing in on employers' good fortune from no longer-rising wages – helped bring on the crisis by speculating wildly and unsuccessfully in all sorts of new financial instruments (asset-backed securities, credit default swaps, etc). The richest also contributed to the crisis by using their money to shift US politics to the right, rendering government regulation and oversight inadequate to anticipate or moderate the crisis or even to react properly once it hit. Indeed, the rich have so far been able to use the crisis to widen still further the gulf separating themselves from the rest, to finally bury American exceptionalism. First, they utilised both parties' dependence on their financial support to make sure there would be no mass federal hiring programme for the unemployed (as FDR used between 1934 and 1940). The absence of such a programme guaranteed that real wages would not rise and, with job benefits, would likely fall – as they indeed have done. Second, the rich made sure that the prime focus of government response to the crisis would benefit banks, large corporations and the stock markets. These have more or less "recovered". Third, the current drive for government budget austerity – especially focused on the 50 states and the thousands of municipalities – forces the mass of people to pick up the costs for the government's unjustly imbalanced response to the crisis. The trillions spent to save the banks and selected other corporations (AIG, GM, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, etc) were mostly borrowed because the government dared not tax the corporations and the richest citizens to raise the needed rescue funds. Indeed, a good part of what the government borrowed came precisely from those funds left in the hands of corporations and the rich, because they had not been taxed to overcome the crisis. With sharply enlarged debts, all levels of government face the pressure of needing to take too much from current tax revenues to pay interest on debts, leaving too little to sustain public services. So, they demand the people pay more taxes and suffer reduced public services, so that government can reduce its debt burden. For example, California's new governor proposes to continue for five more years the massive, broad-based tax increases begun during the crisis and also to cut state services for the poor (reduced Medicaid funding) and the middle class(reduced budgets for community colleges, state colleges, and the university system). The governor admits that California's budget faces sky-high interest costs and reduced federal government assistance just when the crisis increases demands for public services. The governor does not admit his fear to tax the state's huge corporate and private individual wealth. So, he announces an "austerity programme", as if no alternative existed. Indeed, a major support for austerity comes from the large corporations and wealthiest Californians, who hold the state's bonds and want reassurances that the interest on those bonds will be paid. California's austerity programme parallels similar programmes in many other states, in thousands of municipalities, and at the federal level (for example, social security). Together, they reinforce falling real wages, falling benefits, falling government services and rising taxes. In the US, capitalism has stopped "delivering the goods", as it so long boasted. The reality of ever-deeper economic division clashes with expectations built up when wages rose over the century before the 1970s. US capitalism now brings long-term painful decline for its working class, the end of "American exceptionalism" and rising social, cultural and political tensions. • Richard Wolff gives his monthly talk on global capitalism at the Brecht Forum in New York on 18 January; for more information about Professor Wolff's lectures, podcasts and media appearance, visit his website
Skip to site navigation (Press enter) [Marxism-Thaxis] Imperialist booty and the wages of opportunism in the long run
Thu, 20 Jan 2011
http://readersupportednews.org/off-site-opinion-section/102-102/4659-the-myth-of-american-exceptionalism-implod
The myth of 'American exceptionalism' implodes
Until the 1970s, US capitalism shared its spoils with American wage-workers. But since 2008, it has made them pay for its failures <
A homeless encampment known as Tent City in Sacramento, California A homeless encampment known as Tent City, in Sacramento, California, in 2009. Since the 1970s, real wages stopped growing and the gap between rich and poor expanded as the US economy slowed down after decades of growth.
Photograph: Rich Pedroncelli/AP
One aspect of "American exceptionalism" was always economic. US workers, so the story went, enjoyed a rising level of real wages that afforded their families a rising standard of living. Ever harder work paid off in rising consumption. The rich got richer faster than the middle and poor, but almost no one got poorer. Nearly all citizens felt "middle class".
A profitable US capitalism kept running ahead of labour supply. So, it kept raising wages to attract waves of immigration and to retain employees, across the 19th century until the 1970s.
Then everything changed. Real wages stopped rising, as US capitalists redirected their investments to produce and employ abroad, while replacing millions of workers in the US with computers.
The US women's liberation moved millions of US adult women to seek paid employment. US capitalism no longer faced a shortage of labour. US employers took advantage of the changed situation: they stopped raising wages. When basic labour scarcity became labour excess, not only real wages, but eventually benefits, too, would stop rising. Over the last 30 years, the vast majority of US workers have, in fact, gotten poorer, when you sum up flat real wages, reduced benefits (pensions, medical insurance, etc), reduced public services and raised tax burdens.
In economic terms, American "exceptionalism" began to die in the 1970s. The rich, however, have got much richer since the 1970s, as every measure of US income and wealth inequality attests. The explanation is simple: while workers' average real wages stayed flat, their productivity rose (the goods and services that an average hour's labour provided to employers). More and better machines (including computers), better education, and harder and faster labour effort raised productivity since the 1970s.
While workers delivered more and more value to employers, those employers paid workers no more. The employers reaped all the benefits of rising productivity: rising profits, rising salaries and bonuses to managers, rising dividends to shareholders, and rising payments to the professionals who serve employers (lawyers, architects, consultants, etc).
Since the 1970s, most US workers postponed facing up to what capitalism had come to mean for them. They sent more family members to do more hours of paid labour, and they borrowed huge amounts. By exhausting themselves, stressing family life to the breaking point in many households, and by taking on unsustainable levels of debt, the US working class delayed the end of American exceptionalism – until the global crisis hit in 2007.
By then, their buying power could no longer grow: rising unemployment kept wages flat, no more hours of work, nor more borrowing, were possible. Reckoning time had arrived. A US capitalism built on expanding mass consumption lost its foundation. The richest 10-15% – those cashing in on employers' good fortune from no longer-rising wages – helped bring on the crisis by speculating wildly and unsuccessfully in all sorts of new financial instruments (asset-backed securities, credit default swaps, etc). The richest also contributed to the crisis by using their money to shift US politics to the right, rendering government regulation and oversight inadequate to anticipate or moderate the crisis or even to react properly once it hit. Indeed, the rich have so far been able to use the crisis to widen still further the gulf separating themselves from the rest, to finally bury American exceptionalism. First, they utilised both parties' dependence on their financial support to make sure there would be no mass federal hiring programme for the unemployed (as FDR used between 1934 and 1940). The absence of such a programme guaranteed that real wages would not rise and, with job benefits, would likely fall – as they indeed have done. Second, the rich made sure that the prime focus of government response to the crisis would benefit banks, large corporations and the stock markets. These have more or less "recovered". Third, the current drive for government budget austerity – especially focused on the 50 states and the thousands of municipalities – forces the mass of people to pick up the costs for the government's unjustly imbalanced response to the crisis. The trillions spent to save the banks and selected other corporations (AIG, GM, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, etc) were mostly borrowed because the government dared not tax the corporations and the richest citizens to raise the needed rescue funds. Indeed, a good part of what the government borrowed came precisely from those funds left in the hands of corporations and the rich, because they had not been taxed to overcome the crisis. With sharply enlarged debts, all levels of government face the pressure of needing to take too much from current tax revenues to pay interest on debts, leaving too little to sustain public services. So, they demand the people pay more taxes and suffer reduced public services, so that government can reduce its debt burden. For example, California's new governor proposes to continue for five more years the massive, broad-based tax increases begun during the crisis and also to cut state services for the poor (reduced Medicaid funding) and the middle class(reduced budgets for community colleges, state colleges, and the university system). The governor admits that California's budget faces sky-high interest costs and reduced federal government assistance just when the crisis increases demands for public services. The governor does not admit his fear to tax the state's huge corporate and private individual wealth. So, he announces an "austerity programme", as if no alternative existed. Indeed, a major support for austerity comes from the large corporations and wealthiest Californians, who hold the state's bonds and want reassurances that the interest on those bonds will be paid. California's austerity programme parallels similar programmes in many other states, in thousands of municipalities, and at the federal level (for example, social security). Together, they reinforce falling real wages, falling benefits, falling government services and rising taxes. In the US, capitalism has stopped "delivering the goods", as it so long boasted. The reality of ever-deeper economic division clashes with expectations built up when wages rose over the century before the 1970s. US capitalism now brings long-term painful decline for its working class, the end of "American exceptionalism" and rising social, cultural and political tensions. • Richard Wolff gives his monthly talk on global capitalism at the Brecht Forum in New York on 18 January; for more information about Professor Wolff's lectures, podcasts and media appearance, visit his website
American PoliticalEconomy
Republicans are agents of the 1% against the 99%: One capitalist always “kills” many …other capitalists; especially in depressions . Monopoliists want depression to make their biggest killings ; so Republicans try to make depression for the monopolists , the 1%. Depression harms the Wage-Laborers , the 99% , the most.
<
And when unemployment goes up , WAGES go down <
And why are Republicans always saying of wage-laborers , " Let them eat cake " , because they are beating down politically and economically on the Proletariat for the Bourgeosie in the Class Struggle . <
Republicans: Let them eat cake<
http://take10charles.blogspot.com/2026/04/httptake10charles_32.html
For the Big Bourgeoisie, Economic Crashes are Creative Destruction "One capitalist always kills many"-Karl Marx , ( Charles Brown: especially in economic crashes ). < https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch32.htm> This is what Karl Marx said about the monopoly phase of capitalism. Just like in the game of monopoly , the monopoly capitalists buy up more the failing capitalists cheap in downturns. So, the biggest capitalists _want_ economic recession. Corporations also want high unemployment as the competition from unemployed for jobs puts pressure on to lower wages. The stock market rallies when unemployment goes up; and vica versa.< <
Thus, the Republican Party elected officials' policies seek to cause economic downturn : cut Keynesian social spending to reduce effective demand .
So, Republican Trump seeks to cause recession /depression with his tarriff and war policies .
Seeking economic downturns was given a theoretical justification in the 1930's with the idea of CREATIVE DESTRUCTION .<
( "Creative destruction is an economic concept where innovation continuously dismantles long-standing industries, business models, and technologies to make way for superior ones. Popularized by Joseph Schumpeter, this process drives long-term economic growth and productivity, despite causing short-term disruption, job losses, and industry obsolescence.") <
Economic collapse is coming — and the rich are already prepared to profit from it Thom Hartmann <
The Wall Street Journal reports in an article titled "Trump Tells Aides to Prepare for Extended Blockade of Iran" that: "President Trump has instructed aides to prepare for an extended blockade of Iran, U.S. officials said... WHICH WILL CAUSE ECONOMIC DEPRESSION br>
Economic collapse is coming - and the rich are already prepared to profit from it Thom Hartmann 1 ㅿ +7 Thom Hartmann has argued that a deliberate, policy-driven economic crisis is being engineered, allowing the wealthy to profit while the working class faces severe hardship. In his analysis of the 2025-2026 political landscape, Hartmann points to several factors contributing to this predicted scenario: podcasts.apple.com +1<
• Policy-Driven Crises: Policies under the current administration, such as massive tax cuts for the wealthy, deregulation, and escalating national debt, are creating Policy-Driven Crises: Policies under the current administration, such as massive tax cuts for the wealthy, deregulation, and escalating national debt, are creating instability similar to the pre-depression era.
• The "Morbidly Rich" Strategy: Hartmann describes a "Great Secession of the Morbidly Rich," suggesting that billionaires are hoarding assets, influencing lawmakers, and creating a "billionaire's paradise" out of a collapsing economy. o
• Profit from Collapse: The wealthy are positioned to profit from this instability, while ordinary Americans face rising prices, reduced services, and a "hell of a year" for the 99%. podcasts.apple.com +1
• Austerity and Inequality: This era is characterized by accelerating wealth inequality, where the middle class is squeezed by the erosion of democratic, social, and economic stability. @ Facebook • Thom Hart...
• Warning of "2008 Worse": Hartmann has Ask anything Q Economic collapse is coming — and the richthe erosion of democratic, social, and economic stability. @ Facebook • Thom Hart...<
• Warning of "2008 Worse": Hartmann has warned that bank deregulation and Republican economic strategies are actively engineering a financial collapse potentially worse than the 2008 crisis. © Hartmann's Proposed Solution:
He frequently advises his audience that "forewarned is forearmed," urging the public to stop confusing wealth with wisdom, confront these political choices, and reverse them through political action, particularly in the 2026 midterms. @ Note: This information is based on reports from the Hartmann Report published between 2025 and 2026. How Many Times Will the Morbidly Rich Crash..<
.https://hartmannreport.com/p/how-many-times-will-the-morbidly-91b
And when unemployment goes up , WAGES go down <
And why are Republicans always saying of wage-laborers , " Let them eat cake " , because they are beating down politically and economically on the Proletariat for the Bourgeosie in the Class Struggle . <
Republicans: Let them eat cake<
http://take10charles.blogspot.com/2026/04/httptake10charles_32.html
For the Big Bourgeoisie, Economic Crashes are Creative Destruction "One capitalist always kills many"-Karl Marx , ( Charles Brown: especially in economic crashes ). < https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch32.htm> This is what Karl Marx said about the monopoly phase of capitalism. Just like in the game of monopoly , the monopoly capitalists buy up more the failing capitalists cheap in downturns. So, the biggest capitalists _want_ economic recession. Corporations also want high unemployment as the competition from unemployed for jobs puts pressure on to lower wages. The stock market rallies when unemployment goes up; and vica versa.< <
Thus, the Republican Party elected officials' policies seek to cause economic downturn : cut Keynesian social spending to reduce effective demand .
So, Republican Trump seeks to cause recession /depression with his tarriff and war policies .
Seeking economic downturns was given a theoretical justification in the 1930's with the idea of CREATIVE DESTRUCTION .<
( "Creative destruction is an economic concept where innovation continuously dismantles long-standing industries, business models, and technologies to make way for superior ones. Popularized by Joseph Schumpeter, this process drives long-term economic growth and productivity, despite causing short-term disruption, job losses, and industry obsolescence.") <
Economic collapse is coming — and the rich are already prepared to profit from it Thom Hartmann <
The Wall Street Journal reports in an article titled "Trump Tells Aides to Prepare for Extended Blockade of Iran" that: "President Trump has instructed aides to prepare for an extended blockade of Iran, U.S. officials said... WHICH WILL CAUSE ECONOMIC DEPRESSION br>
Economic collapse is coming - and the rich are already prepared to profit from it Thom Hartmann 1 ㅿ +7 Thom Hartmann has argued that a deliberate, policy-driven economic crisis is being engineered, allowing the wealthy to profit while the working class faces severe hardship. In his analysis of the 2025-2026 political landscape, Hartmann points to several factors contributing to this predicted scenario: podcasts.apple.com +1<
• Policy-Driven Crises: Policies under the current administration, such as massive tax cuts for the wealthy, deregulation, and escalating national debt, are creating Policy-Driven Crises: Policies under the current administration, such as massive tax cuts for the wealthy, deregulation, and escalating national debt, are creating instability similar to the pre-depression era.
• The "Morbidly Rich" Strategy: Hartmann describes a "Great Secession of the Morbidly Rich," suggesting that billionaires are hoarding assets, influencing lawmakers, and creating a "billionaire's paradise" out of a collapsing economy. o
• Profit from Collapse: The wealthy are positioned to profit from this instability, while ordinary Americans face rising prices, reduced services, and a "hell of a year" for the 99%. podcasts.apple.com +1
• Austerity and Inequality: This era is characterized by accelerating wealth inequality, where the middle class is squeezed by the erosion of democratic, social, and economic stability. @ Facebook • Thom Hart...
• Warning of "2008 Worse": Hartmann has Ask anything Q Economic collapse is coming — and the richthe erosion of democratic, social, and economic stability. @ Facebook • Thom Hart...<
• Warning of "2008 Worse": Hartmann has warned that bank deregulation and Republican economic strategies are actively engineering a financial collapse potentially worse than the 2008 crisis. © Hartmann's Proposed Solution:
He frequently advises his audience that "forewarned is forearmed," urging the public to stop confusing wealth with wisdom, confront these political choices, and reverse them through political action, particularly in the 2026 midterms. @ Note: This information is based on reports from the Hartmann Report published between 2025 and 2026. How Many Times Will the Morbidly Rich Crash..<
.https://hartmannreport.com/p/how-many-times-will-the-morbidly-91b
WAGE-Labor Day : What is a Wage
<
Karl Marx's 1865 Value, Price and Profit explains that profit comes from unpaid labor time, creating an inverse relationship between wages and profit. A Revolutionary Co... +1 Core Concepts • Value: The amount of socially necessary labor time needed to make a commodity. • Wages: The cost of the worker's labor power, or what is required to keep the worker alive and working. • Profit: The surplus value left over after the capitalist pays for materials, equipment, and wages. W)Profit: The surplus value left over after the capitalist pays for materials, equipment, and wages. W Wikipedia +2 The Relationship • Inverse Proportion: When the value created by a worker is split, higher wages mean lower profit, and lower wages mean higher profit. • Prices: Prices are regulated by overall labor value, not just by arbitrary markups on wages. • Exploitation: Workers produce more value in a workday than what they receive in their paycheck, forming the basis of capitalist profit. - Marxists Internet ... +4 Would you like to explore how this relates to Karl Marx's theory of surplus value or → his debate with John Weston? Marxists Internet Archive Value, Price and Profit, Ask anything W Wikipedia +2 Ask anything 미 Q wages, price profit
Karl Marx's 1865 Value, Price and Profit explains that profit comes from unpaid labor time, creating an inverse relationship between wages and profit. A Revolutionary Co... +1 Core Concepts • Value: The amount of socially necessary labor time needed to make a commodity. • Wages: The cost of the worker's labor power, or what is required to keep the worker alive and working. • Profit: The surplus value left over after the capitalist pays for materials, equipment, and wages. W)Profit: The surplus value left over after the capitalist pays for materials, equipment, and wages. W Wikipedia +2 The Relationship • Inverse Proportion: When the value created by a worker is split, higher wages mean lower profit, and lower wages mean higher profit. • Prices: Prices are regulated by overall labor value, not just by arbitrary markups on wages. • Exploitation: Workers produce more value in a workday than what they receive in their paycheck, forming the basis of capitalist profit. - Marxists Internet ... +4 Would you like to explore how this relates to Karl Marx's theory of surplus value or → his debate with John Weston? Marxists Internet Archive Value, Price and Profit, Ask anything W Wikipedia +2 Ask anything 미 Q wages, price profit
Happy WAGE-Labor Day , PROLETARIAT Day , Darlin ‘
Happy, Merry WAGE-Labor Day ! Live, Love , Laugh !
Proletariat Day uhhuh smiles <
Labor Day is a federal holiday in the United States celebrated on the first Monday of September to honor and recognize the American labor movement and the works and contributions of laborers to the development and achievements in the United States.[1][2][3]
<
Labor in general , and in capitalism , Wage-Labor is the source of all EXCHANGE-- value; along with Nature , Labor is the source of USE-value <
Happy Wage-Labor Day to Thou , Honey. <
Artificial Intelligence says : <
Wage labor is an economic relationship where a worker sells their labor to an employer in exchange for set money, like a wage or salary; ( Charles Brown. sells labor power to make services and goods, commodities objects and bodily motions , communications)<
How It Works • The Agreement: The worker and employer sign a contract or make an agreement for specific work. • The Payment: The worker receives money based on hours worked, tasks completed, or a fixed salary. • The Ownership: The final product or service belongs to the employer, not the worker. Key Views on Wage Labor • Standard Economics: It is a voluntary exchange of services for money in a free market. • Marxist Theory: Critics like Karl Marx argued fixed salary. • The Ownership: The final product or service belongs to the employer, not the worker. Key Views on Wage Labor • Standard Economics: It is a voluntary exchange of services for money in a free market. • Marxist Theory: Critics like Karl Marx argued it creates inequality. Because workers do not own the tools or factories (the means of production), they must sell their labor to survive. Marx stated that workers are paid enough to live, but the extra value of what they produce goes to the employer as profit. Would you like to explore how wage labor started during the Industrial Revolution or learn more about the criticisms of wage labor?<
http://take10charles.blogspot.com/2023/09/blog-post_64.html
<
Wikipedia : Wage labour (also wage labor in American English), usually referred to as paid work, paid employment, or paid labour, refers to the socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer in which the worker works for a set amount of money under a formal or informal employment contract. l These transactions usually occur in a labour market where wages or salaries are market-determined. I2] Wage labor is a service in standard economic theory.<
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Yes, wage-laborers are the proletariat. In Marxist theory, the terms "wage-laborers" and "proletariat" refer to the exact same social class. Defining the Proletariat Marx defines the proletariat by two main characteristics: • No Ownership of Production: They do not own the factories, tools, land, or resources (the means of production) needed to create goods. • Survival Through Wages: Because they own nothing but their ability to work, they have no choice but to sell their labor-power to capitalists in exchange for a wage to buy the means of production) needed to create goods. • Survival Through Wages: Because they own nothing but their ability to work, they have no choice but to sell their labor-power to capitalists in exchange for a wage to buy food, housing, and basic necessities. <
The opposite of the proletariat is the bourgeoisie (the capitalist class), who own the means of production and generate wealth by hiring wage-laborers and keeping the surplus value they produce. Would you like to explore Marx's predictions for how the proletariat would organize, or see how he distinguished them from other groups like the peasantry or the lumpenproletariat? <
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm#S1<
<
Karl Marx. Capital Volume One Part I: Commodities and Money Chapter One: Commodities Contents Section 1 - The Two Factors of a Commodity: Use-Value and Value Section 2 - The two-fold Character of the Labour Embodied in Commodities THE TWO FACTORS OF A COMMODITY: USE-VALUE AND VALUE (THE SUBSTANCE OF VALUE AND THE MAGNITUDE OF VALUE) The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist mode of production prevails, presents itself as “an immense accumulation of commodities,”[1] its unit being a single commodity. Our investigation must therefore begin with the analysis of a commodity. A commodity is, in the first place, an object outside us, a thing that by its properties satisfies human wants of some sort or another. The nature of such wants, whether, for instance, they spring from the stomach or from fancy, makes no difference.[2] Neither are we here concerned to know how the object satisfies these wants, whether directly as means of subsistence, or indirectly as means of production. Every useful thing, as iron, paper, &c., may be looked at from the two points of view of quality and quantity. It is an assemblage of many properties, and may therefore be of use in various ways. To discover the various uses of things is the work of history.[3] So also is the establishment of socially-recognized standards of measure for the quantities of these useful objects. The diversity of these measures has its origin partly in the diverse nature of the objects to be measured, partly in convention. The utility of a thing makes it a use value.[4] But this utility is not a thing of air. Being limited by the physical properties of the commodity, it has no existence apart from that commodity. A commodity, such as iron, corn, or a diamond, is therefore, so far as it is a material thing, a use value, something useful. This property of a commodity is independent of the amount of labour required to appropriate its useful qualities. When treating of use value, we always assume to be dealing with definite quantities, such as dozens of watches, yards of linen, or tons of iron. The use values of commodities furnish the material for a special study, that of the commercial knowledge of commodities.[5] Use values become a reality only by use or consumption: they also constitute the substance of all wealth, whatever may be the social form of that wealth. In the form of society we are about to consider, they are, in addition, the material depositories of exchange value. Exchange value, at first sight, presents itself as a quantitative relation, as the proportion in which values in use of one sort are exchanged for those of another sort,[6] a relation constantly changing with time and place. Hence exchange value appears to be something accidental and purely relative, and consequently an intrinsic value, i.e., an exchange value that is inseparably connected with, inherent in commodities, seems a contradiction in terms.[7] Let us consider the matter a little more closely. A given commodity, e.g., a quarter of wheat is exchanged for x blacking, y silk, or z gold, &c. – in short, for other commodities in the most different proportions. Instead of one exchange value, the wheat has, therefore, a great many. But since x blacking, y silk, or z gold &c., each represents the exchange value of one quarter of wheat, x blacking, y silk, z gold, &c., must, as exchange values, be replaceable by each other, or equal to each other. Therefore, first: the valid exchange values of a given commodity express something equal; secondly, exchange value, generally, is only the mode of expression, the phenomenal form, of something contained in it, yet distinguishable from it. Let us take two commodities, e.g., corn and iron. The proportions in which they are exchangeable, whatever those proportions may be, can always be represented by an equation in which a given quantity of corn is equated to some quantity of iron: e.g., 1 quarter corn = x cwt. iron. What does this equation tell us? It tells us that in two different things – in 1 quarter of corn and x cwt. of iron, there exists in equal quantities something common to both. The two things must therefore be equal to a third, which in itself is neither the one nor the other. Each of them, so far as it is exchange value, must therefore be reducible to this third. A simple geometrical illustration will make this clear. In order to calculate and compare the areas of rectilinear figures, we decompose them into triangles. But the area of the triangle itself is expressed by something totally different from its visible figure, namely, by half the product of the base multiplied by the altitude. In the same way the exchange values of commodities must be capable of being expressed in terms of something common to them all, of which thing they represent a greater or less quantity. This common “something” cannot be either a geometrical, a chemical, or any other natural property of commodities. Such properties claim our attention only in so far as they affect the utility of those commodities, make them use values. But the exchange of commodities is evidently an act characterised by a total abstraction from use value. Then one use value is just as good as another, provided only it be present in sufficient quantity. Or, as old Barbon says, “one sort of wares are as good as another, if the values be equal. There is no difference or distinction in things of equal value ... An hundred pounds’ worth of lead or iron, is of as great value as one hundred pounds’ worth of silver or gold.”[8] As use values, commodities are, above all, of different qualities, but as exchange values they are merely different quantities, and consequently do not contain an atom of use value. If then we leave out of consideration the use value of commodities, they have only one common property left, that of being products of labour. But even the product of labour itself has undergone a change in our hands. If we make abstraction from its use value, we make abstraction at the same time from the material elements and shapes that make the product a use value; we see in it no longer a table, a house, yarn, or any other useful thing. Its existence as a material thing is put out of sight. Neither can it any longer be regarded as the product of the labour of the joiner, the mason, the spinner, or of any other definite kind of productive labour. Along with the useful qualities of the products themselves, we put out of sight both the useful character of the various kinds of labour embodied in them, and the concrete forms of that labour; there is nothing left but what is common to them all; all are reduced to one and the same sort of labour, human labour in the abstract. Let us now consider the residue of each of these products; it consists of the same unsubstantial reality in each, a mere congelation of homogeneous human labour, of labour power expended without regard to the mode of its expenditure. All that these things now tell us is, that human labour power has been expended in their production, that human labour is embodied in them. When looked at as crystals of this social substance, common to them all, they are – Values. We have seen that when commodities are exchanged, their exchange value manifests itself as something totally independent of their use value. But if we abstract from their use value, there remains their Value as defined above. Therefore, the common substance that manifests itself in the exchange value of commodities, whenever they are exchanged, is their value. The progress of our investigation will show that exchange value is the only form in which the value of commodities can manifest itself or be expressed. For the present, however, we have to consider the nature of value independently of this, its form. A use value, or useful article, therefore, has value only because human labour in the abstract has been embodied or materialised in it. How, then, is the magnitude of this value to be measured? Plainly, by the quantity of the value-creating substance, the labour, contained in the article. The quantity of labour, however, is measured by its duration, and labour time in its turn finds its standard in weeks, days, and hours. Some people might think that if the value of a commodity is determined by the quantity of labour spent on it, the more idle and unskilful the labourer, the more valuable would his commodity be, because more time would be required in its production. The labour, however, that forms the substance of value, is homogeneous human labour, expenditure of one uniform labour power. The total labour power of society, which is embodied in the sum total of the values of all commodities produced by that society, counts here as one homogeneous mass of human labour power, composed though it be of innumerable individual units. Each of these units is the same as any other, so far as it has the character of the average labour power of society, and takes effect as such; that is, so far as it requires for producing a commodity, no more time than is needed on an average, no more than is socially necessary. The labour time socially necessary is that required to produce an article under the normal conditions of production, and with the average degree of skill and intensity prevalent at the time. The introduction of power-looms into England probably reduced by one-half the labour required to weave a given quantity of yarn into cloth. The hand-loom weavers, as a matter of fact, continued to require the same time as before; but for all that, the product of one hour of their labour represented after the change only half an hour’s social labour, and consequently fell to one-half its former value. We see then that that which determines the magnitude of the value of any article is the amount of labour socially necessary, or the labour time socially necessary for its production.[9] Each individual commodity, in this connexion, is to be considered as an average sample of its class.[10] Commodities, therefore, in which equal quantities of labour are embodied, or which can be produced in the same time, have the same value. The value of one commodity is to the value of any other, as the labour time necessary for the production of the one is to that necessary for the production of the other. “As values, all commodities are only definite masses of congealed labour time.”[11] The value of a commodity would therefore remain constant, if the labour time required for its production also remained constant. But the latter changes with every variation in the productiveness of labour. This productiveness is determined by various circumstances, amongst others, by the average amount of skill of the workmen, the state of science, and the degree of its practical application, the social organisation of production, the extent and capabilities of the means of production, and by physical conditions. For example, the same amount of labour in favourable seasons is embodied in 8 bushels of corn, and in unfavourable, only in four. The same labour extracts from rich mines more metal than from poor mines. Diamonds are of very rare occurrence on the earth’s surface, and hence their discovery costs, on an average, a great deal of labour time. Consequently much labour is represented in a small compass. Jacob doubts whether gold has ever been paid for at its full value. This applies still more to diamonds. According to Eschwege, the total produce of the Brazilian diamond mines for the eighty years, ending in 1823, had not realised the price of one-and-a-half years’ average produce of the sugar and coffee plantations of the same country, although the diamonds cost much more labour, and therefore represented more value. With richer mines, the same quantity of labour would embody itself in more diamonds, and their value would fall. If we could succeed at a small expenditure of labour, in converting carbon into diamonds, their value might fall below that of bricks. In general, the greater the productiveness of labour, the less is the labour time required for the production of an article, the less is the amount of labour crystallised in that article, and the less is its value; and vice versâ, the less the productiveness of labour, the greater is the labour time required for the production of an article, and the greater is its value. The value of a commodity, therefore, varies directly as the quantity, and inversely as the productiveness, of the labour incorporated in it. [A] A thing can be a use value, without having value. This is the case whenever its utility to man is not due to labour. Such are air, virgin soil, natural meadows, &c. A thing can be useful, and the product of human labour, without being a commodity. Whoever directly satisfies his wants with the produce of his own labour, creates, indeed, use values, but not commodities. In order to produce the latter, he must not only produce use values, but use values for others, social use values. (And not only for others, without more. The mediaeval peasant produced quit-rent-corn for his feudal lord and tithe-corn for his parson. But neither the quit-rent-corn nor the tithe-corn became commodities by reason of the fact that they had been produced for others. To become a commodity a product must be transferred to another, whom it will serve as a use value, by means of an exchange.)[12] Lastly nothing can have value, without being an object of utility. If the thing is useless, so is the labour contained in it; the labour does not count as labour, and therefore creates no value.<
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm#S1
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1865/value-price-profit/<
Value, Price and Profit Speech by Marx to the First International Working Men's Association, June 1865 Source: Marx, Karl. Value, Price and Profit. New York: International Co., Inc, 1969; Written: between end of May and June 27, 1865; First published: 1898; Edited: by Eleanor Marx Aveling; HTML Mark-up: Mike Ballard, 1995; Proofed: and corrected by Brandon Poole, 2009. Introduction Preface by Edward Aveling Preliminary 1. Production and Wages 2. Production, Wages, Profits 3. Wages and Currency 4. Supply and Demand 5. Wages and Prices 6. Value and Labour 7. Labour Power 2 Drndnictinn of Cumnlin Talin Preface by Edward Aveling Preliminary 1. Production and Wages 2. Production, Wages, Profits 3. Wages and Currency 4. Supply and Demand 5. Wages and Prices 6. Value and Labour 7. Labour Power 8. Production of Surplus Value 9. Value of Labour 10. Profit is made by Selling a Commodity at its Value 11. The different Parts into which Surplus Value is Decomposed 12. The General Relation of Profits, Wages, and Prices 13. Main cases of Attempts at Raising Wages or Resisting their Fall 14. The Struggle between Capital and Labour, and its Results Study Guide | Notes by Marx Marx and Engels on Political Economy <
Preface by Edward Aveling Preliminary 1. Production and Wages 2. Production, Wages, Profits 3. Wages and Currency 4. Supply and Demand 5. Wages and Prices 6. Value and Labour 7. Labour Power 8. Production of Surplus Value 9. Value of Labour 10. Profit is made by Selling a Commodity at its Value 11. The different Parts into which Surplus Value is Decomposed 12. The General Relation of Profits, Wages, and Prices 13. Main cases of Attempts at Raising Wages or Resisting their Fall 14. The Struggle between Capital and Labour, and its Results Study Guide | Notes by Marx Marx and Engels on Political Economy<
Karl Marx's 1865 Value, Price and Profit explains that profit comes from unpaid labor time, creating an inverse relationship between wages and profit. A Revolutionary Co... +1 Core Concepts • Value: The amount of socially necessary labor time needed to make a commodity. • Wages: The cost of the worker's labor power, or what is required to keep the worker alive and working. • Profit: The surplus value left over after the capitalist pays for materials, equipment, and wages. W)Profit: The surplus value left over after the capitalist pays for materials, equipment, and wages. W Wikipedia +2 The Relationship • Inverse Proportion: When the value created by a worker is split, higher wages mean lower profit, and lower wages mean higher profit. • Prices: Prices are regulated by overall labor value, not just by arbitrary markups on wages. • Exploitation: Workers produce more value in a workday than what they receive in their paycheck, forming the basis of capitalist profit. - Marxists Internet ... +4 Would you like to explore how this relates to Karl Marx's theory of surplus value or → his debate with John Weston? Marxists Internet Archive Value, Price and Profit, Ask anything W Wikipedia +2 Ask anything 미 Q wages, price profit
Labor Day is a federal holiday in the United States celebrated on the first Monday of September to honor and recognize the American labor movement and the works and contributions of laborers to the development and achievements in the United States.[1][2][3]
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Labor in general , and in capitalism , Wage-Labor is the source of all EXCHANGE-- value; along with Nature , Labor is the source of USE-value <
Happy Wage-Labor Day to Thou , Honey. <
Artificial Intelligence says : <
Wage labor is an economic relationship where a worker sells their labor to an employer in exchange for set money, like a wage or salary; ( Charles Brown. sells labor power to make services and goods, commodities objects and bodily motions , communications)<
How It Works • The Agreement: The worker and employer sign a contract or make an agreement for specific work. • The Payment: The worker receives money based on hours worked, tasks completed, or a fixed salary. • The Ownership: The final product or service belongs to the employer, not the worker. Key Views on Wage Labor • Standard Economics: It is a voluntary exchange of services for money in a free market. • Marxist Theory: Critics like Karl Marx argued fixed salary. • The Ownership: The final product or service belongs to the employer, not the worker. Key Views on Wage Labor • Standard Economics: It is a voluntary exchange of services for money in a free market. • Marxist Theory: Critics like Karl Marx argued it creates inequality. Because workers do not own the tools or factories (the means of production), they must sell their labor to survive. Marx stated that workers are paid enough to live, but the extra value of what they produce goes to the employer as profit. Would you like to explore how wage labor started during the Industrial Revolution or learn more about the criticisms of wage labor?<
http://take10charles.blogspot.com/2023/09/blog-post_64.html
<
Wikipedia : Wage labour (also wage labor in American English), usually referred to as paid work, paid employment, or paid labour, refers to the socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer in which the worker works for a set amount of money under a formal or informal employment contract. l These transactions usually occur in a labour market where wages or salaries are market-determined. I2] Wage labor is a service in standard economic theory.<
<
Yes, wage-laborers are the proletariat. In Marxist theory, the terms "wage-laborers" and "proletariat" refer to the exact same social class. Defining the Proletariat Marx defines the proletariat by two main characteristics: • No Ownership of Production: They do not own the factories, tools, land, or resources (the means of production) needed to create goods. • Survival Through Wages: Because they own nothing but their ability to work, they have no choice but to sell their labor-power to capitalists in exchange for a wage to buy the means of production) needed to create goods. • Survival Through Wages: Because they own nothing but their ability to work, they have no choice but to sell their labor-power to capitalists in exchange for a wage to buy food, housing, and basic necessities. <
The opposite of the proletariat is the bourgeoisie (the capitalist class), who own the means of production and generate wealth by hiring wage-laborers and keeping the surplus value they produce. Would you like to explore Marx's predictions for how the proletariat would organize, or see how he distinguished them from other groups like the peasantry or the lumpenproletariat? <
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm#S1<
<
Karl Marx. Capital Volume One Part I: Commodities and Money Chapter One: Commodities Contents Section 1 - The Two Factors of a Commodity: Use-Value and Value Section 2 - The two-fold Character of the Labour Embodied in Commodities THE TWO FACTORS OF A COMMODITY: USE-VALUE AND VALUE (THE SUBSTANCE OF VALUE AND THE MAGNITUDE OF VALUE) The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist mode of production prevails, presents itself as “an immense accumulation of commodities,”[1] its unit being a single commodity. Our investigation must therefore begin with the analysis of a commodity. A commodity is, in the first place, an object outside us, a thing that by its properties satisfies human wants of some sort or another. The nature of such wants, whether, for instance, they spring from the stomach or from fancy, makes no difference.[2] Neither are we here concerned to know how the object satisfies these wants, whether directly as means of subsistence, or indirectly as means of production. Every useful thing, as iron, paper, &c., may be looked at from the two points of view of quality and quantity. It is an assemblage of many properties, and may therefore be of use in various ways. To discover the various uses of things is the work of history.[3] So also is the establishment of socially-recognized standards of measure for the quantities of these useful objects. The diversity of these measures has its origin partly in the diverse nature of the objects to be measured, partly in convention. The utility of a thing makes it a use value.[4] But this utility is not a thing of air. Being limited by the physical properties of the commodity, it has no existence apart from that commodity. A commodity, such as iron, corn, or a diamond, is therefore, so far as it is a material thing, a use value, something useful. This property of a commodity is independent of the amount of labour required to appropriate its useful qualities. When treating of use value, we always assume to be dealing with definite quantities, such as dozens of watches, yards of linen, or tons of iron. The use values of commodities furnish the material for a special study, that of the commercial knowledge of commodities.[5] Use values become a reality only by use or consumption: they also constitute the substance of all wealth, whatever may be the social form of that wealth. In the form of society we are about to consider, they are, in addition, the material depositories of exchange value. Exchange value, at first sight, presents itself as a quantitative relation, as the proportion in which values in use of one sort are exchanged for those of another sort,[6] a relation constantly changing with time and place. Hence exchange value appears to be something accidental and purely relative, and consequently an intrinsic value, i.e., an exchange value that is inseparably connected with, inherent in commodities, seems a contradiction in terms.[7] Let us consider the matter a little more closely. A given commodity, e.g., a quarter of wheat is exchanged for x blacking, y silk, or z gold, &c. – in short, for other commodities in the most different proportions. Instead of one exchange value, the wheat has, therefore, a great many. But since x blacking, y silk, or z gold &c., each represents the exchange value of one quarter of wheat, x blacking, y silk, z gold, &c., must, as exchange values, be replaceable by each other, or equal to each other. Therefore, first: the valid exchange values of a given commodity express something equal; secondly, exchange value, generally, is only the mode of expression, the phenomenal form, of something contained in it, yet distinguishable from it. Let us take two commodities, e.g., corn and iron. The proportions in which they are exchangeable, whatever those proportions may be, can always be represented by an equation in which a given quantity of corn is equated to some quantity of iron: e.g., 1 quarter corn = x cwt. iron. What does this equation tell us? It tells us that in two different things – in 1 quarter of corn and x cwt. of iron, there exists in equal quantities something common to both. The two things must therefore be equal to a third, which in itself is neither the one nor the other. Each of them, so far as it is exchange value, must therefore be reducible to this third. A simple geometrical illustration will make this clear. In order to calculate and compare the areas of rectilinear figures, we decompose them into triangles. But the area of the triangle itself is expressed by something totally different from its visible figure, namely, by half the product of the base multiplied by the altitude. In the same way the exchange values of commodities must be capable of being expressed in terms of something common to them all, of which thing they represent a greater or less quantity. This common “something” cannot be either a geometrical, a chemical, or any other natural property of commodities. Such properties claim our attention only in so far as they affect the utility of those commodities, make them use values. But the exchange of commodities is evidently an act characterised by a total abstraction from use value. Then one use value is just as good as another, provided only it be present in sufficient quantity. Or, as old Barbon says, “one sort of wares are as good as another, if the values be equal. There is no difference or distinction in things of equal value ... An hundred pounds’ worth of lead or iron, is of as great value as one hundred pounds’ worth of silver or gold.”[8] As use values, commodities are, above all, of different qualities, but as exchange values they are merely different quantities, and consequently do not contain an atom of use value. If then we leave out of consideration the use value of commodities, they have only one common property left, that of being products of labour. But even the product of labour itself has undergone a change in our hands. If we make abstraction from its use value, we make abstraction at the same time from the material elements and shapes that make the product a use value; we see in it no longer a table, a house, yarn, or any other useful thing. Its existence as a material thing is put out of sight. Neither can it any longer be regarded as the product of the labour of the joiner, the mason, the spinner, or of any other definite kind of productive labour. Along with the useful qualities of the products themselves, we put out of sight both the useful character of the various kinds of labour embodied in them, and the concrete forms of that labour; there is nothing left but what is common to them all; all are reduced to one and the same sort of labour, human labour in the abstract. Let us now consider the residue of each of these products; it consists of the same unsubstantial reality in each, a mere congelation of homogeneous human labour, of labour power expended without regard to the mode of its expenditure. All that these things now tell us is, that human labour power has been expended in their production, that human labour is embodied in them. When looked at as crystals of this social substance, common to them all, they are – Values. We have seen that when commodities are exchanged, their exchange value manifests itself as something totally independent of their use value. But if we abstract from their use value, there remains their Value as defined above. Therefore, the common substance that manifests itself in the exchange value of commodities, whenever they are exchanged, is their value. The progress of our investigation will show that exchange value is the only form in which the value of commodities can manifest itself or be expressed. For the present, however, we have to consider the nature of value independently of this, its form. A use value, or useful article, therefore, has value only because human labour in the abstract has been embodied or materialised in it. How, then, is the magnitude of this value to be measured? Plainly, by the quantity of the value-creating substance, the labour, contained in the article. The quantity of labour, however, is measured by its duration, and labour time in its turn finds its standard in weeks, days, and hours. Some people might think that if the value of a commodity is determined by the quantity of labour spent on it, the more idle and unskilful the labourer, the more valuable would his commodity be, because more time would be required in its production. The labour, however, that forms the substance of value, is homogeneous human labour, expenditure of one uniform labour power. The total labour power of society, which is embodied in the sum total of the values of all commodities produced by that society, counts here as one homogeneous mass of human labour power, composed though it be of innumerable individual units. Each of these units is the same as any other, so far as it has the character of the average labour power of society, and takes effect as such; that is, so far as it requires for producing a commodity, no more time than is needed on an average, no more than is socially necessary. The labour time socially necessary is that required to produce an article under the normal conditions of production, and with the average degree of skill and intensity prevalent at the time. The introduction of power-looms into England probably reduced by one-half the labour required to weave a given quantity of yarn into cloth. The hand-loom weavers, as a matter of fact, continued to require the same time as before; but for all that, the product of one hour of their labour represented after the change only half an hour’s social labour, and consequently fell to one-half its former value. We see then that that which determines the magnitude of the value of any article is the amount of labour socially necessary, or the labour time socially necessary for its production.[9] Each individual commodity, in this connexion, is to be considered as an average sample of its class.[10] Commodities, therefore, in which equal quantities of labour are embodied, or which can be produced in the same time, have the same value. The value of one commodity is to the value of any other, as the labour time necessary for the production of the one is to that necessary for the production of the other. “As values, all commodities are only definite masses of congealed labour time.”[11] The value of a commodity would therefore remain constant, if the labour time required for its production also remained constant. But the latter changes with every variation in the productiveness of labour. This productiveness is determined by various circumstances, amongst others, by the average amount of skill of the workmen, the state of science, and the degree of its practical application, the social organisation of production, the extent and capabilities of the means of production, and by physical conditions. For example, the same amount of labour in favourable seasons is embodied in 8 bushels of corn, and in unfavourable, only in four. The same labour extracts from rich mines more metal than from poor mines. Diamonds are of very rare occurrence on the earth’s surface, and hence their discovery costs, on an average, a great deal of labour time. Consequently much labour is represented in a small compass. Jacob doubts whether gold has ever been paid for at its full value. This applies still more to diamonds. According to Eschwege, the total produce of the Brazilian diamond mines for the eighty years, ending in 1823, had not realised the price of one-and-a-half years’ average produce of the sugar and coffee plantations of the same country, although the diamonds cost much more labour, and therefore represented more value. With richer mines, the same quantity of labour would embody itself in more diamonds, and their value would fall. If we could succeed at a small expenditure of labour, in converting carbon into diamonds, their value might fall below that of bricks. In general, the greater the productiveness of labour, the less is the labour time required for the production of an article, the less is the amount of labour crystallised in that article, and the less is its value; and vice versâ, the less the productiveness of labour, the greater is the labour time required for the production of an article, and the greater is its value. The value of a commodity, therefore, varies directly as the quantity, and inversely as the productiveness, of the labour incorporated in it. [A] A thing can be a use value, without having value. This is the case whenever its utility to man is not due to labour. Such are air, virgin soil, natural meadows, &c. A thing can be useful, and the product of human labour, without being a commodity. Whoever directly satisfies his wants with the produce of his own labour, creates, indeed, use values, but not commodities. In order to produce the latter, he must not only produce use values, but use values for others, social use values. (And not only for others, without more. The mediaeval peasant produced quit-rent-corn for his feudal lord and tithe-corn for his parson. But neither the quit-rent-corn nor the tithe-corn became commodities by reason of the fact that they had been produced for others. To become a commodity a product must be transferred to another, whom it will serve as a use value, by means of an exchange.)[12] Lastly nothing can have value, without being an object of utility. If the thing is useless, so is the labour contained in it; the labour does not count as labour, and therefore creates no value.<
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm#S1
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1865/value-price-profit/<
Value, Price and Profit Speech by Marx to the First International Working Men's Association, June 1865 Source: Marx, Karl. Value, Price and Profit. New York: International Co., Inc, 1969; Written: between end of May and June 27, 1865; First published: 1898; Edited: by Eleanor Marx Aveling; HTML Mark-up: Mike Ballard, 1995; Proofed: and corrected by Brandon Poole, 2009. Introduction Preface by Edward Aveling Preliminary 1. Production and Wages 2. Production, Wages, Profits 3. Wages and Currency 4. Supply and Demand 5. Wages and Prices 6. Value and Labour 7. Labour Power 2 Drndnictinn of Cumnlin Talin Preface by Edward Aveling Preliminary 1. Production and Wages 2. Production, Wages, Profits 3. Wages and Currency 4. Supply and Demand 5. Wages and Prices 6. Value and Labour 7. Labour Power 8. Production of Surplus Value 9. Value of Labour 10. Profit is made by Selling a Commodity at its Value 11. The different Parts into which Surplus Value is Decomposed 12. The General Relation of Profits, Wages, and Prices 13. Main cases of Attempts at Raising Wages or Resisting their Fall 14. The Struggle between Capital and Labour, and its Results Study Guide | Notes by Marx Marx and Engels on Political Economy <
Preface by Edward Aveling Preliminary 1. Production and Wages 2. Production, Wages, Profits 3. Wages and Currency 4. Supply and Demand 5. Wages and Prices 6. Value and Labour 7. Labour Power 8. Production of Surplus Value 9. Value of Labour 10. Profit is made by Selling a Commodity at its Value 11. The different Parts into which Surplus Value is Decomposed 12. The General Relation of Profits, Wages, and Prices 13. Main cases of Attempts at Raising Wages or Resisting their Fall 14. The Struggle between Capital and Labour, and its Results Study Guide | Notes by Marx Marx and Engels on Political Economy<
Karl Marx's 1865 Value, Price and Profit explains that profit comes from unpaid labor time, creating an inverse relationship between wages and profit. A Revolutionary Co... +1 Core Concepts • Value: The amount of socially necessary labor time needed to make a commodity. • Wages: The cost of the worker's labor power, or what is required to keep the worker alive and working. • Profit: The surplus value left over after the capitalist pays for materials, equipment, and wages. W)Profit: The surplus value left over after the capitalist pays for materials, equipment, and wages. W Wikipedia +2 The Relationship • Inverse Proportion: When the value created by a worker is split, higher wages mean lower profit, and lower wages mean higher profit. • Prices: Prices are regulated by overall labor value, not just by arbitrary markups on wages. • Exploitation: Workers produce more value in a workday than what they receive in their paycheck, forming the basis of capitalist profit. - Marxists Internet ... +4 Would you like to explore how this relates to Karl Marx's theory of surplus value or → his debate with John Weston? Marxists Internet Archive Value, Price and Profit, Ask anything W Wikipedia +2 Ask anything 미 Q wages, price profit