PHIL3395: Marx

Novy SP09

Notes on Wolff Chapter 2 (pp.66-99)

The Economics of Capitalism

1. Commodity

1. Use-value vs. Exchange-value

2. Labor Theory of Value

3. Value of commodity = socially necessary labor time required for its production

2. Concrete Labor (produces use-value) vs. Abstract Labor (produces exchange-value)

1. Insight #1: EV frustrates UV and so promotes alienation

2. Insight #2: Regarding EV: how does capitalist make a profit?

3. Circuit of commodities vs. Circuit of capital (Usury is its purest form)

4. Why M ≠ M’

1. Labor power generates more value in its use than its cost

2. Necessary Labor vs. Surplus Labor

3. Surplus value is source of all profits

5. Why workers can’t refuse to be exploited

6. Why workers sell their labor so cheaply

7. Consequences

1. Full employment is not possible

2. To better workers’ lot, the capitalist must lower profit margin
3. To regain profit margin the capitalist requires labor-saving machinery

4. Law of the falling rate of profit

5. Capitalism is a system in terminal decline; built-in obsolescence

The Transition to Communism

1. Really, Russia?

2. Material conditions of communism “developing in the womb of the old society”

3. Abundance

1. Highly developed forces of production – technology

2. Classes exist only if there is a possibility of productive surplus

4. Fettering of the development of the productive forces

5. Existent communist-friendly structures in advanced capitalism

6. Two models of a communist revolution

1. Economic-first

2. Politics-first

The Nature of Communism

1. After the revolution

1. Marx vs. Bakunin on “Dictatorship of the Proletariat”

2. We ought not draw up “recipes for the cook shops of the future”

2. “Known” qualities:

3. Nature of work

4. Economic organization

5. Distribution of resources