China has taken considerable steps in recent years to address electronic waste management practices unsafe for the individuals involved and harmful to local land and water supplies, as NEEDigest has previously reported.

However, China’s limited electronic waste recycling facilities and swelling consumption patterns has rendered domestic containment of toxic trash a serious problem.

Like China, the US and Europe face this predicament, and for years have exported trash to developing countries in Asia and Africa at a lower cost and with fewer environmental safeguards. It is therefore somewhat unsurprising, but no less disheartening, to find out that China, too, is joining the ranks of countries opting to manage waste by having less developed countries manage it for them – often at considerable health and environmental risks.

The newest recipient country is not in Africa or Southeast Asia, as one might expect.

Rather, it appears that waste is being diverted to North Korea, China’s northeastern neighbor, whose western coast lies directly across from China’s prosperous coastal areas and many port towns. This revelation contradicts certain assumptions that North Korea, its economic development stunted due to a centrally planned economy and isolation from the outside world, was comparatively free from the industrial pollution that beleaguers many of its East and South Asian counterparts.

According to South Korean newspaper Dong-a Ilbo, North Korean entities responsible for generating foreign currency are importing and burying industrial waste from China. The trade is being conducted secretly, according to reports, and critics of the trade from North Korea’s scientific community have been silenced.

As per the Dong-a Ilbo:

Daily NK, a media outlet on North Korean affairs, quoted a source in the North’s South Hamkyong Province as saying, “The soil survey research center at Hamhung Institute of Technology released a research paper on its study of land pollution resulting from burial of industrial waste from China and a letter urging countermeasures to the Central Committee of the (North Korean) Workers’ Party. The institute was dismantled and senior officials and researchers were all purged.”

This is not the first instance where North Korea has been reported as soliciting other countries’ toxic waste.

In the mid-1990s, North Korea offered to dispose of the North Sea Brent Spar oil storage platform for Royal Dutch Shell, which the company had planned to dump in the deep Atlantic in 1995. The deal did not go through.

In 1997, Taiwan officials negotiated a cash-for-nuclear waste deal with the North Korean government. South Korea mounted pressure to cancel the deal, and in the end, Taiwan did not send the 60,000 barrels of toxic waste to North Korea.

Since then, North Korea has become more aggressive in its offerings.

Solicitations from the hermit country have been found on a Chinese-language website called “I DPRK” that promotes investment in North Korea. In the words of one of these ads North Korea seeks plastic and electronic waste that “can be processed in the port but which other countries and territories are restricted from dealing in.”

The website further stated “there are no limits, any business taking advantage of [North] Korea’s low labour costs for intensive processing is welcome.”

Just how much e-waste has been sent from China to North Korea is not known. The photo above shows North Korean workers unloading e-waste on the docks of Sinuiju, which lies across from the Chinese border town Dandong. Apart from the trade of waste, China is North Korea’s largest trading partner.

In 2008, bilateral trade reached $2.79 billion, though a big imbalance favoring North Korea exists. North Korea’s pronounced dependence on China is illustrated by data revealing much of the country’s food and nearly 90 percent of its energy supplies come from China. This imbalance is seen by some to be giving China added economic leverage with North Korea.

As China’s economy and personal wealth continue to grow, while North Korea remains economically stagnant, it is not difficult to imagine the streams of electronic waste coming from China widening further and wreaking more havoc on the land and people, ill-equipped to properly handle toxic substances, that come into contact with it.

By Robert LaVida

The current global economic crisis is a capitalist crisis. Millions of workers are losing their jobs and face a chaotic market which has no employment to offer. Many families face eviction from their homes as poverty rises to its highest level since the Great Depression. This situation offers plenty of opportunity for the “Change” President Obama has promised the nation, though we have yet to see it in any way, shape or form.

Though we have a new CEO of the ruling class in office it should not deter us from seeking to change the economic landscape to the benefit of the working class and the US labor movement. Given that one of the root causes of this economic crisis is a growing divide between the rich and the working class in the United States, and the corresponding growth of corporate power, now is a time for our Party to fight for both economic rights (job creation, extension of unemployment benefits, expansion of Medicare, etc.) and political power.

Particularly for the American Party of Labor and the U.S. working class movement, especially the organized labor movement, increasing power will mean reversing the slow decline of membership that has marked the past four decades. Today only about 12% of the workers in the United States belong to a union, although more than half of all workers say they would join a union if they could. Decades of anti-union propaganda distributed by the capitalists have contributed to this.

But how to turn around decades of slow retraction given the continued attacks on unions and workers’ right to organize? The labor movement and allies in the social and economic justice movements are pushing hard on the House and Senate to change national labor law to fix some of its biggest holes. The proposed legislation, called the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), would increase the currently feeble sanctions against employers who fire workers for supporting a union and force arbitration of a union contract if an employer refuses to negotiate within a reasonable amount of time. Furthermore, the legislation would force a company to recognize a union once a majority of workers had signed a petition or card saying they wanted to join the union. These changes would dramatically increase workers’ power to form unions by taking away some of the critical tools employers use to drag out the unionization process while they harass and intimidate workers.

Clearly shifting the balance of power, even slightly, toward workers and unions will not be easy, nor will one legislative battle alone turn around this economic crisis. That is why grassroots groups that bring together unions, community organizations and student activists are working to connect the fight for EFCA to a broader fight for economic rights, a fight at the local, state and national levels to increase social spending and the social safety net to create jobs, keep people in their homes, and reverse the skyrocketing cost of health care.

In October and December of last year, community and labor activists around the country took to the streets as part of “Peoples’ Bailout Now” weeks of action, supporting struggles to keep people in their jobs (or at least guarantee their severance pay, in the case of the Chicago Republic Windows and Doors workers who occupied their factory), stop evictions from foreclosed homes, and fight for public property like schools and shelters to remain public.
Building bridges between the battle for major labor law reform and the push for a massive economic stimulus package is critical for strengthening the working class movement. By taking this opportunity to raise the political consciousness of working people, we help to build a broad movement of the most advanced members of that class. This work brings together groups of people with similar interests who often are working so hard on their own campaigns and issues that they don’t have the time or resources to connect.

We should begin in the cities to partner with labor unions, workers’ centers and organizations including domestic workers and day laborers, and other grassroots tenant and community rights organizations to hold town-hall style gatherings to define what a real economic recovery that impacts the people most affected by the current economic crisis would look like.

We should come out of these forums with a grassroots proposal and the momentum behind it to secure both the right to organize and the basic right of all people to economic stability. Those changes nationally—together with the critical international solidarity work of ending U.S. military, political, and economic intervention abroad, are the kind of changes the labor movement and the American Party of Labor need to demand of an administration that has raised people’s hope for change.

“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. The knowledge of the existence of something unfathomable to us. The manifestation of the most profound reason, coupled with the most brilliant beauty.

I cannot imagine God, who rewards and punishes the objects of his creation, or who has a will of the kind that we experience in ourselves. I am satisfied with the mystery of life’s eternity and with the awareness of, and glimpse into, the marvelous construction of the existing world, together with a steadfast determination, to comprehend a portion be ever so tiny of the reason that manifests itself in nature. This is the basis of cosmic religiosity. And it appears to me, that the most important function of art and science is awaken this feeling among the receptive and keep it alive.

I sense that it is not the state that has intrinsic values in the machinery of mankind; but rather the creative feeling individual, the personality alone that created the noble and sublime. Men’s ethical behaviour should be effectively grounded on compassion, nurture and social bonds. What is moral, is not the divine, but rather a purely human matter albeit the most important of all human matters. In the course of history the ideal pertaining to human beings behaviour to each other, and pertaining to the preferred organization of their communities have been espoused and taught by enlightened individuals. These ideals and convictions, results of historical experience, empathy and the need for beauty and harmony, have usually been willingly recognized by human beings, at least in theory. The highest principles for our aspirations and judgements are given to us westerners in a jewish, christian religious tradition. It is a very high goal. Free and responsible development of the individual, so that he may place his powers freely and gladly in the service of all mankind. The pursuit of recognition for their own sake, and almost fanatical love of justice and the quest for personal independence, formed the traditional themes of the jewish people, of which I am a member. But if one holds these high principles clearly before ones eyes and compares them with the life and spirit of our times, then it is glaringly apparent that mankind finds itself at present in grave danger.

I see the nature of the current crisis in the juxtaposition of the individual to society. The individual feels more than ever dependent on society, but he feels this dependence not in the positive sense, cradled, connected as part of an organic whole. He sees it as a threat to his natural rights and even his economic existence. His position in society, then, is such that, that which drives his ego is encouraged and developed, and that which would drive him towards other men, a weak impulse to begin with, is left to atrophy. It is my believe that there is only one way to eliminate these evils. Namely, the establishment of a planned economy, coupled with an education geared towards social goals. Alongside the development of individual abilities, the education of the individual aspires to revive an ideal that is geared towards the service of our fellow-men. And that needs to take the place of the glorification of power and outer success.”

Albert Einstein – 1950s

Some, like G. Edward Griffin, have proposed that there are two types of people in the world: individualists and collectivists. The former professes that all great things come from individuals. The latter professes that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Those who observe this dichotomy believe that individualists are superior. However, I’d like to question this.

To avoid repetition, I shall use “he” to denote the individual instead of trying to be politically correct. I myself am a “he”.

The requirements for true individualism

An individualist may have worked in his own quiet laboratory with minimal disruption to invent something great. However, it was the fact that he was able to do away with many startup problems such as designing, constructing and furnishing his laboratory, all of which he most likely could not have done without some help, directly or indirectly. In other words, there is no way he could have made his own hammer, cut down his own trees for wood, made his own ceramic tiles, supplied his own equipment, wrote each and every one of the programs on his computer, etc. There is scant anyone today (or ever) who could have invented something out of materials each of which he himself composed. Therefore, it was the collective work of many individuals upon which he could build further. Standing on the shoulders of giants was what he did to enable him to see further.

For example, I am able to write this entry because I did not have to spend time programming my own blogging software (which I have done in the past but evidently do not use it today), the browser that I use, the operating system on my computer, etc.

The ends never justify the means

Now, at the risk of sounding like a collectivist, I do not support creation that was built on forced collectivization. This means that I would not profess that people go out and force others to build laboratories and provide equipment at the barrel of a gun, just for the sake of innovation! The ends never justify the means. If such a belief is successful to get things done, then it will only lead one to do evil deeds to get other things done. If practiced to the fullest, everyone will suffer in the end. I need not say much if such a belief is a failure.

Voluntary collaboration!

So, the suppliers and the consumer (i.e. the inventor) both must agree to their transactions. Therefore, the collective work must be voluntary. When I look at the world and see the good things in it, I am most likely seeing the results of voluntary collaboration. At the very least, all of that could not have been done by one person alone. Most movies are not one man shows! I also would guess right that all kilometre-long bridges in the world were not built by only one man! Great ideas may come from one man alone, but it is up to him to seek others to help make his ideas reality. Yet, involuntary collaboration will lead to some degree of internal sabotage, or at best, a product that could have been produced with much higher quality.

By all means, an individual may (and would be free to) continue to try to do everything for himself. Eventually, he would find it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to innovate something profound, especially nowadays when everything is mind-boggingly monolithic and complex.

Transactions must be made willingly and without force by either party. A planned economy would make too many false assumptions about what each of the two parties would want. Thus, I question the dichotomy of individualism versus collectivism, a dichotomy that I once thought existed. The dichotomy I now profess is that of volition versus coercion.

Resulting problems

Still, there is the problem of deadlock. If people do not compromise, nothing happens versus the creation of a poor quality product. Voting is too a form of compromise; the non-winning party is forced to go along.

Such is the dilemma today. Clearly, nothing is perfect.

• 
• • Eric Hobsbawm
  • The Guardian, Friday 10 April 2009

The 20th century is well behind us, but we have not yet learned to live in the 21st, or at least to think in a way that fits it. That should not be as difficult as it seems, because the basic idea that dominated economics and politics in the last century has patently disappeared down the plughole of history. This was the way of thinking about modern industrial economies, or for that matter any economies, in terms of two mutually exclusive opposites: capitalism or socialism.

We have lived through two practical attempts to realise these in their pure form: the centrally state-planned economies of the Soviet type and the totally unrestricted and uncontrolled free-market capitalist economy. The first broke down in the 1980s, and the European communist political systems with it. The second is breaking down before our eyes in the greatest crisis of global capitalism since the 1930s. In some ways it is a greater crisis than in the 1930s, because the globalisation of the economy was not then as far advanced as it is today, and the crisis did not affect the planned economy of the Soviet Union. We don’t yet know how grave and lasting the consequences of the present world crisis will be, but they certainly mark the end of the sort of free-market capitalism that captured the world and its governments in the years since Margaret Thatcher and President Reagan.

Impotence therefore faces both those who believe in what amounts to a pure, stateless, market capitalism, a sort of international bourgeois anarchism, and those who believe in a planned socialism uncontaminated by private profit-seeking. Both are bankrupt. The future, like the present and the past, belongs to mixed economies in which public and private are braided together in one way or another. But how? That is the problem for everybody today, but especially for people on the left.

Continued >>

Stephanie Behne shares her thoughts about a new FDR biography.

Chicago Reporter intern, dedicated mother and wife, and emerging career changer Stephanie Behne posted the following in response to a recent post about President Obama and a biography about Franklin Delano Roosevelt by James MacGregor Burns  (Again, the added links are mine):

“I, too, am a little envious of your ability to feast on books. But I’m chomping on a good one now, the Brands biography of FDR you mentioned, Traitor to His Class. I’m just a little over halfway through, but there’s so much in the 430 something pages I read so far, I should mention a couple things while I still remember them!

Brands’ book is reminiscent of Burns, it sounds like, in showing FDR’s true talent as the consummate politician. Congenial, even charming, he not only won the average person over personally but had the ability to reach out and create a sense of understanding with his radio audience, too. A fine use of the technology of the times, really, to further his own political aims. But people responded to him in person, too, so is that so wrong? Politics and technology–sound like anybody we know today?

Another strategy that FDR used that stuck with me was when he’d put rivals together to work out issues, while he mostly stayed out of the way. One example was workers and union reps during the establishment of the NRA and the “planned economy.” Amazingly, it worked over and over with different people and agreements reached to fulfill a variety of political goals.

I could go on and on. FDR and his battle with his polio diagnosis was compelling in Brands’ hands. Roosevelt’s extraordinary handling of the crisis and establishing a sort of a rehab spa for polio victims from across America in Warm Springs, GA–at his expense, he brought them there and encouraged and exercised right alongside of them–was a surprisingly inspiring section. For a period of several years, he recuperated, strengthened, and entertained wonderfully, even fishing, boating and driving a hand-controlled car around the countryside on his own and with groups of friends regularly. In letters, he reported feeling better than he ever had in his life!

Brands goes on to say of FDR: “…for years afterward he credited his experience in Georgia with providing insight into this aspect or that of politics, economics, or the American dream.”

Also, too, there are many striking similarities to our new 44th president, aside from the shrewd use of technology, that it would take at least another comment space to mention them.”

Terrific post, Stephanie! I look forward to borrowing the Brands book after you finish it!

Everyone else, keep the comments coming!

Jeff

You all know that states around the world are trying to solve the current financial crisis by giving huge credits to banks. I would rather call it system crisis. As I am a Swiss citizen and I am interested in Swiss politics, I wonder where Switzerland is going and how we come out after this crisis. Is my bank account firm? I could never have imagined asking myself this question before. Personally, I think it is firm, but you never know.

The Swiss government decided to help UBS, the largest Swiss bank, to overcome the current slump and established a own corporation where UBS can deposit the risky investments, mainly bad hypothecary credits from the USA. So, Swiss tax payers are taking the risk away from the holy UBS. Usually, I only take risks when I know what the consequences are. When I invest my own money, I know how much I can lose. But this deal between the Swiss government and UBS is totally nontransparent to me and it might affect my future income. That sucks!

Another shock this week was when I heard that Mrs. Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, member of the Swiss Federal Council, would like to limit the income for managers. This strongly reminds me of a planned economy. I agree that stockholders should have the power to set the salaries for the managers, but never the state. The recent interactions of states around the world in their economies is worrying to me. When one state is doing something, then the other state is forced to do the same, otherwise market distortions appear. Michael White, an investment banker, says:” The Europeans were always hysterical.” I buy that!

Other people want that former UBS mangers should pay back their bonuses. What a ridiculous idea! Ho jealous must these people be and what effect would this money have on the current crisis? Nothing! I think that these people just want to hurt former managers. Then, why not a public whipping? Let’s stone Mr. Ospel but not with real stones, with Swiss francs.

Mr. Sarkozy, French President since 2007, calls for new worldwide rules for capitalism. I just say, if we listen to a French midget when it comes to business we will be lost! Mr. Sarkozy seems so happy when he talks about how to reform the world, but how do you reform France? Cobbler, stick to you last!

by Kapialism 101

We will start this explanation of the labor theory of value with an analogy from outside the sphere of economics.

A teenage boy is arguing with his mother about borrowing the car. A shrink watches their interaction and he doesn’t really pay attention to the specifics of the argument. To the therapist, it isn’t important if the boy did his chores, or whether the mother promised him he could borrow the car—he sees all these unconscious motivations at play: a struggle over control, the son wanting to leave the nest but not doing it, perhaps a good Oedipus Complex. These motives are the motor and context of the entire interaction even though they don’t enter into the surface substance of the interaction. The specific words of the conversation are important if we want to know about cars and chores, but if we want to know about their relationship, their egos or their behavior then we have to ask deeper questions that penetrate beneath the surface froth of words.

Similarly, the substance of bourgeois theory, supply and demand, is important for understanding some things about the economy: price fluctuations, inflation, etc. But if we want to understand deeper issues about the economy we need other tools that are able to pierce through this surface substance to the underlying meanings. That is what the labor theory of value is all about.

Means and Modes of Production

All societies coordinate human labor in order to produce things. The total social product is divided about society. The organization of this production and distribution is the subject of economics. When societies began producing a surplus of this social product a new aspect of distribution and production entered the equation: who controls what is left?

Under feudalism the social surplus was extracted from peasants by landlords; in a slave system the social surplus is extracted from slaves by slave owners. In these examples the economic act in which the surplus is passed from worker to exploiter is easy to see. Under feudalism the peasants gathered up a portion of all the food they had made, physically took it over to the landlords house, and under slavery a slave works all day harvesting cane, cotton or diamonds and then watches the slaver owner take away all of those goods without compensating them. In both of these modes of production it is clear that human labor is producing these goods and that it is the products of labor that are being appropriated by the dominant class.

Under capitalism the process of exchange makes it harder to see the passing of surplus from exploited to exploiter, but it’s still there. Workers are still producing the entire social product and another class, this time the capitalist class, is taking the surplus from them, selling it back to them and getting rich off of it.

Under capitalism, the worker sells his labor power and is paid a wage for it. The capitalist sells the commodities the worker made and he gets money for it. We don’t see the exploitation, but it’s still there, albeit in a different form. Workers aren’t forced to work for a slave owner or pay a tax to a feudal landlord, but are compelled by necessity to eek out a living in a capitalist society. Most of the time this means selling your labor to a capitalist.

In this way, money—or the process of exchanging goods and services in a “free” market—obscures the underlying reality that what is really going on at a basic, societal level is that a dominant class is extracting the social surplus from a subordinate class. This is basically what the labor theory of value is saying. When people make things in a capitalist society, it is the labor that goes into them that gives them their value. Though money obscures and distorts this underlying value, this collective human labor is still the basic driving force of our collective economic activity.

The concept that the labor that goes into a commodity is the underlying essence of its value has been around for awhile. It even predates Marx, though he gave the theory new life. Economists going all the way back to Ben Franklin realized that this theory helped answer a perplexing question in economic theory: why do heterogeneous commodities exchange? By heterogeneous, I mean that commodities are really different from each other. They have different physical properties, different uses. Why is it that they can all be exchanged in the free market? What explains the ratios of their exchange? Why are some commodities worth more than others?

The theory went on to postulate: all these commodities must be made up of a common substance, something that they all have to a greater or lesser degree, something that gives them value. This thing is their “embodied labor time,” that is, the amount of labor that went into creating them.

Thus a 2008 convertible with custom leather seats and an audio system is worth more than a dozen eggs. This is because it requires the combined labor of many people all working over a long period of time to make all the parts of a car and put them together, whereas to get eggs you throw stale bread at chickens. At today’s price of 55 grand, it would take about 660,000 eggs to equal one 2008 convertible—this is their exchange ratio. The labor theory of value helps us to explain their exchange ratio.

Money & Value

Now, I’ve already said that the act of exchange, the act of buying and selling commodities in the market via money, obscures the underlying labor value of commodities. Let’s explore this point further.

I’ll start by referring back to my opening example of a mother and son having an argument. Even though there may be underlying psychological motives behind their conversation, the words they are using and the topic of the argument still have relevance. Though the topic may not have long-term relevance to their relationship, in the present the topic and words are important to them. As we move between these different perspectives, we see two distinct layers of meaning. Both are important.

So to with money and value. Though the labor value of a commodity may be the underlying substance to an economic interaction, it is the way this value is expressed through a money price that really effects the economic decisions people make. When you go to a store to buy something, you want to know how much money it costs, not how much labor went into it. But the act of buying something with money implies the existence of value, whether or not you are aware of it.

So to with money and value. Though the labor value of a commodity may be the underlying substance to an economic interaction, it is the way this value is expressed through a money price that really effects the economic decisions people make. When you go to a store to buy something, you want to know how much money it costs, not how much labor went into it. But the act of buying something with money implies the existence of value, whether or not you are aware of it.

Specific money prices are determined by supply and demand. Money prices fluctuate—clothes and entertainment commodities come in and out of style, supplies of food temporarily change due to droughts, etc. But underneath this day-to-day fluctuation lies a general equilibrium price related to the amount of labor embodied in commodities.

Money prices are mathematical, quantifiable, observable things. We see dollar signs hanging off of price tags and they have a real effect on us. Not so with labor value: we don’t see the people who make those commodities. Even if we could see them, quantifying the amount of labor time in a commodity is next to impossible; we’d have to figure out not just how much work went into a specific commodity in each stage of its making (and some commodities go through a lot of stages, through many firms, contain parts from all over the world, etc.) but also the labor behind each tool and machine used in the making of the commodity. We could, however, measure the total number of hours worked by society, which is a better measure of labor time anyway, since value is a social concept.

Though there have been countless attempts to quantify this theory, labor value will never be as quantifiable as price is. This is because labor value only really find its expression in money. It would be impossible to have a capitalist economy where goods were traded according to exact measurements of labor time. Capitalist economies require flexibility, and they require liquidity. Money provides this. But in providing this flexibility money also deviates from being an exact measurement of labor time. It is, at best, an approximation.

Money fundamentally acts as a measure of value. It represents work people have done. When you work you are paid money and are more or less frugal with this money depending on how much of it you have and how hard it would be to get more of it. The commodities you buy all cost money because someone had to be paid to make them. If a commodity didn’t take any labor to make, it would be free. This is what I mean when I say that the act of exchange “implies” labor value.

But commodities are constantly fluctuating in price as capitalists find cheaper ways to make commodities, better ways to exploit workers, etc. The supply of money is changing too—money itself is a commodity related to labor time. It has a supply and a demand. Money is also called upon to perform other social functions other than measure value: it lubricates exchange, it can become credit, etc. So money is needed to be much more flexible—to be sensitive to rapid economic changes. We say, though its fundamental role in society is a measure of value, its relationship to this value is a loose one as supply and demand force it to fluctuate above and below the equilibrium values of embodied labor time.

Is All Work Equal?

Here’s another important angle: we said that commodities appear heterogeneous until we see that they have a common substance: labor. But isn’t labor heterogeneous? People work at different speeds, with different skills, with more or less competency. How can these heterogeneous acts be a common substance?

This question makes important the concept of “socially necessary labor time.” Just as in a capitalist society the process of exchange and competition tends to bring prices to a general equilibrium for certain products, so too the process of exchange and competition create a social average of how much labor it takes to complete a task. Remember—value is a concept that only makes sense from a macro level. It doesn’t matter if you go into work drunk and work really slow and sloppy at making cars, since that doesn’t destroy value. The labor value of a car corresponds to the socially necessary time that it takes to make it. In this way we say that exchange exerts a homogenizing influence on labor.

This homogenizing influence is very strong in society. Capitalist want work to be standardized and reliable so that workers can be as productive as possible. Capitalists are constantly seeking ways to mechanize work in order to make it unskilled and uniform. Perhaps you can think of many examples of this in your own life. The service industry and the industrial sector are almost entirely made up of this uniform, low-skilled work. This increases the potential supply of labor, because anyone could do the job, thus driving down wages.

But how strong is this homogenizing influence? We still have a lot of skilled labor which fetches a much higher price than unskilled labor, and we have union jobs which pay better than non-union jobs even though both groups of workers may do the same type of work. We could dismiss this as supply and demand casting its usual distorting influence over the law of value, and we would be justified to some degree. But we also might say that the need for skilled labor in society is indeed a countervailing influence against the homogenizing influence of capitalism on the labor process. We might even say that capitalism has a tendency to “de-skill” homogenize most work, while making other work highly skilled.

Again, the homogenization of labor time (or the “simplification” of labor) is not a quantifiable phenomena. We can observe it qualitatively as a tendency under capitalism but there really isn’t an objective way of measuring it.

But how strong is this homogenizing influence? We still have a lot of skilled labor which fetches a much higher price than unskilled labor, and we have union jobs which pay better than non-union jobs even though both groups of workers may do the same type of work. We could dismiss this as supply and demand casting its usual distorting influence over the law of value, and we would be justified to some degree. But we also might say that the need for skilled labor in society is indeed a countervailing influence against the homogenizing influence of capitalism on the labor process. We might even say that capitalism has a tendency to “de-skill” homogenize most work, while making other work highly skilled.

Again, the homogenization of labor time (or the “simplification” of labor) is not a quantifiable phenomena. We can observe it qualitatively as a tendency under capitalism but there really isn’t an objective way of measuring it.

Source: http://kapitalism101.wordpress.com/the-labor-theory-of-value/

Clif Droke writes:

One thing experience has taught is that every notable market crash, panic, bear market or financial crisis is the result of careful planning and forethought by the monetary authorities. With trillions of dollars at stake, nothing happens without their tacit or explicit approval and there is simply no such thing as a crisis that happens by “coincidence.” For happenstance to be allowed to run its course in with trillions in derivates out there would be certain death for the financial system. As the economist Dr. Stuart Crane was fond of saying, “Things [in the monetary world] don’t just happen to happen. They happen because they were planned to happen.”

He goes on to say:

And it’s no coincidence that in every case, a financial crisis always yields the following results:

1.) Greater consolidation within the banking and financial industry with the smaller players being merged into the bigger players, or else swept away;

2.) Greater regulator powers for the monetary authorities.

There has never been an exception to this outcome in the history of U.S. financial crises.

Nothing affecting high levels of power is spontaneous. That includes elections, wars, “terrorism”, global warming and so forth.

The Fed knew exactly what they were doing when they created the housing bubble.

Political economy has a huge problem, that of rationality: How to design an intelligent system which can achieve both justice and efficiency? The basic solutions on the table are:

1. Institutional intelligence (planned economy)
2. Swarm intelligence (market economy)

Both of these have great and well-known flaws. Planned economy is too slow and clumsy, market economy is too unrestrained (i.e. evil) and also vulgar. On top of that, both systems have their peculiar ways of corrupting the power and infantilizing the people.

A third solution is to make a compromise, where market forces are intelligently restrained, that is, where a government institution strategically adjusts taxes and other regulations. This might be a good idea, but it can’t shake off this final leg iron: the demand for computation inflates the bureaucracy.

This, of course, is where computers come in. Today, I can make a user friendly database with functionality only dreamt of ten years ago. And ten years from now, my guess is that Google will provide a universal database, which one can feed complicated queries in an intuitive query-language (that is, not code), and 0.06 seconds later, recieve intelligent reports from. If there is geographical information in the report, one can immediately switch to GIS-view. If the information has a history, one can view it as a graph. If one has opted for a high-security Google account (or family of accounts), one can safely put in one’s own classified information, and so use it as a personalized database. This will be divine grace to all bureaucracies (the threat of hackers notwithstanding).

Ten years after that, then, AI will have reached a broadly functional level, and therefore it will quickly be omnipresent — a lot quicker than the Internet managed this. The details of how this massive change will manifest is impossible to foresee. But I suspect it will be a powerful advantage for all things bureaucratical. I dare say this augurs a rapid regeneration of institutional intelligence. Maybe this time the dream of a truly conscious society will be (technically) realizable.

Political platonists of all sorts should rejoice.

If you’re like me (and if you are congratulations!) you probably have a hard time deciding if Leftists are dumb and/or crazy and/or evil. I’ve been conducting an informal poll of left-of-center folks since I was a teenager. I just ask questions and keep a running tab in my head on some of the more interesting answers.One of the questions I ask is, “When you achieve your goal of establishing a far left/socialist/communist government what will you do for a living?” I always get the exact same answer. Do they plan to work on a collective farm? Nah. Do they plan on working at the centralized napkin factory? Nah. How about working in the nationalized health care field? Double nah! They always answer the same way and without exception,”Oh, I would work for the government.” Most of them give you a look that says they can’t believe you even had to ask the question.

What’s my point? Simple, proponents of a big and intrusive government always picture themselves in a power wielding position, without fail. Never as the poor gullible sap who has to support the whole gargantuan bureaucracy on his back. So, as many right-wing radio talk show hosts say, it’s all about power, who has it and who doesn’t.