Good work so far, crew. We are about a quarter of the way through Volume 1 and about 10% of the way through the whole thing. Having said that, we're also about 10% of the way through 2024, so don't get too comfortable, keep pedalling.

Having set up the idea of surplus-labour as the source of profit, Marx looked at how this plays out in practice, how it affects people's lives.

I think we have a minimum of 8 people reading; it could even be 12 or 13.

Let's use this shared activity as an excuse to also build camaraderie by thinking out loud in the comments.

The overall plan is to read Volumes 1, 2, and 3 in one year. (Volume IV, often published under the title Theories of Surplus Value, will not be included in this particular reading club, but comrades are encouraged to do other solo and collaborative reading.) This bookclub will repeat yearly. The three volumes in a year works out to about 6½ pages a day for a year, 46⅔ pages a week.

I'll post the readings at the start of each week and @mention anybody interested. Let me know if you want to be added or removed.

Just joining us? It'll take you about 10½ hours to catch up to where the group is.

Archives: Week 1 – Week 2 – Week 3 – Week 4 – Week 5

Week 6, Feb 5-11, we are reading Volume 1, Chapter 10 Sections 4, 5, 6, and 7.

In other words, read from the heading '4. Day Work and Night Work. The Shift System' to the end of the chapter

Discuss the week's reading in the comments.

Use any translation/edition you like. Marxists.org has the Moore and Aveling translation in various file formats including epub and PDF: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/

Ben Fowkes translation, PDF: http://libgen.is/book/index.php?md5=9C4A100BD61BB2DB9BE26773E4DBC5D

AernaLingus says: I noticed that the linked copy of the Fowkes translation doesn't have bookmarks, so I took the liberty of adding them myself. You can either download my version with the bookmarks added, or if you're a bit paranoid (can't blame ya) and don't mind some light command line work you can use the same simple script that I did with my formatted plaintext bookmarks to take the PDF from libgen and add the bookmarks yourself.

Audiobook of Ben Fowkes translation, American accent, male, links are to alternative invidious instances: 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7 – 8 – 9

Resources

(These are not expected reading, these are here to help you if you so choose)

  • Harvey's guide to reading it: https://www.davidharvey.org/media/Intro_A_Companion_to_Marxs_Capital.pdf

  • A University of Warwick guide to reading it: https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/english/currentstudents/postgraduate/masters/modules/worldlitworldsystems/hotr.marxs_capital.untilp72.pdf

  • Engels' Synopsis of Capital or PDF

  • Reading Capital with Comrades: A Liberation School podcast series - https://www.liberationschool.org/reading-capital-with-comrades-podcast/

  • quarrk [he/him]
    ·
    9 months ago

    I think I answered these in my other comment but I’ll briefly answer here too for clarity.

    1. Working time is expressed in hours, rather than as a fraction of the working day, because the working day can have variable length whereas an hour is a constant length. Your fractions are equivalent if one assumes a working day of 12 hours.
    2. The rate of surplus value is relative to variable capital, not a time-rate like “amount of surplus value per hour”. If necessary labor (wages) is given as 5 hours, then 7 hours are unpaid, and s/v = 7/5. If the working day reduces to 11 hours, then the rate of surplus value changes to 6/5.
    • commiewithoutorgans [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      9 months ago

      Thanks comrade!

      Ok, my question still lingering is then for your second example. Why does variable capital cost not vary with hours worked? It seems like my confusion mostly is arising from that, and I'd guess Marx was assuming a daily wage regardless of hours worked set at "necessary" labour wage. This is also likely a result of his analysis that wages tend towards only necessary labor costs, so just taking it from there makes sense.

      Otherwise I could see it ss approaching the problem with assumptions of the person he is critiquing, and I'll accept that, too.

      • quarrk [he/him]
        ·
        9 months ago

        That’s another great question. I don’t have textual evidence of this on hand, but I think you are right — the daily means of subsistence required to reproduce the laborer are here considered constant, varying only with the standard of living morally and politically accepted at a given moment.

        Up to this point we have only used “wages” to refer to the value of labor power as a commodity. Paying an hourly wage is just one form of payment, which on the average should be equal to the value of their labor power. This is covered in Chapter 19: The Transformation of the Value (and Respective Price) of Labour-Power into Wages.