Shit like this is why I have a problem with surplus value being centered without any discussion of abolishing the value form.

  • InternetLefty [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Nonono, don't try to dole out every individuals "real share". Social production, social ownership, period.

  • invalidusernamelol [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    You are entitled to the total value of your labor. So profits (which still exist in a socialist system, DPRK still has profits, they abolished tax though because the state runs on profits from industry) are to be re-invested either back into production, or into infrastructure/housing/imports that are directly accessible to the workers.

    Under capitalism, profits are not re-invested, and instead are controlled dictatorially by the capitalists who either hoard them, spend them on exotic luxuries so others can horde them, or waste it on projects that have no direct impact on worker wellbeing (see yachts, vaporware, military, police, etc.)

    This doesn't apply to a communist mode of production, as communism has no profits and labor is utilized only where labor is needed.

  • RNAi [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    I preffer to tell people "cut the middle men sapping the money and putting it in Panama or expensive wine"

  • MarxMadness [comrade/them]
    ·
    edit-2
    3 years ago

    Getting down into the weeds like this, no matter what you say, probably isn't convincing anyone of anything.

    If you're talking to people who aren't already on board, it's probably best to leave it at "workers deserve far more and CEOs deserve far less." Trying to get any more precise is futile for a dozen reasons, and should be met with something like "you don't need to know exactly how much water a human needs every day to know that someone dying of thirst needs more."

  • furryanarchy [comrade/them,they/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    This is why I don't really care about the surplus value of your labor nonsense. It quickly becomes extremely abstract and stupid.

    Its much more easily and realistically described as a problem of the people who own the means having a disproportionate amount of power, and this situation leading to the decisions made by society usually benefiting the people who own the means at the expense of everyone else. When it's not directly at the expense of everyone else, it's indirectly in the sense that extra profits from good fortune only going to the people who own things.

    And it's not just a disproportionate amount of power in the sense they get first dibs on everything, it's stacked to the point what they want is almost the only thing that matters at all. At best the worker gets to not suffer quite as much as the bosses originally intended, the worker never gets anything extra. If the boss wants to be nice, he can be. But if he wants to be cruel, nothing will stop him.

    This way of phrasing it works a lot better on people in my experience. It's more direct, as you can point to specific examples of things happening it's much harder to refute with abstraction.