Wages declining as profits surge.

Source

The capitalist class is concerned about the rising price of commodities which might affect corporate profits which have, as the Wall Street Journal reports today,  been surging of late.  One of the reasons for the profit surge has been the economic terrorism that the employers can wage on workers in times of high unemployment. The bosses have managed to "squeeze" production from fewer workers.  We should always remind ourselves what it means from our point of view when the bosses talk about "squeezing" more from their workers.  It means speed ups, weaker safety conditions on the job, increased competition between workers on the job as we try to outdo each other to keep our positions in the workplace as millions wait outside the gate. We "squeeze" something when we want to get all we can out of it, like a sponge.

Fortunately for the bosses there is one important commodity that is declining in price and that is human Labor power.  So not only has unemployment and the fear of job loss allowed the US employers to "squeeze" more out of the existing workforce, it is allowing them to pay less for  Labor power. "Employers are finding so much Labor available that they are able to keep a tight lid on wages" says the Journal, the mouthpiece of US capitalism.

But as Marx pointed out, human Labor power is a unique commodity unlike no other.   When we use a commodity it declines in value as we consume the past human Labor contained in it, "wear and tear" as they say.  But human Labor power in use adds value.  It is the goose that lays the golden egg for the capitalists that purchase it. A human being can be worked to death as we have over the centuries so we have our limits, as does a horse or mule that someone might purchase; but for the capitalist this is not the best thing to do as that Labor power needs to be reproduced.  Unlike other commodities, human Labor power is contained within a living thinking being and those of us that sell our Labor power, our life activity to another individual or group of individuals, have learned that we can join together and by withholding this Labor power and interrupting the process of production, we can sometimes get a higher price for it; can increase wages and alter the conditions of its use.  It comes at a great sacrifice compared to the capitalist, but it is how we have advanced.

The capitalist has some advantages in that they control and own the forces of production and the state apparatus that maintains this coercive system; they also have more money and can outlast us.  A cursory glimpse at US or global Labor history reveals the murderous levels capitalists go to to keep Labor power cheap and prevent workers organizing.  All sorts of divisive tactics are used to weaken this natural tendency of workers, those of us whose existence is based not on buying Labor power but selling it, to unite to defend our economic self interest.  Racism, sexism, religious sectarianism, skilled versus unskilled is used at one time or another to undermine any united movement of workers.  Keeping a reserve army of unemployed is a also a necessity for the capitalist class in the day to day struggle with workers over the price of Labor power and the ownership of the surplus value that the use of this Labor power creates.

"There's a capitulation on the part of the workers" says David Resler, the chief economist at one of their companies that manages the money the coupon clippers steal. "They're increasingly willing to accept a lower wage than they might have thought they had to when the recession started." he adds talking of US workers. Let's think of this term "willing". It is used repeatedly by the bosses media.  The workers in Mexico are "willing" to work for lower wages than us in the US.  The Chinese workers are different to us, they are more "willing" to work harder for less.  I guess, women are "willing" to earn 75 cents to a mans dollar.  Now it seems, US workers have become more "willing" to work for less wages.

Willing implies agreement but there is free agreement and coerced agreement.  The capitalist economist above is somewhat mistaken when he says that the workers have capitulated. The prime capitulation has been on the part of workers leaders and in the US, as we have no political party of our own, this would be the heads of the trade Union movement.   Faced with a ferocious offensive from the bosses on all fronts, and being witness to defeat after defeat of attempts on the part of the organized working class to fight back, workers, organized or not, are extremely cautious about stepping in to the fray; there's a general feeling that we cannot win..

There were numerous attempts to resist the capitalist offensive after Reagan gave the employers the green light by the firing of the Air Traffic Controllers and arrest of their leadership in the PATCO strike of 1981.  All of these struggles were defeated through a powerful combination of the employers and organized Labor's hierarchy.  The leaders of these isolated struggles bear some responsibility also as they failed to have a clear strategy and program for not only defeating the employers (Corporate campaigns and boycotts for example) but also for combating the concessionary policies of the Labor hierarchy.

Staley struggle in Decatur in the 90's, the Hormel strike in  Austen MN back in the 80's yet their success in helping to build genuine militant rank and file oppositions within organized Labor out of such heightened class struggles is poor to say the least as each group usually jockey's to build its own minuscule ranks rather than a United Front  movement as a whole that could transform organized Labor and along with it, the consciousness and confidence of the entire working class.

The likelihood of increased inflationary pressures is high.  Millions of social security recipients are receiving no cost of living raises with bad economic times as an excuse as they attack us on all fronts.  As we have stressed many, many times on this blog, there is no shortage of money in society.  Productivity is up.  Capitalism is so productive, the manufacturing sector is much smaller percentage of output than it once was (seeking cheaper labor abroad also contributes to this) and I recall reading in the early 1990's that Ford produced at the time 5 times as many cars with the same number of workers it did in 1948. Meanwhile a typical farmer today is three times as productive as in 1950.

There is a limit to what we can win from them within the framework of capitalism for sure.  But the decline in wages and living standards in general is not simply a matter of market forces. It is due to the complete capitulation of the workers' leaders to the offensive of capital.  In the 1990's, profits reached a 40 year high during this tech driven boom.  Wages, for those on the lower rungs in particular rose due simply to market forces namely the tight Labor market but even in these boom times, the heads of organized Labor refused to go on the offensive. And the downward pressure on wages we see today is due to market forces.  But just as in the nineties, or eighties for that matter, serious advances could have been made had the Labor leadership mobilized the potential power of its members and the working class as a whole in an offensive of our own. The massive transfer of wealth, loss of homes, jobs and elimination of public services could be halted were the Labor leadership to play a different role.

The recession and subsequent bail out of the financial sector, those who caused the mess, created the most favorable mood for organizing in a long time.  We recently saw an unprecedented protest of as many as 100,000 people on the streets of Madison Wisconsin.  But once again opportunity knocks and the door is shut in its face as what could be an independent offensive of the working class gets dragged in to that black hole called the Democratic Party.

It's not entirely ruled out as the assaults continue and the capitalist class, confident as they are, make some serious mistakes, that an unstoppable movement could rise again quite rapidly, inside the traditional workers organizations, but especially outside them initially given the stifling grip the bureaucracy and its layer of full time staff  have.  Such a development would tend to overcome the obstacle of the top trade Union leadership and go on the offensive including building an independent mass workers party.  I think that this will not happen this time.

But I'd like to be wrong