This is a contentious subject. Please keep the discussion respectful. I think this will get more traction, here, but I’ll cross-post it to !Communism, too.
Workers who sell their labour power for a wage are part of the working class, right? They are wage-workers because they work for a wage. Are they wage-labourers?
“They’re proletariat,” I hear some of you shout.
“Not in the imperial core! Those are labour aristocrats,” others reply.
So what are the workers in the imperial core? Are they irredeemable labour aristocrats, the inseparable managers and professionals of the ruling class? Or are they proletarian, the salt of the earth just trying to get by?
It’s an important distinction, even if the workers in any country are not a homogenous bloc. The answer determines whether workers in the global north are natural allies or enemies of the oppressed in the global south.
The problem is as follows.
There is no doubt that people in the global north are, in general, more privileged than people in the global south. In many cases, the difference in privilege is vast, even among the wage-workers. This is not to discount the suffering of oppressed people in the global north. This is not to brush away the privilege of national bourgeois in the global south.
For some workers in the global north, privilege amounts to basic access to water, energy, food, education, healthcare, and shelter, streetlights, paved highways, etc. As much as austerity has eroded access to these basics, they are still the reality for the majority of people in the north even, to my knowledge, in the US.
Are these privileges enough to move someone from the ranks of the proletariat and into the labour aristocracy or the petit-bourgeois?
I’m going to discuss some sources and leave some quotes in comments, below. This may look a bit spammy, but I’m hoping it will help us to work through the several arguments, that make up the whole. The sources:
- Settlers by J Sakai
- Corona, Climate, and Chronic Emergency by Andreas Malm
- The Wealth of Nations by Zac Cope
- ‘Decolonization is Not a Metaphor’ by Eve Tuck and K Wayne Yang.
I have my own views on all this, but I have tried to phrase the points and the questions in a ’neutral’ way because I want us to discuss the issues and see if we can work out where and why we conflict and how to move forwards with our thinking (neutral to Marxists, at least). I am not trying to state my position by stating the questions below, so please do not attack me for the assumptions in the questions. By all means attack the assumptions and the questions.
The Wealth of Nations by Zac Cope
Cope’s book is on ‘Imperialism and the Mechanics of Value Transfer’. He looks into the detail of unequal exchange in the modern world. Cope’s explanation supports Sakai’s argument. I’m going to try to keep the maths in this section simple, which means removing some nuance, which means there are holes in the numbers. Please focus on the points being made rather than the maths (unless I have made a blatant, crucial error).
There’s an interesting section on pages 34–7, ‘Monopoly Rent and Metropolitan Wages’. Cope cites Adam Smith and N Brown, among others. I’ll summarise two points.
First example, from Smith, keeping the numbers simple.
But how does A exploit B? From Brown, and changing the scenario a little:
In this example, A does not wake up and think ‘I’m going to exploit B today’. But it doesn’t matter. By they time they both go to bed, that is what has happened. They’re both ripped off by MNC, who keeps the bulk of the value produced.
How are the millions of As in the global north supposed to act in solidarity with the billions of Bs in the global south, when the basic prosperity of A relies on exploiting B?
In a section on ‘wage differentials’ (pages 49–53), Cope engages with another idea discussed by Adam Smith (and also by Marx), on how the town can exploit the countryside with capitalist trade. We now see the same on a global scale.
In 1961, if an hours worth of work was paid the same in the Phillipines as in Canada, Philippine exports would have totalled 5.269 billion pesos. Due to ‘wage differentials’ (Canadian workers being paid more than Philippine workers), those Philippine exports only brought in 1.129 billion pesos. So in that year, for one aspect of one relationship, Canada quietly kept 4+ billion pesos that should have gone to workers in the Philippines. To put it another way, if it were not for this exploitation, the relevant workers in the Philippines should have been paid almost 4x more than they were paid.
Similar money unequally transferred to the global north goes to support the welfare systems of the global north. Those systems, however damaged they are today, directly rely on the exploitation of the global south. Much of that stolen wealth goes to the ruling class, so under a different model of distribution, perhaps the welfare systems can be maintained only from value produced in the global north.
In the meantime, how are the interests of the workers across the globe aligned? Can the workers in the global north, even minimum wage workers, call themselves proletariat? Can those who rely on the above exploitation be persuaded to act in solidarity with the global south?
Edit: The consensus view seems to be, and I am reliably informed that, 40-2-12=26 not 36.
I believe so yes.
Firstly, 40-2-12=26 not 36.
Secondly, exploit means: transitive verb 1 : to make productive use of : utilize exploiting your talents exploit your opponent’s weakness 2 : to make use of meanly or unfairly for one’s own advantage
In economics it means to subject one to the extraction of surplus labor value via imbalanced power dynamics in relations over the means of production. How does worker A have control to manipulate worker B? They don’t. They have control over their labor and by extension their oppressor to a certain degree which is proportionate to their labor’s value, which is increased by joining a union (good job worker B). I know, you said not literally but I’m a stickler for specifics.
What he is trying to state is that worker A indirectly benefits from the poverty of worker B, which is accurate as it is the relation a labor aristocrat has with a proletarian, however if neither worker A nor worker B can afford luxury (non essential basics of life) and even fight to afford those basic necessities of life (food, water, shelter, clothing, transportation depending on the conditions) then this doesn’t matter as they’re both so exploited that neither are benefiting in any significant material way from the other’s worse situation. Then they are both proletarian, this is the relationship 2 prols have.
I believe you are correct with those numbers. Thanks for pointing that out!
Good points about the power involved in exploitation.
I agree that that A should act in solidarity with B but is that likely? The example above only captures people earning $10 and $2 because it keeps the numbers simple (still apparently too complex for me, but there we are). This isn’t far off the average hourly wage in the US (fluctuating around $11.00).
But what if it’s $37.31 (median hourly wage for nurses, apparently: https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm) versus $0.42 (median hourly wage in Rwanda: https://wageindicator.org/about/publications/2013/wages-in-rwanda)?
Just for the sake of argument, imagine the worker in Rwanda makes something used in the nurse’s hospital. The nurse can’t do their job without it. And imagine the nurse’s employer also owns the majority share in the Rwandan factory.
How does one convince the US nurse to fight for the Rwandan worker? Is the nurse more likely to argue for their own pay rise, job security, and benefits, etc, or to argue for an overhaul of the whole system (meaning that, potentially, the nurses wages are lowered while the Rwandan worker’s are increased)? Hope likely is there nurse to say, ‘but everything is cheaper in Rwanda, so they don’t need to earn as much as me living in the expensive US’?
Thanks for the thought-filled reply. I think it’s our perspective on this issue that, once shifted, will provide a better understanding and method of gauging material motivations of workers:
We exchange our labor power for wages to exchange for commodities.
The agreement between worker and owner is the market value of our labor power (what we’re going to be paid for the labor we work. $/hr).
However, what happens when the price of basic commodities (basic necessities) are higher than the agreed upon wage? Poverty occurs. Yes there are more complications to this (debts, stocks, crypto, “side gigs”, meth money, etc…) but it all comes down to can basic commodities be afforded with the financial resources one has. (In the event of poverty, capital is liquidated to obtain these basic necessities)
Marx differentiates the agreed upon exchange rate of one’s labor value and the exchange value one’s wages represent as nominal wages vs real wages (Wage Labour and Capital)
This is what I believe we should focus more on this to understand the proletarianization of the labor aristocracy. On paper, we are rich, but how many of the same commodity can each wage afford each worker? Yes no doubt the number and value of the food, water, shelter, etc… are much lower in the global south, however the commodities afforded by both the worker in the south and the north proletariat worker are both only basic with no luxuries afforded.
I want to specify that this goes beyond inflation. The prices of a commodity are determined first by the cost of production, then minus the wages of the labor force. This is the actual price, the material cost of production, the price they can then charge for said commodity are determined by various market conditions. 2 of which are:
Competition or lack thereof; if demand for a product is high and the supply is rare, the cost of the commodity rises. To put it simply, when there are 5 fishermen all selling fish, they try to outsell one another by deflating the cost of commodity to the floor (it’s production value), minimize their surplus per fish, and aim to sell more fish than the other fishermen to gain more surplus. Why? Why would you choose to pay $5 for a bass when you can pay $1? This is the law of competition.
The rate of profit and it’s tendency to fall. Due to the division of labor, the rate of profitability of a company decreases after it reaches a crescendo. After which more and more capital must be obtained in order to maintain the business. Failure to do so and they will go bankrupt or be bought out or simply out-competed.
This is why we are paid $11/hr but it only covers the same amount as what a basic wage would in the global south. There are other aspects such as predatory debt, indoctrinated financial irresponsibility, lack of beneficial standardized education on the subject, and mass propagandization and a culture around consumerism which also play a role in why this is the case but it predominately revolves around the conditions of the market and the laws of capital.
this analysis fails to account for a pretty important fact if both A and B lived in a socialist country and everything else was the same then A and B could be paid the 12$ + the 26$ the capitalist kept which devided equally would leave both A and B with 19$, so if anything this example argues that the workers in the global south and the global north share the same class interest.
and considering how much money leeches like executives, stock holders and landlords or just capitalist in general well… leech im pretty sure the example is accurate to reality
I agree in principle. But how to get A to argue for that when they will find it much easier to argue for a bigger share for themselves (leaving B the same or worse off) and will also find themselves on the same side as the employer and the empire, with all the support that comes with it?
well would the capitalist give concessions equaling what A could get by cutting out the capitalist and sharing equally with B, idk maybe, but either way it would be an inherently unstable arrangement like the social democracies of Europe, where it took an exceptional threat in the form of the USSR for them to even exist and even those concessions have almost all but been clawed back by capitalist.
but yeah i suppose that for that time that would put the interest of the working people of the global north at odds with those of the global south.
also theoretical are all well and good but at the end of the day i can tell you the american capitalist definitely dont pay me well enough to not want them decapitated so does it even matter.
I think the bourgeoisie would try if they were under threat again, as happened with welfare states / the New Deal when the USSR was rising and rising. But super-profits were possible back then, which go a long way when shared between a (relatively) small group. If the world continues to go along the path that seems to be opening up, though, the global south will be turning towards China. The US, EU, etc, will start to lose their super-profits. For how long will they have enough to buy off the domestic labour aristocrats? It’s hard to predict and a lot can change – in either direction.
Because that “prosperity” is a relation that can only be temporary due to TRPF. Eventually all workers must be exploited and immiserated; labour aristocrats can only be maintained so long as there is sufficient surplus profit to go around, a surplus which is constantly shrinking. Therefore, in the final analysis it is still in the interest of the working masses in the north to unite with those in the south against their exploiters.
This is true but remember it is a tendency that the bourgeoisie occasionally can affect to create a new deal just as it did after WW2 and in the 70s. A new deal can accommodate and weaponize privileged workers. So while the tendency can limit the options of privileged workers and push them toward solidarity it is not a done deal and still depends some on the agency and consciousness of the bourgeoisie.
Now it would take a pretty hefty action to bring back a golden age, but western workers will still be more interested in that more than costly solidarity with the global proletariat. It is the path of least resistance, the path that aligns closer to their interests as privileged workers that rely on their relationships with the bourgeoisie, AND (perhaps the biggest problem) its the path privileged workers have historically taken meaning the theory of being that is crafted by the history of privileged workers will drive them to identify with a new deal as their grandparents did.
I say this to emphasize the need for a movement that is rooted in history, and specifically not the history of white workers. It’s why, for example, Indigenous histories and ontologies cannot be ignored even as the rate of profit falls.