This video on Patreon: www.patreon.com/posts/capital-vol-1-6-119671540?Link& This video on Soundcloud (audio only): soundcloud.com/socialismforall/capital-vol-1-chapter-6-1867-by-karl-marx-audiobook-discussion-of-marxist-theory This video on Spotify: creators.spotify.com/pod/show/socialismforall/episodes/Capital-Vol--1--Chapter-6-1867-by-Karl-Marx--Audiobook--Discussion-of-Marxist-Theory-e2t9nlj This video on Substack: open.substack.com/pub/socialismforall/p/capital-vol-1-chapter-6-1867-by-karl?r=2wwfgr&showWelcomeOnShare=true
I'm really liking these daily audios of capital. This book used to intimidate me a little. But now that I'm reading it alongside listening to it, it doesn't seem as complicated as I had feared. Thanks for your work!
It's giving eating pb and j every day for school lunch or eating discount lunches. It's giving bologna sandwiches for the poorest of workers. It's reminding me of my parents paying off payday loans and further burying themselves in the red. It's giving my father, a fully disabled veteran, buying food on credit from the military base. This system of exploitation and suffering must end!
Another great chapter read and commented by S4A. Usually, the contract of theft is what the employee has to sign before he or she begins to work for the employer for so much in wages in which many places is the minimum wage by bourgeoisie law. The majority of Americans, and elsewhere, don't have an inkling that what they sell to the employer is their labor power even though they are given the clue that they have to sell (be able to convince) an employer that their ability is worth employing. Moreover, labor power is a commodity (like any other commodity such as lumber, cotton, etc.) along with whatever the capitalist purchases for the production processes in order for the workers to create the final products for market. Labor is the only commodity that can create use value with the tools and machines at their disposal which they don't own. Labor in the workplace is a team effort which proves that collective ownership of the means of production and distribution can be a reality on the condition that the workforce is class conscious and organized nationally both economically and politically.
24:15 is such an important point and why I think it's at least theoretically important to recognize that the ill effects of capitalism don't require any malevolence from any individual capitalists or even capitalists as a class (though that absolutely does exist of course). Like all commodities, labor power is paid after it is expended but the creation and recreation of it happen before it is even sold. And like any commodity that isn't fully available at time of sale, the buyer will have an advantage of being able to demand a lower price or some sort of potential penalty upon the seller if they do not furnish all the commodities upon the end of the contract term. Which may be all well and good when we are talking about inert goods, but for labor power, the very life essence of humans, this means taking out loans, buying less healthy food, buying goods on a premium, or being tied to a company store to recreate our labor power until pay day for fear of not living until pay day or not getting paid at all.
This part is wonderfully put: "Nature does not produce on the one side owners of money or commodities, and on the other men possessing nothing but their own labour-power. This relation has no natural basis, neither is its social basis one that is common to all historical periods. It is clearly the result of a past historical development, the product of many economic revolutions, of the extinction of a whole series of older forms of social production." An idealist may take the position that capitalism is somehow natural, and Marx handily dispels that in the first sentence and a half. But in my notes I have made for my use a distinction between idealism and a semi-idealism or "just-so-ism", whose adherents do not necessarily believe in ideals that exist beyond the physical world, nor in ideas as the motive force of history, but instead they holds that some things within the physical world just so happen to exist in a pure state. They see the world in this 'just so' state, a carefully balanced machine arisen out of the chaos of the past, technically not a wholly impossible belief, but a strange one certainly. The semi-idealist does not believe anything that couldn't hypothetically be true, just things that are far more unlikely than they judge them to be, and they take it for granted that reality just is that way. [Similar to Parenti's "stochastic-idealism"] A semi-idealist might then look at the world and note it strange that some countries are capitalist and some are feudal and shrug their shoulders and say that it just so happens to be that way. And Marx swiftly dispels semi-idealism as well in the second sentence and a half. Essentially saying 'no, this too has it's causes and developments'. I just really appreciate that he dispelled both notions so swiftly and so seamlessly.
This video on Patreon: www.patreon.com/posts/capital-vol-1-6-119671540?Link&
This video on Soundcloud (audio only): soundcloud.com/socialismforall/capital-vol-1-chapter-6-1867-by-karl-marx-audiobook-discussion-of-marxist-theory
This video on Spotify: creators.spotify.com/pod/show/socialismforall/episodes/Capital-Vol--1--Chapter-6-1867-by-Karl-Marx--Audiobook--Discussion-of-Marxist-Theory-e2t9nlj
This video on Substack: open.substack.com/pub/socialismforall/p/capital-vol-1-chapter-6-1867-by-karl?r=2wwfgr&showWelcomeOnShare=true
I'm really liking these daily audios of capital. This book used to intimidate me a little. But now that I'm reading it alongside listening to it, it doesn't seem as complicated as I had feared. Thanks for your work!
I had to listen to this twice right away. ❤
Just got off work and this popped up. Never a better time to listen to theory. Keep it up, comrade ☭
Sweet. Thank you. Will tackle this soon. Algo comment for now.
Jesus you're putting these out fast
Solidarity forever, Comrades ✊
It's giving eating pb and j every day for school lunch or eating discount lunches. It's giving bologna sandwiches for the poorest of workers. It's reminding me of my parents paying off payday loans and further burying themselves in the red. It's giving my father, a fully disabled veteran, buying food on credit from the military base. This system of exploitation and suffering must end!
Thank you, I read this while eating my shop floor dust struggle sandwich.
6 mins in. Great intro comments. The quick reviews of previous chapters are a big help and much appreciated.
Perfect I just finished chapter 5 and I'm off today
Yes! Chapter 6, I am so hyped to listen to this after school! Thank you s4a
get's home at 1:00am, oh new capital chapter just dropped, ok yeah i got an other half hour
Another great chapter read and commented by S4A. Usually, the contract of theft is what the employee has to sign before he or she begins to work for the employer for so much in wages in which many places is the minimum wage by bourgeoisie law. The majority of Americans, and elsewhere, don't have an inkling that what they sell to the employer is their labor power even though they are given the clue that they have to sell (be able to convince) an employer that their ability is worth employing.
Moreover, labor power is a commodity (like any other commodity such as lumber, cotton, etc.) along with whatever the capitalist purchases for the production processes in order for the workers to create the final products for market. Labor is the only commodity that can create use value with the tools and machines at their disposal which they don't own. Labor in the workplace is a team effort which proves that collective ownership of the means of production and distribution can be a reality on the condition that the workforce is class conscious and organized nationally both economically and politically.
24:15 is such an important point and why I think it's at least theoretically important to recognize that the ill effects of capitalism don't require any malevolence from any individual capitalists or even capitalists as a class (though that absolutely does exist of course). Like all commodities, labor power is paid after it is expended but the creation and recreation of it happen before it is even sold. And like any commodity that isn't fully available at time of sale, the buyer will have an advantage of being able to demand a lower price or some sort of potential penalty upon the seller if they do not furnish all the commodities upon the end of the contract term. Which may be all well and good when we are talking about inert goods, but for labor power, the very life essence of humans, this means taking out loans, buying less healthy food, buying goods on a premium, or being tied to a company store to recreate our labor power until pay day for fear of not living until pay day or not getting paid at all.
This part is wonderfully put:
"Nature does not produce on the one side owners of money or commodities, and on the other men possessing nothing but their own labour-power. This relation has no natural basis, neither is its social basis one that is common to all historical periods. It is clearly the result of a past historical development, the product of many economic revolutions, of the extinction of a whole series of older forms of social production."
An idealist may take the position that capitalism is somehow natural, and Marx handily dispels that in the first sentence and a half.
But in my notes I have made for my use a distinction between idealism and a semi-idealism or "just-so-ism", whose adherents do not necessarily believe in ideals that exist beyond the physical world, nor in ideas as the motive force of history, but instead they holds that some things within the physical world just so happen to exist in a pure state. They see the world in this 'just so' state, a carefully balanced machine arisen out of the chaos of the past, technically not a wholly impossible belief, but a strange one certainly. The semi-idealist does not believe anything that couldn't hypothetically be true, just things that are far more unlikely than they judge them to be, and they take it for granted that reality just is that way. [Similar to Parenti's "stochastic-idealism"]
A semi-idealist might then look at the world and note it strange that some countries are capitalist and some are feudal and shrug their shoulders and say that it just so happens to be that way. And Marx swiftly dispels semi-idealism as well in the second sentence and a half. Essentially saying 'no, this too has it's causes and developments'.
I just really appreciate that he dispelled both notions so swiftly and so seamlessly.
Algo comment
First comment for the algo