Marxist theory

 

Subject: Marxist theory

Marxist theory of “surplus value” brought new understanding to the struggle of the working class, revealing not only that they were exploited but how they were exploited.

It's interesting how Marxists' , a socio/economic theory of the development of human exploitation of the majority by a few is ridiculed by quasi independent people today, especially in America/Britain with the need for three jobs to make ends meet. Exploitation, “why it's those 'commies' who exploited their people leaving us the freedom to make my own way”.

Of course they are right if lucky and have the opportunity to choose not to self destruct, by having to start their day at 5am to meet the ‘first job’ deadline of 6am, perhaps a cleaning job untill 8am and then off to a second job until 5pm, before starting the last stretch at 7pm until 10 waiting on table or packing supermarket shelves. Yes they have their independence but little or no time to enjoy it, they are independent until the boss barks and theres no independence from the bills which tumble through the letterbox like confetti at a church wedding.

The 'commie', poor chap was locked into an 8am till 5pm regime but then went home to a subsidised house and ate a subsidised meal and he was truly independent until the morning shift, with few worries about the fluctuation in living costs or fears about being thrown out on the street because of a private landlords individual need.

Marxist theory of ‘surplus value’, a value which  is the value created by the worker in excess of their own labour costs, is, in capitalistic jargon, 'profit'.

The theory of profit is unchallenged in a capitalistic countries, it's commonplace, a natural phenomena but of course it's exploitative. It exploits the weak by the strong and leads, almost inevitably to the grotesque riches when 1% of humanity own the equivalent of of what's left. Wealth, once described as financial assets, plus a house, less their debts but now inflated to place the likes of Jeff Bazos, Elon Musk and Bill Gates, plus a whole host of, below the radar plutocrats and oligarchs in the position to earn in a second or two, the equivalent  of my whole life's earnings.

Surplus value is not created by anything other than our mixing up our understanding of value and our understanding of profit. Profit no longer becomes relevant to input but is conflated by 'opportunity', and 'opportunity' is fundamental to a system of exploitation.

Exploitation of people is the crime of the human race. It's gone on since mankind gathered to combine in economic endeavour in Mesopotamia. A pre biblical land fed by the Tigers and Euphrates rivers, a land was so productive  nomads settled to create the first agrarian community where skills were traded and given value by the community. This was in play whilst the West was running around in skins, and one can sense the frustration in and amongst the people of Iraq, Iran, Kuwait and Syria when morally despised by the West.

Capitalism was founded not on the trade of skills but the commodities those skills provided and especially on a trade in money which was introduced to enable the trade in skills to be more easily transactable. The exploitation and manipulation of money raised a whole new breed of men, the ‘money changers’ who famously Jesus grew out of the temple. From them to Goldman Sachs has taken 2000 years but the damage Jesus Christ saw in them has multiplied to the point where  there is no equity anymore only a disparity which is beyond understanding.