Get your own Free Home Page
For this reason it is perfectly possible to impress upon each product how many labour-hours its production has cost. There are, of course, certain installations which produce no tangible product, such as the social and economic councils, the health service, education and so on; but these also are just as well able to determine how many labour-hours in means of production and labour-power they have consumed, so that here also the costs of reproduction can be exactly revealed. Should we wish to make a concise definition of reproduction, then we would say: MEANS OF PRODUCTION AND LABOUR-POWER ARE THE DIRECTLY OPERATIVE FACTORS IN PRODUCTION. IN ASSOCIATION WITH NATURE, THERE ARISES OUT OF THEIR INTERACTION A MASS OF PRODUCTS IN THE USE-VALUE FORM OF MACHINES, BUILDINGS, FOODSTUFFS, RAW MATERIALS ETC. ON THE ONE SIDE, THIS MASS OF PRODUCTS MOVES FROM FACTORY TO FACTORY IN AN UNBROKEN STREAM; AND ON THE OTHER SIDE, IT IS USED UP IN THE INDIVIDUAL NEEDS OF THE CONSUMERS
Each factory secures its reproduction through an exact accounting of means of production (= p) and labour ( = L ), expressed in labour-hours. The production formula for each factory is therefore expressed as follows:
p + L = product
As is well known the Marxist category "means of production" comprises machinery and buildings ( fixed means of production), and also raw materials and auxiliary materials (circulating means of production). If now we use for fixed means of production the letter p and for the circulating means of production the letter c, then the formula takes on the following form:
( p + c ) + L = product
If for the sake of clarity we now replace the letters by fictitious figures, then production in, for instance, a shoe factory would reveal the following schematic:
( p + c ) + L = product
that is
( machinery + raw material ) + Labour = 40000 pairs of shoes, that is, in labour-hours (L-Hrs)
( 1250 L-Hrs + 61250 L-Hrs) + 62500 L-Hrs = 125000 Labour-Hours.
therefore
to average:
In this formula for production, the factory simultaneously finds its formula for reproduction, which shows how many Labour-Hours representing social product must be restored to it in order to renew everything that has been used up.
That which applies for each separate industrial establishment also holds good for the whole communist economy. In this sense, the latter is only the sum of all the economic installations active at any given moment in the economy. The same is also valid for the total social product. It is nothing other than the product ( p + c ) + L for the total of all economic establishments. In order to distinguish this from the sphere of production accounting control for the separate industrial establishments, we use for the total product the formula:
(P + C ) + L = Total Product
If we assume the sum of all used up machinery - ( P ) - in all the industrial installations = 100,000,00 Labour-Hours and that for raw materials - ( C ) = 600,000,000 Labour-Hours; and if also 600,000,000 Labour-Hours of living labour-power - ( L ) - were consumed, then the schematic for total social production would appear as follows:
( P + C ) + L = Total Product
( 100 million + 600 million ) + 600 million = 1300 million Labour- Hours
All industrial installations taken together thus take out of the total social stock 700,000,000 Labour-Hours of product in order to reproduce the physical part of the productive apparatus, whilst the workers consume 600,000,000 Labour-Hours of the final social product. In this way the reproduction of all the production elements is assured.
Let us now consider the reproduction of labour-power in particular. In our example 600,000,000 Labour-Hours are available for individual consumption. More than this cannot and must not be consumed, because in the industrial establishments only 600,000,000 Labour-Hours in the form of labour certificates has been accounted for. This however bears no relation to how that product is to be distributed amongst the workers. It is, for instance, quite possible that unskilled, skilled and intellectual labour will all be remunerated differently. Distribution could, for instance, be carried out on such a basis that the unskilled receive three-quarters of an hour pro rata for each one hour performed, the skilled exactly one hour and the officials and fore-persons three hours.
RETURN TO MAIN / CONTENTS PAGE
Get your own Free Home Page