Class, Productive and Unproductive Labour - Journal of Alternative ...

Dr. Timothy KerswellThe reason why consumption economies are interestingunits of analysis is that there can be only two theoreticalexplanations for why the majority of the productive forces inthese economies can be employed for the purposes ofconsumption. They are not mutually exclusive, but have farreaching political implications both in terms of the domesticpolitics of that particular economy, and in terms of the globalpolitical economy. In particular the question of the extent towhich workers have an identity of interest on a global scalewill determine the potential for unity against capital. For thepurposes of demonstration, it is possible to identify two idealsituations, noting that the reality is likely to be far morecomplex than this.The first situation is where a country has the majority ofits productive forces employed in the sphere of socialconsumption through the exploitation of a sector of thedomestic workforce. This hypothetical situation is one wherethe productive sector of the workforce is exploited to theextent that the surplus value produced through theexploitation of this sector is sufficient to firstly pay for thesocial consumption of the distribution and socialreproduction sectors. A society such as this would mostlikely feature a dual economy where workers due to specialconditions (such as being slaves or illegal workers) areexploited to a degree which is impossible under free marketconditions.The second situation is where a country has the majorityof its productive forces employed in the sphere of socialconsumption due to the appropriation of value from workersin other countries. Leaving aside the possibility of directplunder, the mechanics of which are simple to understand,trade and the multistage realization process are mechanismsthrough which a transfer of value from the productioneconomy to the consumption economy occurs.Shaikh and Tonak discuss a two-stage realization processby which a commodity passes through the phase ofproduction before being sold to the distribution sphere andthen sold for consumption at a final price. In their example,Shaikh and Tonak ask us to imagine a commodity with atotal value of $2000. In describing the process by which the45