weltanschauunging the NYtimes
My friend has been having a blast recently posting every article about Islam from the NYTimes and that seems to be a good definition of a weltanschauung, the thing that makes. you post certain articles on facebook and not others. Well now it's my turn.
I was thrilled to read this article in the New York Times about conventional jobs being dissolved during the recession not because it satisfied my sadistic fears about not being able to get a job when I get home but because it so excellently shows all kinds of Marxist phenomenon. The more I clicked on links, the more "he told you so" moments popped up. Here is a sampling.
from: In job market shift, some workers are left behind -
For the last two years, the weak economy has provided an opportunity for employers to do what they would have done anyway: dismiss millions of people — like file clerks, ticket agents and autoworkers — who were displaced by technological advances and international trade.
now from limits to Capital-
the problem for Capital in general is somehow to stabilize the value composition in the face of a perpetual tendency to increase the organic composition through technological change within the enterprise. what Marx will ultimately seek to show us is that there is only one way that this can be done: through Crises. The latter can then be interpreted as the forced re-structuring of the labour process so as to bring the system as a whole back into something that roughly conforms to the conditions of balanced accumulation.
This sets off all sorts of different questions about the OCC of a firm (does the blackberry actually reduce the OCC of a firm and therefore counter the fall in the variable capital caused by booting Cynthia?, what is the value of Cynthia vs. a computer program, how could their values be measured, is the logic of her firing better explained by the increased rate of exploitation of the other people in the office who will now pick up the slack, the decreased constant capital-input costs (which, if people are using their own blackberries, would be none) of office communication, the imperative for innovation (can an insurance company garner superprofits by kicking out cynthia?). I think her case shows how many different tendencies (technological change, devaluation, crisis caused at the macro level playing out, OCC) are acting just at the level of her firing. Is this a good example of Althusserian overdetermination? Her bum fucking life being the slightly more understandable instance of the "determinant contradictions of capitalism"?
Then there is a cute article about people buying canoes in Florida instead of X-boxes during the recession and it was a good example of the tensions of effective demand in America and the habits of consumerism.
Barbara Koricanek, 73, a retired nurse in rural Texas, said she cut back on shopping after a recent mission trip to Nicaragua made her realize that “we don’t need half of what we got.” Over the past few months, Ms. Koricanek has started purging her closets and baking bread from scratch, partly because it tastes better, she said, partly to become more independent.
Dangerous! Heretical! Marx says in Capital vol. 2
"The capitalist, as well as his press, is often dissatisfied with the way in which the [laborour] spends his money' and every effort is then made...to make a more rational consumer of him"
The article explains how certain firms are benefiting (events and places, museums and cinemas) in the recession while others should probably be shitting their pants (retailers). Maybe wal-mart has a secret hit squad it sends out for people who figure out what the meadow looks like at dusk.
the last article, that I have to admit was a little bit sadistic to read, was about cutting teachers salaries in the NY region. well this one was just plain good old fashion Class struggle. duh.
I was thrilled to read this article in the New York Times about conventional jobs being dissolved during the recession not because it satisfied my sadistic fears about not being able to get a job when I get home but because it so excellently shows all kinds of Marxist phenomenon. The more I clicked on links, the more "he told you so" moments popped up. Here is a sampling.
from: In job market shift, some workers are left behind -
For the last two years, the weak economy has provided an opportunity for employers to do what they would have done anyway: dismiss millions of people — like file clerks, ticket agents and autoworkers — who were displaced by technological advances and international trade.
now from limits to Capital-
the problem for Capital in general is somehow to stabilize the value composition in the face of a perpetual tendency to increase the organic composition through technological change within the enterprise. what Marx will ultimately seek to show us is that there is only one way that this can be done: through Crises. The latter can then be interpreted as the forced re-structuring of the labour process so as to bring the system as a whole back into something that roughly conforms to the conditions of balanced accumulation.
This sets off all sorts of different questions about the OCC of a firm (does the blackberry actually reduce the OCC of a firm and therefore counter the fall in the variable capital caused by booting Cynthia?, what is the value of Cynthia vs. a computer program, how could their values be measured, is the logic of her firing better explained by the increased rate of exploitation of the other people in the office who will now pick up the slack, the decreased constant capital-input costs (which, if people are using their own blackberries, would be none) of office communication, the imperative for innovation (can an insurance company garner superprofits by kicking out cynthia?). I think her case shows how many different tendencies (technological change, devaluation, crisis caused at the macro level playing out, OCC) are acting just at the level of her firing. Is this a good example of Althusserian overdetermination? Her bum fucking life being the slightly more understandable instance of the "determinant contradictions of capitalism"?
Then there is a cute article about people buying canoes in Florida instead of X-boxes during the recession and it was a good example of the tensions of effective demand in America and the habits of consumerism.
Barbara Koricanek, 73, a retired nurse in rural Texas, said she cut back on shopping after a recent mission trip to Nicaragua made her realize that “we don’t need half of what we got.” Over the past few months, Ms. Koricanek has started purging her closets and baking bread from scratch, partly because it tastes better, she said, partly to become more independent.
Dangerous! Heretical! Marx says in Capital vol. 2
"The capitalist, as well as his press, is often dissatisfied with the way in which the [laborour] spends his money' and every effort is then made...to make a more rational consumer of him"
The article explains how certain firms are benefiting (events and places, museums and cinemas) in the recession while others should probably be shitting their pants (retailers). Maybe wal-mart has a secret hit squad it sends out for people who figure out what the meadow looks like at dusk.
the last article, that I have to admit was a little bit sadistic to read, was about cutting teachers salaries in the NY region. well this one was just plain good old fashion Class struggle. duh.
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