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SURPLUS VALUE

Sociologyindex, Sociology Books 2012

In Marxist theory surplus value is the value created by individual labour which is left over, or remains in the product or services produced, after the employer has paid the costs of hiring the worker.

It is this 'surplus' value which the worker produces but does not receive which allows the capitalist owner to expand their capital.

Absolute and Relative Surplus Value
Absolute surplus value is the surplus value generated by increasing the length of the Working day, thus increasing the surplus labour time.
Relative surplus value is the surplus value generated by cutting wages or reducing the cost of living, thus reducing workers’ Necessary labour time in proportion to the surplus value extracted.

The Counterfactual Method of Marx's Theory of Surplus - Author: Perri S.
Source: Review of Political Economy, Volume 15, Number 1, 1 January 2003, pp. 107-124(18)
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to show that Marx supports his theory of surplus value by developing a counterfactual argument, that is, by comparing the 'normal' state of a capitalist economy against a hypothetical state in which no surplus is produced. Marx then divides his analysis of value into three successive steps. The first deals with the production of new value in the sphere of production; the second with the process of creation of surplus value, both in the sphere of production and in the sphere of circulation; and the third with the process of equalisation of the rate of profit, which is accomplished via capitalist competition in the sphere of circulation. The paper proposes a formalisation of the three-step analysis and of the counterfactual argument. Marx's three-step analysis is shown to be a scientific analysis of the hidden connections between social relations (expressed in labour flows) and commodity exchange; thus it is not a useless detour. - ingentaconnect.com

Abstract from: The Trinity Formula - marxists.org
Like all its predecessors, the capitalist process of production proceeds under definite material conditions, which are, however, simultaneously the bearers of definite social relations entered into by individuals in the process of reproducing their life. Those conditions, like these relations, are on the one hand prerequisites, on the other hand results and creations of the capitalist process of production; they are produced and reproduced by it.
We saw also that capital -- and the capitalist is merely capital personified and functions in the process of production solely as the agent of capital -- in its corresponding social process of production, pumps a definite quantity of surplus-labour out of the direct producers, or labourers; capital obtains this surplus-labour without an equivalent, and in essence it always remains forced labour -- no matter how much it may seem to result from free contractual agreement. This surplus-labour appears as surplus-value, and this surplus-value exists as a surplus-product. 
Surplus-labour in general, as labour performed over and above the given requirements, must always remain. In the capitalist as well as in the slave system, etc., it merely assumes an antagonistic form and is supplemented by complete idleness of a stratum of society. A definite quantity of surplus-labour is required as insurance against accidents, and by the necessary and progressive expansion of the process of reproduction in keeping with the development of the needs and the growth of population, which is called accumulation from the viewpoint of the capitalist. It is one of the civilising aspects of capital that it enforces this surplus-labour in a manner and under conditions which are more advantageous to the development of the productive forces, social relations, and the creation of the elements for a new and higher form than under the preceding forms of slavery, serfdom, etc. 
Thus it gives rise to a stage, on the one hand, in which coercion and monopolisation of social development (including its material and intellectual advantages) by one portion of society at the expense of the other are eliminated; on the other hand, it creates the material means and embryonic conditions, making it possible in a higher form of society to combine this surplus-labour with a greater reduction of time devoted to material labour in general. 
For, depending on the development of labour productivity, surplus-labour may be large in a small total working-day, and relatively small in a large total working-day. If the necessary labour-time=3 and the surplus-labour=3, then the total working-day=6 and the rate of surplus-labour=100%. If the necessary labour=9 and the surplus-labour=3, then the total working-day=12 and the rate of surplus-labour only=33 1/3 %. In that case, it depends upon the labour productivity how much use-value shall be produced in a definite time, hence also in a definite surplus labour-time. The actual wealth of society, and the possibility of constantly expanding its reproduction process, therefore, do not depend upon the duration of surplus-labour, but upon its productivity and the more or less copious conditions of production under which it is performed. 
In fact, the realm of freedom actually begins only where labour which is determined by necessity and mundane considerations ceases; thus in the very nature of things it lies beyond the sphere of actual material production. Just as the savage must wrestle with Nature to satisfy his wants, to maintain and reproduce life, so must civilised man, and he must do so in all social formations and under all possible modes of production. With his development this realm of physical necessity expands as a result of his wants; but, at the same time, the forces of production which satisfy these wants also increase. Freedom in this field can only consist in socialised man, the associated producers, rationally regulating their interchange with Nature, bringing it under their common control, instead of being ruled by it as by the blind forces of Nature; and achieving this with the least expenditure of energy and under conditions most favourable to, and worthy of, their human nature. But it nonetheless still remains a realm of necessity. Beyond it begins that development of human energy which is an end in itself, the true realm of freedom, which, however, can blossom forth only with this realm of necessity as its basis. The shortening of the working-day is its basic prerequisite.
In a capitalist society, this surplus-value, or this surplus-product (leaving aside chance fluctuations in its distribution and considering only its regulating law, its standardising limits), is divided among capitalists as dividends proportionate to the share of the social capital each holds. In this form surplus-value appears as average profit which falls to the share of capital, an average profit which in turn divides into profit of enterprise and interest, and which under these two categories may fall into the laps of different kinds of capitalists. 

Estimates of the Rate of Surplus-Value in the Postwar United States Economy 
Fred Moseley, Economics, Colby College, Waterville, ME 04901 
Review of Radical Political Economics, Vol. 18, No. 1-2, 168-189 (1986) © 1986 Union for Radical Political Economics
One important prediction of Marx's theory is that the rate of surplus-value will increase as a secular tendency. This paper subjects this prediction of Marx's theory to an empirical test, by deriving annual estimates of the rate of surplus-value in the United States economy over the period 1947-1977. These estimates show that the rate of surplus-value in the United States economy increased significantly over this period, as predicted by Marx's theory. These estimates are then compared with other estimates of the rate of surplus-value in the postwar United States economy which are based on different interpretations of the main theoretical issues involved in the estimation of the rate of surplus-value. This comparison shows that the theoretical issue which makes the most difference in the estimated trend of the rate of surplus-value is whether or not Marx's distinction between productive labor and unproductive labor is taken into account in the definition of the rate of surplus-value. - rrp.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/18/1-2/168

Surplus Value, Unemployment and Industrial Turbulence 
A Statistical Application of the Marxian Model To Post-War Japan 
Yoshio Sugimoto, Department of ]Sociology La Trobe University, Australia 
Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 19, No. 1, 25-47 (1975) © 1975 SAGE Publications
The paper examines in quantitative terms how powerful such Marxian concepts as the amount and rate of surplus value and the size of the industrial reserve army are in accounting for levels of industrial turbulence. On the basis of data drawn from post-war Japan from 1952 to 1960, a series of statistical analyses has been performed to investigate relationships between the Marxian variables and various types of labor disturbance. None of these investigations has established strong connections between the former and the latter. Further inquiry has demonstrated that there is a partial convergence between the Marxian concepts of exploitation and the Tocquevillian concepts of improvement of social conditions. - jcr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/19/1/25

Emotional labour and surplus value: the case of holiday 'reps' 
Authors: Panikkos Constanti; Paul Gibbs
Source: The Service Industries Journal, Volume 25, Number 1, January 2005, pp. 103-116(14)
Abstract: Service organizations are encouraged by the literature [Grönroos, 1996, 1997; 2000; Zeithaml and Bitner, 2000] to consider the manner in which employees perform at the customer/front-line employee interface, as a means to gain competitive advantage. The employee's behaviour requires 'emotional labour' [Hochschild, 1983] where the front-line employee has to either conceal or manage actual feelings for the benefit of a successful service delivery. The implication is not necessarily of equality or mutual benefit but of satisfaction for the customer and profit for the management. The article discusses whether the service employee is being exploited in this three-way relationship, and how surplus value accrues and its benefit distributed. Expecting emotional labour from employees can be exploitative, thus increasing the risk of potential deceit, in particular where poor recruitment, training and support recovery accompany the expectations of the emotional labourer. To illustrate this argument, data gathered from in-depth interviews with three holiday 'reps' are used. - ingentaconnect.com

Marx's Value, Exchange and Surplus Value Theory: A Suggested Interpretation 
JEAN CARTELIER, The Jerome Levy Economics Institute; Université Paris X Nanterre - General 
Abstract: The concept of commodity society based on a specific division of labour (opposition between private and social labour) and that of surplus-value are the most prominent achievements of Marx's intellectual efforts in dealing with the economy of capitalism. This paper attempts to evaluate the consistency of the theoretical propositions inherent in these concepts. The main contention is that an internal criticism of Marx's theory of exchange and surplus-value leads one to restate it in a different framework. This framework. which mas be called monetary approach represents an alternative to value theory. 
The first section of the paper is devoted to Marx's value theory, especially to the form of value analysis. We suggest that Marx did not succeed in deriving money from commodity. As a consequence, money, if any, has to be presupposed at the same time as the specific division of labour. Doing so is breaking with the typical abstraction of value theory which substitutes values for monetary magnitudes, the former being thought of as expressing the essence of society in contrast with the latter conceived as surface phenomena. 
The second section points out the logical inconsistencies which make the surplus value theory unsuitable for its purpose. A restatement will be suggested in which the monetary character of 
economic relations is again central. - papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=186693

Theories of Surplus Value, Marx 1861-3
The first section “Production Process of Capital” to be divided in the following way:

1. Introduction. Commodity. Money.

2. Transformation of money into capital.

3. Absolute surplus-value. (a) Labour-process and the process of producing surplus-value. (b) Constant capital and variable capital. (c) Absolute surplus-value. (d) Struggle for the normal working-day. (e) Simultaneous working-days (number of simultaneously employed labourers). Amount of surplus-value and rate of surplus-value (magnitude and height?).

4. Relative surplus-value. (a) Simple co-operation. (b) Division of labour. (c) Machinery. etc.

5. Combination of absolute and relative surplus-value. Relation (proportion) between wage-labour and surplus-value. Formal and real subsumption of labour under capital. Productivity of capital. Productive and unproductive labour.

6. Reconversion of surplus-value into capital. Primitive accumulation. Wakefield’s colonial theory.

7. Result of the production process.

(Either under 6 or under 7 the change in the form of the law of appropriation can be shown.)

8. Theories of surplus-value.

9. Theories of productive and unproductive labour. |XVIII-1140||

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