: Between the cost of production (including labor amongst all capital and other costs) and its saleable price. If people dont want it there is no profit, if people willingly pay masses for it there is large profit. if workers were constantly becoming poorer by being 'skimmed' then there would be an economic spiral with less and less production, not more and more (the consumers would have less than the value of what they bought- ie they couldnt afford to buy what was produced, the companies would dwindle away - the process by which this does not occur is that wealth is created dynamically, not stolen form a pre-set amount)1:Workers are not 'skimmed' in such much as they are paid teh value of their commodified labour power, teh explpoitation occurs within the remits of the system.
2;the final cause of any economic crisis is the tendancy of industrial production to extend production to the absolute consumptive power of society, in contradiction with the restricted consumption of the masses.
3:Wages are forced downwards, to make more profits. this does cause econpomic crises. We can see this in America, where wages have been forced back down to 70's levels.
: Why? Because all people are naturally bad/stupid and would support unsafe, damaging products over good ones? Seems a low opinion of man.
1:In 19th C. Britain workers bought bread mixed with Chalk, ALum, white lead I seem to recall, because it was all they could afford.
2:the dangers may come in work practices, many workers in the unregulated market of the 19th C. were maimed and mutilated by unsafe work practise, the goods were safe though.
3;Some unscrupulous types would try and make a quick buck throughdeception and substandard goods.
: You really seem to think that companies run countries dont you? I think its more of a deadly marriage between govt and the monsters they have grown (ie not 'companies', but some specific companies)
Not companies, capitalists, the very wealthy- for example at the last election over half the Labour party's finances for the campiagn (Some 11 million £'s) came from about 50 millionaires.
: You'll need some strong evidence to support that assertion - what do you imagine would happen in a stateless society and why exactly?
Erm, immigration laws that make it illegal for foriegners to work, some countries sign deals to get firms to make sure some or all of the jobs in a firm are recruited locally, and investment fgoes into the local community, as a way of getting a right of access. in a stateless society capitalists would open and close factories wherever they wanted, without having to pay taxation to help train the workforce, or invest in the social infrastraucture...
: Why?
Otherwise the poor come and wreck their factories for them, and have a wee revolution.
: Hence it is state which introduces minimum wages, working conditions, weekly hours, hiring and firing regulations etc? Doesnt fit with reality.
Yes, they do those things, but in pursuant of point one above- managing labour relations,and also ensuring that one company cannot out compete another by lowering standards to a socially disruptive degree...
: They would do better with private banks. Observe what happened when UK and US started interfering more and more with money supply and decided to abandon the gold standard.
Then those private banks would have a hell of a lot of power. Plus, who's to stop forgery without a state- legal tender goes out the window...
: As everyone seems to be a capitalist to you I simply couldnt answer!
No, capitalists are the very wealthy who own teh means of production, and when the basic war between them economically escalates into real war, they deploy the state- I suppose in an anacrgho capitalist world they'd use mercenaries...
: The brainless masses again? I think its empty vote winning by supporting interest groups over eachother and creaming votes from as many as possible. Although arbitrary standards do favour the large 'connected' companies over competitors, hence the govt creates behemoths which would otherwise be pruned (or made efficient) by competition.
No- if its found to be dangerous to use unsafe machinary (dangerous from the capitalists position vis a vis revolution) then they need to stop using said machinary. However, they cannot stop using it, so long as their competitors may have an edge from using it while they don't- hence the state is needed to ensure equality of safety regulation and the like...
