| This question <38|100> overall <86|88> Hans: <85|89>. |
| Question 69: Explain better what I meant by the sentence: “Under capitalism, labor has social significance only as abstract labor.” |
| [87] Hans: Labor is taking off its hat Panacea's answer in [38] argues that the abstract labor of the construction worker does not have as much prestige as that of the architect, although it should. This seems to be just the opposite of what I said. How can this be reconciled? |
| First of all, what I meant by “social significane” is not social prestige, but economic significance: only the abstract labor counts in the social interaction between the labors. Pippy's metaphor with the hat in her [82] fits better for labor than for the commodity. Pippy's text should be rewritten as follows: |
| The concrete useful aspect of the labor has already been abstracted at the onset of its confrontation with other labors in the social context. It has shed its useful properties like a gentleman who has removed his hat upon entering a room with proper company. Labor as a social creature abandons its individual qualities when it sits in relation to other labors. |
| Regarding the architect and the construction worker, there is on the one hand the social oddity that the productive laborers are socially looked down upon, although they create all the value. Perhaps one can also say that architects still have so much prestige because homebuilding is an industry which has resisted mass production. How long before they will be replaced by computer programs in the hands of the sales agent for a firm which sells mass-produced “custom homes”? |
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