From: cbcox-AT-rs6000.cmp.ilstu.edu (Carrol Cox) Subject: Re: M-I: Budget Day. Source of Taxes Date: Thu, 4 Dec 1997 16:07:16 -0600 (CST) Rebecca writes: However I tend to the view that certainly in the long run tax reductions do not necessarily mean an increase in real wages. I take the view that the price of labour power is essentially independent of income tax. Instead the price of labour power or wages centres around the value of labour power whatever this may be. The character of the class struggle comes into play too. Depending on the relative strength of the working class the price of labour power at any given time. Years ago, reading *Wages, Price and Profit*, I inferred from it as at least a speculative proposition that *all* taxes come from surplus value, and that taxes levied on workers are merely a bookkeepign device: that is, the capitalist class pays *part* of its own taxes (since only it controls the surplus value) by the judicial route of first paying (some of) them to the workers, from whom it is then transferred back to the State. I never pursued the idea, partly because I lacked the technical know-how to try to figure it out, partly because I didn't see what political use could be made of it in either case. But in principle, Rebecca may be correct here. Carrol --- from list marxism-international-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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