Precarization, Informalization, and Marx

Tamar Diana Wilson

Review of Radical Political Economics, 2020, vol. 52, issue 3, 470-486

Abstract: It is argued that informalization (used primarily to understand economic dynamics in the Global South) and precarization (used primarily in the analysis of the labor market in the Global North) are in the process of becoming identical phenomena and are both related to the expansion of the reserve army of labor. Insights from Marx are useful in understand both processes, especially his concepts of the value of labor, of formal subsumption vs. real subsumption, and of absolute vs. relative surplus value. The vast expansion and globalization of the labor force has fostered the trend toward a reversion to formal subsumption and facilitated the recommodification of labor.

Keywords: Capital accumulation; globalization; labor and workers; precarious work; reserve army of labor (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: B24 F66 J6 J7 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:reorpe:v:52:y:2020:i:3:p:470-486

DOI: 10.1177/0486613419843199

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