Deveopment of U.S. Labor Movement This research derives a theoretical

This research derives a theoretical explanation of the development of the labor movement in the United States to the point it has reached in the early1990s. As a part of this research, the theoretical explanation derived is compared to the labor theories of Karl Marx (1860s in Europe) and Selig Perlman (1920s in the United States). Marx (1852) held that class structures in societies, the political systems in societies, and societal cultures were the product of the ways in which societies produced their goods and services. Within this context, Marx was concerned with the value of labor, its contribution to the creation of wealth, and the proportion of the value of labor received by its creators, the workers (Ekelund and Hebert, 1983). Perlman (1928), by contrast with Marx, was more concerned with organized labor as a representative of workers in the collective bargaining process. Within this context, Perlman was particularly interested in labor's efforts to control the opportunity to work (Reynolds, 1988). The difference in the perspectives from which Marx and Perlman considered labor means that, when comparing the theoretical explanation derived in this research to the theories of Marx and Perlman, it cannot be assumed that an agreement or disagreement with Marx would, of necessity, require either agreement or disagreement with Perlman, because any implied comparison of Marx and Perlman, with respect to labor theory, would be akin to the proverbial compar

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ished by the amount of labor consumed in its production (Ekelund and Hebert, 1983). Marx, thus, regarded labor as a commodity, and the distinction between the labor value of a commodity and the utility value of a commodity was critical in an analysis of value employing Marxist theory (Ekelund and Hebert, 1983). Where Smith (1776) thought that the factors of supply and demand were major determinants of commodity prices (although the value of labor consumed in their production provided a basis for the determination of value), Marx (1859) thought that: 1. The owners of capital paid wages which are determined by the exchange value of labor. 2. The exchange value of labor, in turn, is determined by the socially necessary labor time required to produce workers. The socially necessary labor time required to produce workers is comprised of the inputs required to rear, feed, clothe, educate, and train workers. 3. In return for the exchange value of labor, the owners of capital who use labor gain the utility value of labor. Marx believed that the utility value of labor was greater than the exchange value of labor.4. The difference between the utility value of labor and the exchange value of labor was termed surplus value by Marx,

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