Question

2. In a small village on a far-off continent, 101 people live together in relative harmony. Life follows the seasons very closely, since the only thing that the people produce is grain. Almost everyone is involved in tilling the fields and planting the seeds, except one individual who is the overlord and who has been given the land by divine ordinance (or by his father, no one can be sure, because it all happened a long time ago). This overlord "employs" one hundred ordinary men and women, all of whom use an identical production process to make identical bushels of grain. Given the methods available to the overlord to control workers, workers' motivation, and other determinants of the intensity of labor, to produce a bushel of grain requires 10 hours of effort from each person and 1/10th of a bushel of grain (as seed). Each week, the community does 1000 hours of work in the fields (10 hours per person) and spends the rest of the time singing, dancing, and thanking god. The overlord makes sure that everyone is paid the same, .05 bushels per hour worked, which is .5 bushels per bushel produced. This amount is consumed by each worker and his/her family in daily living. a) What are the total, necessary, and surplus products produced in this society per week? (Use the text's definitions of total, necessary, and surplus products. Show your calculations and give your answers in bushels of grain.)

Answer 1

a.) Total Product (per week) = No. of workers employed in a week X No. of hours spent in working by each worker X No. of bushels produced in one hour = 100 X 10 X 0.1= 100 bushels

Necessary Product (per week) = the part of the output produced which is necessary to sustain the working population at the existing level of living standard = No. of workers employed in a week X No. of bushels consumed by each worker in daily living= 100 X ( No. of bushels paid to a worker per hour worked X No. of hours a worker spends in working each week) = 100 X 0.05 X 10 = 50 bushels

Surplus Product ( per week) = Total Product - Necessary Product - Raw material cost = 100 - 50 - ( No. of bushels required as seed per bushel of grain X total no of bushels produced) = 100 - 50 - (0.1 X 100) = 40