The principal mechanism by which capitalists worldwide have been
able to limit this political pressure has been the relocation of given sectors
of production to other zones of the world economy that are, on the
average, lower-wage areas. This is a difficult operation politically as well
as one that is dependent on taking skill levels into the calculations of eventual
profits. Hence, it has tended to be done primarily during Kondratieff
B-periods, as we suggested earlier. Nonetheless, it has been done
repeatedly during the historical development of the modern world
system. But why are the areas into which the sectors are being relocated
lower-wage areas? It solves nothing to say that this is the consequence of
‘historical’ wage levels. Whence this history?