| This question <101|66> overall <107|109> Pikk: <330-31|146>. |
| Question 77: What does Marx understand to be the riddle of money? |
| [108] Pikk: Network down Marx writes that commodities are born into the world in the form of a “use-value” such as material goods. He defines such as commodities only because they have a dual nature in that they simultaneously are objects of utility and bearers of value. Commodities possess a double form of the “natural form” and the “value form.” Marx then goes on to speak of commodities in their “common value-form” (money) which contrasts with the natural forms of their use-values. Marx continues by explaining that we must show the origin and trace the development of this money form because it expresses value contained in the value-relation of commodities from its simplest outline “to the dazzling money-form.” Marx contends that when this has been done, the mystery of money will disappear. Marx uses the simplest value-relation which is evident in that of one commodity to another of a different kind. He expresses this in an algebraic fashion to show the value of a single commodity: |
| “x commodity A=y commodity B or: x commodity A is worth y commodity B.” |
| In the relationship between the linen and the coat as two different kinds of commodities, the linen expresses its value in the form of the coat. The linen acting in the active role and the coat in the passive. The linen is represented as a relative value or in its relative form of value. The coat fulfills the function of equivalent form. Commodities have evolved themselves from the general form of value to the money form. The money form is different in that when gold once served as a commodity in isolated exchanges, it gradually began to serve as a universal equivalent. As soon as it became the expression of value for the world of commodities, it became the money commodity. The difficulty in the concept of the money form is the grasping of the universal equivalent form and hence the general form of value which may be reduced from working backwards from form C to form B and its element of A in the latter equation. “The simplest commodity form is therefore the germ of the money-form.” |
| Hans: You are re-telling here Marx without addressing any of the questions his story throws up. I did not even find an answer to Question 77 in your submission. I am looking for much more focused contributions which build on the discussion that has already taken place in the class. I told Miata the same thing, who gave a similarly encyclopedic overview in [101]. |
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