| This question <25|25> overall <25|27> Hans: <23|27>. |
| Question 36: An acquaintance of mine regularly swaps his wife with a friend. Does this mean his wife has an exchange value? |
| [26] Hans: Wives do not have exchange value in our society I am glad Darcy took the bait with Question 36. Of course you fell on your nose, but this is only a trial Question and I hope not only you but also others will learn from it. Marx's statement that commodities have exchange value means that commodities are routinely exchanged. It is a social custom, everybody considers it as natural and fair. People don't have to have a special relationship with each other to do it, but it is done between strangers. |
| By contrast, my fictitious acquaintance has a very special relation with his wife, his friend, and his friend's wife in order to “exchange wives”. Wives are not routinely exchanged in our society, they do not have exchange value. |
| Darci's answer [24] to Question 35 has the flaw which Marx often criticizes in his writings, namely, that nowadays people are used to looking only at the quantitative side of things, and overlooking the qualitative side of things. Both [24] and [25] suffer under the same error. |
|
|
|||||