[1996sp:34]

This question <33|46> overall <33|35> Hans: <30|59>.

Question 51: Is the magnitude of value of a commodity determined by the quantity of abstract labor necessary to produce it, or by the quantity of other commodities against which it can be exchanged?

[34] Hans: Someone who is trying to understand it all at once MsMarx's [33] gives not only an answer to Question 51, but also discusses several other issues from the assigned readings. With the exception of one sentence which I will point out below, nothing is really wrong, but it is not presented in a very coherent way. Perhaps you are too impatient to go through it step by step? I will reproduce it with my comments, which try to put your development in perspective.

The value of the labor power and the value which that labor power creates in the labor process are two different magnitudes. The basis for profit lies in the difference between. Marx is totaling up on the one hand the exchange-values of the commodities needed to maintain the mass of workers and on the other the exchange-values of the commodities produced by them.

This is a good opener, showing how relevant the Marxian theory of value is. It uses several undefined terms, which need now to be defined to make this more precise. One of them is “value”. What is value? The next paragraph gives an answer:

If a quarter of wheat exchanges with iron in a certain proportion, or the value of a quarter of wheat is expressed in a certain amount of iron, the value of wheat and its equivalent in iron are equal to some third thing, and they have the same magnitude in two different shapes. Either of them, independently of the other, can be reduced to a third common measure. This third thing determines the exchange-value of the goods being sold. Labor is this common social substance for all commodities.

What comes now is not only true for labor power but for all commodities:

The value of laboring power is determined by the quantity of labor used to produce it, both directly and indirectly. As exchange-values, all commodities are merely definite quantities of congealed labor time. In other words, the magnitude of value of a commodity becomes the amount of labor congealed in it. This quantity of labor itself is measured by the duration of time as defined by hours, days, weeks, etc. If we consider commodities as values, we consider them under the aspect of social labor. Social labor is the common social substance of all commodities. They differ by representing a greater or smaller quantity of labor. Time is important in isolation of the labor process because it represents the opportunity cost or the time which the worker could have spent doing something else.

Now you are saying some specfic things about labor power:

In essence, the worker is also a commodity on the market, like wheat or iron. He offers his labor power for sale. His exchange value is ultimately the amount of labor provided by himself and other workers needed to produce and maintain him and his family, or the labor embodied in him.

Here you are giving th answer to the Question, which is correct.

It is the exchange-value which determines the general price category. The exchange of goods for each other is determined fundamentally by the amount of labor embodied in it. So if goods are ultimately sold at their exchange values and these values embody labor, profit is surplus labor.

Now you suddently start talking about use value.

The form aspect of value is value as exchange-value, which is independent from use value. If one abstracts from the use value of the product of labor, one obtains the value.

Here is the one sentence I do not agree with:

Marx implies that this abstract takes place in the mind, as opposed to reality.

As use-values, commodities differ in quality, and as exchange-values they can only differ in quantity and do not contain an atom of use-value. If the use-value of commodities is disregarded, only one property remains, products of labor. If we made abstraction from its use-value, the useful character of the kinds of labor embodied in it disappears. This entails the disappearance of the different concrete forms of labor. These forms are all reduced to the same kind of labor, human labor in the abstract.