| This question <129-3|128-1> overall <21|23> Quake: <442|113>. |
| Question 66: The value of a commodity does not increase if it is made by a slow or inept laborer. Explain carefully why not. Whose decision is it to keep the value of the output of a slow worker below the time actually used for its production? How is it enforced? |
| [22] Quake: Slow workers not keeping up. The value of a commodity does not increase if made by a slow or lazy laborer, because the magnitude of value of the commodity is determined by the socially necessary labor time for the production of the commodity. The laborer who takes twice as long to produce a commodity as the socially necessary time would otherwise dictate, is faced with the reality that he/she can only produce half the amount of the commodity in a given time period. This lesser amount of the commodity is still valued in magnitude, however, the same as the like commodity produced within the socially necessary average labor time. This is due in part to the assumption that commodities of a given type are homogeneous regardless of who produced them. Value embodied strictly by labor time might suggest that the price of a commodity produce by the slow laborer would be worth more on the basis of the actual time taken to produce the commodity. However, that homogeneous product would have no more exchange value when in competition with other homogenous products produced within the socially necessary labor time for the commodity. |
| Competition, in a capitalist society, is really what is dictating this socially necessary time for a commodities' production, and is the mechanism for enforcing the value of the commodity based on the socially necessary time expectations. Thus, due to competition by other laborers who can produce the commodity within the given necessary production times, the slow laborer is would be forced to exist on less ‘profit’, (is that a dirty word at this point?), relative to their competition. Capitalism would view this as a way of making production efficient by driving those who cannot produce efficiently out of business. Slow laborers would not be able to compete with laborers who have the ability, (skill and/or technical ability), to produce at or below the socially necessary time. Those laborers with this ability would have the greater margins in their commodity, forcing less efficient laborers/producers out of business. |
| Whose decision is it to keep the value of the output of a slow worker below the time actually used for its production? This “who” would have to be competition again, as in the market is where the commodity is exchanging. As explained above, this exchange of uniform commodities would force the value of the commodity to remain at the socially necessary value, as dictated by the socially necessary labor time for producing the commodity. |
| Hans: Regarding “who is making the decision” I would put the responsibility at least in part on the population which accepts the market outcomes as fair. |
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