| This question <95|93> overall <97|99> Hans: <94|99>. |
| Exam Question 3: What is a commodity? Marx does not give the definition of a commodity but an analysis. How would you define the thing he analyzes? (The answer can be given in one sentence.) |
| [98] Hans: Manure as a Commodity Maktub's second submission [96] is asking a question, but his formulations are also already beginning to answer this question. The manure is a by-product in the production of cows. Its market value therefore represents not only the labor collecting the manure but also some of the labor raising the cow itself. |
| Of course, the laborer has a very limited role in the actual production of the manure. But this is so with all production: as use values, products are not only the products of labor but “labor is their father and the earth their mother.” Here the cow is considered part of the “earth”, just as machines must also be considered part of the “earth”. |
| The production of manure exemplifies three aspects of the production process which are becoming more and more prevalent and which make production for the market a more and more inappropriate form: |
| (1) every production process has more than one product, it is a process with many inputs and many outputs. The market simply cannot handle this multidimensionality. |
| (2) with increasing technology, machines will become more and more important and direct labor a less and less important ingredient in every production process. Markets are much better in allocating current expenditures than in directing the buildup of investment. |
| (3) I assume future societies will include animals not just as things to be utilized but as as members of society in their own right. The most pressing goal is to abolish the exploitation of humans by humans, but afterwards I am sure the exploitation of animals will become an issue society is concerned about. |
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