| This question <27|27> overall <24|26> Tuffy: <744|268-4>. |
| Question 57: Marx argues that commodities are exchangeable only because they have some common substance. Bailey denies this. He compares the exchange-value of commodities with the distance between points, which is not based on a commonality between the two points but is purely relative: “As we cannot speak of the distance of any object without implying some other object, between which and the former this relation exists, so we cannot speak of the value of a commodity but in reference to another commodity compared with it. A thing cannot be valuable in itself without reference to another thing” [mecw32]329, fn. Comment. |
| [25] Tuffy: Labor Theory of Value. In comment on Q57, Marx makes a valiant effort at isolating labor as the foundation of value. He argues that because one commodity is exchangeable for another, that the ratio of exchange must reflect a similar characteristic seen in both goods by the market. That characteristic, Marx claims, is the labor invested in the production of each good; for what else do wheat and iron have in common but labor invested in their production? |
| The Annotations points out that this argument is still incomplete. An example might be that Marx has difficulty justifying the rise in prices for, say, art and land. Both of which rise in market price, while neither necessarily undergo more invested labor. So the question remains: what does market price (exchange value) tell us about the exchange and the commodities being exchanged? |
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