| This question <95|95> overall <99|101> Hans: <89|101>. |
| Question 165: The linen weaver just said: “20 yards of linen is worth one coat.” In response to this, the tailor offers her a coat in exchange for her 20 yards of linen. Is the weaver now obligated to follow through with this exchange, or can she still decline? |
| [100] Hans: I want to give only 10 yards of linen for a coat. This question (like many others) tries to clarify how to understand Marx's text. In Marx's theory the exchange proportions are, in the long run, not determined by the people making the trades on the market, but they are determined in production by the labor content of the commodities. If the market interactions result in exchange relations that are not in line with labor input, then Marx assumes that the producers of that commodity which gets too much in this exchange will raise supply and therefore depress the price of that commodity, and conversely for that commodity which gets too little. |
| Nevertheless, in section 3 of chapter One, Marx obviously assumes that this exchange-proportion is also that proportion at which the linen weaver is willing to trade linen for coats. If she then declines to make this trade, this would be something like false advertising. That seems a contradiction, but it can be resolved if we argue as follows: |
| If “20 yards of linen versus one coat” is the exchange proportion which has become the equilibrium after the play of demand and supply as described above, then this means that there are people in this society who are willing to make this exchange. Marx is obviously talking about those who are willing to make this exchange and not about those who are not willing to make the exchange. |
| One of the main characteristics of capitalism, which makes it so powerful, is that it has hijacked people's deliberate self-interested activity. People are trying to act in their interest, but nevertheless, the deck is so much stacked against them, that they turn out just to be the cogs in the wheels of the system, which pursues quite different goals than those people themselves. Here you can see one of the mechanisms how this comes about. If you don't want to trade 20 yards of linen for a coat, then you will make other exchanges; but there are just enough people out there who want to make this particular trade that the capitalist system can go on despite your “vote” against it. |
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