An Incontestable Argument for the Law of Value
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‘… when it is only a feture of capitalism which has only existed for three hundred years.’
But, sir, Engels detected the existence of commodities during Barbarism, the last prehistoric era preceding civilisation and wrote about it in unequivocal terms in THE ORIGIN OF THE FAMILY, PRIVATE PROPERTY AND THE STATE.
‘Are you sure you don’t want to correct yourself and …’
A humble seeker after the Truth, my life philosophy is the Principle of healthy & meaningful living. So, I can assure you that I’m all for the Truth and ready always to rectify my mistakes.
Ok. Do you think that every useful thing produced by human labour is a commodity?’
My answer is, ‘Yes!’
So this is what you really meant to say. But why didn’t you tell us before that you were defining “commodity” as any product of human labour? We assumed, because you said that you were setting out to provide an incontrovertible proof of the validity of the Marxian labour theory of value, that you would be using words in the same sense that Marx did.
But now it turns out that you are using the word “commodity” — a key concept in Marxian economics, defined in the opening pages of Das Kapital — in a quite different sense to Marx. Marx defines a commodity as a use-value produced by human labour that is produced to be exchanged. This contrasts with your view that a commodity is any use-value produced by human labour. Hence your peculiar statement that commodities would still exist in socialism but that they would not be exchanged (bought and sold) there.
I second DJP’s motion that, before we continue, you re-read the first section of the opening chapter of Capital, paying particular attention to its concluding paragraph:
“A thing can be a use value, without having value. This is the case whenever its utility to man is not due to labour. Such are air, virgin soil, natural meadows, &c. A thing can be useful, and the product of human labour, without being a commodity. Whoever directly satisfies his wants with the produce of his own labour, creates, indeed, use values, but not commodities. In order to produce the latter, he must not only produce use values, but use values for others, social use values. (And not only for others, without more. The mediaeval peasant produced quit-rent-corn for his feudal lord and tithe-corn for his parson. But neither the quit-rent-corn nor the tithe-corn became commodities by reason of the fact that they had been produced for others. To become a commodity a product must be transferred to another, whom it will serve as a use value, by means of an exchange.)[12] Lastly nothing can have value, without being an object of utility. If the thing is useless, so is the labour contained in it; the labour does not count as labour, and therefore creates no value.“
The passage in brackets [12] above was added by Engels to the 4th German edition in 1890 with this explanation:
“I am inserting the parenthesis because its omission has often given rise to the misunderstanding that every product that is consumed by some one other than its producer is considered in Marx a commodity.”
Prakas wrote:”What’s your mightiest point against my view that every useful thing containing human labour is a commodity ?”
By calling every useful product of human labour a commodity you are losing the distinction between things made for exchange and things made for use. You are losing explanatory and predictive power. That’s the strongest objection.
And yes you are correct, commodities (and also wage labour and capital) do predate the capitalist mode of production.
Your ‘strongest objection’ is truly the weakest one as it disregards the obvious fact that ‘things made for exchange and things made for [the] use [of the producers themselves]’ both are equally useful products of labour and so exchangeable like commodities and the fact that useful things, if they’re valueless (i.e., if they contain no labour incorporated in them), cannot turn commodities during exchange.
Saying that there is difference between things made for exchange and things made for use isn’t the same thing as saying that the only things that can be exchanged are commodities (things made for exchange). So what you say above doesn’t logically follow.
The whole point of Marx’s analysis was an attempt to understand the dynamics of societies based on the exchange of commodities. And an important part of that was making a distinction between this kind of society and others, where social labour takes the form of production for use.
Engels was not referring to the same concept of commodity expressed by Marx on Das Kapital, even more, Marx indicated that the law of value was only applicable to the capitalist mode of production.
I have the best translation of Das Kapital and the works of Marx and Engels which is Editorial Progreso and Siglo XXI and in regard to Engels it uses the word Mercancia which is not the same as commodity, even if the English translation use the word commodity it is not the same things as the concept expressed by Marx on Das Kapital
The originality of the French edition of Das Kapital.
Peter Hudis who read Marx and Engels on the original German language has also made the distinction of the concept of commodity
I used the expression ‘exchangeable like commodities’. Examples of such things are all things that are bought & sold; Not everything exchangeable. You seem to have missed this point.
I don’t think that Engels’s insertion at the end of the first section of chapter 1 of Capital is at variance with Marx’s view of a commodity as a item of wealth produced, and reproducible, by human labour to be sold (exchanged). This being the case, that peasants and others whose surplus labour is taken in kind to be directly used by their exploiters are not producing commodities is clear. They are not producing things to be sold but directly for use, even if not theirs.
The word Marx used in German for “commodity” is Ware which has the same root as the English word “ware(s)” which in English is associated with something that is for sale (I don’t know about German, perhaps someone can help here). Marx had to find an equivalent in German for the word “commodity” that was used by Adam Smith, David Ricardo and other “Political Economists” whose theory he set out to criticise.
Actually, “commodity”, as its etymology suggests, was used by the Political Economists to mean what modern economists mean by “good” but in their minds was still associated with exchange as they considered this to be natural. Today, in economics, the word “commodity” is used only for some goods, those bought and sold in bulk whose individual items are indistinguishable such as wheat and metals, but is definitely associated with buying and selling.
In any event, in Marxian economics the term is defined as an item of wealth produced by labour that is produced to be sold.
If you want to use “commodity” as an alternative to “good” then, as DJP has pointed out, you will still need different words to distinguish between goods produced directly for use and goods produced to be sold so as to be able analyse the different types of society they imply.
The correct word is the one used in Spanish which is Mercancia, in French is Marchandise, that is the reason why Dunayeskaya said that the best translation of Das Kapital is in French, and Grijalbo used the French and the German translation and compared both.
I use commodity in the same way that it was used by Marx in Das Kapital I do not care about the innovation of the so called economists, even more, personally I do not think that there are economists in this planet, even if they have a doctorate degree, the best example is Richard Wolf who studied economic ( or econometric ) in Harvard and he said that he never learned anything and despite the fact that he read Marx capital still he is making a lot of mistake.
Socialism is not an intelectual adventure, any worker can learn it and I have met several factories workers and peasants who knew capital and it much better way than intelectuals
I agree with ALB that Engels insertion is not at variance with Marx’s view of commodity, although I do recognize that Engels thru his life made many mistakes
——————————-I used the expression ‘exchangeable like commodities’. Examples of such things are all things that are bought & sold; Not everything exchangeable. You seem to have missed this point.
I am not missing any point, I just use Marx point of view, and he is the only ‘economist’ that I cite and use all the time
‘But why didn’t you tell us before that you were defining “commodity” as any product of human labour?’
To the best of my knowledge & belief, I was not aware, when I posted this work by me here, that this stuff meant to prove the validity of the law of value may lead to redefining the stuff called commodity.
‘We assumed, because you said that you were setting out to provide an incontrovertible proof of the validity of the Marxian labour theory of value, that you would be using words in the same sense that Marx did.’
I don’t think I don’t have freedom, in order to prove or disprove some stuff, to use terms in senses different from senses in which the author of the stuff at issue used these terms. I think I’m outright free to discover a new sense or devise a new definition of a known term. What matters is whether the new stuff is right or wrong, Not whether it’s new or old, as I see it.
Nevertheless, in the light of our discussion on this topic so far, I don’t think the new simplified definition of a commodity (namely, the commodity is a useful thing with some human labour incorporated in it) clashes with the content of the law of value.
https://content.csbs.utah.edu/~ehrbar/cap1.pdf
This is an interlineal version of Das Kapital in English and German
https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-41423547
If you insert this article into a digital translation you will see that there are more than 500 mistakes made when Das Kapital was translated into others languages. Editorial Grijalbo was one of the few publisher that corrected some of those mistakes. Peter Hudis has indicated that the only person able to understand Marx handwriting was Engels
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