DJP

Forum Replies Created

Viewing 15 posts - 1,816 through 1,830 (of 1,959 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • in reply to: What Socialists Say Series #88517
    DJP
    Participant

    Why litter our forums with this Trotskyist rubbish?

    in reply to: Extreme Value Theory #88501
    DJP
    Participant

    It’s to do with statistics rather than ‘value’ in the Marxian sense.

    in reply to: Anti-Capitalist Initiative #88432
    DJP
    Participant

    I don’t think we should ignore any current. But we should also be aiming our attentions to where the people are. And that is largely outside the ‘left’ and the various ‘activist’ groups.

    in reply to: Anti-Capitalist Initiative #88428
    DJP
    Participant

    They may have joined the peoples front of judea for all I care. 

    in reply to: Dumping (pricing policy) #88453
    DJP
    Participant

     A glut of free goods may cause a temporary fall in prices.. It is peferctly possible for goods created by socialised labour in one area to be sold as commodities in another region of the world. Surely this would just be giving a free gift to commercial capitalists?Or perhaps I haven’t grasped what it is you’re talking about.

    in reply to: Labour Theory of Value #88421
    DJP
    Participant

     

    Young Master Smeet wrote:
    Well, if I exchange one valueless item for another, both of which have a large price figure, there is no value exchanged.  Two million pound opaintings could be so exchanged, and amillion pound price deal established without any comensurate value being involved.

    But the wealth (or value) that the money represents has to come from somewhere. The total value, that has been created in production is just being re-distributed.

    Young Master Smeet wrote:
    I wouldn’t agree that price is an expression of value, price is a definite relation expressed in commodity money.  The way I see it, it’s like saying total rulers equal total lengths, and there are more lengths than have been measured.

    But if value is not realised is it value at all? Does this not instead indicate a change in the average socialy necessary labour time?

    Young Master Smeet wrote:
    Yes, I suspect so, certainly I have one book at home that talks of the “Value domain” and the “price domain” in Marx as related but separate things.

    To me the single system interpretation seems to make more sense, but then I’m not claiming to have studied all the issues or to fully understand them.

    Duncan K. Foley wrote:
    In this [the single system] approach money is the form of value and labor its substance. Money prices are a form of value. Constant and variable capital are the sums of money laid out by capitalist firms to initiate production, and surplus value the total of gross profits (of which interest and rent form subsidiary parts) realized. These money value flows can be translated into labor time through a “monetary expression of labor” coefficient which represents the amount of money value equivalent to a unit of labor time in each period.From this single-system perspective there is no need to calculate a separate accounting system of “labor values”, that is, coefficients expressing the amount of labor time embodied in individual commodities, as in the “dual-system” interpretation of Marx’s theory of value…http://homepage.newschool.edu/~foleyd/marxnoneq.pdf
    in reply to: Labour Theory of Value #88419
    DJP
    Participant

     

    Young Master Smeet wrote:
    The price paid for valueless objects can come out of general wealth, not just surplus value, and it is undetermined (anyone can pay any price they like).  they establish the concept that price can be independent of value.  This opens the door to the idea that prices can be under value, and generally a large chunk of value goes unrealised.

    All prices paid come out of the general wealth, which in a capitalist society is the same thing as the total value in society. Prices can be under value for sure, they can also be over, but isn’t the fact the some prices and under value that allows for others to be above?But since all prices are just an expression of an amount of the total value, you cannot create more value by just creating more money, to do so just decreases the amount of value that a certain amount of money represents. So I’m still not sure what it would mean if prices and value did not equal in aggregate. Would this not imply that you could create wealth by just raising prices?I know some interpreters of Marx refer to price and value as being to separate systems, is this the school from which you are drawing?

    in reply to: Labour Theory of Value #88416
    DJP
    Participant
    Young Master Smeet wrote:
    DJP wrote:
    In Marx total value = total price is true by definition. To say something else is to depart from what Marx said, which would mean having to use a completely different analysis.

    Marx was wrong on this one, his maths on the transformation problem have been exploded, and all other attempts to make that work are truly tortuous, it’s easier to say that prices can’t equal value. 

    Having re-read Kliman’s ‘Reclaiming Capital’ I’m not so sure about this. The so-called ‘transformation problem’ is not a problem at all. The problems come from mis-interpretating what Marx wrote.A further consequence of total prices not equaling value would be that all of Marx’s arguments about exploitation go out the window.

    Quote:
    The simplest disproof are antiques and arts: their prices are not at all determined by value (since they are unique and cannot be reproduced). 

    I don’t think this supports at all what you are saying; the price paid from them comes out of the total surplus value, unless they are bought with funny money how can this not be the case?

    in reply to: Labour Theory of Value #88414
    DJP
    Participant
    Young Master Smeet wrote:
    Actually, I would say the opposite, goods only sell at their value by accident, and Marx was wrong, total prices don’t equal total values (and, I suspect it would be the case that a good deal of value goes unrealised as price).  I think value is more like a sort of gravity for prices, which aere subject to other forces as well.

    Interesting. I would agree that for an individual commodity, price = value only by accident, I think Marx would have said this?’Value’ is expressed in terms of socially necessary labour-time, ‘exchange-value’ in price. Socially necessary labour time is determined through the mechanism of market exchange. If capital fails to become valorised, i.e expanded in production, it is because it has not been invested in socially necessary avenues.In Marx total value = total price is true by definition. To say something else is to depart from what Marx said, which would mean having to use a completely different analysis.The above is as much a question as a statement.

    in reply to: Labour Theory of Value #88412
    DJP
    Participant

    The thing is, though it’s probably only important if you want to be an ultra-geek, as far as I know, Marx never used the term ‘labour theory of value’ to refer to his theories.Marx didn’t set out to come up with a theory to explain the individual prices of commodities (though his theory does this) but a theory to explain how labour is regulated in a capitalist exchange economy.A lot of introductions to Marx say that he said that the price of individual commodities gravitate towards there value (socially necessary labour time) equivalent  but I don’t think this is necessarily the case. All Marx said was that total value equals total price and that value and surplus value is distributed between capitalists through the competitive struggle for profits.In Capital 1 Marx, to illustrate that value is created in production and not exchange, presumes that price equals value. In the later volumes this presumption is dropped to explain the workings of the market and competition.

    in reply to: Labour Theory of Value #88407
    DJP
    Participant

    Hopefully this article is of interest. It’s all about the difference between value and exchange value which often gets blurred in secondary texts.http://libcom.org/files/kliman.pdf

    in reply to: Labour Theory of Value #88404
    DJP
    Participant
    in reply to: Labour Theory of Value #88403
    DJP
    Participant
    TheOldGreyWhistle wrote:
    Value is not defined by the quantity of work (one could put a lot of work to destroy his house but it would be a negative value!), it is defined by how much importance an individual puts on a good to achieve his own preferences. Value is not intrinsic but subjective, that’s why people exchange things (work against money for instance)and how they get wealthier. To create wealth you need division of labour and voluntary exchanges.

    In Marx, ‘Value’ relates to the amount of reproducable socially necessary labour-time embodied in the commodity. In this sense ‘value’ is not subjective but intrinsic. The trouble is, as with all words, in a different context it can mean a completely different thing.I recently read this blog post which I thought was quite good: http://kapitalism101.wordpress.com/2012/04/05/value-cant-be-created-in-exchange/Or you could watch this rather excellent video: http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/video/marx-and-economics’The labour theory of value’ is something that really belongs to Smith and Ricardo, not Marx. 

    in reply to: The ban on religion #88367
    DJP
    Participant

     

    robbo203 wrote:
    There is a difference , as I am sure you realise, between an organisation whose purpose is specifically to combat religious ideas and a political party whose purpose is to help  transform society . If you are expecting the latter to depend on a majority becoming convinced atheists you will be waiting forever

    The thing is our current policy does not stop people with a religious persuasion carrying on socialist activity outside the party, after all we have always claimed that it is not the SPGB itself that will bring about socialism but the working class as a whole.If any members have strong enough feelings about changing from the present set up they are free to raise the issue, but as I have not seen anything about religion on the last few years conference agendas it appears that there isn’t much enthusiasm to do so.So that’s pretty much end of story. I could go on, but really I’d be wasting time.

    in reply to: Votes for us #88326
    DJP
    Participant

    Robin, can you point me to the queue of religous belivers that are waiting to join the SPGB?I think you’ll find it only exists in your imagination.

Viewing 15 posts - 1,816 through 1,830 (of 1,959 total)