commodities 2 of 2

.....Now I will tell the story one more time, this time in a very abstract way:

You work. You exchange the work you do for the work other people do. This work is all embodied in commodities. Anyone's work can exchange for any other person's work because, unlike the realm of use-value, the realm of exchange is homogeneous. Did you see any paradoxes yet? Any mysteries waiting to be solved? Look closer and I will reveal them to you a little at a time.

Here's one:
Heterogeneous labor practices are exchangeable in a homogenous market place. In other words, very different types of work all all exchangeable with one another.

Think of it! Billions and billions of people working all over the world, performing very different types of labor. Billions of people all consuming things they didn't make themselves. The act of exchange brings all of these labors and uses together. But why is possible to exchange anyone's work for anyone else's?

Well, the short answer is: Money. blah blah.....

In other words, if we can reduce commodities to the amount of labor it took to make them then it becomes easy to measure their exchange value. The labor becomes homogeneous when it is exchanged. We will talk more about this later in greater detail, but for now it's safe to generalize and say that hard work is hard work. I measure the value of something by asking myself what it would take for me to make it myself. So the amount of labor- whether measured in time or sweat- becomes an abstract idea that can measure any commodity. (A few fancy sounding phrases come out of this like "the homogenization of labor" and "socially necessary labor time." We'll talk about these later.)

Now let's bring money back in.... The exchange value of all commodities are measured in money. Money stands between labor and commodities. It is a measure of value.

...another paradox: Although we pay for labor with money wages, and although we buy the objects of labor with money, the actual money price of commodities don't always directly correspond with their labor value. There are a few other forces (which we will have to get into later) that intervene in this process in a way that obscures the underlying labor value of commodities. Thus, though labor is central to the basic nature of commodities, that act of exchange has the appearance of being separated from labor. This is why I said that the realm of exchange is one of mystification and confusion. When we buy ketchup at the grocery store we don't see the people making the ketchup nor do we associate the money we pay with the work that they did. We are just buying ketchup. Exchange separates us from the underlying realities of the labor all around us.

We started with a definition of commodities: that they are made by workers, sold by capitalists, and bought by consumers. By examining this three step process, through the language of labor value, exchange value and use-value, we discovered many interesting things which we usually don't think about though we participate in them every day. Labor creates all of the use-values around us. We can exchange these diverse use-values because we measure all commodities by the abstract amount of labor that went into making them. Money acts as our standard of measurement. But this act of exchange obscures the underlying reality of labor going on all around us.
who cares.....
You see, within these academic sounding terms of use-value, exchange-value, and labor value lie the most important moral questions of our age.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• commodity
• exchange
• value
• labor
• exploitation
• marx
• capital
• engels
• labour
• class
• use
• materialism
• cap
• social
• sc

[waderodenmayer]

i should probably share my economic inclinations by revealing that I found these two videos while searching for clarification on the definition of subjective use value to augment my reading Mises' theory of money and credit. That said, I enjoyed your video and think you made some good points. Your conclusion, however, os flawed by your own definition of commodity. A commodity is labor plus capital. It is the capitalist that puts up this capital (and often contributes labor as well). It is the c

[pecosRoy]

@ivanjrt my rant continues....based on your appearance of being offended, i'd say you have some hidden guilt and don't really and fully believe what you say. it also appears that for you the ends justify the means. have you heard the expression 'every saw cuts both ways'? at no time in the video did this fellow advocate any action other than consideration of the ideas he presented. are you so immature that YOU can't even do that? are you flexible enough to go beyond morality in a polite talk?

[pecosRoy]

@ivanjrt this fellow is explaining a particular perceptual viewpoint, that being marxist economics. in that viewpoint the word 'work' has a somewhat different meaning than the one you assume it does. any perceptual viewpoint may be deconstructed from any other perceptual vantage, or even within the same one and that's even before you attempt to impose the question of morality or personalization. 'working smart' is a crock. believe what you want to----NOTHING's really true.

[ivanjrt]

@pecosRoy SO WHAT IS HIS POINT???? THAT CAPITALISTS DON'T WORK AS HARD???? WELL MAYBE IT IS NOT ABOUT WORKING HARD BUT WORKING SMART. A GOOD ENTREPRENEUR OR CAPIALIST BECOMES RICH IF HE OFERED A GREAT SERVICE TO SOCIETY WHO VOLUNTARILY CHOSE TO PURCHASE THE GOODS.