Angelus Novus wrote: > But in all seriousness, I want to address a point made by Mike Ballard (yet > another Michael!):
> Quote: > "That Marx was able to develop his critique of political-economy as he > learned more about how the complexities of the system operated historically > and were developing as he was alive. Obviously, Marx didn't repudiate the > labour theory of value." > > It should be noted that Marx's "labour theory of value" is **not** the > "labour theory of value" of the classical economists. > > What is key is Marx's historically situating the commodity form of human > labor as specific to the capitalist mode of production. > > The generalization of the commodity form necessitates the universal > equivalent, money, in order to make concrete acts of labor commensurable with > one another. This is the key to Marx's category of "abstract labor". > > Michael Heinrich, borrowing a term from Hans-Georg Backhaus, uses the term > "monetary theory of value" to distinguish between Marx's value theory and > that of Smith and Ricardo. > This was also key to Marx's polemic with Proudhon: Proudhon wanted to abolish > money while retaining commodities. Marx pointed out that commodities require > money in order to be exchanged. Socially necessary labor time cannot be > measured with a stop watch; it has to be measured ex post facto in exchange > by the amount of money it brings in. Right! if I remember correctly, this is why Himmelweit and Mohun refer to the "value theory of labor" and others (including myself) refer to the Marx's "law of value." In contrast, Ricardo's theory should really be called a "labor theory of prices," as should the "Marxist" theory that neo-Ricardians such as Ian Steadman criticize. -- Jim Devine / "An atheist is a man who has no invisible means of support." -- John Buchan _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
