Charles Brown wrote:
By the way, the commodity produced by a teacher is labor power.
CB
Not necessarily. There is a huge adult education industry out there
with teachers instructing in everything from foreign languages for
tourists to music appreciation to craft welding all designed for the
'ultimate consumer'. Many such courses are delivered 'for profit' both
by private companies (e.g. Berlitz) and by public education systems.
Thus the product/service is both a commodity and creates surplus value.
Paul Phillips
^^^
No -- only a _commodity_ can have exchange value, and there is a great
deal of highly useful labor in any society which does not create any
sort of commodity (product or service) and thus produces no exchange
value. Teachers produce workers but they do not produce a commodity,
^^^^
CB; Actually, in _Capital_ Vol. I , Marx uses the example of a teacher
as producing a commodity in teaching students. He analogizes to stuffing
a sausage.
Many services are commodities. They are not material objects, but they
are commodities. A massage is a commodity, even though no material
object is produced.
^^^^^^
--
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