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Capital - A Critical Analysis of Capitalist Production - Karl Marx Part 1 · Timeless Karl Marx Philosophy

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Speaker 1: Capital by Karl Marx, Volume one, Editor's Preface to the
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Speaker 1: English Edition, eighteen eighty six. The publication of an English
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Speaker 1: version of Das Capital needs no apology. On the contrary,
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Speaker 1: an explanation might be expected why this English version has
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Speaker 1: been delayed until now, seeing that for some years past
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Speaker 1: the theories advocated in this book have been constantly referred to,
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Speaker 1: attacked and defended, interpreted and misinterpreted in the periodical press
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Speaker 1: and the current literature of both England and America. When
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Speaker 1: soon after the author's death in eighteen eighty three it
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Speaker 1: became evident that an English edition of the work was
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Speaker 1: really required. Mister Samuel Moore, for many years a friend
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Speaker 1: of Marx and of the present writer, and than whom
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Speaker 1: perhaps no one is more conversant with the book itself,
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Speaker 1: consented to undertake the translation which the literary executors of
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Speaker 1: Marx were anxious to lay before the public. It was
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Speaker 1: understood that I should compare the manuscript with the original work,
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Speaker 1: and it suggests such alterations as I might deem advisable.
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Speaker 1: When by and by it was found that mister Moore's
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Speaker 1: professional occupations prevented him from finishing the translation as quickly
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Speaker 1: as we all desired, we gladly accepted doctor Aveling's offer
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Speaker 1: to undertake a portion of the work. At the same time,
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Speaker 1: Missus Aveling, Marx's youngest daughter, offered to check the quotations
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Speaker 1: and to restore the original text of the numerous passages
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Speaker 1: taken from English authors and blue books and translated by
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Speaker 1: Marx into German. This has been done throughout with but
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Speaker 1: a few unavoidable exceptions. The following portions of the book
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Speaker 1: have been translated by Dr Aveling. One Chapters ten, the
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Speaker 1: working Day and eleven, Rate and Mass of Surplus Value
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Speaker 1: two Part six Wages comprising chapters nineteen to twenty two,
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Speaker 1: three from chapter twenty four, Section four, Circumstance that etc.
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Speaker 1: To the end of the book comprising the latter part
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Speaker 1: of chapter twenty four, Chapter twenty five, and the whole
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Speaker 1: of parts eight chapters twenty six to thirty three. Four
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Speaker 1: the two authors prefaces. All the rest of the book
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Speaker 1: has been done by mister Moore. While thus each of
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Speaker 1: the translators is responsible for his share of the work,
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Speaker 1: only I bear a joint responsibility for the whole. The
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Speaker 1: third German edition, which has been made the basis of
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Speaker 1: our work throughout was prepared by me in eighteen eighty three,
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Speaker 1: with the assistance of notes left by the author indicating
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Speaker 1: the passages of the second edition to be replaced by
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Speaker 1: designated passages from the French text published in eighteen seventy three.
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Speaker 1: Footnote Le capitale Barkarl Marx preduccion de m giroi antierremnt
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Speaker 1: rivisi parlatur paris Lachartre. This translation, especially the latter part
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Speaker 1: of the book, contains considerable alterations in and additions to
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Speaker 1: the text of the second German edition end footnote. The
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Speaker 1: alterations thus affected in the text of the second edition
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Speaker 1: unally coincided with the changes prescribed by Marx in a
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Speaker 1: set of manuscript instructions for an English translation that was
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Speaker 1: planned about ten years ago in America, but abandoned, chiefly
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Speaker 1: for want of a fit and proper translator. This manuscript
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Speaker 1: was placed at our disposal by our old friend mister F. A.
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Speaker 1: Sorge of Hoboken, New Jersey. It designates some further interpolations
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Speaker 1: from the French edition, but being so many years older
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Speaker 1: than the final instructions for the third edition, I did
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Speaker 1: not consider myself at liberty to make use of it
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Speaker 1: otherwise than sparingly, and chiefly in cases where it helped
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Speaker 1: us over difficulties. In the same way, the French text
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Speaker 1: has been referred to in most of the difficult passages
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Speaker 1: as an indicator of what the author himself was prepared
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Speaker 1: to sacrifice, wherever something of the full import of the
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Speaker 1: original had to be sacrificed in the rendering. There is, however,
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Speaker 1: one difficulty. We could not spare the reader the use
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Speaker 1: of certain terms in a sense different from what they
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Speaker 1: have not only in common life but in ordinary political economy.
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Speaker 1: But this was unavoidable. Every new aspect of a science
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Speaker 1: involves a revolution in the technical terms of that science.
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Speaker 1: This is best shown by chemistry, where the whole of
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Speaker 1: the terminology is radically changed about once in twenty years,
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Speaker 1: and where you will hardly find a single organic compound
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Speaker 1: that has not gone through a series of different names.
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Speaker 1: Political economy has generally been content to take just as
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Speaker 1: they were, the terms of commercial and industrial life, and
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Speaker 1: to operate with them, entirely, failing to see that by
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Speaker 1: so doing it confined itself within the narrow circles of
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Speaker 1: ideas expressed by those terms. Thus, though perfectly aware that
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Speaker 1: both profits and rent are but subdivisions fragments of that
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Speaker 1: unpaid part of the product which the laborer has to
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Speaker 1: supply to his employer, its first appropriator, though not its
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Speaker 1: ultimate exclusive owner. Yet, even classic political economy never went
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Speaker 1: beyond the received notions of profits and rents, never examined
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Speaker 1: this unpaid part of the product, called by marks product
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Speaker 1: in its integrity as a whole, and therefore never arrived
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Speaker 1: at a clear comprehension either of its origin and nature,
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Speaker 1: or of the laws that regulate the subsequent distribution of
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Speaker 1: its value. Similarly, all industry, not agricultural or handicraft, is
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Speaker 1: indiscriminately comprised in the term of manufacture, and thereby the
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Speaker 1: distinction is obliterated between two great and essentially different periods
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Speaker 1: of economic history, the period of manufacture proper, based on
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Speaker 1: the division of manual labour, and the period of modern industry,
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Speaker 1: based on machinery. It is, however, self evident that a
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Speaker 1: theory which views modern capitalist production as a mere passing
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Speaker 1: stage in the economic history of mankind must make use
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Speaker 1: of terms different from those habitual to writers who look
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Speaker 1: upon that form of production as imperishable and final. A
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Speaker 1: word respecting the author's method of quoting may not be
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Speaker 1: out of place. In the majority of cases, the quotations
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Speaker 1: serve in the usual way as documentary evidenced in support
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Speaker 1: of assertions made in the text. But in many instances
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Speaker 1: passages from economic writers are quoted in order to indicate when, where,
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Speaker 1: and by whom a certain proposition was for the first
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Speaker 1: time clearly enunciated. This is done in cases where the
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Speaker 1: proposition quoted is of importance, as being a more or
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Speaker 1: less adequate expression of the conditions of social production and
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Speaker 1: exchange prevalent at the time, and quite irrespective of Marx's
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Speaker 1: recognition or otherwise of its general validity. These quotations therefore
6:33
Speaker 1: supplement the text by a running commentary taken from the
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Speaker 1: history of the science. Our translation comprises the first book
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Speaker 1: of the work only, but this first book is in
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Speaker 1: a great measure a whole in itself, and has for
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Speaker 1: twenty years ranked as an independent work. The second book,
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Speaker 1: edited in German by me in eighteen eighty five, is
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Speaker 1: decidedly incomplete without the third, which cannot be published before
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Speaker 1: the end of eighteen eighty seven. When book three has
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Speaker 1: been brought out in the original German, it will then
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Speaker 1: be soon enough to think about preparing an English edition
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Speaker 1: of both. DEA's Capital is often called on the continent
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Speaker 1: the Bible of the working class. That the conclusions arrived
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Speaker 1: at in this work are daily more and more becoming
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Speaker 1: the fundamental principles of the great working class movement, not
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Speaker 1: only in Germany and Switzerland, but in France, in Holland
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Speaker 1: and Belgium, in America, and even in Italy and Spain.
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Speaker 1: That everywhere the working class more and more recognizes in
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Speaker 1: these conclusions the most adequate expression of its condition and
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Speaker 1: of its aspirations. Nobody acquainted with that movement will deny.
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Speaker 1: And in England too, the theories of Marx, even at
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Speaker 1: this moment, exercise a powerful influence upon the socialist movement,
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Speaker 1: which is spreading in the ranks of cultured people no
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Speaker 1: less than in those of the working class. But that
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Speaker 1: is not all. The time is rapidly approaching when a
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Speaker 1: thorough examination of England's economic position will impose itself as
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Speaker 1: an irresistible national necessity. The working of the industrial system
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Speaker 1: of this country impossible without a constant and rapid extension
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Speaker 1: of production and therefore of markets, is coming to a
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Speaker 1: dead stop. Free trade has exhausted its resources. Even Manchester
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Speaker 1: doubts this its quandum economic gospel footnote. At the quarterly
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Speaker 1: meeting of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, held this afternoon,
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Speaker 1: a warm discussion took place on the subject of free trade.
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Speaker 1: A resolution was moved to the effect that, having waited
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Speaker 1: in vain forty years for other nations to follow the
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Speaker 1: free trade example of England, this Chamber thinks the time
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Speaker 1: has now arrived to reconsider that position. End quote. The
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Speaker 1: resolution was rejected by a majority of only one, the
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Speaker 1: figures being twenty one to four and twenty two against
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Speaker 1: evening standard November one, eighteen eighty six end footnote. Foreign
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Speaker 1: industry rapidly developing stares English production in the face everywhere,
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Speaker 1: not only in protected but also in neutral markets, and
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Speaker 1: even on this side of the Channel. While the productive
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Speaker 1: power increases in a geometric the extension of markets proceeds
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Speaker 1: at best in an arithmetic ratio. The disennial cycle of stagnation,
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Speaker 1: prosperity overproduction and crisis, ever recurrent from eighteen twenty five
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Speaker 1: to eighteen sixty seven, seems indeed to have run its course,
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Speaker 1: but only to land us in the slough of despond
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Speaker 1: of a permanent and chronic depression. The side for period
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Speaker 1: of prosperity will not come as often as we seem
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Speaker 1: to perceive its heralding symptoms. So often do they again
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Speaker 1: vanish into air. Meanwhile, each succeeding winter brings up afresh
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Speaker 1: the great question what to do with the unemployed? But
9:53
Speaker 1: while the number of the unemployed keeps swelling from year
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Speaker 1: to year, there is nobody to answer that question. Can
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Speaker 1: almost calculate the moment when the unemployed losing patients, will
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Speaker 1: take their own fate into their own hands. Surely, at
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Speaker 1: such a moment the voice ought to be heard of
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Speaker 1: a man whose whole theory is the result of a
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Speaker 1: lifelong study of the economic history and condition of England,
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Speaker 1: and whom that study led to the conclusion that, at
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Speaker 1: least in Europe, England is the only country where the
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Speaker 1: inevitable social revolution might be affected entirely by peaceful and
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Speaker 1: legal means. He certainly never forgot to add that he
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Speaker 1: hardly expected the English ruling classes to submit without a
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Speaker 1: pro slavery rebellion to this peaceful and legal revolution. Frederick Engels,
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Speaker 1: November fifth, eighteen eighty six, Preface to the first German
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Speaker 1: edition eighteen sixty seven. The work, the first volume of
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Speaker 1: which I now submit to the public, forms the continuation
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Speaker 1: of my zo critique their Politician Economy, A Contribution to
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Speaker 1: the Criticism of Political Economy, published in eighteen fifty nine.
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Speaker 1: The long pause between the first part and the continuation
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Speaker 1: is due to an illness of many years duration that
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Speaker 1: again and again interrupted my work. The substance of that
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Speaker 1: earlier work is summarized in the first three chapters of
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Speaker 1: this volume. This is not done merely for the sake
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Speaker 1: of connection and completeness. The presentation of the subject matter
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Speaker 1: is improved as far as circumstances in any way permit.
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Speaker 1: Many points only hinted at in the earlier book are
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Speaker 1: here worked out more fully, whilst conversely, points worked out
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Speaker 1: fully there are only touched upon in this volume. The
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Speaker 1: sections on the history of the theories of value and
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Speaker 1: of money are now of course left out altogether. The
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Speaker 1: reader of the earlier work will find, however, in the
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Speaker 1: notes to the first chapter additional sources of reference relative
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Speaker 1: to the history of those theories. Every beginning is difficult
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Speaker 1: holds in all sciences to understand, and the first chapter,
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Speaker 1: especially the section that contains the analysis of commodities will
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Speaker 1: therefore present the greatest difficulty that which concerns more especially
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Speaker 1: the analysis of the substance of value and the magnitude
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Speaker 1: of value. I have as much as it was possible
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Speaker 1: popularized footnote. This is the more necessary as even the
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Speaker 1: section of Ferdinand Lassal's work against Schultze de Leitch, in
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Speaker 1: which he professes to give the intellectual quintessence of my
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Speaker 1: explanations on these subjects, contains important mistakes. If Ferdinand LaSalle
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Speaker 1: has borrowed almost literally from my writings, and without any acknowledgment,
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Speaker 1: all the general theoretical propositions in his economic works e g.
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Speaker 1: Those on the historical character of capital, on the connection
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Speaker 1: between the conditions of production and the mode of production,
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Speaker 1: et cetera, et cetera, even to the terminology created by me,
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Speaker 1: this may perhaps be due to purposes of propaganda. I
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Speaker 1: am here, of course, not speaking of his detailed working
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Speaker 1: out and application of these propositions, with which I have
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Speaker 1: nothing to do. End footnote. The value form, whose fully
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Speaker 1: developed shape is the money form, is very elementary and simple. Nonetheless,
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Speaker 1: the human mind has for more than two thousand years
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Speaker 1: sought in vain to get to the bottom of it all, whilst,
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Speaker 1: on the other hand, to the successful analysis of much
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Speaker 1: more composite and complex forms, there has been at least
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Speaker 1: an approximation. Why because the body as an organic whole
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Speaker 1: is more easy of study than other cells of the body.
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Speaker 1: In the analysis of economic forms. Moreover, neither microscopes nor
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Speaker 1: chemical reagents are of use. The force of abstraction must
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Speaker 1: replace both. But in bourgeois society the commodity form of
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Speaker 1: the product of labour or value form of the commodity
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Speaker 1: is the economic cell form. To the superficial observer, the
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Speaker 1: analysis of these forms seems to turn upon my new shy.
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Speaker 1: It does in fact deal with my new shy. But
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Speaker 1: they are of the same order as those dealt with
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Speaker 1: in microscopic anatomy, with the exception of the section of
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Speaker 1: value form. Therefore, this volume cannot stand accused on the
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Speaker 1: score of difficulty. I presuppose, of course, a reader who
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Speaker 1: is willing to learn something new and therefore to think
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Speaker 1: for himself. The physicist either observes physical phenomena where they
14:25
Speaker 1: occur in their most typical form and most free from
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Speaker 1: disturbing influence, or wherever possible, he makes experiments under conditions
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Speaker 1: that assure the occurrence of the phenomena in its normality.
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Speaker 1: In this work, I have to examine the capitalist mode
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Speaker 1: of production and the conditions of production and exchange corresponding
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Speaker 1: to that mode up to the present time. Their classic
14:46
Speaker 1: ground is England. That is the reason why England is
14:49
Speaker 1: used as the chief illustration in the development of my
14:52
Speaker 1: theoretical ideas. If, however, the German reader shrugs his shoulders
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Speaker 1: at the condition of the English industrial and agriculture labourers,
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Speaker 1: or in optimist fashion, comforts himself with the thought that
15:04
Speaker 1: in Germany things are not nearly so bad, I must
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Speaker 1: plainly tell him detai fabula narraiture. It is a view
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Speaker 1: that the story is told horace intrinsically. It is not
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Speaker 1: a question of the higher or lower degree of development
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Speaker 1: of the social antagonisms that result from the natural laws
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Speaker 1: of capitalist production. It is a question of these laws themselves,
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Speaker 1: of these tendencies working with iron necessity towards inevitable results.
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Speaker 1: The country that is more developed industrially only shows to
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Speaker 1: the less developed the image of its own future. But
15:39
Speaker 1: apart from this, where capitalist production is fully naturalized among
15:43
Speaker 1: the Germans, for instance, in the factories proper, the condition
15:47
Speaker 1: of things is much worse than in England because the
15:49
Speaker 1: counterpoise of the factory acts is wanting. In all other spheres, we,
15:54
Speaker 1: like the rest of continental Western Europe, suffer not only
15:58
Speaker 1: from the development of capitalist production, but also from the
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Speaker 1: incompleteness of that development. Alongside the modern evils, a whole
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Speaker 1: series of inherited evils oppressors arising from the passive survival
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Speaker 1: of antiquated modes of production, with their inevitable train of
16:14
Speaker 1: social and political anachronisms. We suffer not only from the
16:18
Speaker 1: living but from the dead. Lemont Ciesi levife the dead
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Speaker 1: holds the living in his grasp formula of French common law.
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Speaker 1: The social statistics of Germany and the rest of continental
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Speaker 1: Western Europe are, in comparison with those of England, wretchedly compiled.
16:35
Speaker 1: But they raise the veil just enough to let us
16:37
Speaker 1: catch a glimpse of the meduca head behind it. We
16:40
Speaker 1: should be appalled at the state of things at home. If,
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Speaker 1: as in England, our governments and parliaments appointed periodically commissions
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Speaker 1: of inquiry into economic conditions. If these commissions were armed
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Speaker 1: with the same plenary powers to get at the truth
16:54
Speaker 1: if it were possible to find for this purpose men
16:56
Speaker 1: as competent, as free from partisanship and respect of persons,
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Speaker 1: as are the English factory inspectors, her medical reporters on
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Speaker 1: public health, her commissioners of Inquiry into the exploitation of
17:07
Speaker 1: women and children into housing and food. Perseus wore a
17:12
Speaker 1: magic cap down over his eyes and ears as a
17:15
Speaker 1: make believe that there are no monsters. Let us not
17:18
Speaker 1: deceive ourselves on this as in the eighteenth century the
17:21
Speaker 1: American War of Independence sounded the toxin for the European
17:24
Speaker 1: middle class, so that in the nineteenth century the American
17:28
Speaker 1: Civil War sounded it for the European working class. In England,
17:33
Speaker 1: the process of social disintegration is palpable. When it has
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Speaker 1: reached a certain point, it must react on the continent.
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Speaker 1: There it will take a form more brutal or more humane,
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Speaker 1: according to the degree of development of the working class itself.
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Speaker 1: Apart from higher motives, therefore, their own most important interests
17:52
Speaker 1: dictate to the classes that are for the nonce the
17:55
Speaker 1: ruling ones. The removal of all legally removable hindrances to
17:59
Speaker 1: the free development of the working class. For this reason,
18:03
Speaker 1: as well as others, I have given so large a
18:06
Speaker 1: space in this volume to the history, the details and
18:09
Speaker 1: the results of English factory legislation. One nation canon should
18:14
Speaker 1: learn from others, and even when a society has got
18:17
Speaker 1: upon the right track for the discovery of the natural
18:20
Speaker 1: laws of its movement. And it is the ultimate aim
18:23
Speaker 1: of this work to lay bare the economic law of
18:25
Speaker 1: motion of modern society. It can neither clear by bold leaps,
18:29
Speaker 1: nor remove by legal enactments the obstacles offered by the
18:33
Speaker 1: successive phases of its normal development, but it can shorten
18:37
Speaker 1: and lessen the birth pangs to prevent possible misunderstandings. A word,
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Speaker 1: I paint the capitalist and the landlord in no sense
18:46
Speaker 1: couleur d'rerouse I e. Seen through rose tinted glasses. But
18:51
Speaker 1: here individuals are dealt with only in so far as
18:54
Speaker 1: they are the personifications of economic categories, embodiments of particular
18:58
Speaker 1: class relations and class interests. My standpoint, from which the
19:03
Speaker 1: evolution of the economic formation of society is viewed as
19:07
Speaker 1: a process of natural history, can less than any other,
19:11
Speaker 1: make the individual responsible for relations whose creature he socially remains,
19:16
Speaker 1: however much he may subjectively raise himself above them in
19:21
Speaker 1: the domain of political economy, free scientific inquiry meets not
19:25
Speaker 1: merely the same enemies as in all other domains. The
19:29
Speaker 1: peculiar nature of the materials it deals with, summons as
19:32
Speaker 1: foes into the field of battle, the most violent, mean
19:36
Speaker 1: and malignant passions of the human breast, the furies of
19:39
Speaker 1: private interest. The English Established Church, for example, will more
19:44
Speaker 1: readily pardon an attack on thirty eight of its thirty
19:47
Speaker 1: nine articles than on one thirty ninth of its income. Nowadays,
19:53
Speaker 1: atheism is culpoleivus, a relatively slight sin contrast with mortal
19:58
Speaker 1: sinn compaired with criticism of existing property relations. Nevertheless, there
20:04
Speaker 1: is an unmistakable advance. I refer, for example to the
20:08
Speaker 1: Blue Book published within the last few weeks correspondence with
20:12
Speaker 1: Her Majesty's missions abroad regarding industrial questions and trades unions.
20:17
Speaker 1: The representatives of the English Crown in foreign countries there
20:21
Speaker 1: declare in so many words that in Germany, in France,
20:24
Speaker 1: to be brief, in all the civilized states of the
20:26
Speaker 1: European continent, radical change in the existing relations between capital
20:31
Speaker 1: and labour is as evident and inevitable as in England.
20:35
Speaker 1: At the same time, on the other side of the
20:37
Speaker 1: Atlantic Ocean. Mister Wade, vice President of the United States,
20:42
Speaker 1: declared in public meetings that after the abolition of slavery,
20:46
Speaker 1: a radical change of the relations of capital and of
20:49
Speaker 1: property in land is next upon the order of the day.
20:53
Speaker 1: These are signs of the times, not to be hidden
20:55
Speaker 1: by purple mantles or black cassocks. They do not signify
20:59
Speaker 1: that to tomorrow a miracle will happen. They show that
21:03
Speaker 1: within the ruling classes themselves, a foreboding is dawning, that
21:07
Speaker 1: the present society is no solid crystal, but an organism
21:11
Speaker 1: capable of change, and is constantly changing. The second volume
21:15
Speaker 1: of this book will treat of the process of the
21:18
Speaker 1: circulation of capital, Book two, and of the varied forms
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Speaker 1: assumed by capital in the course of its development Book three.
21:26
Speaker 1: The third and last volume, Book four, the history of
21:29
Speaker 1: the theory every opinion based on scientific criticism. I welcome
21:35
Speaker 1: as to prejudices of so called public opinion, to which
21:38
Speaker 1: I have never made concessions. Now as a four time,
21:41
Speaker 1: the maxim of the great Florentine is mine segui il
21:46
Speaker 1: duo gosul illscia. Dear LEGENTI follow your own course and
21:52
Speaker 1: let people talk paraphrased from Dante Carl Marx London, July
21:59
Speaker 1: the twenty five, eighteen sixty seven end of the preface
22:04
Speaker 1: to the first German edition. Afterward to the second edition
22:08
Speaker 1: eighteen seventy three to the present moment, political economy in
22:14
Speaker 1: Germany is a foreign science. Gustav von Gulich, in his
22:19
Speaker 1: historical description of Commerce, Industry, etc. Especially in the two
22:23
Speaker 1: first volumes published in eighteen thirty, has examined at length
22:26
Speaker 1: the historical circumstances that prevented in Germany the development of
22:31
Speaker 1: the capitalist mode of production and consequently the development in
22:35
Speaker 1: that country of modern bourgeois society, thus the soil. Whence
22:40
Speaker 1: political economy springs was wanting, this science had to be
22:46
Speaker 1: imported from England and France as a ready made article.
22:50
Speaker 1: Its German professors remained schoolboys. The theoretical expression of a
22:55
Speaker 1: foreign reality was turned in their hands into a collection
22:59
Speaker 1: of dogmas, interpreted by them in terms of the petty
23:02
Speaker 1: trading world around them, and therefore misinterpreted. The feeling of
23:07
Speaker 1: scientific impotence, a feeling not wholly to be repressed, and
23:12
Speaker 1: the uneasy consciousness of having to touch on a subject
23:15
Speaker 1: in reality foreign to them was but imperfectly concealed, either
23:19
Speaker 1: under a parade of literary and historical erudition or by
23:23
Speaker 1: an admixture of extraneous material borrowed from the so called
23:27
Speaker 1: commeral sciences, a medley of smatterings through whose purgatory the
23:32
Speaker 1: hopeless candidate for the German bureaucracy has to pass. Since
23:36
Speaker 1: eighteen forty eight, capitalist production has developed rapidly in Germany,
23:41
Speaker 1: and at the present time it is in the full
23:43
Speaker 1: bloom of speculation and swindling. But fate is still unpropitious
23:48
Speaker 1: to our professional economists. At the time when they were
23:51
Speaker 1: able to deal with political economy in a straightforward fashion,
23:55
Speaker 1: modern economic conditions did not actually exist in Germany. Of
24:00
Speaker 1: these conditions did come into existence, they did so under
24:03
Speaker 1: circumstances that no longer allowed of their being really and
24:06
Speaker 1: impartially investigated within the bounds of the bourgeois horizon. In
24:10
Speaker 1: so far i e. As the capitalist regime is looked
24:14
Speaker 1: upon as the absolutely final form of social production instead
24:18
Speaker 1: of as a passing historical phase of its evolution, political
24:23
Speaker 1: economy can remain a science only so long as the
24:25
Speaker 1: class struggle is latent or manifests itself only in isolated
24:30
Speaker 1: and sporadic phenomena. Let us take England. Its political economy
24:36
Speaker 1: belongs to the period in which the class struggle was
24:38
Speaker 1: as yet undeveloped. Its last great representative, Ricardo, in the end,
24:44
Speaker 1: consciously makes the antagonism of class interests of wages and profits,
24:49
Speaker 1: of profits and rent the starting point of his investigations,
24:53
Speaker 1: naively taking this antagonism for a social law of nature.
25:00
Speaker 1: But by this start the science of bourgeois economy had
25:03
Speaker 1: reached the limits beyond which it could not pass. Already
25:07
Speaker 1: in the lifetime of Ricardo, and in opposition to him,
25:10
Speaker 1: it was met by criticism in the person of Sismondi
25:14
Speaker 1: footnote see my work zur Critique, etc. Page thirty nine,
25:20
Speaker 1: end footnote. The succeeding period from eighteen twenty to eighteen
25:25
Speaker 1: thirty was notable in England for scientific activity in the
25:28
Speaker 1: domain of political economy. It was the time as well
25:32
Speaker 1: as the vulgarizing and extending of Ricardo's theory. As to
25:36
Speaker 1: the contest of that theory with the Old School, splendid
25:40
Speaker 1: tournaments were held. What was done then is little known
25:43
Speaker 1: to the continent, generally because the polemic is for the
25:47
Speaker 1: most part scattered through articles in reviews, occasional literature and pamphlets.
25:52
Speaker 1: The unprejudiced character of this polemic, although the theory of
25:56
Speaker 1: Ricardo already serves in exceptional cases as a weapon of
26:00
Speaker 1: attack upon bourgeois economy, is explained by the circumstances of
26:04
Speaker 1: the time. On the one hand, modern industry itself was
26:08
Speaker 1: only just emerging from the age of childhood, as is
26:12
Speaker 1: shown by the fact that with the crisis of eighteen
26:14
Speaker 1: twenty five it for the first time opens the periodic
26:17
Speaker 1: cycle of its modern life. On the other hand, the
26:21
Speaker 1: class struggle between capital and labour is forced into the background.
26:25
Speaker 1: Politically by the discord between the governments and the feudal
26:28
Speaker 1: aristocracy gathered around the Holy Alliance on the one hand,
26:32
Speaker 1: and the popular masses led by the bourgeoisie on the other.
26:36
Speaker 1: Economically by the quarrel between industrial capital and aristocratic landed property,
26:42
Speaker 1: a quarrel that in France was concealed by the opposition
26:45
Speaker 1: between small and large landed property, and that in England
26:49
Speaker 1: broke out openly after the Corn Laws. The literature of
26:53
Speaker 1: political economy in England at this time calls to mind
26:56
Speaker 1: the stormy forward movement in France after doctor Quesnay's death,
27:01
Speaker 1: but only as a Saint Martin's summer reminds us of spring.
27:05
Speaker 1: With the year eighteen thirty came the decisive crisis in
27:10
Speaker 1: France and and England. The bourgeoisie had conquered political power.
27:14
Speaker 1: Thenceforth the class struggle practically as well as theoretically, took
27:19
Speaker 1: on more and more outspoken and threatening forms. I sounded
27:23
Speaker 1: the knell of scientific bourgeois economy. It was thenceforth no
27:28
Speaker 1: longer a question whether this theorem or that was true,
27:31
Speaker 1: but whether it was useful to capital or harmful, expedient
27:35
Speaker 1: or inexpedient, politically dangerous or not. In place of disinterested inquirers,
27:42
Speaker 1: there were hired prize fighters in place of genuine scientific research,
27:47
Speaker 1: the bad conscience and the evil intent of apologetic Still,
27:52
Speaker 1: even the obtrusive pamphlets with which the anti corn law league,
27:55
Speaker 1: led by the manufacturers Common and Bright, deluged the world,
28:00
Speaker 1: have a historic interest, if no scientific one, on account
28:03
Speaker 1: of their polemic against the landed aristocracy. But since then
28:08
Speaker 1: the free trade legislation, inaugurated by Sir Robert peel As
28:12
Speaker 1: deprived vulgar economy of this its last sting. The continental
28:17
Speaker 1: Revolution of eighteen forty eight to nine also had its
28:21
Speaker 1: reaction in England, men who still claimed some scientific standing
28:26
Speaker 1: and aspired to be something more than mere sophists and
28:28
Speaker 1: sycophants of the ruling classes tried to harmonize the political
28:32
Speaker 1: economy of capital with the claims no longer to be
28:35
Speaker 1: ignored of the proletariat. Hence a shallow syncretism, of which
28:41
Speaker 1: John Stuart Mill is the best representative. It is a
28:44
Speaker 1: declaration of bankruptcy by bourgeois economy, an event on which
28:49
Speaker 1: the great Russian scholar and critic n at Chernishowski has
28:53
Speaker 1: thrown the light of a master mind in his outlines
28:56
Speaker 1: of political economy. According to Mill, in Germany, therefore, the
29:01
Speaker 1: capitalist mode of production came to a head after its
29:04
Speaker 1: antagonistic character had already in France and England shown itself
29:09
Speaker 1: in a fierce strife of classes. And meanwhile, moreover, the
29:13
Speaker 1: German proletariat had attained a much more clear class consciousness
29:17
Speaker 1: than the German bourgeoisie. Thus, at the very moment when
29:21
Speaker 1: a bourgeois science of political economy seemed at last possible
29:24
Speaker 1: in Germany, it had in reality become impossible under these circumstances,
29:31
Speaker 1: its professors fell into two groups. The one set prudent,
29:36
Speaker 1: practical business folk, flocked to the banner of Bastiach, the
29:39
Speaker 1: most superficial and therefore the most adequate representative of the
29:43
Speaker 1: apologetic of vulgar economy. The other, proud of the professional
29:49
Speaker 1: dignity of their science, followed John Stuart Mill in his
29:52
Speaker 1: attempt to reconcile irreconcilables. Just as in the classical time
29:57
Speaker 1: of bourgeois economy, so also in the time of its decline,
30:01
Speaker 1: the Germans remained me as schoolboys, imitators and followers, petty
30:06
Speaker 1: retailers and hawkers in the service of the great foreign
30:10
Speaker 1: wholesale concern. The peculiar historic development of German society therefore
30:16
Speaker 1: forbids in that country all the original work in bourgeois economy,
30:21
Speaker 1: but not the criticism of that economy. So far as
30:26
Speaker 1: such criticism represents a class, it can only represent the
30:29
Speaker 1: class whose vocation in history is the overthrow of the
30:32
Speaker 1: capitalist mode of production and the final abolition of all
30:36
Speaker 1: classes the proletariat. The learned and unlearned spokesman of the
30:41
Speaker 1: German bourgeoisie tried at first to kill das capital by silence,
30:46
Speaker 1: as they had managed to do with my earlier writings.
30:50
Speaker 1: As soon as they found that these tactics no longer
30:52
Speaker 1: fitted the conditions of the time, they wrote, under pretense
30:56
Speaker 1: of criticizing my book descriptions quote for the tranquilization of
31:01
Speaker 1: the bourgeois mind end quote, but they found in the
31:04
Speaker 1: workers press see for example Joseph Dietskin's articles in the
31:09
Speaker 1: Volkstart antagonists stronger than themselves, to whom doubted this very day.
31:15
Speaker 1: They owe a reply footnote. The mealy mouthed babblers of
31:20
Speaker 1: German vulgar economy fell foul of the style of my book.
31:25
Speaker 1: No one can feel the literary shortcomings in dask Capital
31:28
Speaker 1: more strongly than I myself. Yet I will for the
31:31
Speaker 1: benefit and enjoyment of these gentlemen and their public. Quote
31:35
Speaker 1: in this connection one English and one Russian notice. The
31:39
Speaker 1: Saturday Review, always hostile to my views, said in its
31:43
Speaker 1: notice of the first edition. Quote the presentation of the
31:46
Speaker 1: subject invests the driest economic questions with a certain peculiar
31:51
Speaker 1: charm end quote. The Saint Petersburg Journal sank to Pettersburgski
31:57
Speaker 1: via Doomasti, in its issue of April twentieth eighteen seventy two,
32:02
Speaker 1: says quote. The presentation of the subject, with the exception
32:06
Speaker 1: of one or two exceptionally special parts, is distinguished by
32:10
Speaker 1: its comprehensibility by the general reader, its clearness, and, in
32:14
Speaker 1: spite of the scientific intricacy of the subject, by an
32:17
Speaker 1: unusual liveliness. In this respect, the author in no way
32:21
Speaker 1: resembles the majority of German scholars, who write their books
32:25
Speaker 1: in a language so dry and obscure that the heads
32:28
Speaker 1: of ordinary mortals are cracked by it. End quote, end footnote.
32:35
Speaker 1: An excellent Russian translation of Das Capital appeared in the
32:38
Speaker 1: spring of eighteen seventy two. The edition of three thousand
32:42
Speaker 1: copies is already nearly exhausted. As early as eighteen seventy one,
32:47
Speaker 1: A Seeber, professor of political economy in the University of Kiev,
32:52
Speaker 1: in his work David Ricardo's Theory of Value and of
32:55
Speaker 1: Capital referred to my Theory of Value of Money and
32:59
Speaker 1: of Capital as in its fundamentals, a necessary sequel to
33:03
Speaker 1: the teaching of Smith and Ricardo. That which astonishes the
33:07
Speaker 1: Western European in the reading of this excellent work is
33:10
Speaker 1: the author's consistent and firm grasp of the purely theoretical
33:14
Speaker 1: position that the method employed in Das Capital has been
33:19
Speaker 1: little understood is shown by the various conceptions contradictory one
33:23
Speaker 1: to another that have been formed of it. Thus the
33:27
Speaker 1: Paris Revue possivist reproaches me in that on the one hand,
33:31
Speaker 1: I treat economics metaphysically, and on the other hand, imagine
33:35
Speaker 1: confine myself to the mere critical analysis of actual facts
33:40
Speaker 1: instead of writing receipts contest ones for the cook shops
33:44
Speaker 1: of the future. In answer to the reproach in Ray Metaphysics,
33:49
Speaker 1: Professor Seeberg has it quote in so far as it
33:53
Speaker 1: deals with actual theory, the method of Marx is the
33:57
Speaker 1: deductive method of the whole English school, a school whose
34:01
Speaker 1: failings and virtues are common to the best theoretical economists.
34:04
Speaker 1: End quote. Monsieur bloc le terricien du suscialisma on Armagne
34:10
Speaker 1: xtred Gurnale de z economiste jullie eaut disuitsan sissndus makes
34:17
Speaker 1: the discovery that my method is analytic, and says quote
34:23
Speaker 1: parse tufrage mission Marx s glais parmi lesispri analtique les
34:29
Speaker 1: pluzemino end quote. With this work, mister Marx puts himself
34:34
Speaker 1: among the most eminent of analytical minds. German reviews, of
34:39
Speaker 1: course shriek out at Hegelian sophistics. The European Messenger of
34:44
Speaker 1: Saint Petersburg, in an article dealing exclusively with the method
34:48
Speaker 1: of Das Capital Main number eighteen seventy two, pages four
34:52
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty seven to four hundred and thirty six,
34:55
Speaker 1: finds my method of inquiry severely realistic, but my method
35:00
Speaker 1: of presentation unfortunately German dialectical. It says, quote at first sight,
35:06
Speaker 1: if the judgment is based on the external form of
35:09
Speaker 1: the presentation of the subject. Marx is the most ideal
35:13
Speaker 1: of ideal philosophers, always in the German i e. The
35:17
Speaker 1: bad sense of the word. But in points of fact
35:20
Speaker 1: he is infinitely more realistic than all his forerunners. In
35:23
Speaker 1: the work of economic criticism. He can in no sense
35:27
Speaker 1: be called an idealist. End I cannot answer the writer
35:32
Speaker 1: better than by aid of a few extracts from his
35:34
Speaker 1: own criticism, which may interest some of my readers, to
35:38
Speaker 1: whom the Russian original is inaccessible. After a quotation from
35:43
Speaker 1: the preface to My Criticism of Political Economy, Berlin, eighteen
35:47
Speaker 1: fifty nine, pages four to seven, where I discussed the
35:51
Speaker 1: materialistic basis of my method. The writer goes on quote,
35:55
Speaker 1: The one thing which is of moment to Marx is
35:58
Speaker 1: to find the laws of the phenomena with whose investigation
36:01
Speaker 1: he is concerned. And not only is that law of
36:05
Speaker 1: moment to him which governs these phenomena in so far
36:08
Speaker 1: as they have a definite form and mutual connection within
36:11
Speaker 1: a given historical period, A still greater moment to him
36:15
Speaker 1: is the law of their variation, of their development, i e.
36:19
Speaker 1: Of their transition from one into another, from one series
36:22
Speaker 1: of connections into a different one. This law, once discovered,
36:27
Speaker 1: he investigates in detail the effects in which it manifests
36:30
Speaker 1: itself in social life. Consequently, Marx only troubles himself about
36:35
Speaker 1: one thing, to show, by rigid scientific investigation, the necessity
36:40
Speaker 1: of successive determinate orders of social conditions, and to establish
36:45
Speaker 1: as impartially as possible the facts that serve him for
36:49
Speaker 1: fundamental starting points. For this is quite enough if he
36:53
Speaker 1: proves at the same time both the necessity of another
36:56
Speaker 1: order into which the first must inevitably pass over all
37:00
Speaker 1: the same, whether men believe or do not believe it,
37:03
Speaker 1: whether they are conscious or unconscious of it. Marx treats
37:07
Speaker 1: the social movement as a process of natural history, governed
37:11
Speaker 1: by laws not only independent of human will, consciousness, and intelligence,
37:15
Speaker 1: but rather on the contrary determining that will, consciousness, and intelligence.
37:21
Speaker 1: If in the history of civilization the conscious element plays
37:25
Speaker 1: a part so subordinate, then it is self evident that
37:28
Speaker 1: a critical inquiry whose subject matter is civilization, can, less
37:32
Speaker 1: than anything else, have for its basis any form of
37:35
Speaker 1: or any result of consciousness. That is to say, that
37:40
Speaker 1: not the idea but the material phenomena alone can serve
37:44
Speaker 1: as its starting point. Such an inquiry will confine itself
37:47
Speaker 1: to the confrontation and the comparison of a fact, not
37:51
Speaker 1: with ideas, but with another fact. For this inquiry, the
37:55
Speaker 1: one thing of moment is that both facts can be
37:57
Speaker 1: investigated as accurately as possible, that they actually form, each
38:02
Speaker 1: with respect to the other, different momenta of an evolution.
38:06
Speaker 1: But most important of all is the rigid analysis of
38:10
Speaker 1: the series of successions, of the sequences and concatenations in
38:14
Speaker 1: which the different stages of such an evolution present themselves.
38:19
Speaker 1: But it will be said, the general laws of economic
38:22
Speaker 1: life are one and the same, no matter whether they
38:24
Speaker 1: are applied to the present or the past. This Marks
38:28
Speaker 1: directly denies. According to him, such abstract laws do not exist.
38:34
Speaker 1: On the contrary, in his opinion, every historical period has
38:38
Speaker 1: laws of its own. As soon as society has outlived
38:41
Speaker 1: a given period of development and is passing over from
38:44
Speaker 1: one given stage to another, it begins to be subject
38:48
Speaker 1: also to other laws. In a word, economic life offers
38:52
Speaker 1: as a phenomenon analogous to the history of evolution on
38:55
Speaker 1: other branches of biology. The old economists misunderstood the nature
39:00
Speaker 1: of economic laws when they liken them to the laws
39:02
Speaker 1: of physics and chemistry. A more thorough analysis of phenomena
39:07
Speaker 1: shows that social organisms differ among themselves as fundamentally as
39:11
Speaker 1: plants or animals Nay. One and the same phenomenon falls
39:15
Speaker 1: under quite different laws in consequence of the different structure
39:19
Speaker 1: of those organisms as a whole, of the variations of
39:22
Speaker 1: their individual organs, of the different conditions in which those
39:26
Speaker 1: organs function, etc. Marks, for example, denies that the law
39:30
Speaker 1: of population is the same at all times and in
39:33
Speaker 1: all places. He asserts, on the contrary, that every stage
39:36
Speaker 1: of development has its own law of population, with the
39:40
Speaker 1: varying degree of development of productive power, social conditions and
39:44
Speaker 1: the laws governing them vary too. Whilst Mark sets himself
39:48
Speaker 1: the task of following and explaining from this point of
39:51
Speaker 1: view the economic system established by the sway of capital,
39:54
Speaker 1: he is only formulating in a strictly scientific manner, the
39:58
Speaker 1: aim that every accurate invent investigation into economic life must have.
40:03
Speaker 1: The scientific value of such an inquiry lies in the
40:06
Speaker 1: disclosing of the special laws that regulate the origin, existence, development,
40:11
Speaker 1: death of a given social organism and its replacement by
40:15
Speaker 1: another and higher one. And it is this value that,
40:18
Speaker 1: in point of fact, Marks his book has end quote.
40:23
Speaker 1: Whilst the writer pictures what he takes to be actually
40:26
Speaker 1: my method in this striking, and as far as concerns
40:29
Speaker 1: my own application of it generous way, what else is
40:33
Speaker 1: he picturing but the dialectic method. Of course, the method
40:37
Speaker 1: of presentation must differ in form from that of inquiry.
40:41
Speaker 1: The latter has to appropriate the material in detail, to
40:45
Speaker 1: analyze its different forms of development, to trace out their
40:48
Speaker 1: inner connection. Only after this work is done can the
40:52
Speaker 1: actual movement be adequately described. If this is done successfully,
40:57
Speaker 1: if the life of the subject matter is ideally reflected
41:00
Speaker 1: as in a mirror, then it may appear as if
41:02
Speaker 1: we had before us a mere a priori construction. My
41:06
Speaker 1: dialectical method is not only different from the Hegelian but
41:10
Speaker 1: is its direct opposite to hegel The life process of
41:15
Speaker 1: the human brain, I eat, the process of thinking, which
41:18
Speaker 1: under the name of the idea he even transforms into
41:22
Speaker 1: an independent subject, is the demiurgus of the real world,
41:27
Speaker 1: and the real world is only the external phenomenal form
41:30
Speaker 1: of the idea. With me, on the contrary, the ideal
41:34
Speaker 1: is nothing else than the material world reflected by the
41:37
Speaker 1: human mind and translated into forms of thought. The mystifying
41:42
Speaker 1: side of Hegelian dialectic I criticized nearly thirty years ago,
41:47
Speaker 1: at a time when it was still the fashion. But
41:50
Speaker 1: just as I was working at the first volume of
41:52
Speaker 1: Das Capital, it was the good pleasure of the peevish, arrogant,
41:56
Speaker 1: mediocre Epigonoi who now talked last Arge in cultured Germany
42:01
Speaker 1: to treat Hegel in the same way as the brave
42:04
Speaker 1: Moses Mendelssohn in Lessing's time treated Spinosa i e As
42:09
Speaker 1: a dead dog. I therefore openly avowed myself the pupil
42:13
Speaker 1: of that mighty thinker, and even here and there in
42:16
Speaker 1: the chapter on the theory of value coquetted with the
42:19
Speaker 1: modes of expression peculiar to him. The mystification which Dialectic
42:24
Speaker 1: suffers in Hegel's hands, by no means prevents him from
42:27
Speaker 1: being the first to present its general form of working
42:29
Speaker 1: in a comprehensive and conscious manner. With him. It is
42:33
Speaker 1: standing on its head. It must be turned right side
42:36
Speaker 1: up again if you would discover the rational kernel within
42:39
Speaker 1: the mystical shell. In its mystified form, Dialectic became the
42:44
Speaker 1: fashion in Germany because it seemed to transfigure and to
42:47
Speaker 1: glorify the existing state of things in its rational form.
42:51
Speaker 1: It is a scandal and abomination to bourgeois dom and
42:55
Speaker 1: its doctrinaire professors, because it includes in its comprehension an
42:58
Speaker 1: affirmative recognition of the existing state of things, at the
43:02
Speaker 1: same time also the recognition of the negation of that state,
43:07
Speaker 1: of its inevitable breaking up, because it regards every historically
43:11
Speaker 1: developed social form as in fluid movement, and therefore takes
43:15
Speaker 1: into account its transient nature not less than its momentary existence.
43:20
Speaker 1: Because it lets nothing impose upon it, and is in
43:23
Speaker 1: its essence critical and revolutionary. The contradictions inherent in the
43:28
Speaker 1: movement of capitalist society impress themselves upon the practical bourgeois,
43:33
Speaker 1: most strikingly in the changes of the periodic cycle through
43:37
Speaker 1: which modern industry runs, and whose crowning point is the
43:41
Speaker 1: universal crisis. That crisis is once again approaching, although as
43:47
Speaker 1: yet but in its preliminary stage, and by the universality
43:51
Speaker 1: of its theater and the intensity of its action, it
43:54
Speaker 1: will drum dialectics even into the heads of the mushroom
43:58
Speaker 1: upstarts of the new Holy Prussio Germanic Empire. Karl Marx London,
44:05
Speaker 1: January twenty fourth, eighteen seventy three, end of afterward, Chapter one,
44:14
Speaker 1: Section one. The two factors of a commodity use value
44:19
Speaker 1: and value, the substance of value and the magnitude of value.
44:24
Speaker 1: The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist mode
44:27
Speaker 1: of production prevails presents itself as quote, an immense accumulation
44:33
Speaker 1: of commodities end quote footnote Karl Marx Zo Critique de
44:38
Speaker 1: politician Economy, Berlin, eighteen fifty nine, page three, end footnote.
44:45
Speaker 1: Its unit being a single commodity, our investigation must therefore
44:50
Speaker 1: begin with the analysis of a commodity a commodity is,
44:54
Speaker 1: in the first place, an object outside us, a thing that,
44:58
Speaker 1: by its properties satisfies human wants of some sort or another.
45:02
Speaker 1: The nature of such wants, whether for instance, they spring
45:05
Speaker 1: from the stomach or from fancy, makes no difference. Footnote
45:12
Speaker 1: quote desire implies want. It is the appetite of the mind,
45:16
Speaker 1: and as natural as hunger to the body. The greatest
45:19
Speaker 1: number of things have their value from supplying the wants
45:23
Speaker 1: of the mind. End quote. Nicholas Barbon a Discourse concerning
45:29
Speaker 1: coining the new money lighter, in answer to mister Locke's Considerations,
45:32
Speaker 1: et cetera, London, sixteen ninety six. End footnote Neither are
45:38
Speaker 1: we here concerned to know how the object satisfies these wants,
45:42
Speaker 1: whether directly as means of subsistence or indirectly as means
45:46
Speaker 1: of production. Every useful thing, as iron, paper, et cetera,
45:51
Speaker 1: may be looked at from the two points of view
45:53
Speaker 1: of quality and quantity. It is an assemblage of many properties,
45:58
Speaker 1: and may therefore be of use in various ways. To
46:01
Speaker 1: discover the various uses of things is the work of history.
46:06
Speaker 1: Footnote quote things have an intrinsic value. End quote. This
46:12
Speaker 1: is Barben's special term for value in use quote, which
46:16
Speaker 1: in all places have the same virtue as the loadstone
46:20
Speaker 1: to attract iron. End quote. The property which the magnet
46:24
Speaker 1: possesses of attracting iron became of use only after, by
46:28
Speaker 1: means of that property, the polarity of the magnet had
46:30
Speaker 1: been discovered. End footnote. So also is the establishment of
46:36
Speaker 1: socially recognized standards of measure for the quantities of these
46:40
Speaker 1: useful objects. The diversity of these measures has its origin
46:44
Speaker 1: partly in the diverse nature of the objects to be measured,
46:48
Speaker 1: partly in convention. The utility of a thing makes it
46:52
Speaker 1: a use value footnote quote. The natural worth of anything
46:56
Speaker 1: consists in its fitness to supply the necessities or serve
47:00
Speaker 1: the conveniences of human life. En John Locke, Some Considerations
47:06
Speaker 1: on the Consequences of the Lowering of Interest, sixteen ninety one.
47:11
Speaker 1: In English writers of the seventeenth century, we frequently find
47:15
Speaker 1: worth in the sense of value in use, and value
47:19
Speaker 1: in the sense of exchange value. This is quite in
47:22
Speaker 1: accordance with the spirit of a language that likes to
47:25
Speaker 1: use a Teutonic word for the actual thing and a
47:28
Speaker 1: Romance word for its reflection. End footnote. But this utility
47:33
Speaker 1: is not a thing of air. Being limited by the
47:36
Speaker 1: physical properties of the commodity, it has no existence apart
47:40
Speaker 1: from that commodity. A commodity such as iron, corn, or
47:44
Speaker 1: a diamond, is, therefore, so far as it is a
47:46
Speaker 1: material thing, a use value, something useful. This property of
47:52
Speaker 1: a commodity is independent of the amount of labour required
47:56
Speaker 1: to appropriate its useful qualities. When treating of use value,
48:01
Speaker 1: we always assume to be dealing with definite quantities, such
48:04
Speaker 1: as dozens of watches, yards of linen, or tons of iron.
48:10
Speaker 1: The use values of commodities furnish the material for a
48:13
Speaker 1: special study, that of the commercial knowledge of commodities. Footnote.
48:19
Speaker 1: In bourgeois societies, the economic pixio juris prevails that everyone,
48:25
Speaker 1: as a buyer, possesses an encyclopedic knowledge of commodities. End footnote.
48:31
Speaker 1: Use values become a reality only by use or consumption.
48:36
Speaker 1: They also constitute the substance of all wealth, whatever may
48:40
Speaker 1: be the social form of that wealth, in the form
48:43
Speaker 1: of society we are about to consider. They are, in addition,
48:46
Speaker 1: the material depositories of exchange value. Exchange value, at first sight,
48:52
Speaker 1: presents itself as a quantitative relation as the proportion in
48:55
Speaker 1: which values in use of one sort are exchanged for
48:59
Speaker 1: those of another sort. Footnote quote la valleur conciste don
49:05
Speaker 1: la rapaur de chene quisertrouve entretlus etel entreatel megieur do
49:12
Speaker 1: production el messieur do not end quote. Value consists in
49:18
Speaker 1: the exchange relation between one thing and another, between a
49:21
Speaker 1: given amount of one product and a given amount of
49:24
Speaker 1: another latrez de lentes social visiocrat, Paris, eighteen forty six
49:33
Speaker 1: end footnote a relation constantly changing with time and place. Hence,
49:38
Speaker 1: exchange value appears to be something accidental and purely relative,
49:42
Speaker 1: and consequently an intrinsic value, i e. An exchange value
49:46
Speaker 1: that is in separately connected with inherent in commodities seems
49:51
Speaker 1: a contradiction in terms. Footnote quote nothing can have an
49:57
Speaker 1: intrinsic value, Nicholas Barber or, as Butler says, quote, the
50:03
Speaker 1: value of a thing is just as much as it
50:05
Speaker 1: will bring end quote. Let us consider the matter a
50:09
Speaker 1: little more closely. A given commodity, for example, a quarter
50:13
Speaker 1: of wheat is exchanged for X blacking y silk, or
50:18
Speaker 1: z gold, et cetera. In short, for other commodities in
50:22
Speaker 1: the most different proportions. Instead of one exchange value, the
50:26
Speaker 1: wheat has therefore a great many. But since x blacking,
50:31
Speaker 1: hy silk or z gold, et cetera, each represents the
50:34
Speaker 1: exchange value of one quarter of wheat, X blacking, hy silk,
50:39
Speaker 1: z gold, et cetera, must, as exchange values, be replaceable
50:44
Speaker 1: by each other or equal to each other. Therefore, first,
50:49
Speaker 1: the valid exchange values of a given commodity express something equal. Secondly,
50:54
Speaker 1: exchange value, generally is only the mode of expression the
50:58
Speaker 1: phenomenal form of something contained in it yet distinguishable from it.
51:04
Speaker 1: Let us take two commodities, for example, corn and iron.
51:09
Speaker 1: The proportions in which they are exchangeable, whatever those proportions
51:12
Speaker 1: may be, can always be represented by an equation in
51:16
Speaker 1: which a given quantity of corn is equated to some
51:19
Speaker 1: quantity of iron. For example, one quarter corn equals x
51:23
Speaker 1: hundredweight of iron. What does this equation tell us? It
51:27
Speaker 1: tells us that in two different things, in one quarter
51:30
Speaker 1: of corn and in x hundredweight of iron, there exists,
51:34
Speaker 1: in equal quantities something common to both. The two things
51:38
Speaker 1: must therefore be equal to a third, which in itself
51:41
Speaker 1: is neither the one nor the other. Each of them,
51:44
Speaker 1: so far as it is exchange value must therefore be
51:47
Speaker 1: reducible to this third. A simple geometrical illustration will make
51:52
Speaker 1: this clear. In order to calculate and compare the areas
51:56
Speaker 1: of rectilinear figures, we decompose them into a triangle. But
52:01
Speaker 1: the area of the triangle itself is expressed by something
52:04
Speaker 1: totally different from its visible figure, namely, by half the
52:08
Speaker 1: product of the base multiplied by the altitude. In the
52:12
Speaker 1: same way, the exchange values of commodities must be capable
52:16
Speaker 1: of being expressed in terms of something common to them,
52:19
Speaker 1: all of which thing they represent a greater or less quantity.
52:23
Speaker 1: This common something cannot be either a geometrical, a chemical,
52:28
Speaker 1: or any other natural property of commodities. Such properties claim
52:32
Speaker 1: our attention only in so far as they affect the
52:35
Speaker 1: utility of those commodities, make them use values. But the
52:40
Speaker 1: exchange of commodities is evidently an act characterized by a
52:43
Speaker 1: total abstraction from use value. Then one use value is
52:47
Speaker 1: just as good as another, provided only it be present
52:50
Speaker 1: in sufficient quantity. Or, as Old Barbon says, one sort
52:56
Speaker 1: of wares are as good as another if the values
52:59
Speaker 1: be equal there is no difference or distinction in things
53:02
Speaker 1: of equal value. An hundred pounds worth of lead or
53:06
Speaker 1: iron is of as great value as one hundred pounds
53:10
Speaker 1: worth of silver or golden. As use values, commodities are,
53:16
Speaker 1: above all of different qualities, but as exchange values, they
53:20
Speaker 1: are merely different quantities, and consequently do not contain an
53:24
Speaker 1: atom of use value. If we then leave out of
53:28
Speaker 1: consideration the use value of commodities, they have only one
53:31
Speaker 1: common property left, that of being products of labor. But
53:36
Speaker 1: even the product of labor itself has undergone a change
53:39
Speaker 1: in our hands. If we make abstraction from its use value,
53:43
Speaker 1: we make abstraction at the same time from the material
53:46
Speaker 1: elements and shapes that make the product a use value.
53:50
Speaker 1: We see in it no longer a table, a house, yarn,
53:54
Speaker 1: or any other useful thing. Its existence as a material
53:57
Speaker 1: thing is put out of sight. Neither can it any
54:00
Speaker 1: longer be regarded as the product of the labour of
54:02
Speaker 1: the joiner, the mason, the spinner, or of any other
54:06
Speaker 1: definite kind of productive labour. Along with the useful qualities
54:10
Speaker 1: of the products themselves, we put out of sight both
54:13
Speaker 1: the useful character of the various kinds of labour embodied
54:16
Speaker 1: in them, and the concrete forms of that labour. There
54:20
Speaker 1: is nothing left but what is common to them. All
54:23
Speaker 1: all are reduced to one and the same sort of labour,
54:26
Speaker 1: human labour in the abstract. Let us now consider the
54:30
Speaker 1: residue of each of these products. It consists of the
54:33
Speaker 1: same unsubstantial reality, in each, a mere condulation of the
54:38
Speaker 1: homogeneous human labour, of labour power expended without regard to
54:43
Speaker 1: the mode of its expenditure. All that these things now
54:46
Speaker 1: tell us is that human labour power has been expended
54:50
Speaker 1: in their production, that human labour is embodied in them.
54:54
Speaker 1: When looked at as crystals of this social substance common
54:58
Speaker 1: to them, all they are. We have seen that when
55:02
Speaker 1: commodities are exchanged, their exchange value manifests itself as something
55:07
Speaker 1: totally independent of their use value. But if we abstract
55:11
Speaker 1: from their use value, there remains their value as defined above. Therefore,
55:17
Speaker 1: the common substance that manifests itself in the exchange value
55:20
Speaker 1: of commodities whenever they are exchanged is their value. The
55:25
Speaker 1: progress of our investigation will show that exchange value is
55:29
Speaker 1: the only form in which the value of commodities can
55:32
Speaker 1: manifest itself, or be expressed for the present. However, we
55:36
Speaker 1: have to consider the nature of value independently of this
55:40
Speaker 1: its form. A use value or useful article therefore has
55:45
Speaker 1: value only because human labour in the abstract has been
55:49
Speaker 1: embodied or materialized in it. How then, is the magnitude
55:54
Speaker 1: of this value to be measured plainly by the quantity
55:57
Speaker 1: of the value creating substance, the labour contained in the article.
56:02
Speaker 1: The quantity of labour, however, is measured by its duration
56:06
Speaker 1: and labour time, and labour time in turn finds its
56:10
Speaker 1: standard in weeks, days, and hours. Some people might think
56:15
Speaker 1: that if the value of a commodity is determined by
56:17
Speaker 1: the quantity of labour spent on it, the more idle
56:20
Speaker 1: and unskillful the laborer, the more valuable would his commodity be,
56:24
Speaker 1: because more time would be required in its production. The labour, however,
56:28
Speaker 1: that forms the substance of value, is homogeneous human labour
56:33
Speaker 1: expenditure of one uniform labour power. The total labour power
56:37
Speaker 1: of society, which is embodied in the sum total of
56:40
Speaker 1: the values of all commodities produced by that society, counts
56:43
Speaker 1: here as one homogeneous mass of human labour power, composed,
56:48
Speaker 1: though it be of innumerable individual units. Each of these
56:52
Speaker 1: units is the same as any other so far as
56:55
Speaker 1: it has the character of the average labour power of
56:57
Speaker 1: society and takes effect as such. That is, so far
57:01
Speaker 1: as it requires for producing a commodity, no more time
57:05
Speaker 1: than is needed on an average, no more than is
57:08
Speaker 1: socially necessary. The labour time socially necessary is that required
57:12
Speaker 1: to produce an article under the normal conditions of production,
57:16
Speaker 1: and with the average degree of skill and intensity prevalent
57:19
Speaker 1: at the time. The introduction of power looms into England
57:23
Speaker 1: probably reduced by one half the labour required to weave
57:27
Speaker 1: a given quantity of yarn into cloth. The hand loom weavers,
57:31
Speaker 1: as a matter of fact, continued to require the same
57:34
Speaker 1: time as before, but for all that the product of
57:37
Speaker 1: one hour of their labour represented after the change only
57:41
Speaker 1: half an hour's social labour, and consequently fell to one
57:45
Speaker 1: half of its former value. We see, then, that that
57:49
Speaker 1: which determines the magnitude of the value of any article
57:52
Speaker 1: is the amount of labour socially necessary, or the labour
57:56
Speaker 1: time socially necessary for its production footnote quote. The value
58:01
Speaker 1: of them the necessities of life, when they are exchanged.
58:05
Speaker 1: The one for another is regulated by the quantity of
58:08
Speaker 1: labour necessarily required and commonly taken in producing them. End quote.
58:14
Speaker 1: Some thoughts on the interest of money in general and
58:17
Speaker 1: particularly in the public funds, et cetera. This remarkable, anonymous
58:22
Speaker 1: work written in the last century bears no date. It
58:25
Speaker 1: is clear, however, from internal evidence, that it appeared in
58:29
Speaker 1: the reign of George the Second about seventeen thirty nine
58:32
Speaker 1: or seventeen forty end footnote. Each individual commodity in this
58:38
Speaker 1: connection is to be considered as an average sample of
58:42
Speaker 1: its class. Footnote quote dutte les production de meme jan
58:48
Speaker 1: nefarmes propermnt cunemasse don l prix se dittermine general e
58:53
Speaker 1: senze guard or circumstance particuliere end quote. Properly speaking, all
59:00
Speaker 1: products of the same kind form a single mass, and
59:03
Speaker 1: their price is determined in general and without regard to
59:06
Speaker 1: particular circumstances the Trozno end footnote. Commodities therefore, in which
59:13
Speaker 1: equal quantities of labour are embodied, or which can be
59:17
Speaker 1: produced in the same time, have the same value. The
59:20
Speaker 1: value of one commodity is to the value of any other,
59:23
Speaker 1: as the labour time necessary for the production of the
59:26
Speaker 1: one is to that necessary for the production of the other.
59:30
Speaker 1: Quote as values, all commodities are only definite masses of
59:35
Speaker 1: congealed labour time. End quote footnote Carl Marx Zoo Critique
59:41
Speaker 1: de politician Economy end footnote. The value of a commodity
59:46
Speaker 1: would therefore remain constant if the labour time required for
59:49
Speaker 1: its production also remain constant, but the latter changes with
59:54
Speaker 1: every variation in the productiveness of labour. This productiveness is
59:58
Speaker 1: determined by various circumstances, amongst others, by the average amount
1:00:03
Speaker 1: of skill of the workmen, the state of science and
1:00:06
Speaker 1: the degree of its practical application, the social organization of production,
1:00:11
Speaker 1: the extent and capabilities of the means of production, and
1:00:15
Speaker 1: by physical conditions. For example, the same amount of labour
1:00:19
Speaker 1: in favorable seasons is embodied in eight bushels of corn,
1:00:23
Speaker 1: and in unfavorable only in four. The same labour extracts
1:00:28
Speaker 1: from rich minds more metal than from poor mines. Diamonds
1:00:33
Speaker 1: are of very rare occurrence in the Earth's surface, and
1:00:36
Speaker 1: hence their discovery costs, on average, a great deal of
1:00:39
Speaker 1: labour time. Consequently, much labour is represented in a small compass.
1:00:46
Speaker 1: Jacob doubts whether gold has ever been paid for at
1:00:49
Speaker 1: its full value. This applies still more to diamonds. According
1:00:54
Speaker 1: to Eschvegger, the total production of the Brazilian diamond mines
1:00:58
Speaker 1: for the eighty years ending eighteen twenty three had not
1:01:02
Speaker 1: realized the price of one and a half year's average
1:01:04
Speaker 1: produce of the sugar and coffee plantations of the same country.
1:01:08
Speaker 1: Although the diamonds cost much more labour and therefore represented
1:01:13
Speaker 1: more value, with richer minds, the same quantity of labour
1:01:16
Speaker 1: would embody itself in more diamonds, and their value would fall.
1:01:21
Speaker 1: If we could succeed at a small expenditure of labour
1:01:24
Speaker 1: in converting carbon into diamonds, their value might fall below
1:01:28
Speaker 1: that of bricks. In general, the greater the productiveness of labour,
1:01:33
Speaker 1: the less is the labour time required for the production
1:01:36
Speaker 1: of an article, The less is the amount of labour
1:01:39
Speaker 1: crystallized in that article, and the less is its value,
1:01:43
Speaker 1: and vice versa. The less the productiveness of labour, the
1:01:46
Speaker 1: greater is the labour time required for the production of
1:01:49
Speaker 1: an article, and the greater is its value. The value
1:01:53
Speaker 1: of a commodity therefore varies directly as the quantity and
1:01:57
Speaker 1: inversely as the productiveness of the labour incorporated in it.
1:02:01
Speaker 1: A thing can be a use value without having value.
1:02:05
Speaker 1: This is the case whenever its utility to man is
1:02:08
Speaker 1: not due to labour, such are air, virgin soil, natural meadows,
1:02:13
Speaker 1: et cetera. A thing can be useful and the product
1:02:17
Speaker 1: of human labour without being a commodity. Whoever directly satisfies
1:02:22
Speaker 1: his wants with the produce of his own labour creates,
1:02:26
Speaker 1: indeed use values, but not commodities. In order to produce
1:02:30
Speaker 1: the latter, he must not only produce use values, but
1:02:34
Speaker 1: use values for others social use values parentheses, and not
1:02:39
Speaker 1: only for others without more. The medieval peasant produced quit
1:02:44
Speaker 1: rent corn for his feudal lord and tithe corn for
1:02:48
Speaker 1: his parson, but neither the quit rent corn nor the
1:02:52
Speaker 1: tithe corn became commodities by reason of the fact that
1:02:55
Speaker 1: they had been produced for others. To become a commodity,
1:02:58
Speaker 1: a product must be transfer referred to another whom it
1:03:01
Speaker 1: will serve as a use value by means of an exchange.
1:03:05
Speaker 1: End parentheses. Footnote. I am inserting the parenthesis because its
1:03:10
Speaker 1: omission has often given rise to the misunderstanding that every
1:03:14
Speaker 1: product that is consumed by someone other than its producer,
1:03:17
Speaker 1: is considered in marks a commodity Angeles, fourth German edition,
1:03:23
Speaker 1: end footnote. Lastly, nothing can have value without being an
1:03:28
Speaker 1: object of utility. If the thing is useless, so is
1:03:32
Speaker 1: the labour contained in it. The labour does not count
1:03:35
Speaker 1: as labour, and therefore creates no value. End of Chapter one,
1:03:41
Speaker 1: Section one, Chapter one, Section two. The twofold character of
1:03:46
Speaker 1: the labour embodied in commodities. At first sight, a commodity
1:03:52
Speaker 1: presented itself to us as a complex of two things
1:03:56
Speaker 1: use value and exchange value. Later on we see or
1:04:00
Speaker 1: also that labour two possesses the same twofold nature, for
1:04:04
Speaker 1: so far as it finds expression in value, it does
1:04:07
Speaker 1: not possess the same characteristics that belong to it as
1:04:10
Speaker 1: a creator of use values. I was the first to
1:04:13
Speaker 1: point out and to examine critically, this two fold nature
1:04:16
Speaker 1: of the labour contained in commodities. As this point is
1:04:20
Speaker 1: the pivot on which a clear comprehension of political economy turns,
1:04:24
Speaker 1: we must go more into detail. Let us take two commodities,
1:04:28
Speaker 1: such as a coat and ten yards of linen, and
1:04:31
Speaker 1: let the former be double the value of the latter.
1:04:33
Speaker 1: So that if ten yards of linen equals DOB, the
1:04:36
Speaker 1: coat equals two do W. The coat is a use
1:04:41
Speaker 1: value that satisfies a particular want. Its existence is the
1:04:45
Speaker 1: result of a special sort of productive activity, the nature
1:04:48
Speaker 1: of which is determined by its aim, mode of operation, subject, means,
1:04:53
Speaker 1: and result. The labour, whose utility is thus represented by
1:04:58
Speaker 1: the value in use of its product, or which manifests
1:05:01
Speaker 1: itself by making its product a use value, we call
1:05:04
Speaker 1: useful labour. In this connection we consider only its useful effect.
1:05:10
Speaker 1: As the coat and the linen are two qualitatively different
1:05:13
Speaker 1: use values, so also are the two forms of labour
1:05:16
Speaker 1: that produce them, tailoring and weaving. Were these two objects
1:05:20
Speaker 1: not qualitatively different, not produced respectively by labour of different quality,
1:05:26
Speaker 1: they could not stand to each other. In the relation
1:05:28
Speaker 1: of commodities. Coats are not exchanged for coats, one use
1:05:33
Speaker 1: value is not exchanged for another of the same kind.
1:05:37
Speaker 1: To all the different varieties of values in use, they
1:05:40
Speaker 1: correspond as many different kinds of useful labour, classified according
1:05:45
Speaker 1: to the order, genus, species, and variety to which they
1:05:49
Speaker 1: belong in the social division of labour. This division of
1:05:53
Speaker 1: labour is a necessary condition for the production of commodities.
1:05:56
Speaker 1: But it does not follow conversely, that the production of
1:05:59
Speaker 1: commodities is a necessary condition for the division of labour.
1:06:04
Speaker 1: In the primitive Indian community, there is social division of
1:06:07
Speaker 1: labour without production of commodities, or to take an example,
1:06:12
Speaker 1: near a home. In every factory, the labour is divided
1:06:15
Speaker 1: according to a system, but this division is not brought
1:06:18
Speaker 1: about by the operatives mutually exchanging their individual products. Only
1:06:23
Speaker 1: such products can become commodities with regard to each other,
1:06:27
Speaker 1: as results from different kinds of labour, each kind being
1:06:30
Speaker 1: carried on independently, and for the account of private individuals
1:06:35
Speaker 1: to resume. Then in the use value of each commodity
1:06:38
Speaker 1: there is contained useful labour i e. Productive activity of
1:06:43
Speaker 1: a definite kind and exercised with a definite aim. Use
1:06:47
Speaker 1: values cannot confront each other as commodities unless the useful
1:06:51
Speaker 1: labour embodied in them is qualitatively different in each of
1:06:54
Speaker 1: them in a community, the produce of which in general
1:06:58
Speaker 1: takes the form of commodities i e. In a community
1:07:01
Speaker 1: of commodity producers, this qualitative difference between the useful forms
1:07:06
Speaker 1: of labor that are carried on independently by individual producers,
1:07:10
Speaker 1: each on their own account develops into a complex system,
1:07:14
Speaker 1: a social division of labor. Anyhow, whether the coat be
1:07:19
Speaker 1: worn by the tailor or by his customer, in either
1:07:22
Speaker 1: case it operates as a use value. Nor is the
1:07:25
Speaker 1: relation between the coat and the labor that produced it
1:07:28
Speaker 1: altered by the circumstance that tailoring may have become a
1:07:32
Speaker 1: special trade, an independent branch of the social division of labor,
1:07:37
Speaker 1: wherever the want of clothing forced them to it. The
1:07:40
Speaker 1: human race made clothes for thousands of years without a
1:07:44
Speaker 1: single man becoming a tailor. But coats and linen, like
1:07:48
Speaker 1: every other element of material wealth, that is not the
1:07:50
Speaker 1: spontaneous produce of nature, must invariably owe their existence to
1:07:55
Speaker 1: a special productive activity exercised with a definite aim, an
1:08:00
Speaker 1: activity that appropriates particular nature given materials to particular human wants.
1:08:06
Speaker 1: So far, therefore, as labour is a creator of use value,
1:08:10
Speaker 1: is useful labour. It is a necessary condition, independent of
1:08:14
Speaker 1: all forms of society, for the existence of the human race.
1:08:18
Speaker 1: It is an eternal, nature imposed necessity, without which there
1:08:22
Speaker 1: can be no material exchanges between man and nature, and
1:08:26
Speaker 1: therefore no life. The use values coat, linen, etc. I e.
1:08:32
Speaker 1: The bodies of commodities are combinations of two elements, matter
1:08:37
Speaker 1: and labour. If we take away the useful labour expended
1:08:41
Speaker 1: upon them, a material substratum is always left, which is
1:08:45
Speaker 1: furnished by nature without the help of man. The latter
1:08:49
Speaker 1: can only work as nature does, that is, by changing
1:08:52
Speaker 1: the form of matter. Footnote two.
1:08:57
Speaker 2: T if in a many de luniverso cieno is si
1:09:00
Speaker 2: prodi da la mano de luomo of Vero, dalle universally
1:09:05
Speaker 2: leggi de la physica nunci dano idea diatoale criazze ma
1:09:12
Speaker 2: unicamente di una modificazione de la matteria a costare is
1:09:19
Speaker 2: seperai sono uni chi elementi kelin geniomano ritrova and alixando
1:09:26
Speaker 2: lidea del reproduccone etanto reproduccione di valore.
1:09:33
Speaker 1: Value in use. Although Very in this passage of his
1:09:36
Speaker 1: controversy with the physiocrats is not himself quite certain of
1:09:40
Speaker 1: the kind of value he is speaking of.
1:09:43
Speaker 2: Dirikitica cela tera laria a laquancampi citrus mutiningrano come se
1:09:51
Speaker 2: co la mano de luomo, including unin setto citras mutin
1:09:56
Speaker 2: veluto of Vero alcuni pezzo di di metalo surganizzino a
1:10:02
Speaker 2: fur mare una repetitzione.
1:10:05
Speaker 1: Pietro veri meditazione sula economia politica, first printed in seventeen
1:10:13
Speaker 1: seventy three in Custodi's edition of the Italian Economists, Parte
1:10:18
Speaker 1: moderna en footnote nay More. In this work of changing
1:10:23
Speaker 1: the form, he is constantly helped by natural forces. We
1:10:27
Speaker 1: see then that labour is not the only source of
1:10:30
Speaker 1: material wealth, of use values produced by labor. As William
1:10:35
Speaker 1: Petty puts it, labour is its father and the earth
1:10:38
Speaker 1: its mother. Let us now pass from the commodity considered
1:10:42
Speaker 1: as a use value to the value of commodities. By
1:10:46
Speaker 1: our assumption, the coat is worth twice as much as
1:10:49
Speaker 1: the linen. But this is a mere quantitative difference which
1:10:53
Speaker 1: for the present does not concern us. We bear in mind, however,
1:10:57
Speaker 1: that if the value of the coat is double that
1:10:59
Speaker 1: of time, ten yards of linen, twenty yards of linen
1:11:02
Speaker 1: must have the same value as one coat. So far
1:11:05
Speaker 1: as they are values, the coat and the linen are
1:11:08
Speaker 1: things of a like substance, objective expressions of essentially identical labour.
1:11:14
Speaker 1: But tailoring and weaving are qualitatively different kinds of labour.
1:11:19
Speaker 1: There are, however, states of society in which one and
1:11:22
Speaker 1: the same man does tailoring and weaving alternately, in which
1:11:26
Speaker 1: case these two forms of labour and mere modifications of
1:11:29
Speaker 1: the labour of the same individual, and not special and
1:11:32
Speaker 1: fixed functions of different persons, just as the coat which
1:11:37
Speaker 1: our tailor makes one day and the trousers which he
1:11:39
Speaker 1: makes another day imply only a variation in the labour
1:11:43
Speaker 1: of one and the same individual. Moreover, we see at
1:11:47
Speaker 1: a glance that in our capitalist society, a given portion
1:11:51
Speaker 1: of human labour is in accordance with the varying demand
1:11:55
Speaker 1: at one time supplied in the form of tailoring, at
1:11:58
Speaker 1: another in the form of weaving. This change may possibly
1:12:01
Speaker 1: not take place without friction, but take place it must
1:12:06
Speaker 1: productive activity. If we leave out of sight its special
1:12:09
Speaker 1: form vias, the useful character of the labour is nothing
1:12:13
Speaker 1: but the expenditure of human labour power. Tailoring and weaving,
1:12:17
Speaker 1: though qualitatively different productive activities, are each a productive expenditure
1:12:22
Speaker 1: of human brains, nerves, and muscles, and in this sense
1:12:26
Speaker 1: are human labour. They are but two different modes of
1:12:29
Speaker 1: expending human labour power. Of course, this labour power, which
1:12:33
Speaker 1: remains the same under all its modifications, must have attained
1:12:37
Speaker 1: a certain pitch of development before it can be expended
1:12:40
Speaker 1: in a multiplicity of modes. But the value of a
1:12:43
Speaker 1: commodity represents human labour in the abstract the expenditure of
1:12:48
Speaker 1: human labour in general, and just as in society, a
1:12:52
Speaker 1: general or a banker plays a great part, but mere man,
1:12:56
Speaker 1: on the other hand, a very shabby part. Footnote compare
1:13:01
Speaker 1: Hegel philosophy Disrects Berlin, eighteen forty end footnote. So here
1:13:09
Speaker 1: with mere human labour, it is the expenditure of simple
1:13:13
Speaker 1: labour power, i e. Of the labour power which, on average,
1:13:16
Speaker 1: apart from any special development, exists in the organism of
1:13:20
Speaker 1: every human individual. Simple average labour, it is true, varies
1:13:25
Speaker 1: in character in different countries and at different times, But
1:13:28
Speaker 1: in a particular society it is given. Skilled labour counts
1:13:33
Speaker 1: only as simple labour intensified, or rather as multiplied simple labour.
1:13:38
Speaker 1: A given quantity of skilled being considered equal to a
1:13:42
Speaker 1: greater quantity of simple labour. Experience shows that this reduction
1:13:47
Speaker 1: is constantly being made. A commodity may be the product
1:13:51
Speaker 1: of the most skilled labour, but its value by equating
1:13:54
Speaker 1: it to the product of simple unskilled labour represents a
1:13:57
Speaker 1: definite quantity of the latter labour alone. Footnote. The reader
1:14:02
Speaker 1: must note that we are not speaking here of the
1:14:04
Speaker 1: wages or value that the labourer gets for a given
1:14:07
Speaker 1: labour time, but of the value of the commodity in
1:14:10
Speaker 1: which that labour time is materialized. Wages is a category
1:14:14
Speaker 1: that as yet has no existence at the present stage
1:14:17
Speaker 1: of our investigation. End footnote. The different proportions in which
1:14:22
Speaker 1: different sorts of labour are reduced to unskilled labour as
1:14:25
Speaker 1: their standard are established by a social process that goes
1:14:29
Speaker 1: on behind the backs of the producers and consequently appears
1:14:33
Speaker 1: to be fixed by custom. For simplicity's sake, we shall
1:14:37
Speaker 1: henceforth account every kind of labour to be unskilled simple labour.
1:14:42
Speaker 1: By this we do no more than save ourselves the
1:14:45
Speaker 1: trouble of making the reduction. Just as therefore, in viewing
1:14:49
Speaker 1: the coat and linen as values, we abstract from their
1:14:53
Speaker 1: different use values, so it is with the labour represented
1:14:56
Speaker 1: by those values we disregard the difference between in its
1:15:00
Speaker 1: useful forms weaving and tailoring, as the use values. Coat
1:15:04
Speaker 1: and linen are combinations of special productive activities with cloth
1:15:08
Speaker 1: and yarn, while the values coat and linen are, on
1:15:12
Speaker 1: the other hand, mere homogeneous condulations of undifferentiated labour. So
1:15:17
Speaker 1: the labour embodied in these latter values does not count
1:15:21
Speaker 1: by virtue of its productive relation to cloth and yarn,
1:15:24
Speaker 1: but only as being expenditure of human labour power tailoring
1:15:29
Speaker 1: and weaving, and necessary factors in the creation of the
1:15:32
Speaker 1: use values coat and linen precisely because these two kinds
1:15:36
Speaker 1: of labour are of different qualities, but only in so
1:15:40
Speaker 1: far as abstraction is made from their special qualities, only
1:15:44
Speaker 1: in so far as both possess the same quality of
1:15:46
Speaker 1: being human labour do Tailoring and weaving form the substance
1:15:50
Speaker 1: of the values of the same articles. Coats and linen, however,
1:15:55
Speaker 1: are not merely values, but values of definite magnitude, and
1:16:00
Speaker 1: according to our assumption, the coat is worth twice as
1:16:02
Speaker 1: much as the ten yards of linen. Whence this difference
1:16:06
Speaker 1: in their values, it is owing to the fact that
1:16:09
Speaker 1: the linen contains only half as much labour as the coat,
1:16:12
Speaker 1: and consequently that in the production of the latter labour
1:16:16
Speaker 1: power must have been expended during twice the time necessary
1:16:19
Speaker 1: for the production of the former, while therefore, with reference
1:16:23
Speaker 1: to use value, the labour contained in a commodity counts
1:16:26
Speaker 1: only qualitatively. With reference to value, it counts only quantitatively,
1:16:31
Speaker 1: and must first be reduced to human labour, pure and simple.
1:16:35
Speaker 1: In the former case, it is a question of how
1:16:38
Speaker 1: and what. In the latter of how much how long
1:16:41
Speaker 1: a time. Since the magnitude of the value of a
1:16:44
Speaker 1: commodity represents only the quantity of labour embodied in it,
1:16:48
Speaker 1: it follows that all commodities, when taken in certain proportions,
1:16:53
Speaker 1: must be equal in value. If the productive power of
1:16:56
Speaker 1: all the different sorts of useful labour required for the
1:16:59
Speaker 1: production of coat remains unchanged, the sum of the values
1:17:03
Speaker 1: of the coats produced increases with their number. If one
1:17:06
Speaker 1: coat represents x day's labour, two coats represents two x
1:17:11
Speaker 1: days labour, and so on. But assume that the duration
1:17:15
Speaker 1: of the labour necessary for the production of a coat
1:17:17
Speaker 1: becomes doubled or halved. In the first case, one coat
1:17:22
Speaker 1: is worth as much as two coats were before. In
1:17:24
Speaker 1: the second case, two coats are only worth as much
1:17:27
Speaker 1: as one was before, although in both cases one coat
1:17:31
Speaker 1: renders the same services before and the useful labour embodied
1:17:35
Speaker 1: in it remains of the same quality, but the quantity
1:17:38
Speaker 1: of labour spent on its production has altered. An increase
1:17:43
Speaker 1: in the quantity of use values is an increase of
1:17:46
Speaker 1: material wealth. With two coats, two men can be clothed
1:17:50
Speaker 1: with one coat only one man. Nevertheless, an increased quantity
1:17:55
Speaker 1: of material wealth may correspond to a simultaneous fall in
1:17:59
Speaker 1: the magnitude of its value. This antagonistic movement has its
1:18:03
Speaker 1: origin in the twofold character of labour. Productive power has reference,
1:18:08
Speaker 1: of course, only to labour of some useful concrete form.
1:18:12
Speaker 1: The efficacy of any special productive activity during a given
1:18:16
Speaker 1: time being dependent on its productiveness. Useful labour becomes therefore
1:18:22
Speaker 1: a more or less abundant source of products in proportion
1:18:25
Speaker 1: to the rise or fall of its productiveness. On the
1:18:28
Speaker 1: other hand, no change in this productiveness affects the labour
1:18:32
Speaker 1: represented by value. Since productive power is an attribute of
1:18:37
Speaker 1: the concrete useful forms of labour, of course, it can
1:18:40
Speaker 1: no longer have any bearing on that labour so soon
1:18:43
Speaker 1: as we make abstraction from those concrete useful forms. However,
1:18:48
Speaker 1: then productive power may vary. The same labour exercised during
1:18:53
Speaker 1: equal periods of time always yields equal amounts of value,
1:18:58
Speaker 1: but it will yield during equal periods of time different
1:19:02
Speaker 1: quantities of values in use more if the productive power rise,
1:19:07
Speaker 1: fewer if it fall. The same change in productive power
1:19:11
Speaker 1: which increases the fruitfulness of labour, and in consequence the
1:19:15
Speaker 1: quantity of use values produced by that labour will diminish
1:19:19
Speaker 1: the total value of this increased quantity of use values
1:19:23
Speaker 1: provided such change shortened the total labour time necessary for
1:19:26
Speaker 1: their production, and vice versa. On the other hand, all
1:19:31
Speaker 1: labour is, speaking physiologically, an expenditure of human labour power,
1:19:36
Speaker 1: and in the character of identical, abstract human labour it
1:19:40
Speaker 1: creates and forms the values of commodities. On the other hand,
1:19:44
Speaker 1: all labour is the expenditure of human labour power in
1:19:47
Speaker 1: a special form and with a definite aim, and in
1:19:51
Speaker 1: this its character of concrete, useful labour, it produces use
1:19:55
Speaker 1: values footnote. In order to prove that labour alone is
1:20:01
Speaker 1: that all sufficient and real measure by which, at all
1:20:03
Speaker 1: times the value of all commodities can be estimated and compared,
1:20:07
Speaker 1: Adam Smith says, quote equal quantities of labour must, at
1:20:12
Speaker 1: all times and in all places, have the same value.
1:20:15
Speaker 1: For the labourer, in his normal state of health, strength,
1:20:19
Speaker 1: and activity, and with the average degree of skill that
1:20:22
Speaker 1: he may possess, he must always give up the same
1:20:24
Speaker 1: proportion of his rest, his freedom, and his happiness. End
1:20:30
Speaker 1: Wealth of Nations, Book one, chapter five. On the one hand,
1:20:34
Speaker 1: Adam Smith, here but not everywhere, confuses the determination of
1:20:39
Speaker 1: value by the means of quantity of labour expended in
1:20:41
Speaker 1: the production of commodities with the determination of the values
1:20:45
Speaker 1: of commodities by means of the value of labour, and
1:20:48
Speaker 1: seeks in consequence to prove that equal quantities of labour
1:20:52
Speaker 1: have always the same value. On the other hand, he
1:20:56
Speaker 1: has a presentiment that labour, so far as it manifests
1:20:59
Speaker 1: itself in the value of commodities, counts only as expenditure
1:21:03
Speaker 1: of labor power. But he treats this expenditure as the
1:21:06
Speaker 1: mere sacrifice of rest, freedom and happiness, not as at
1:21:10
Speaker 1: the same time the normal activity of living beings. But
1:21:14
Speaker 1: then he has the modern wage laborer in his eye.
1:21:18
Speaker 1: Much more aptly, the anonymous predecessor of Adam Smith, quoted
1:21:21
Speaker 1: above in note one, page thirty nine, says, quote, one
1:21:26
Speaker 1: man has employed himself a week in providing this necessary
1:21:30
Speaker 1: of life, and he that gives him some other in
1:21:32
Speaker 1: exchange cannot make a better estimate of what is a
1:21:35
Speaker 1: proper equivalent than by computing what cost him just as
1:21:39
Speaker 1: much labor and time, which in effect is no more
1:21:42
Speaker 1: than exchanging one man's labor in one thing for a
1:21:45
Speaker 1: time certain for another man's labor in another thing for
1:21:48
Speaker 1: the same time. End quote, editorial note. The English language
1:21:54
Speaker 1: has the advantage of possessing different words for the two
1:21:57
Speaker 1: aspects of labor here considered. The labour which creates use
1:22:01
Speaker 1: value and counts qualitatively is work as distinguished from labour.
1:22:06
Speaker 1: That which creates value and counts quantitatively is labour as
1:22:10
Speaker 1: distinguished from work Angeles end editorial note, end footnote, end
1:22:19
Speaker 1: of Chapter one, Section two, Section three. The form of
1:22:24
Speaker 1: value or exchange value. Commodities come into the world in
1:22:28
Speaker 1: the shape of use values, articles or goods such as iron, linen, corn, etc.
1:22:35
Speaker 1: This is their plain, homely, bodily form. They are, however,
1:22:39
Speaker 1: commodities only because they are something twofold, both objects of
1:22:43
Speaker 1: utility and at the same time depositories of value. They
1:22:47
Speaker 1: manifest themselves therefore as commodities, or have the form of
1:22:50
Speaker 1: commodities only in so far as they have two forms,
1:22:54
Speaker 1: a physical or natural form and a value form. The
1:22:58
Speaker 1: reality of the value of commodities differs in this respect
1:23:01
Speaker 1: from dame quickly that we don't know quote where to
1:23:05
Speaker 1: have it end quote. The value of commodities is the
1:23:08
Speaker 1: very opposite of the coarse materiality of their substance. Not
1:23:13
Speaker 1: an atom of matter enters into its composition. Turn and
1:23:16
Speaker 1: examine a single commodity by itself, as we will, Yet
1:23:20
Speaker 1: in so far as it remains an object of value,
1:23:23
Speaker 1: it seems impossible to grasp it. If, however, we bear
1:23:26
Speaker 1: in mind that the value of commodities has a purely
1:23:29
Speaker 1: social reality, and that they acquire this reality only in
1:23:32
Speaker 1: so far as they are expressions or embodiments of one
1:23:35
Speaker 1: identical social substance viz. Human labor, it follows, as a
1:23:39
Speaker 1: matter of course, that value can only manifest itself in
1:23:43
Speaker 1: a social relation of commodity to commodity. In fact, we
1:23:47
Speaker 1: started from exchange value or the exchange relation of commodities.
1:23:52
Speaker 1: In order to get at the value that lies hidden
1:23:54
Speaker 1: behind it, we must now return to this form under
1:23:57
Speaker 1: which the value first appeared to us. Everyone knows if
1:24:01
Speaker 1: he knows nothing else, that commodities have a value form
1:24:05
Speaker 1: common to them all, and presenting a marked contrast with
1:24:08
Speaker 1: the varied, bodily forms of their use values, I mean
1:24:12
Speaker 1: their money form. Here, however, a test is set us,
1:24:16
Speaker 1: the performance of which has never yet been attempted by
1:24:19
Speaker 1: bourgeois economy. The task of tracing the genesis of this
1:24:23
Speaker 1: money form of developing the expression of value implied in
1:24:27
Speaker 1: the value relation of commodities from its simplest or most
1:24:31
Speaker 1: imperceptible outline to the dazzling money form. By doing this,
1:24:36
Speaker 1: we shall, at the same time solve the riddle presented
1:24:38
Speaker 1: by money. The simplest value relation is evidently that of
1:24:43
Speaker 1: one commodity to some one other commodity of a different kind. Hence,
1:24:48
Speaker 1: the relation between the values of two commodities supplies us
1:24:51
Speaker 1: with the simplest expression of the value of a single commodity.
1:24:57
Speaker 1: A elementary or accidental form of value. Ex. Commodity A
1:25:04
Speaker 1: is worth y commodity B. Twenty yards of linen are
1:25:09
Speaker 1: worth one coat one the two poles of the expression
1:25:14
Speaker 1: of value relative form and equivalent form. The whole mystery
1:25:20
Speaker 1: of the form of value lies hidden in this elementary form.
1:25:24
Speaker 1: Its analysis. Therefore is our real difficulty. Here two different
1:25:29
Speaker 1: kinds of commodities. In our example, the linen and the
1:25:32
Speaker 1: coat evidently play two different parts. The linen expresses its
1:25:37
Speaker 1: value in the coat. The coat serves as the material
1:25:41
Speaker 1: in which that value is expressed. The former plays an
1:25:44
Speaker 1: active the latter a passive part. The value of the
1:25:48
Speaker 1: linen is represented as relative value, or appears in relative form.
1:25:54
Speaker 1: The coat officiates as equivalent or appears in equivalent form.
1:25:59
Speaker 1: The relative form and the equivalent form are two intimately connected,
1:26:04
Speaker 1: mutually dependent, and inseparable elements of the expression of value,
1:26:09
Speaker 1: but at the same time are mutually exclusive antagonistic extremes
1:26:13
Speaker 1: ie poles of the same expression. They are allotted respectively
1:26:18
Speaker 1: to the two different commodities brought into relation by that expression.
1:26:22
Speaker 1: It is not possible to express the value of linin
1:26:25
Speaker 1: in linin twenty yards of linin equals twenty yards of linin.
1:26:29
Speaker 1: Is no expression of value. On the contrary, such an
1:26:33
Speaker 1: equation merely says that twenty yards of linin are nothing
1:26:36
Speaker 1: else than twenty yards of linin a definite quantity of
1:26:39
Speaker 1: the use value linin. The value of the linin can
1:26:43
Speaker 1: therefore be expressed only relatively i e. In some other commodity.
1:26:48
Speaker 1: The relative form of the value of the linin presupposed
1:26:51
Speaker 1: is therefore the presence of some other commodity. Here the
1:26:55
Speaker 1: coat under the form of an equivalent. On the other hand,
1:26:59
Speaker 1: the the comodity that figures as the equivalent cannot at
1:27:02
Speaker 1: the same time assume the relative form. That second commodity
1:27:07
Speaker 1: is not the one whose value is expressed. Its function
1:27:10
Speaker 1: is merely to serve as the material in which the
1:27:13
Speaker 1: value of the first commodity is expressed. No doubt, the
1:27:17
Speaker 1: expression that twenty yards of linen equals one coat, or
1:27:20
Speaker 1: twenty yards of linen, or worth one coat implies the
1:27:24
Speaker 1: opposite relation one coat equals twenty yards of linen, or
1:27:28
Speaker 1: one coat is worth twenty yards of linen. But in
1:27:32
Speaker 1: that case I must reverse the equation in order to
1:27:35
Speaker 1: express the value of the coat relatively, and so soon
1:27:38
Speaker 1: as I do that, the linen becomes the equivalent instead
1:27:41
Speaker 1: of the coat. A single commodity cannot therefore simultaneously assume
1:27:47
Speaker 1: in the same expression of value both forms. The very
1:27:51
Speaker 1: polarity of these forms makes them mutually exclusive. Whether then
1:27:57
Speaker 1: a commodity assumes the relative form or the opposite equivalent
1:28:01
Speaker 1: form depends entirely upon its accidental position in the expression
1:28:05
Speaker 1: of value, That is, upon whether it is the commodity
1:28:08
Speaker 1: whose value is being expressed or the commodity in which
1:28:12
Speaker 1: value is being expressed. Two, the relative form of value
1:28:20
Speaker 1: a the nature and import of this form. In order
1:28:25
Speaker 1: to discover how the elementary expression of the value of
1:28:27
Speaker 1: a commodity lies hidden in the value relation of two commodities,
1:28:31
Speaker 1: we must, in the first place, consider the latter entirely
1:28:35
Speaker 1: apart from its quantitative aspect. The usual mode of procedure
1:28:39
Speaker 1: is generally the reverse, and in the value relation nothing
1:28:43
Speaker 1: is seen but the proportion between definite quantities of two
1:28:46
Speaker 1: different sorts of commodities that are considered equal to each other.
1:28:50
Speaker 1: It is apt to be forgotten that the magnitudes of
1:28:53
Speaker 1: different things can be compared quantitatively only when those magnitudes
1:28:57
Speaker 1: are expressed in terms of the same unit. It is
1:29:01
Speaker 1: only as expressions of such a unit that they are
1:29:03
Speaker 1: of the same denomination and therefore commensurable. Footnote. The few economists,
1:29:11
Speaker 1: amongst whom is S. Bailey, who have occupied themselves with
1:29:15
Speaker 1: the analysis of the form of value have been unable
1:29:18
Speaker 1: to arrive at any result. First because they confuse the
1:29:21
Speaker 1: form of value with value itself. And second, because under
1:29:25
Speaker 1: the coarse influence of the practical bourgeois, they exclusively give
1:29:29
Speaker 1: their attention to the quantitative aspects of the question. Quote
1:29:33
Speaker 1: the command of quantity constitutes value. End Quote money in
1:29:39
Speaker 1: its vicissitudes London, eighteen thirty seven by S. Bailey end
1:29:44
Speaker 1: footnote whether twenty yards of linen equals one coat, or
1:29:49
Speaker 1: equals twenty coats or equals x coats, That is, whether
1:29:53
Speaker 1: a given quantity of linen is worth few or many coats.
1:29:56
Speaker 1: Every such statement implies that the linen and coat, as
1:30:00
Speaker 1: magnitudes of value, are expressions of the same unit things
1:30:04
Speaker 1: of the same kind. Linin equals coat is the basis
1:30:08
Speaker 1: of the equation. But the two commodities whose identity of
1:30:11
Speaker 1: quality is thus assumed, do not play the same part.
1:30:15
Speaker 1: It is only the value of the linen that is expressed,
1:30:18
Speaker 1: and how by its reference to the coat as its
1:30:21
Speaker 1: equivalent as something that can be exchanged for it. In
1:30:25
Speaker 1: this relation, the coat is the mode of existence of value,
1:30:30
Speaker 1: is value embodied, for only as such is it the
1:30:33
Speaker 1: same as the linen. On the other hand, the linin's
1:30:37
Speaker 1: own value comes to the front receives independent expression, for
1:30:42
Speaker 1: it is only as being value that it is comparable
1:30:45
Speaker 1: with the coat as a thing of equal value or
1:30:47
Speaker 1: exchangeable with the coat. To borrow an illustration from chemistry,
1:30:52
Speaker 1: but tyric acid is a different substance from proper formate,
1:30:57
Speaker 1: yet both are made up of the same chemical substances
1:31:00
Speaker 1: carbon C, hydrogen H and oxygen O, and that too
1:31:05
Speaker 1: in like proportions, namely C four H eight O two.
1:31:10
Speaker 1: If we now equate butyric acid to proper formate, then
1:31:14
Speaker 1: in the first place, proper formate would be in this
1:31:17
Speaker 1: relation merely a form of existence of C four H
1:31:21
Speaker 1: eight O two, And in the second place, we should
1:31:24
Speaker 1: be stating that butyric acid also consists of C four
1:31:29
Speaker 1: H eight O two. Therefore, by thus equating the two substances,
1:31:33
Speaker 1: expression would be given to their chemical composition, while their
1:31:37
Speaker 1: different physical forms would be neglected. If we say that
1:31:41
Speaker 1: as values commodities are mere condulations of human labour, we
1:31:45
Speaker 1: reduce them by our analysis, it is true to the
1:31:48
Speaker 1: abstraction value, but we ascribe to this value no form
1:31:52
Speaker 1: apart from their bodily form. It is otherwise in the
1:31:56
Speaker 1: value relation of one commodity to another Here the one
1:32:00
Speaker 1: stands forth in its character of value by reason of
1:32:03
Speaker 1: its relation to the other. By making the coat the
1:32:07
Speaker 1: equivalent of the linen, we equate the labour embodied in
1:32:10
Speaker 1: the former to that in the latter. Now it is
1:32:13
Speaker 1: true that the tailoring which makes the coat is concrete
1:32:17
Speaker 1: labour of a different sort from the weaving which makes
1:32:19
Speaker 1: the linen. But the act of equating it to the
1:32:22
Speaker 1: weaving reduces the tailoring to that which is really equal
1:32:26
Speaker 1: in the two kinds of labour, to their common character
1:32:29
Speaker 1: of human labour. In this roundabout way, then the fact
1:32:33
Speaker 1: is expressed that weaving, also in so far as it
1:32:36
Speaker 1: weaves value, has nothing to distinguish it from tailoring, and
1:32:40
Speaker 1: consequently is abstract human labour. It is the expression of
1:32:46
Speaker 1: equivalence between different sorts of commodities that alone brings into
1:32:50
Speaker 1: relief the specific character of value creating labour, and this
1:32:54
Speaker 1: it does by actually reducing the different varieties of labour
1:32:57
Speaker 1: embodied in the different kinds of commodities to their common
1:33:00
Speaker 1: quality of human labour in the abstract footnote. The celebrated Franklin,
1:33:06
Speaker 1: one of the first economists after William Petty, who saw
1:33:10
Speaker 1: through the nature of value says quote trade in general
1:33:14
Speaker 1: being nothing else but the exchange of labour for labour,
1:33:17
Speaker 1: the value of all things is most justly measured by
1:33:20
Speaker 1: labour end quote. The Works of Franklin, etc. Edited by Sparks, Boston,
1:33:27
Speaker 1: eighteen thirty six, Volume two. Franklin is unconscious that by
1:33:32
Speaker 1: estimating the value of everything in labour, he makes abstraction
1:33:35
Speaker 1: from any difference in the sorts of labour exchanged, and
1:33:39
Speaker 1: thus reduces them all to equal human labour. But although
1:33:43
Speaker 1: ignorant of this, yet he says it. He speaks first
1:33:46
Speaker 1: of quote the one labour end quote, then of quote
1:33:50
Speaker 1: the other labour end quote, and finally of quote labour quote,
1:33:55
Speaker 1: without further qualification. As the substance of the value of everything.
1:34:01
Speaker 1: There is, however, something else required beyond the expression of
1:34:05
Speaker 1: the specific character of the labour of which the value
1:34:07
Speaker 1: of the linen consists. Human labour, power in motion or
1:34:11
Speaker 1: human labour creates value, but is not its self value.
1:34:15
Speaker 1: It becomes value only in its congealed state, when embodied
1:34:19
Speaker 1: in the form of some object. In order to express
1:34:22
Speaker 1: the value of the linen as a condulation of human labour,
1:34:25
Speaker 1: that value must be expressed as having objective existence as
1:34:29
Speaker 1: being something materially different from the linin itself, and yet
1:34:33
Speaker 1: are something common to the linin and all other commodities.
1:34:37
Speaker 1: The problem is already solved when occupying the position of equivalent.
1:34:43
Speaker 1: In the equation of value, the coat ranks quantitatively as
1:34:46
Speaker 1: the equal of the linen as something of the same kind,
1:34:50
Speaker 1: because it is value. In this position, it is a
1:34:54
Speaker 1: thing in which we see nothing but value, or whose
1:34:57
Speaker 1: palpable bodily form represents value. Yet the coat itself, the
1:35:01
Speaker 1: body of the commodity coat, is a mere use value.
1:35:05
Speaker 1: A coat as such no more tells us it is
1:35:08
Speaker 1: value than does the first piece of linen we take
1:35:11
Speaker 1: hold of. This shows that when placed in value relation
1:35:15
Speaker 1: to the linen, the coat signifies more than when out
1:35:18
Speaker 1: of that relation, just as many a man strutting about
1:35:22
Speaker 1: in a gorgeous uniform counts for no more than when
1:35:26
Speaker 1: in mufti. In the production of the coat, human labor
1:35:30
Speaker 1: power in the shape of tailoring must have been actually expended.
1:35:34
Speaker 1: Human labor is therefore accumulated in it. In this aspect,
1:35:39
Speaker 1: the coat is a depository of value, but though worn
1:35:42
Speaker 1: to a thread, it does not let this fact show through,
1:35:46
Speaker 1: and as equivalent of the linen in the value equation,
1:35:49
Speaker 1: it exists under this aspect alone counts therefore as embodied value.
1:35:54
Speaker 1: As a body that is value, A, for instance, cannot
1:35:58
Speaker 1: be your magic to B unless, at the same time
1:36:03
Speaker 1: majesty in B's eyes assumes the bodily form of A.
1:36:07
Speaker 1: And what is more, with every new father of the
1:36:10
Speaker 1: people changes its features, hair, and many other things besides. Hence,
1:36:16
Speaker 1: in the value equation in which the coat is the
1:36:18
Speaker 1: equivalent of the linen, the coat officiates as the form
1:36:22
Speaker 1: of value. The value of the commodity linin is expressed
1:36:25
Speaker 1: by the bodily form of the commodity coat, the value
1:36:29
Speaker 1: of one by the use value of the other. As
1:36:32
Speaker 1: a use value, the linen is something palpably different from
1:36:35
Speaker 1: the coat. As value. It is the same as the
1:36:38
Speaker 1: coat and now has the appearance of a coat. Thus
1:36:42
Speaker 1: the linen acquires a value form different from its physical form.
1:36:47
Speaker 1: The fact that it is value is made manifest by
1:36:50
Speaker 1: its equality with the coat, just as the sheep's nature
1:36:53
Speaker 1: of a Christian is shown in its resemblance to the
1:36:55
Speaker 1: lamb of God. We see then all that are analysis
1:36:59
Speaker 1: of the v value of commodities has already told us
1:37:02
Speaker 1: is told us by the linen itself. So soon as
1:37:05
Speaker 1: it comes into communication with another commodity, the coat, only
1:37:10
Speaker 1: it betrays its thoughts in that language with which alone
1:37:13
Speaker 1: it is familiar, the language of commodities. In order to
1:37:17
Speaker 1: tell us that its own worth value is created by labour.
1:37:20
Speaker 1: In its abstract character of human labour, it says that
1:37:24
Speaker 1: the coat, insofar as it is worth as much as
1:37:26
Speaker 1: the linen and therefore is value, consists of the same
1:37:30
Speaker 1: labour as the linen. In order to inform us that
1:37:33
Speaker 1: its sublime reality as value is not the same as
1:37:37
Speaker 1: its bookram body, it says that the value has the
1:37:40
Speaker 1: appearance of a coat, and consequently that so far as
1:37:43
Speaker 1: the linen is value, it and the coat are as
1:37:46
Speaker 1: like as two peas. We may here remark that the
1:37:50
Speaker 1: language of commodities has, besides Hebrew, many more or less
1:37:54
Speaker 1: correct dialects. The German verstein to be worth, for instance,
1:38:00
Speaker 1: expresses in a less striking manner than the Romance verbs
1:38:04
Speaker 1: valeire valeire valois that the equating of commodity B to
1:38:10
Speaker 1: commodity A is commodity a's own mode of expressing its value.
1:38:15
Speaker 1: Paris vaubien unmess by means Therefore, of the value relation
1:38:20
Speaker 1: expressed in our equation, the bodily form of commodity B
1:38:23
Speaker 1: becomes the value form of commodity A, or the body
1:38:27
Speaker 1: of commodity B acts as a mirror to the value
1:38:30
Speaker 1: of commodity A. Footnote. In a sort of way, it
1:38:35
Speaker 1: is with man as with commodities, since he comes into
1:38:38
Speaker 1: the world neither with a looking glass in his hand,
1:38:41
Speaker 1: nor as a Fictinian philosopher, to whom I am I
1:38:44
Speaker 1: is sufficient. Man first seeks and recognizes himself in other men.
1:38:50
Speaker 1: Peter only establishes his own identity as a man by
1:38:53
Speaker 1: first comparing himself with Paul as being of like kind,
1:38:57
Speaker 1: and thereby Paul, just as he stands in his poor line, personality,
1:39:02
Speaker 1: becomes to Peter the type of the genus Homo end footnote.
1:39:07
Speaker 1: By putting itself in relation with commodity B as value
1:39:11
Speaker 1: in proporia persona as the matter of which human labour
1:39:15
Speaker 1: is made up, the commodity A converts the value in
1:39:18
Speaker 1: use B into the substance in which to express its
1:39:23
Speaker 1: a's own value. The value of A, thus expressed in
1:39:27
Speaker 1: the use value of B, has taken the form of
1:39:29
Speaker 1: relative value B. Quantitative determination of relative value. Every commodity
1:39:38
Speaker 1: whose value it is intended to express is a useful
1:39:42
Speaker 1: object of given quantity, as fifteen bushels of corn or
1:39:47
Speaker 1: one hundred pounds of coffee, and a given quantity of
1:39:50
Speaker 1: any commodity contains a definite quantity of human labour. The
1:39:54
Speaker 1: value form must therefore not only express value generally, but
1:39:58
Speaker 1: also value in definitely quantity. Therefore, in the value relation
1:40:03
Speaker 1: of commodity A to commodity B of the linen to
1:40:06
Speaker 1: the coat, not only is the latter, as value in general,
1:40:09
Speaker 1: made the equal in quality of the linen, but a
1:40:12
Speaker 1: definite quantity of coat one coat is made the equivalent
1:40:16
Speaker 1: of a definite quantity twenty yards of linen. The equation
1:40:20
Speaker 1: twenty yards of linen equals one coat or twenty yards
1:40:23
Speaker 1: of linen are worth one coat implies that the same
1:40:26
Speaker 1: quantity of value substance congealed labour is embodied in both.
1:40:31
Speaker 1: That the two commodities have each cost the same amount
1:40:34
Speaker 1: of labour of the same quantity of labour time. But
1:40:37
Speaker 1: the labour time necessary for the production of twenty yards
1:40:40
Speaker 1: of linen or one coat varies with every change in
1:40:43
Speaker 1: the productiveness of weaving or tailoring. We have now to
1:40:47
Speaker 1: consider the influence of such changes on the quantitative aspect
1:40:51
Speaker 1: of the relative expression of value. One let the value
1:40:56
Speaker 1: of the linen vary that of the coat remain in constant. Footnote.
1:41:01
Speaker 1: Value is here as occasionally in the preceding pages, used
1:41:05
Speaker 1: in the sense of value determined as to quantity or
1:41:09
Speaker 1: of magnitude of value en. Footnote. If say, in consequence
1:41:13
Speaker 1: of the exhaustion of flax growing soil, the labor time
1:41:17
Speaker 1: necessary for the production of the linen be doubled, the
1:41:20
Speaker 1: value of the linen will also be doubled. Instead of
1:41:23
Speaker 1: the equation twenty yards of linen equals one coat, we
1:41:26
Speaker 1: should have twenty yards of linen equals two coats, since
1:41:30
Speaker 1: one coat would now contain only half the labor time
1:41:33
Speaker 1: embodied in twenty yards of linen. If, on the other hand,
1:41:37
Speaker 1: in consequence say of improved looms, this labor time be
1:41:41
Speaker 1: reduced by one half, the value of the linen would
1:41:44
Speaker 1: fall by one half. Consequently, we should have twenty yards
1:41:48
Speaker 1: of linen equals half a coat. The relative value of
1:41:51
Speaker 1: commodity a i e. Its value expressed in commodity B
1:41:55
Speaker 1: rises and falls directly as the value of A, the
1:41:58
Speaker 1: value of B being posed constant. Two, let the value
1:42:04
Speaker 1: of the linen remain constant while the value of the
1:42:06
Speaker 1: coat varies. If under these circumstances, in consequence, for instance,
1:42:12
Speaker 1: of a poor crop of wool, the labour time necessary
1:42:15
Speaker 1: for the production of a coat becomes doubled, we have,
1:42:18
Speaker 1: instead of twenty yards of linen equals one coat, twenty
1:42:21
Speaker 1: yards of linen equals half a coat. If, on the
1:42:25
Speaker 1: other hand, the value of the coat sinks by one half,
1:42:28
Speaker 1: then twenty yards of linen equals two coats. Hence, if
1:42:31
Speaker 1: the value of commodity A remain constant, its relative value
1:42:36
Speaker 1: expressed in commodity B rises and falls inversely as the
1:42:40
Speaker 1: value of B. If we compare the different cases in
1:42:44
Speaker 1: one and two, we see that the same change of
1:42:47
Speaker 1: magnitude in relative value may arise from totally opposite causes. Thus,
1:42:51
Speaker 1: the equation twenty yards of linen equals one coat becomes
1:42:55
Speaker 1: twenty yards of linen equals two coats, either because the
1:42:59
Speaker 1: value of the linin has doubled, or because the value
1:43:02
Speaker 1: of the coat has fallen by one half and it
1:43:05
Speaker 1: becomes twenty yards of linen equals half a coat. Either
1:43:08
Speaker 1: because the value of the linen has fallen by one half,
1:43:12
Speaker 1: or because the value of the coat has doubled. Three,
1:43:16
Speaker 1: Let the quantities of labour time, respectively necessary for the
1:43:19
Speaker 1: production of the linen and the coat vary simultaneously in
1:43:23
Speaker 1: the same direction and in the same proportion. In this case,
1:43:27
Speaker 1: twenty yards of linen continue to equal one coat. However
1:43:31
Speaker 1: much their values have altered. Their change of value is
1:43:35
Speaker 1: seen as soon as they are compared with the third commodity,
1:43:37
Speaker 1: whose value has remained constant. If the values of all
1:43:41
Speaker 1: commodities rose and fell simultaneously and in the same proportion,
1:43:45
Speaker 1: their relative values would remain unaltered. Their real change of
1:43:49
Speaker 1: value would appear from the diminished or increased quantity of
1:43:52
Speaker 1: commodities produced in a given time. Four The labour time
1:43:57
Speaker 1: respectively necessary for the production of the linen and the coat,
1:44:01
Speaker 1: and therefore the value of these commodities may simultaneously vary
1:44:05
Speaker 1: in the same direction, but at unequal rates, or in
1:44:09
Speaker 1: opposite directions, or in other ways. The effect of all
1:44:12
Speaker 1: these possible different variations on the relative value of a
1:44:15
Speaker 1: commodity may be deduced from the results of one, two,
1:44:19
Speaker 1: and three. Thus, real changes in the magnitude of value
1:44:23
Speaker 1: are neither unequivocally nor exhaustively reflected in their relative expression,
1:44:28
Speaker 1: that is, in the equation expressing the magnitude of relative value.
1:44:32
Speaker 1: The relative value of a commodity may vary although its
1:44:35
Speaker 1: value remains constant. Its relative value may remain constant although
1:44:40
Speaker 1: its value varies. And finally, simultaneous variations in the magnitude
1:44:46
Speaker 1: of value and in that of its relative expression by
1:44:49
Speaker 1: no means necessarily correspond in amount. Footnote. This incongruity between
1:44:56
Speaker 1: the magnitude of value and its relative expression, as with
1:45:00
Speaker 1: customary ingenuity, been exploited by vulgar economists. For example, once
1:45:07
Speaker 1: admit that A falls because B, with which it is
1:45:10
Speaker 1: exchanged rises, while no less labour is bestowed in the
1:45:13
Speaker 1: meantime on A, and your general principle of value falls
1:45:17
Speaker 1: to the ground. If he Ricardo allowed that when A
1:45:21
Speaker 1: rises in value relatively to B, B falls in value
1:45:25
Speaker 1: relatively to A, he cut away the ground on which
1:45:28
Speaker 1: he rested his grand proposition that the value of a
1:45:31
Speaker 1: commodity is ever determined by the labour embodied in it.
1:45:35
Speaker 1: For if a change in the cost of A alters
1:45:38
Speaker 1: not only its own value in relation to B, for
1:45:40
Speaker 1: which it is exchanged, but also the value of B
1:45:44
Speaker 1: relatively to that of A, though no change has taken
1:45:47
Speaker 1: place in the quantity of labour to produce B. Then
1:45:50
Speaker 1: not only the doctrine falls to the ground which asserts
1:45:53
Speaker 1: that the quantity of labour bestowed on an article regulates
1:45:56
Speaker 1: its value, but also that which affirms the cost of
1:46:00
Speaker 1: an article to regulate its value. End quote J. Broadhurst,
1:46:05
Speaker 1: Political Economy, London, eighteen forty two. Mister Broadhurst might just
1:46:11
Speaker 1: as well say, consider the fractions ten over twenty, ten,
1:46:15
Speaker 1: over fifty, ten over one hundred, et cetera. The number
1:46:19
Speaker 1: ten remains unchanged, and yet its proportional magnitude, its magnitude
1:46:24
Speaker 1: relatively to the numbers twenty, fifty, one hundred, et cetera,
1:46:27
Speaker 1: continually diminishes. Therefore, the great principle that the magnitude of
1:46:32
Speaker 1: a whole number such as ten is regulated by the
1:46:36
Speaker 1: number of times unity is contained in it. Fourth to
1:46:39
Speaker 1: the ground editorial note. The author explains in section four
1:46:45
Speaker 1: of this chapter what he understands by vulgar economy angles
1:46:50
Speaker 1: and editorial note end footnote three. The equivalent form of value.
1:46:57
Speaker 1: We have seen that commodity A the linen by expressing
1:47:01
Speaker 1: its value in the use value of a commodity differing
1:47:03
Speaker 1: in kind. The coat, at the same time impresses upon
1:47:07
Speaker 1: the latter a specific form of value, namely that of
1:47:11
Speaker 1: the equivalent. The commodity linen manifests its quality of having
1:47:15
Speaker 1: a value by the fact that the coat, without having
1:47:18
Speaker 1: assumed a value form different from its bodily form, is
1:47:21
Speaker 1: equated to the linen. The fact that the latter therefore
1:47:25
Speaker 1: has a value is expressed by saying that the coat
1:47:28
Speaker 1: is directly exchangeable with it. Therefore, when we say that
1:47:32
Speaker 1: the commodity is in the equivalent form, we express the
1:47:35
Speaker 1: fact that it is directly exchangeable with other commodities. When
1:47:39
Speaker 1: one commodity such as a coat, serves as the equivalent
1:47:42
Speaker 1: of another such as linen, and coats consequently acquire the
1:47:46
Speaker 1: characteristic property of being directly exchangeable with linen, we are
1:47:50
Speaker 1: far from knowing in what proportion the two are exchangeable,
1:47:55
Speaker 1: the value of the linen being given in magnitude. The
1:47:58
Speaker 1: proportion depends on the value of the coat, whether the
1:48:01
Speaker 1: coat serves as the equivalent and the linen as relative value,
1:48:05
Speaker 1: or the linen as the equivalent of the coat as
1:48:07
Speaker 1: relative value. The magnitude of the coat's value is determined
1:48:11
Speaker 1: independently of its value form by the labour time necessary
1:48:14
Speaker 1: for its production. But whenever the coat assumes in the
1:48:17
Speaker 1: equation of value the position of equivalent, its value acquires
1:48:21
Speaker 1: no quantitative expression. On the contrary, the commodity coat now
1:48:26
Speaker 1: figures only as a definite quantity of some article. For instance,
1:48:31
Speaker 1: forty yards of linen are worth what two coats, because
1:48:35
Speaker 1: the commodity coat here plays the part of equivalent. Because
1:48:39
Speaker 1: the use value of coat, as opposed to the linen,
1:48:42
Speaker 1: figures as an embodiment of value. Therefore, a definite number
1:48:46
Speaker 1: of coats suffices to express the definite quantity of value
1:48:49
Speaker 1: in the linen. Two coats may therefore express the quantity
1:48:53
Speaker 1: of value of forty yards of linen, but they can
1:48:55
Speaker 1: never express the quantity of their own value. A superficial
1:48:59
Speaker 1: observation of this fact, namely that in the question of value,
1:49:03
Speaker 1: the equivalent figures exclusively as a simple quantity of some
1:49:07
Speaker 1: article of some use value, as misled Bailey as also
1:49:11
Speaker 1: many others both before and after him, into seeing in
1:49:14
Speaker 1: the expression of value merely a quantitative relation, the truth
1:49:19
Speaker 1: being that when a commodity acts as equivalent, no quantitative
1:49:23
Speaker 1: determination of its value is expressed. The first peculiarity that
1:49:28
Speaker 1: strikes us in considering the form of the equivalent is
1:49:30
Speaker 1: this use value becomes the form of manifestation the phenomenal
1:49:35
Speaker 1: form of its opposite value, the bodily form of the
1:49:39
Speaker 1: commodity becomes its value form. But mark well that this
1:49:44
Speaker 1: quid pro quo exists in the case of any commodity
1:49:47
Speaker 1: B only when some other commodity A enters into a
1:49:51
Speaker 1: value relation with it, and then only within the limits
1:49:54
Speaker 1: of this relation. Since no commodity can stand in the
1:49:58
Speaker 1: relation of equivalent to itself health and thus turn its
1:50:01
Speaker 1: own bodily shape into the expression of its own value,
1:50:05
Speaker 1: every commodity is compelled to choose some other commodity for
1:50:08
Speaker 1: its equivalent, and to accept the use value, that is
1:50:11
Speaker 1: to say, the bodily shape of that other commodity, as
1:50:14
Speaker 1: the form of its own value. One of the measures
1:50:17
Speaker 1: that we apply to commodities as material substances as use values,
1:50:22
Speaker 1: will serve to illustrate this point. A sugar loaf being
1:50:25
Speaker 1: a body, is heavy and therefore has weight, but we
1:50:29
Speaker 1: can neither see nor touch this weight. We then take
1:50:33
Speaker 1: various pieces of iron whose weight has been determined beforehand.
1:50:37
Speaker 1: The iron, as iron is no more the form of
1:50:39
Speaker 1: manifestation of weight than is the sugar loaf. Nevertheless, in
1:50:44
Speaker 1: order to express the sugar loaf as so much weight,
1:50:47
Speaker 1: we put it into a weight relation with the iron.
1:50:50
Speaker 1: In this relation, the iron officiates as a body representing
1:50:54
Speaker 1: nothing but weight. A certain quantity of iron therefore serves
1:50:57
Speaker 1: as the measure of the weight of the sugar, and represents,
1:51:00
Speaker 1: in relation to the sugar loaf weight embodied the form
1:51:04
Speaker 1: of manifestation of weight. This part is played by the
1:51:08
Speaker 1: iron only within this relation, into which the sugar or
1:51:11
Speaker 1: any other body whose weight has to be determined, enters
1:51:14
Speaker 1: with the iron. Were they not both heavy, they could
1:51:18
Speaker 1: not enter into this relation, and the one could therefore
1:51:21
Speaker 1: not serve as the expression of the weight of the other.
1:51:24
Speaker 1: When we throw both into the scales, we see in
1:51:27
Speaker 1: reality that as weight they are both the same, and
1:51:30
Speaker 1: that therefore, when taken in proper proportions, they have the
1:51:34
Speaker 1: same weight. Just as the substance iron, as a measure
1:51:37
Speaker 1: of weight, represents in relation to the sugar loaf weight alone.
1:51:41
Speaker 1: So in our expression of value, the material object coat
1:51:45
Speaker 1: in relation to the linen represents value alone. Here, however,
1:51:51
Speaker 1: the analogy ceases. The iron in the expression of weight
1:51:54
Speaker 1: of the sugar loaf represents a natural property common to
1:51:57
Speaker 1: both bodies, namely their weight, but the coat in the
1:52:01
Speaker 1: expression of value of the linen, represents a non natural
1:52:05
Speaker 1: property of both something purely social, namely their value. Since
1:52:10
Speaker 1: the relative form of value of a commodity the linen,
1:52:13
Speaker 1: for example, expresses the value of that commodity as being
1:52:17
Speaker 1: something wholly different from its substance and properties, as being,
1:52:21
Speaker 1: for instance, coat like we see that this expression itself
1:52:25
Speaker 1: indicates that some social relation lies at the bottom of it.
1:52:29
Speaker 1: With the equivalent form, it is just the contrary. The
1:52:33
Speaker 1: very essence of this form is that the material commodity itself,
1:52:36
Speaker 1: the coat, just as it is, expresses value and is
1:52:40
Speaker 1: endowed with the form of value by nature itself. Of course,
1:52:45
Speaker 1: this holds good only so long as the value relation
1:52:47
Speaker 1: exists in which the coat stands in the position of
1:52:50
Speaker 1: equivalent to the linen. Footnote. Such expressions of relations, in general,
1:52:55
Speaker 1: called by Hegel reflex categories, form a very curious claims.
1:53:00
Speaker 1: For instance, one man is king only because other men
1:53:03
Speaker 1: stand in the relation of subjects to him. They, on
1:53:07
Speaker 1: the contrary, imagine that they are subjects because he is king.
1:53:11
Speaker 1: End footnote. Since, however, the properties of a thing are
1:53:15
Speaker 1: not the result of its relations to other things, but
1:53:18
Speaker 1: only manifest themselves in such relations, the coat seems to
1:53:22
Speaker 1: be endowed with its equivalent form, its property of being
1:53:25
Speaker 1: directly exchangeable, just as much by nature as it is
1:53:28
Speaker 1: endowed with the property of being heavy or the capacity
1:53:31
Speaker 1: to keep us warm. Hence, the enigmatical character of the
1:53:35
Speaker 1: equivalent form, which escapes the notice of the bourgeois political
1:53:39
Speaker 1: economist until this form completely developed confronts him in the
1:53:43
Speaker 1: shape of money. He then seeks to explain away the
1:53:46
Speaker 1: mystical character of gold and silver by substituting for them
1:53:50
Speaker 1: less dazzling commodities, than by reciting, with ever renewed satisfaction,
1:53:55
Speaker 1: the catalog of all possible commodities which, at one time
1:53:58
Speaker 1: or another have played the part of equivalent. He has
1:54:01
Speaker 1: not the least suspicion that the most simple expression of value,
1:54:04
Speaker 1: such as twenty yards of linen equals one coat, already
1:54:08
Speaker 1: propounds the riddle of the equivalent form. For our solution,
1:54:12
Speaker 1: the body of the commodity that serves as the equivalent
1:54:15
Speaker 1: figures as the materialization of human labour in the abstract,
1:54:19
Speaker 1: and is at the same time the product of some
1:54:21
Speaker 1: specifically useful concrete labour. This concrete labour becomes therefore the
1:54:27
Speaker 1: medium for expressing abstract human labour. If on the one hand,
1:54:32
Speaker 1: the coat ranks as nothing but the embodiment of abstract
1:54:35
Speaker 1: human labour, so on the other hand, the tailoring, which
1:54:39
Speaker 1: is actually embodied in it, counts nothing but the form
1:54:42
Speaker 1: under which that abstract labour is realized in the expression
1:54:46
Speaker 1: of value of the linen. The utility of the tailoring
1:54:49
Speaker 1: consists not in making clothes, but in making an object
1:54:53
Speaker 1: which we at once recognize to be value, and therefore
1:54:57
Speaker 1: to be a condulation of labour, but of labour indistinguishable
1:55:02
Speaker 1: from that realized in the value of the linen. In
1:55:05
Speaker 1: order to act as such a mirror of value, the
1:55:07
Speaker 1: labour of tailoring must reflect nothing besides its own abstract
1:55:11
Speaker 1: quality of being human labor. Generally, in tailoring as well
1:55:16
Speaker 1: as in weaving, human labour power is expended. Both therefore
1:55:21
Speaker 1: possess the general property of being human labour, and may, therefore,
1:55:25
Speaker 1: in certain cases, such as in the production of value,
1:55:29
Speaker 1: have to be considered under this aspect alone. There is
1:55:33
Speaker 1: nothing mysterious in this but in the expression of value
1:55:36
Speaker 1: there is a complete turn of the tables. For instance,
1:55:40
Speaker 1: how is the fact to be expressed that weaving creates
1:55:43
Speaker 1: the value of the linen not by virtue of being
1:55:45
Speaker 1: weaving as such, but by reason of its general property
1:55:49
Speaker 1: of being human labour, simply by opposing to weaving, that
1:55:54
Speaker 1: other particular form of concrete labour in this instance's tailoring,
1:55:58
Speaker 1: which produces the equivalent of the product of weaving. Just
1:56:01
Speaker 1: as the coat in its bodily form became a direct
1:56:04
Speaker 1: expression of value, so now does tailoring, a concrete form
1:56:09
Speaker 1: of labour, appear as the direct and palpable embodiment of
1:56:12
Speaker 1: human labour generally. Hence, the second peculiarity of the equivalent
1:56:17
Speaker 1: form is that concrete labour becomes the form under which
1:56:21
Speaker 1: its opposite, abstract human labour manifests itself. But because this
1:56:26
Speaker 1: concrete labour tailoring in our case ranks as and is
1:56:29
Speaker 1: directly identified with undifferentiated human labour, it also ranks as
1:56:35
Speaker 1: identical with any other sort of labour and therefore with
1:56:38
Speaker 1: that embodied in the linen. Consequently, although like all other
1:56:44
Speaker 1: commodity producing labour. It is the labour of private individuals,
1:56:48
Speaker 1: yet at the same time it ranks as labour directly
1:56:51
Speaker 1: social in its character. This is the reason why it
1:56:55
Speaker 1: results in a product directly exchangeable with other commodities. We
1:56:59
Speaker 1: have there, then, a third peculiarity of the equivalent form,
1:57:02
Speaker 1: namely that the labour of private individuals takes the form
1:57:06
Speaker 1: of its opposite labour directly social in its form. The
1:57:11
Speaker 1: two latter peculiarities of the equivalent form will become more
1:57:15
Speaker 1: intelligible if we go back to the great thinker who
1:57:18
Speaker 1: was the first to analyze so many forms, whether of thought, society,
1:57:23
Speaker 1: or nature, and amongst them also the form of value
1:57:27
Speaker 1: I mean Aristotle. In the first place, he clearly enunciates
1:57:32
Speaker 1: that the money form of commodities is only the further
1:57:34
Speaker 1: development of the simple form of value, i e. Of
1:57:38
Speaker 1: the expression of the value of one commodity in some
1:57:41
Speaker 1: other commodity taken at random. For he says five beds
1:57:45
Speaker 1: equals one house is not to be distinguished from five
1:57:50
Speaker 1: beds equal so much money. He further sees that the
1:57:54
Speaker 1: value relation which gives rise to this expression makes it
1:57:57
Speaker 1: necessary that the house should qualityatively be made the equal
1:58:01
Speaker 1: of the bed, and that without such an equalization, these
1:58:05
Speaker 1: two clearly different things could not be compared with each
1:58:08
Speaker 1: other as commensurable quantities. Exchange, he says, cannot take place
1:58:14
Speaker 1: without equality, and equality not without commensurability. Here, however, he
1:58:20
Speaker 1: comes to a stop and gives up the further analysis
1:58:23
Speaker 1: of the form of value. Quote it is, however, in reality,
1:58:27
Speaker 1: impossible that such unlike things can be commensurable end quote
1:58:32
Speaker 1: I e qualitatively equal. Such an equalization can only be
1:58:36
Speaker 1: something foreign to their real nature. Consequently, only quote A
1:58:41
Speaker 1: makeshift for practical purposes end quote. Aristotle therefore himself tells
1:58:47
Speaker 1: us what barred the way to his further analysis. It
1:58:50
Speaker 1: was the absence of any concept of value. What is
1:58:54
Speaker 1: that equal something, that common substance which admits of the
1:58:57
Speaker 1: value of the beds being expressed by a Such a thing,
1:59:01
Speaker 1: in truth cannot exist, says Aristotle. And why not, compared
1:59:06
Speaker 1: with the beds, the house does represent something equal to
1:59:09
Speaker 1: them in so far as it represents what is really
1:59:12
Speaker 1: equal both in the beds and the house, and that
1:59:16
Speaker 1: is human labour. There was, however, an important fact which
1:59:20
Speaker 1: prevented Aristotle from seeing that to attribute value to commodities
1:59:25
Speaker 1: is merely a mode of expressing all labour as equal
1:59:28
Speaker 1: human labour, and consequently as labour of equal quality. Greek
1:59:32
Speaker 1: society was founded upon slavery, and had therefore for its
1:59:36
Speaker 1: natural basis the inequality of men and their labour. Powers
1:59:41
Speaker 1: The secret of the expression of value, namely, that all
1:59:44
Speaker 1: kinds of labour are equal and equivalent, because and so
1:59:48
Speaker 1: far as they are, Human labour in general, cannot be
1:59:51
Speaker 1: deciphered until the notion of human equality has already acquired
1:59:55
Speaker 1: the fixity of a popular prejudice. This, however, is possible
2:00:00
Speaker 1: only in a society in which the great mass of
2:00:03
Speaker 1: the produce of labour takes the form of commodities, in
2:00:07
Speaker 1: which consequently the dominant relation between man and man is
2:00:11
Speaker 1: that of owners of commodities. The brilliancy of Aristotle's genius
2:00:15
Speaker 1: is shown by this alone, that he discovered, in the
2:00:18
Speaker 1: expression of the value of commodities a relation of equality.
2:00:22
Speaker 1: The peculiar conditions of the society in which he lived
2:00:26
Speaker 1: alone prevented him from discovering what, in truth was at
2:00:30
Speaker 1: the bottom of this equality. Four. The elementary form of
2:00:35
Speaker 1: value considered as a whole, The elementary form of value
2:00:39
Speaker 1: of a commodity is contained in the equation expressing its
2:00:42
Speaker 1: value relation to another commodity of a different kind, or
2:00:45
Speaker 1: in its exchange relation to the same. The value of
2:00:48
Speaker 1: commodity A is qualitatively expressed by the fact that commodity
2:00:53
Speaker 1: B is directly exchangeable with it. Its value is quantitatively
2:00:57
Speaker 1: expressed by the fact that a definite qualtiy of B
2:01:01
Speaker 1: is exchangeable with a definite quantity of A. In other words,
2:01:05
Speaker 1: the value of a commodity obtains independent and definite expression
2:01:09
Speaker 1: by taking the form of exchange value. When at the
2:01:13
Speaker 1: beginning of this chapter we said in common parlance that
2:01:16
Speaker 1: a commodity is both a use value and an exchange value,
2:01:20
Speaker 1: we were accurately speaking wrong. A commodity is a use
2:01:24
Speaker 1: value or object of utility and a value. It manifests
2:01:28
Speaker 1: itself as this twofold thing that it is as soon
2:01:32
Speaker 1: as its value assumes an independent form viz. The form
2:01:36
Speaker 1: of exchange value. It never assumes this form when isolated,
2:01:41
Speaker 1: but only when placed in a value or exchange relation
2:01:44
Speaker 1: with another commodity of a different kind. When once we
2:01:47
Speaker 1: know this, such a mode of expression does no harm.
2:01:50
Speaker 1: It simply serves as an abbreviation. Our analysis has shown
2:01:55
Speaker 1: that the form or expression of the value of a
2:01:57
Speaker 1: commodity originates in the nature of value. Are not that
2:02:01
Speaker 1: value and its magnitude originate in the mode of their
2:02:04
Speaker 1: expression as exchange value. This, however, is the delusion as
2:02:09
Speaker 1: well of the mercantilists and their recent revivers Ferrier, Ganil
2:02:14
Speaker 1: and others, as also of their antipodes, the modern bagmen
2:02:19
Speaker 1: of free trade, such as bastiatote f La Ferrier, susann
2:02:25
Speaker 1: Specteur de duine Nuguvernemont Concilerere Dncis Rapports aberg Le Commerce, Paris,
2:02:32
Speaker 1: eighteen o five and Charles Ganil de Sistem de gnemi Politique,
2:02:37
Speaker 1: second edition, Paris, eighteen twenty one. End footnote. The mercantilists
2:02:43
Speaker 1: lay special stress on the qualitative aspect of the expression
2:02:47
Speaker 1: of value, and consequently on the equivalent form of commodities,
2:02:51
Speaker 1: which attains its full perfection in money. The modern hawkers
2:02:55
Speaker 1: of free trade, who must get rid of their article
2:02:58
Speaker 1: at any price, on the other hand, lay most stress
2:03:01
Speaker 1: on the quantitative aspects of the relative form of value.
2:03:05
Speaker 1: For them, there consequently exists neither value nor magnitude of value.
2:03:10
Speaker 1: Anywhere except in its expression by means of the exchange
2:03:13
Speaker 1: relation of commodities, that is, in the daily list of prices.
2:03:17
Speaker 1: Current MacLeod, who has taken upon himself to dress up
2:03:22
Speaker 1: the confused ideas of Lombard Street in the most learned finery,
2:03:27
Speaker 1: is a successful cross between the superstitious mercantilists and the
2:03:31
Speaker 1: enlightened free trade bagman. A close scrutiny of the expression
2:03:36
Speaker 1: of the value of A in terms of B contained
2:03:39
Speaker 1: in the equation expressing the value relation of A to
2:03:42
Speaker 1: B has shown us that within that relation, the bodily
2:03:46
Speaker 1: form of A figures only as a use value, the
2:03:49
Speaker 1: bodily form of B only as the form or aspect
2:03:52
Speaker 1: of value. The opposition or contrast existing internally in each
2:03:56
Speaker 1: commodity between use value and value is therefore made evident
2:04:01
Speaker 1: externally by two commodities being placed in such relation to
2:04:04
Speaker 1: each other that the commodity whose value it is sought
2:04:07
Speaker 1: to express figures directly as a mere use value, while
2:04:11
Speaker 1: the commodity in which that value is to be expressed
2:04:14
Speaker 1: figures directly as a mere exchange value. Hence, the elementary
2:04:19
Speaker 1: form of value of a commodity is the elementary form
2:04:22
Speaker 1: in which the contrast contained in that commodity between use
2:04:26
Speaker 1: value and value becomes apparent. Every product of labour is
2:04:31
Speaker 1: in all states of society a use value, but it
2:04:34
Speaker 1: is only at a definite historical epoch in a society's
2:04:37
Speaker 1: development that such a product becomes a commodity, viz. At
2:04:41
Speaker 1: the epoch when the labour spent on the production of
2:04:44
Speaker 1: a useful article becomes expressed as one of the objective
2:04:47
Speaker 1: qualities of that article, i e. As its value. It
2:04:52
Speaker 1: therefore follows that the elementary value form is also the
2:04:55
Speaker 1: primitive form under which a product of labour appears historically
2:04:59
Speaker 1: as a commodity, and that the gradual transformation of such
2:05:02
Speaker 1: products into commodities precedes pari passu with the development of
2:05:07
Speaker 1: the value form. We perceive at first sight the deficiencies
2:05:11
Speaker 1: of the elementary form of value. It is a mere
2:05:14
Speaker 1: germ which must undergo a series of metamorphoses before it
2:05:18
Speaker 1: can ripen into the price form. The expression of the
2:05:21
Speaker 1: value commodity A in terms of any other commodity B
2:05:25
Speaker 1: merely distinguishes the value from the use value of A,
2:05:28
Speaker 1: and therefore places A merely in a relation of exchange
2:05:32
Speaker 1: with a single different commodity B. But it is still
2:05:35
Speaker 1: far from expressing a's qualitative equality and quantitative proportionality to
2:05:41
Speaker 1: all commodities. To the elementary relative value form of a commodity,
2:05:46
Speaker 1: there corresponds the single equivalent form of one other commodity. Thus,
2:05:50
Speaker 1: in the relative expression of value of the linen, the
2:05:53
Speaker 1: coat assumes the form of equivalent, or of being directly
2:05:57
Speaker 1: exchangeable only in relation to a single commodity the linen. Nevertheless,
2:06:02
Speaker 1: the elementary form of value passes by an easy transition
2:06:06
Speaker 1: into a more complete form. It is true that by
2:06:10
Speaker 1: means of the elementary form, the value of a commodity
2:06:13
Speaker 1: A becomes expressed in terms of one and only one
2:06:17
Speaker 1: other commodity, but that one may be a commodity of
2:06:20
Speaker 1: any kind coat, iron, corn, or anything else. Therefore, according
2:06:25
Speaker 1: as A is placed in relation with one or the other,
2:06:28
Speaker 1: we get from one in the same commodity. Different elementary
2:06:31
Speaker 1: expressions of value footnote. In Homer, for instance, the value
2:06:36
Speaker 1: of an article is expressed in a series of different
2:06:39
Speaker 1: things end footnote. The number of such possible expressions is
2:06:44
Speaker 1: limited only by the number of different kinds of commodities
2:06:47
Speaker 1: distinct from it. The isolated expression of a's value is
2:06:51
Speaker 1: therefore convertible into a series prolonged to any length of
2:06:56
Speaker 1: the different elementary expressions of that value. End of Chapter one,
2:07:04
Speaker 1: Section three, Part one, Chapter one, Section three B. Total
2:07:11
Speaker 1: or expanded form of value Z of commodity A equals
2:07:15
Speaker 1: U of commodity B or V of commodity C or
2:07:19
Speaker 1: equals W of commodity D or equals commodity e or
2:07:23
Speaker 1: equals etc. Twenty yards of linen equals one coat, or
2:07:28
Speaker 1: equals ten pounds of t or equals forty pounds of coffee,
2:07:32
Speaker 1: or equals one quarter of corn, or equals two ounces
2:07:35
Speaker 1: of gold, or equals half a ton of iron, or
2:07:38
Speaker 1: equals etc. One the expanded relative form of value, The
2:07:46
Speaker 1: value of a single commodity, the linen, for example, is
2:07:49
Speaker 1: now expressed in terms of numberless other elements of the
2:07:53
Speaker 1: world of commodities. Every other commodity now becomes a mirror
2:07:57
Speaker 1: of the linen's value footnote. For this reason, we can
2:08:01
Speaker 1: speak of the coat value of the linen when its
2:08:03
Speaker 1: values expressed in coats, are of its corn value when
2:08:07
Speaker 1: expressed in corn, and so on. Every such expression tells
2:08:11
Speaker 1: us that what appears in the use of values cost corn,
2:08:15
Speaker 1: et cetera, is the value of the linen quote the
2:08:20
Speaker 1: value of any commodity, denoting its relation in exchange. We
2:08:23
Speaker 1: may speak of it as corn value cloth value according
2:08:27
Speaker 1: to the commodity with which it is compared, And hence
2:08:30
Speaker 1: there are a thousand different kinds of value, as many
2:08:34
Speaker 1: kinds of value as there are commodities in existence, and
2:08:37
Speaker 1: all are equally real and equally nominal end quote. A
2:08:42
Speaker 1: critical dissertation on the nature, measures, and causes of value,
2:08:46
Speaker 1: chiefly in reference to the writings of mister Ricardo and
2:08:49
Speaker 1: his followers, by the author of Essays on the Formation,
2:08:52
Speaker 1: et cetera of Opinions, London, eighteen twenty five. S. Bailey,
2:08:57
Speaker 1: the author of this synonymous work, a work which in
2:09:00
Speaker 1: its day created much stir in England, fancied that by
2:09:04
Speaker 1: thus pointing out the various relative expressions of one and
2:09:07
Speaker 1: the same value, he had proved the impossibility of any
2:09:11
Speaker 1: determination of the concept of value. However narrow his own
2:09:15
Speaker 1: views may have been, Yet that he laid his finger
2:09:18
Speaker 1: on some serious defects in the Ricardian theory is proved
2:09:22
Speaker 1: by the animosity with which he was attacked by Ricardo's followers.
2:09:26
Speaker 1: See the Westminster Review for example, end footnote. It is
2:09:31
Speaker 1: thus that for the first time, this value shows itself
2:09:34
Speaker 1: in its true light as a condulation of undifferentiated human labour.
2:09:38
Speaker 1: For the labour that creates it now stands expressly revealed
2:09:42
Speaker 1: as labour that ranks equally with every other sort of
2:09:45
Speaker 1: human labour, no matter what its form, whether tailoring, plowing, mining, etc.
2:09:51
Speaker 1: Are no matter. Therefore, whether it is realized in coats, corn, iron,
2:09:55
Speaker 1: or gold. The linen, by virtue of the form of
2:09:58
Speaker 1: its value, stands in a social relation, no longer with
2:10:02
Speaker 1: only one kind of commodity, but with the whole world
2:10:06
Speaker 1: of commodities. As a commodity, it is a citizen of
2:10:10
Speaker 1: that world. At the same time, the interminable series of
2:10:13
Speaker 1: value equations implies that as regards the value of a commodity,
2:10:18
Speaker 1: it is a matter of indifference under what particular form
2:10:21
Speaker 1: or kind of use value it appears. In the first form,
2:10:25
Speaker 1: twenty yards of linen equals one coat, it might for
2:10:29
Speaker 1: aught that otherwise appears be pure accident that these two
2:10:32
Speaker 1: commodities are exchangeable in definite quantities. In the second form,
2:10:36
Speaker 1: on the contrary, we perceive at once the background that
2:10:39
Speaker 1: determines and is essentially different from this accidental appearance. The
2:10:45
Speaker 1: value of the linen remains unaltered in magnitude, whether expressed
2:10:49
Speaker 1: in coats, coffee, or iron, or in the numberless different
2:10:52
Speaker 1: commodities the property of as many different owners the accidental
2:10:57
Speaker 1: relation between two individual commodity owners disappeers. It becomes plain
2:11:02
Speaker 1: that it is not the exchange of commodities which regulates
2:11:05
Speaker 1: the magnitude of their value, but on the contrary, that
2:11:08
Speaker 1: it is the magnitude of their value which controls their
2:11:11
Speaker 1: exchange proportions. Two, The particular equivalent form each commodity such
2:11:19
Speaker 1: as coat, tea, corn, iron, etc. Figures in the expression
2:11:23
Speaker 1: of value of the linen as an equivalent and consequently
2:11:27
Speaker 1: as a thing that is value. The bodily form of
2:11:29
Speaker 1: each of these commodities figures now as a particular equivalent form,
2:11:34
Speaker 1: one out of many. In the same way, the manifold
2:11:37
Speaker 1: concrete useful kinds of labour embodied in these different commodities
2:11:42
Speaker 1: rank now as so many different forms of the realization
2:11:45
Speaker 1: or manifestation of undifferentiated human labour. Three defects of the
2:11:53
Speaker 1: total or expanded form of value. In the first place,
2:11:57
Speaker 1: the relative expression of value is InCom because the series
2:12:01
Speaker 1: representing it is interminable. The chain of which each equation
2:12:06
Speaker 1: of value is a link, is liable at any moment
2:12:10
Speaker 1: to be lengthened by each new kind of commodity that
2:12:12
Speaker 1: comes into existence and furnishes the material for a fresh
2:12:16
Speaker 1: expression of value. In the second place, it is a
2:12:20
Speaker 1: many colored mosaic of disparate and independent expressions of value.
2:12:25
Speaker 1: And lastly, if as must be the case, the relative
2:12:28
Speaker 1: value of each commodity in turn becomes expressed in this
2:12:32
Speaker 1: expanded form, we get for each of them a relative
2:12:35
Speaker 1: value form, different in every case and consisting of an
2:12:40
Speaker 1: interminable series of expressions of value. The defects of the
2:12:44
Speaker 1: expanded relative value form are reflected in the corresponding equivalent form.
2:12:49
Speaker 1: Since the bodily form of each single commodity is one
2:12:52
Speaker 1: particular equivalent form amongst numberless others, we have on the
2:12:56
Speaker 1: whole nothing but fragmentary equivalent forms, each excluding the others.
2:13:01
Speaker 1: In the same way, also, the special, concrete, useful kind
2:13:05
Speaker 1: of labour embodied in each particular equivalent is presented only
2:13:09
Speaker 1: as a particular kind of labour, and therefore not as
2:13:13
Speaker 1: an exhaustive representative of human labour. Generally, the latter indeed
2:13:18
Speaker 1: gains adequate manifestation in the totality of its manifold particular
2:13:23
Speaker 1: concrete forms, but in that case its expression in an
2:13:26
Speaker 1: infinite series is ever incomplete and efficient in unity. The
2:13:31
Speaker 1: expanded relative form is, however, nothing but the sum of
2:13:35
Speaker 1: the elementary relative expressions or equations of the first kind,
2:13:39
Speaker 1: such as, twenty yards of linen equals one coat, twenty
2:13:43
Speaker 1: yards of linen equals ten pounds of tea, etc. Each
2:13:47
Speaker 1: of these implies the corresponding inverted equation one coat equals
2:13:52
Speaker 1: twenty yards of linin, ten pounds of tea equals twenty
2:13:56
Speaker 1: yards of linen, etc. In fact, when US exchanges his
2:14:01
Speaker 1: linen for many other commodities, and thus expresses its value
2:14:04
Speaker 1: in a series of other commodities, it necessarily follows that
2:14:08
Speaker 1: the various owners of the latter exchange them for linen
2:14:12
Speaker 1: and consequently express the value of their various commodities in
2:14:16
Speaker 1: one of the same third commodity, the linen. If then
2:14:20
Speaker 1: we reverse the series twenty yards of linen equals one coat,
2:14:24
Speaker 1: or equals ten pounds of tea, etc. That is to say,
2:14:28
Speaker 1: if we give expression to the convert relation already implied
2:14:31
Speaker 1: in the series, we get the general form of value.
2:14:38
Speaker 1: End of Chapter one, Section three, Part two, Part one,
2:14:42
Speaker 1: Chapter one, Section three, Part three c the general form
2:14:49
Speaker 1: of value one coat, ten pounds of tea forty pounds
2:14:55
Speaker 1: of coffee, one quarter of corn, two ounces of gold,
2:14:59
Speaker 1: half a ton of iron, X commodity A, et cetera
2:15:04
Speaker 1: equal ten yards of linen one. The altered character of
2:15:11
Speaker 1: the form of value, All commodities now express their value
2:15:17
Speaker 1: one in an elementary form, because in a single commodity,
2:15:22
Speaker 1: two with unity, because in one and the same commodity,
2:15:27
Speaker 1: the form of value is elementary and the same for all. Therefore, general,
2:15:33
Speaker 1: the forms A and B were fit only to express
2:15:36
Speaker 1: the value of a commodity as something distinct from its use,
2:15:39
Speaker 1: value or material form. The first form A furnishes such
2:15:45
Speaker 1: questions as the following. One coat equals twenty yards of linen.
2:15:49
Speaker 1: Ten pounds of ta equals half a ton of iron.
2:15:53
Speaker 1: The value of the coat is equated to linen, and
2:15:56
Speaker 1: that of ta to iron. But to be equated to
2:15:59
Speaker 1: linin and again to iron is to be as different
2:16:02
Speaker 1: as are linen and iron. This form, it is plain,
2:16:07
Speaker 1: occurs practically only in the first beginning. When the products
2:16:10
Speaker 1: of labour are converted into commodities by accidental and occasional exchanges,
2:16:16
Speaker 1: the second form B distinguishes in a more adequate manner
2:16:20
Speaker 1: than the first the value of a commodity from its
2:16:22
Speaker 1: use value. For the value of the coat is there
2:16:26
Speaker 1: placed in contrast, under all possible shapes with the bodily
2:16:30
Speaker 1: form of the coat. It is equated to linen, to iron,
2:16:34
Speaker 1: to t in short, to everything else, only not to
2:16:37
Speaker 1: itself the coat. On the other hand, any general expression
2:16:42
Speaker 1: of value common to all is directly excluded for in
2:16:46
Speaker 1: the equation of value of each commodity. All other commodities
2:16:50
Speaker 1: now appear only under the form of equivalents. The expanded
2:16:54
Speaker 1: form of value comes into actual existence for the first
2:16:58
Speaker 1: time so soon as a particular product of labour, such
2:17:01
Speaker 1: as cattle, is no longer exceptionally but habitually exchanged for
2:17:06
Speaker 1: various other commodities. The third and lastly developed form expresses
2:17:11
Speaker 1: the values of the whole world of commodities in terms
2:17:15
Speaker 1: of a single commodity set apart for the purpose, namely
2:17:18
Speaker 1: the linen, and thus represents to us their values by
2:17:22
Speaker 1: means of their equality with linen. The value of every
2:17:26
Speaker 1: commodity is now, by being equated to linen, not only
2:17:30
Speaker 1: different from its own use value, but from all other
2:17:33
Speaker 1: use values generally, and is by that very fact expressed
2:17:37
Speaker 1: as that which is common to all commodities. By this form,
2:17:41
Speaker 1: commodities are for the first time effectively brought into relation
2:17:46
Speaker 1: with one another as values, or made to appear as
2:17:49
Speaker 1: exchange values. The two earlier forms either express the value
2:17:54
Speaker 1: of each commodity in terms of a single commodity of
2:17:57
Speaker 1: a different kind, or in a series of man any
2:18:00
Speaker 1: such commodities. In both cases, it is, so to say,
2:18:05
Speaker 1: the special business of each single commodity to find an
2:18:08
Speaker 1: expression for its value, and this it does without the
2:18:11
Speaker 1: help of the others. These others, with respect to the former,
2:18:15
Speaker 1: play the passive parts of equivalence. The general form of
2:18:19
Speaker 1: value C results from the joint action of the whole
2:18:23
Speaker 1: world of commodities, and from that alone. A commodity can
2:18:28
Speaker 1: acquire a general expression of its value only by all
2:18:31
Speaker 1: other commodities simultaneously with it, expressing their values in the
2:18:36
Speaker 1: same equivalent, and every new commodity must follow suit. It
2:18:41
Speaker 1: thus becomes evident that, since the existence of commodities as
2:18:45
Speaker 1: values is purely social. This social existence can be expressed
2:18:50
Speaker 1: by the totality of their social relations alone, and consequently
2:18:54
Speaker 1: that the form of their value must be a socially
2:18:57
Speaker 1: recognized form. Commodities being equated to linin now appear not
2:19:03
Speaker 1: only as qualitatively equal as values generally, but also as
2:19:07
Speaker 1: values whose magnitudes are capable of comparison. By expressing the
2:19:12
Speaker 1: magnitudes of their value in one of the same material,
2:19:15
Speaker 1: the linen, those magnitudes are also compared with each other.
2:19:19
Speaker 1: For instance, ten pounds of tea equals twenty yards of linen,
2:19:23
Speaker 1: and forty pounds of coffee equals twenty yards of linen. Therefore,
2:19:27
Speaker 1: ten pounds of tea equals forty pounds of coffee. In
2:19:31
Speaker 1: other words, there is contained in one pound of coffee
2:19:34
Speaker 1: only one fourth as much substance of value labour as
2:19:38
Speaker 1: is contained in one pound of tea. The general form
2:19:42
Speaker 1: of relative value, embracing the whole world of commodities, converts
2:19:46
Speaker 1: the single commodity that is excluded from the rest and
2:19:49
Speaker 1: made to play the part of equivalent here, the linen,
2:19:53
Speaker 1: into the universal equivalent. The bodily form of the linen
2:19:58
Speaker 1: is now the form assumed in common by the values
2:20:00
Speaker 1: of all commodities. It therefore becomes directly exchangeable with all
2:20:05
Speaker 1: and every of them. The substance linin becomes the visible
2:20:10
Speaker 1: incarnation the social chrysalis state of every kind of human
2:20:15
Speaker 1: labour weaving, which is the labour of certain private individuals
2:20:20
Speaker 1: producing a particular article. Linin acquires in consequence a social character,
2:20:25
Speaker 1: the character of equality with all other kinds of labour.
2:20:29
Speaker 1: The innumerable equations of which the general form of value
2:20:33
Speaker 1: is composed equate in turn the labour embodied in the
2:20:36
Speaker 1: linen to that embodied in every other commodity, and they
2:20:40
Speaker 1: thus convert weaving into the general form of manifestation of
2:20:44
Speaker 1: undifferentiated human labour. In this manner, the labour realized in
2:20:49
Speaker 1: the values of commodities is presented not only under its
2:20:53
Speaker 1: negative aspect, under which abstraction is made from every concrete
2:20:57
Speaker 1: form and useful property of actual work, but its own
2:21:01
Speaker 1: positive nature is made to reveal itself expressly. The general
2:21:05
Speaker 1: value form is the reduction of all kinds of actual
2:21:09
Speaker 1: labour to their common character of being human labour, generally
2:21:13
Speaker 1: of being the expenditure of human labor power. The general
2:21:17
Speaker 1: value form, which represents all products of labour as mere
2:21:22
Speaker 1: condulations of undifferentiated human labour, shows by its very structure
2:21:27
Speaker 1: that it is the social resume of the world of commodities.
2:21:31
Speaker 1: That form consequently makes it indisputably evident that in the
2:21:35
Speaker 1: world of commodities, the character possessed by all labour of
2:21:39
Speaker 1: being human labour constitutes its specific social character. Two, the
2:21:47
Speaker 1: interdependent development of the relative form of value and of
2:21:51
Speaker 1: the equivalent form. The degree of development of the relative
2:21:55
Speaker 1: form of value corresponds to that of the equivalent form,
2:22:00
Speaker 1: but we must bear in mind that the development of
2:22:02
Speaker 1: the latter is only the expression and result of the
2:22:05
Speaker 1: development of the former. The primary or isolated relative form
2:22:10
Speaker 1: of value of one commodity converts some other commodity into
2:22:14
Speaker 1: an isolated equivalent. The expanded form of relative value, which
2:22:20
Speaker 1: is the expression of the value of one commodity in
2:22:22
Speaker 1: terms of all other commodities, endows those other commodities with
2:22:26
Speaker 1: the character of particular equivalents differing in kind. And Lastly,
2:22:31
Speaker 1: a particular kind of commodity acquires the character of universal
2:22:35
Speaker 1: equivalent because all other commodities make it the material in
2:22:39
Speaker 1: which they uniformly express their value. The antagonism between the
2:22:44
Speaker 1: relative form of value, and the equivalent form the two
2:22:47
Speaker 1: poles of the value form is developed concurrently with that
2:22:51
Speaker 1: form itself. The first form, twenty yards of linen equals
2:22:55
Speaker 1: one coat already contains this antagonism, without a yet fixing it.
2:23:02
Speaker 1: According as we read this equation forwards or backwards, the
2:23:05
Speaker 1: parts played by the linen and the coat are different.
2:23:09
Speaker 1: In the one case, the relative value of the linen
2:23:12
Speaker 1: is expressed in the coat. In the other case, the
2:23:14
Speaker 1: relative value of the coat is expressed in the linen.
2:23:18
Speaker 1: In this first form of value, therefore, it is difficult
2:23:22
Speaker 1: to grasp the polar contrast. Form B shows that only
2:23:26
Speaker 1: one single commodity at a time can completely expand its
2:23:30
Speaker 1: relative value, and that it acquires this expanded form only
2:23:34
Speaker 1: because and in so far as all other commodities are
2:23:38
Speaker 1: with respect to it equivalents. Here we cannot reverse the
2:23:42
Speaker 1: equation as we can the equation twenty yards of linen
2:23:45
Speaker 1: equals one coat without altering its general character and converting
2:23:50
Speaker 1: it from the expanded form of value into the general
2:23:53
Speaker 1: form of value. Finally, the form C gives to the
2:23:58
Speaker 1: world of commodities a social relative form of value because
2:24:03
Speaker 1: and in so far as Thereby all commodities, with the
2:24:06
Speaker 1: exception of one, are excluded from the equivalent form a
2:24:11
Speaker 1: single commodity. The linen appears therefore to have acquired the
2:24:15
Speaker 1: character of direct exchangeability with every other commodity, because and
2:24:19
Speaker 1: in so far as this character is denied to every
2:24:24
Speaker 1: other commodity footnote, it is by no means self evident
2:24:29
Speaker 1: that this character of direct and universal exchangeability is so
2:24:34
Speaker 1: to speak, a polar one, and as intimately connected with
2:24:37
Speaker 1: its opposite pole, the absence of direct exchangeability, as the
2:24:42
Speaker 1: positive pole of the magnet is with its negative counterpart.
2:24:46
Speaker 1: It may therefore be imagined that all commodities can simultaneously
2:24:50
Speaker 1: have this character impressed upon them, just as it can
2:24:53
Speaker 1: be imagined that all Catholics can be popes together. It is,
2:24:57
Speaker 1: of course highly desirable in the eyes of the petty bourgeois,
2:25:01
Speaker 1: for whom the production of commodities is the neck plus
2:25:04
Speaker 1: ultra of human freedom and individual independence, that the inconveniences
2:25:10
Speaker 1: resulting from this character of commodities not being directly exchangeable
2:25:14
Speaker 1: should be removed. Prudon's socialism is a working out of
2:25:19
Speaker 1: this philistine utopia, a form of socialism which, as I
2:25:23
Speaker 1: have elsewhere shown does not possess even the merit of originality.
2:25:28
Speaker 1: Long before his time the task was attempted with much
2:25:31
Speaker 1: better success by gray Bray and others. But for all
2:25:36
Speaker 1: that wisdom of this kind flourishes even now in certain
2:25:40
Speaker 1: circles under the name of science. Never has any school
2:25:44
Speaker 1: played more tricks with the word science than that of Prudon.
2:25:48
Speaker 1: For voubgriphath Phalen does stout zurrecht and zeitvert sikh Ein
2:25:55
Speaker 1: where thoughts are absent, words are brought in as convenient
2:25:59
Speaker 1: replacements Gerte's faust c. Prudone's philosophy of poverty. End of footnote.
2:26:08
Speaker 1: The commodity that figures as universal equivalent is, on the
2:26:11
Speaker 1: other hand, excluded from the relative value form. If the
2:26:15
Speaker 1: linen or any other commodity serving as universal equivalent were
2:26:20
Speaker 1: at the same time to share in the relative form
2:26:22
Speaker 1: of value, it would have to serve as its own equivalent.
2:26:26
Speaker 1: We should then have twenty yards of linine equals twenty
2:26:29
Speaker 1: yards of linin. This torutology expresses neither value nor magnitude
2:26:34
Speaker 1: of value. In order to express the relative value of
2:26:37
Speaker 1: the universal equivalent, we must rather reverse the form C
2:26:42
Speaker 1: This equivalent has no relative form of value in common
2:26:45
Speaker 1: with other commodities, but its value is relatively expressed by
2:26:49
Speaker 1: a never ending series of other commodities. Thus, the expanded
2:26:54
Speaker 1: form of value or form B now shows itself as
2:26:57
Speaker 1: the specific form of relative value for the equivalent commodity.
2:27:02
Speaker 2: Sec.
2:27:03
Speaker 1: Three transition from the general form of value to the
2:27:06
Speaker 1: money form. The universal equivalent form is a form of
2:27:12
Speaker 1: value in general. It can therefore be assumed by any commodity.
2:27:17
Speaker 1: On the other hand, if a commodity be found to
2:27:20
Speaker 1: have assumed the universal equivalent form form C, it is
2:27:25
Speaker 1: only because and in so far as it has been
2:27:28
Speaker 1: excluded from the rest of all other commodities as their equivalent,
2:27:32
Speaker 1: and that by their own act, and from the moment
2:27:35
Speaker 1: that this exclusion becomes finally restricted to one particular commodity.
2:27:39
Speaker 1: From that moment only the general form of relative value
2:27:43
Speaker 1: of the world of commodities obtains real consistence and general
2:27:47
Speaker 1: social validity. The particular commodity with whose bodily form the
2:27:52
Speaker 1: equivalent form is thus socially identified, now becomes the money commodity,
2:27:57
Speaker 1: or serves as money. The special social function of that commodity,
2:28:03
Speaker 1: and consequently its social monopoly to play within the world
2:28:06
Speaker 1: of commodities, the part of the universal equivalent amongst the
2:28:11
Speaker 1: commodities which in form B figure as particular equivalents of
2:28:15
Speaker 1: the linen, and inform C express in common their relative
2:28:18
Speaker 1: values in linin. This foremost place has been attained by
2:28:23
Speaker 1: one in particular, namely gold. If then, in form C
2:28:28
Speaker 1: we replace the linen by gold, we get D the
2:28:33
Speaker 1: money form twenty yards of linen, one coat, ten pounds
2:28:38
Speaker 1: of tea, forty pounds of coffee, one quarter of corn,
2:28:41
Speaker 1: two ounces of gold, half a ton of iron, x
2:28:45
Speaker 1: of commodity A equals two ounces of gold. In passing
2:28:51
Speaker 1: from form A to form B, and from the latter
2:28:54
Speaker 1: to form C, the changes are fundamental. On the other hand,
2:28:58
Speaker 1: there is no difference betwe between forms C and D,
2:29:01
Speaker 1: except that in the latter gold has assumed the equivalent
2:29:05
Speaker 1: form in the place of linen. Gold is in form
2:29:09
Speaker 1: D what linin was in Form C, the universal equivalent.
2:29:14
Speaker 1: The progress consists in this alone that the character of
2:29:18
Speaker 1: direct and universal exchangeability, in other words, that the universal
2:29:23
Speaker 1: equivalent form has now, by social custom, become finally identified
2:29:28
Speaker 1: with the substance gold. Gold is now money with reference
2:29:32
Speaker 1: to all other commodities only because it was previously, with
2:29:36
Speaker 1: reference to them, a simple commodity. Like all other commodities,
2:29:41
Speaker 1: it was also capable of serving as an equivalent, either
2:29:44
Speaker 1: as a simple equivalent in isolated exchanges or as a
2:29:48
Speaker 1: particular equivalent by the side of others. Gradually it became
2:29:53
Speaker 1: to serve, with in varying limits, as universal equivalent. So
2:29:58
Speaker 1: soon as it monopolizes this position in the expression of
2:30:01
Speaker 1: value for the world of commodities, it becomes the money commodity.
2:30:05
Speaker 1: And then, and not till then does form D become
2:30:08
Speaker 1: distinct from form C, and the general form of value
2:30:12
Speaker 1: becomes changed into the money form. The elementary expression of
2:30:16
Speaker 1: the relative value of a single commodity such as linin,
2:30:19
Speaker 1: in terms of the commodity such as gold, that plays
2:30:22
Speaker 1: the part of money is the price form of that commodity.
2:30:26
Speaker 1: The price form of linin is therefore twenty yards of
2:30:30
Speaker 1: linin equals two ounces of gold, or if two ounces
2:30:33
Speaker 1: of gold when kind are two pounds, twenty yards of
2:30:37
Speaker 1: linin equals two pounds. The difficulty in forming a concept
2:30:41
Speaker 1: of the money form consists in clearly comprehending the universal
2:30:46
Speaker 1: equivalent form, and as a necessary corollary the general form
2:30:50
Speaker 1: of value form C. The latter is deducible from form B,
2:30:56
Speaker 1: the expanded form of value. The essential component element of
2:30:59
Speaker 1: which we saw is form A. Twenty yards of linen
2:31:03
Speaker 1: equals one coat, or x of commodity A equals y
2:31:07
Speaker 1: of commodity B. The simple commodity form is therefore the
2:31:11
Speaker 1: germ of the money form. End of Part one, Chapter one,
2:31:19
Speaker 1: Section three, Part three, Chapter one, Section four. The fetishism
2:31:25
Speaker 1: of commodities and the secret thereof a commodity appears at
2:31:30
Speaker 1: first sight a very trivial thing and easily understood. Its
2:31:36
Speaker 1: analysis shows that it is in reality a very queer thing,
2:31:40
Speaker 1: abounding in metaphysical subtleties and theological niceties. So far as
2:31:45
Speaker 1: it is of value in use, there is nothing mysterious
2:31:48
Speaker 1: about it, whether we consider it from the point of
2:31:51
Speaker 1: view that by its properties it is capable of satisfying
2:31:54
Speaker 1: human wants, or from the point that those properties are
2:31:58
Speaker 1: the product of human labour. It is as clear as
2:32:01
Speaker 1: noonday that man, by his industry, changes the forms of
2:32:05
Speaker 1: the materials furnished by nature in such a way as
2:32:09
Speaker 1: to make them useful to him. The form of wood,
2:32:12
Speaker 1: for instance, is altered by making a table out of it.
2:32:16
Speaker 1: Yet for all that the table continues to be that common,
2:32:20
Speaker 1: every day thing wood, but so soon as it steps
2:32:23
Speaker 1: forth as a commodity, it is changed into something transcendent.
2:32:28
Speaker 1: It not only stands with its feet on the ground,
2:32:31
Speaker 1: but in relation to all other commodities, it stands on
2:32:34
Speaker 1: its head and evolves out of its wooden brain. Grotesque
2:32:38
Speaker 1: ideas far more wonderful than table turning, ever was footnote
2:32:45
Speaker 1: In the German edition. There is the following footnote here
2:32:48
Speaker 1: quote one may recall that China and the tables began
2:32:52
Speaker 1: to dance when the rest of the world appeared to
2:32:55
Speaker 1: be standing still Bouron gragi lessortre end quote. The defeat
2:33:01
Speaker 1: of the eighteen forty eight forty nine Revolutions was followed
2:33:04
Speaker 1: by a period of dismal political reaction in Europe. At
2:33:08
Speaker 1: that time, spiritualism, especially table turning, became the rage among
2:33:13
Speaker 1: the European aristocracy. In eighteen fifty to sixty four, China
2:33:18
Speaker 1: was swept by an anti feudal liberation movement in the
2:33:21
Speaker 1: form of a large scale peasant war, the Typing Revolt.
2:33:26
Speaker 1: End footnote. The mystical character of commodities does not originate
2:33:31
Speaker 1: therefore in their use value, just as little does it
2:33:35
Speaker 1: proceed from the nature of the determining factors of value.
2:33:38
Speaker 1: For in the first place, however varied the useful kinds
2:33:41
Speaker 1: of labour or productive activities may be, it is a
2:33:45
Speaker 1: physiological fact that there are functions of the human organism,
2:33:49
Speaker 1: and that each such function, whatever may be its nature
2:33:52
Speaker 1: or form, is essentially the expenditure of human brain, nerves, muscles, etc.
2:34:00
Speaker 1: With regard to that which forms the groundwork for the
2:34:03
Speaker 1: quantitative determination of value, namely the duration of that expenditure
2:34:08
Speaker 1: or the quantity of labour, it is quite clear that
2:34:11
Speaker 1: there is a palpable difference between its quantity and quality
2:34:15
Speaker 1: in all states of society. The labour time that it
2:34:19
Speaker 1: costs to produce the means of subsistence must necessarily be
2:34:22
Speaker 1: an object of interest to mankind, though not of equal
2:34:26
Speaker 1: interest in different stages of development. Footnote. Among the ancient Germans,
2:34:32
Speaker 1: the unit for measuring land was what could be harvested
2:34:35
Speaker 1: in a day, and it was called tagvec tagvarna gennali
2:34:40
Speaker 1: or terror gennalis or dionalis man's mad, etc. End footnote.
2:34:48
Speaker 1: And lastly, from the moment that men in any way
2:34:51
Speaker 1: work for one another, their labour assumes a social form,
2:34:56
Speaker 1: whence then arises the enigmatical character of the productduct of
2:35:00
Speaker 1: labour so soon as it assumes the form of commodities.
2:35:04
Speaker 1: Clearly from this form itself, the quality of all sorts
2:35:08
Speaker 1: of human labour is expressed objectively by their products, all
2:35:13
Speaker 1: being equally values. The measure of the expenditure of labour
2:35:17
Speaker 1: power by the duration of that expenditure takes the form
2:35:20
Speaker 1: of the quantity of value of the products of labour.
2:35:24
Speaker 1: And finally, the mutual relations of the producers, within which
2:35:28
Speaker 1: the social character of their labour affirms itself, take the
2:35:32
Speaker 1: form of a social relation between the products. A commodity
2:35:36
Speaker 1: is therefore a mysterious thing simply because in it the
2:35:40
Speaker 1: social character of men's labour appears to them as an
2:35:44
Speaker 1: objective character stamped upon the product of that labour. Because
2:35:48
Speaker 1: the relation of the producers to the sum total of
2:35:51
Speaker 1: their own labour is presented to them as a social relation,
2:35:55
Speaker 1: existing not between themselves, but between the products of their labour.
2:36:00
Speaker 1: This is the reason why the products of labour become commodities,
2:36:04
Speaker 1: social things whose qualities are at the same time perceptible
2:36:08
Speaker 1: and imperceptible by the senses. In the same way, the
2:36:12
Speaker 1: light from an object is perceived by us not as
2:36:16
Speaker 1: the subjective excitation of our optic nerve, but as the
2:36:19
Speaker 1: objective form of something outside the eye itself. But in
2:36:24
Speaker 1: the act of seeing, there is at all events, an
2:36:27
Speaker 1: actual passage of light from one thing to another, from
2:36:31
Speaker 1: the external object to the eye. There is a physical
2:36:35
Speaker 1: relation between physical things, but it is different with commodities.
2:36:40
Speaker 1: The existence of things qua commodities and the value relation
2:36:45
Speaker 1: between the products of labour which stamps them as commodities,
2:36:49
Speaker 1: have absolutely no connection with their physical properties and with
2:36:52
Speaker 1: material relations. Arising therefrom there it is a definite social
2:36:58
Speaker 1: relation between men, that is sw umes in their eyes,
2:37:01
Speaker 1: the fantastic form of a relation between things. In order therefore,
2:37:06
Speaker 1: to find an analogy, we must have recourse to the
2:37:09
Speaker 1: mist enveloped regions of the religious world. In that world,
2:37:13
Speaker 1: the productions of the human brain appear as independent beings,
2:37:18
Speaker 1: endowed with life and entering into relation both with one
2:37:22
Speaker 1: another and the human race. So it is in the
2:37:25
Speaker 1: world of commodities with the products of men's hands. This
2:37:29
Speaker 1: I call the fetishism which attaches itself to the products
2:37:34
Speaker 1: of labour so soon as they are produced as commodities,
2:37:37
Speaker 1: and which is therefore inseparable from the production of commodities.
2:37:42
Speaker 1: This fetishism of commodities has its origin, as the foregoing
2:37:46
Speaker 1: analysis has already shown, in the peculiar social character of
2:37:51
Speaker 1: the labour that produces them. As a general rule, articles
2:37:55
Speaker 1: of utility become commodities only because they are products of
2:37:59
Speaker 1: the legs labour of private individuals or groups of individuals
2:38:03
Speaker 1: who carry on their work independently of each other. The
2:38:07
Speaker 1: sum total of the labour of all these private individuals
2:38:10
Speaker 1: forms the aggregate labour of society. Since the producers do
2:38:15
Speaker 1: not come into social contact with each other until they
2:38:18
Speaker 1: exchange their products, the specific social character of each producer's
2:38:22
Speaker 1: labour does not show itself except in the act of exchange.
2:38:27
Speaker 1: In other words, the labour of the individual asserts itself
2:38:31
Speaker 1: as a part of the labour of society only by
2:38:35
Speaker 1: means of the relations which the act of exchange establishes
2:38:39
Speaker 1: directly between the products and indirectly through them between the
2:38:44
Speaker 1: producers to the latter. Therefore, the relations connecting the labour
2:38:48
Speaker 1: of one individual with that of the rest appear not
2:38:52
Speaker 1: as direct social relations between individuals at work, but as
2:38:56
Speaker 1: what they really are, material relations between persons and social
2:39:00
Speaker 1: relations between things. It is only by being exchanged that
2:39:04
Speaker 1: the products of labor acquire as values, one uniform social status,
2:39:10
Speaker 1: distinct from their varied forms of existence as objects of utility.
2:39:14
Speaker 1: This division of a product into a useful thing and
2:39:17
Speaker 1: a value becomes practically important only when exchange has acquired
2:39:22
Speaker 1: such an extension that useful articles are produced for the
2:39:26
Speaker 1: purpose of being exchanged, and their character as values has
2:39:31
Speaker 1: therefore to be taken into account beforehand during production. From
2:39:36
Speaker 1: this moment, the labor of the individual producer acquires socially
2:39:41
Speaker 1: a twofold character. On the one hand, it must, as
2:39:44
Speaker 1: a definite useful kind of labor, satisfy a definite social want,
2:39:49
Speaker 1: and thus hold its place as part and parcel of
2:39:52
Speaker 1: the collective labor of all, as a branch of a
2:39:55
Speaker 1: social division of labor that has sprung up spontaneously. On
2:40:00
Speaker 1: the other hand, it can satisfy the manifold wants of
2:40:03
Speaker 1: the individual producer himself only in so far as the
2:40:06
Speaker 1: mutual exchangeability of all kinds of useful private labour is
2:40:10
Speaker 1: an established social fact, and therefore the private useful labour
2:40:14
Speaker 1: of each producer ranks on an equality with that of
2:40:17
Speaker 1: all others. The equalization of the most different kinds of
2:40:22
Speaker 1: labour can be the result only of an abstraction from
2:40:25
Speaker 1: their inequalities, or of reducing them to their common denominator viz.
2:40:30
Speaker 1: Expenditure of human labour, power or human labour. In the abstract,
2:40:36
Speaker 1: the twofold social character of the labour of the individual
2:40:39
Speaker 1: appears to him when reflected in his brain, only under
2:40:42
Speaker 1: those forms which are impressed upon that labour in everyday
2:40:45
Speaker 1: practice by the exchange of products. In this way, the
2:40:49
Speaker 1: character that his own labour possesses of being socially useful
2:40:53
Speaker 1: takes the form of the condition that the product must
2:40:55
Speaker 1: be not only useful, but useful for others. And social
2:40:59
Speaker 1: character that his particular labour has of being the equal
2:41:02
Speaker 1: of all other particular kinds of labour takes the form
2:41:06
Speaker 1: that all the physically different articles that are the products
2:41:08
Speaker 1: of labour have one common quality viz. That of having value. Hence,
2:41:15
Speaker 1: when we bring the products of our labour into relation
2:41:18
Speaker 1: with each other as values, it is not because we
2:41:21
Speaker 1: see in these articles the material receptacles of homogeneous human labour.
2:41:26
Speaker 1: Quite the contrary whenever, by an exchange we equate as
2:41:30
Speaker 1: values our different products. By that very act we also
2:41:33
Speaker 1: equate as human labour the different kinds of labour expended
2:41:37
Speaker 1: upon them. We are not aware of this, Nevertheless we
2:41:41
Speaker 1: do it footnote. When therefore Galiani says value is a
2:41:48
Speaker 1: relation between persons, larichesa e unarraggioni crad due personi. He
2:41:55
Speaker 1: ought to have added a relation between persons expressed as
2:41:58
Speaker 1: a relation between them things end footnote. Value therefore does
2:42:05
Speaker 1: not stalk about with a label describing what it is.
2:42:09
Speaker 1: It is value. Rather that converts every product into a
2:42:12
Speaker 1: social hieroglyphic. Later on we try to decipher the hieroglyphic
2:42:18
Speaker 1: to get behind the secret of our own social products.
2:42:21
Speaker 1: For to stamp an object of utility as a value
2:42:24
Speaker 1: is just as much a social product as language. The
2:42:30
Speaker 1: recent scientific discovery that the products of labour, so far
2:42:33
Speaker 1: as they are values, are but material expressions of the
2:42:36
Speaker 1: human labour spent in their production, marks indeed an epoch
2:42:40
Speaker 1: in the history of the development of the human race,
2:42:43
Speaker 1: but by no means dissipates the mists through which the
2:42:46
Speaker 1: social character of labour appears to us to be an
2:42:50
Speaker 1: objective character of the products themselves, the fact that in
2:42:55
Speaker 1: the particular form of production with which we are dealing
2:42:58
Speaker 1: viars the production of commodities. The specific social character of
2:43:02
Speaker 1: private labor carried on independently consists in the equality of
2:43:06
Speaker 1: every kind of that labor by virtue of its being
2:43:09
Speaker 1: human labor, which character therefore assumes in the product the
2:43:14
Speaker 1: form of value. This fact appears to the producers, notwithstanding
2:43:18
Speaker 1: the discovery above referred to to be just as real
2:43:21
Speaker 1: and final as the fact that, after the discovery by
2:43:24
Speaker 1: science of the component gases of air, the atmosphere itself
2:43:29
Speaker 1: remained unaltered. What first of all, practically concerns producers when
2:43:35
Speaker 1: they make in exchange is the question how much of
2:43:38
Speaker 1: some other product they get for their own in what
2:43:42
Speaker 1: proportions the products are exchangeable. When these proportions have by
2:43:47
Speaker 1: custom attained a certain stability, they appear to result from
2:43:51
Speaker 1: the nature of the products, so that, for instance, one
2:43:54
Speaker 1: ton of iron and two ounces of gold appear as
2:43:58
Speaker 1: naturally to be of equal vas value as a pound
2:44:01
Speaker 1: of gold and a pound of iron, in spite of
2:44:04
Speaker 1: their different physical and chemical qualities, appear to be of
2:44:07
Speaker 1: equal weight. The character of having value, when once impressed
2:44:12
Speaker 1: upon products, obtains fixity only by reason of their acting
2:44:16
Speaker 1: and reacting upon each other. As quantities of value. These
2:44:21
Speaker 1: quantities vary continually independently of the will, foresight, and action
2:44:25
Speaker 1: of the producers to them. Their own social action takes
2:44:29
Speaker 1: the form of the action of objects which rule the
2:44:32
Speaker 1: producers instead of being ruled by them. It requires a
2:44:37
Speaker 1: fully developed production of commodities before from accumulated experience alone.
2:44:42
Speaker 1: The scientific conviction springs up that all the different kinds
2:44:45
Speaker 1: of private labour, which are carried on independently of each other,
2:44:49
Speaker 1: and yet as spontaneously developed branches of the social division
2:44:53
Speaker 1: of labour, are continually being reduced to the quantitative proportions
2:44:57
Speaker 1: in which society requires them. And why because in the
2:45:03
Speaker 1: midst of all the accidental and ever fluctuating exchange relations
2:45:07
Speaker 1: between the products the labour time socially necessary for their
2:45:10
Speaker 1: production forcibly asserts itself like an overriding law of nature.
2:45:16
Speaker 1: The law of gravity thus asserts itself when a house
2:45:20
Speaker 1: falls about our ears footnote what are we to think
2:45:25
Speaker 1: of a law that asserts itself only by periodical revolutions?
2:45:30
Speaker 1: It is just nothing but a law of nature founded
2:45:32
Speaker 1: on the want of knowledge of those whose action is
2:45:35
Speaker 1: the subject of it. Friedrich Engels end footnote. The determination
2:45:42
Speaker 1: of the magnitude of value by labour time is therefore
2:45:46
Speaker 1: a secret hidden under the apparent fluctuations in the relative
2:45:49
Speaker 1: values of commodities. Its discovery, while removing all appearance of
2:45:54
Speaker 1: mere accidentality from the determination of the magnitude of the
2:45:58
Speaker 1: values of products, yet in no way alters the mode
2:46:01
Speaker 1: in which that determination takes place. Man's reflections on the
2:46:06
Speaker 1: forms of social life, and consequently also his scientific analysis
2:46:10
Speaker 1: of those forms, takes a course directly opposite to that
2:46:13
Speaker 1: of their actual historical development. He begins postfest them with
2:46:19
Speaker 1: the results of the process of development ready to hand
2:46:21
Speaker 1: before him. The characters that stamp products as commodities, and
2:46:26
Speaker 1: whose establishment is a necessary preliminary to the circulation of commodities,
2:46:30
Speaker 1: have already acquired the stability of natural, self understood forms
2:46:35
Speaker 1: of social life. Before man seeks to decipher not their
2:46:39
Speaker 1: historical character, for in his eyes they are immutable, but
2:46:43
Speaker 1: their meaning. Consequently, it was the analysis of the prices
2:46:47
Speaker 1: of commodities that alone led to the determination of the
2:46:50
Speaker 1: magnitude of value, and it was the common expression of
2:46:53
Speaker 1: all commodities in money that alone led to the establishment
2:46:56
Speaker 1: of their characters as values. It is, however, just this
2:47:01
Speaker 1: ultimate money form of the world of commodities that actually conceals,
2:47:05
Speaker 1: instead of disclosing, the social character of private labour and
2:47:09
Speaker 1: the social relations between the individual producers. When I state
2:47:14
Speaker 1: that coats or boots stand in a relation to linen
2:47:17
Speaker 1: because it is the universal incarnation of abstract human labour,
2:47:21
Speaker 1: the absurdity of the statement is self evident. Nevertheless, when
2:47:25
Speaker 1: the producers of coats and boots compare those articles with
2:47:29
Speaker 1: linen or what is the same thing, with gold or
2:47:32
Speaker 1: silver as the universal equivalent, they express the relation between
2:47:36
Speaker 1: their own private labour and the collective labour of society
2:47:41
Speaker 1: in the same absurd form. The categories of bourgeois economy
2:47:47
Speaker 1: consist of such like forms. They are forms of thought
2:47:51
Speaker 1: expressing with social validity, the conditions and relations of a definite,
2:47:55
Speaker 1: historically determined mode of production viz. The production of commodities.
2:48:00
Speaker 1: The whole mystery of commodities, all the magic and necromancy
2:48:04
Speaker 1: that surrounds the products of labour, as long as they
2:48:07
Speaker 1: take the form of commodities, vanishes. Therefore, so soon as
2:48:11
Speaker 1: we come to other forms of production. Since Robinson Crusoe's
2:48:15
Speaker 1: experiences are a favorite theme with political economists, let us
2:48:19
Speaker 1: take a look at him on his island. Footnote. Even
2:48:23
Speaker 1: Ricardo has his stories Ala Robinson. He makes the primitive
2:48:28
Speaker 1: hunter and the primitive fisher straightway as owners of commodities
2:48:32
Speaker 1: exchange fish and game in the proportion in which labour
2:48:35
Speaker 1: time is incorporated in these exchange values. On this occasion
2:48:40
Speaker 1: he commits the anachronism of making these men apply to
2:48:43
Speaker 1: the calculation, so far as their implements have to be
2:48:46
Speaker 1: taken into account. The annuity tables in current use on
2:48:50
Speaker 1: the London Exchange in the year eighteen seventeen. The parallelograms
2:48:55
Speaker 1: of mister Owen appear to be the only form of
2:48:57
Speaker 1: society besides the bourgeois with which he was acquainted. Karl
2:49:04
Speaker 1: Marx Zoo Critique et ce end footnote. Moderate, though he
2:49:09
Speaker 1: be yet some few wants he has to satisfy, and
2:49:13
Speaker 1: must therefore do a little useful work of various sorts,
2:49:17
Speaker 1: such as making tools and furniture, taming goats, fishing and hunting.
2:49:22
Speaker 1: Of his prayers and the like, we take no account,
2:49:24
Speaker 1: since they are a source of pleasure to him, and
2:49:27
Speaker 1: he looks upon them as so much recreation. In spite
2:49:30
Speaker 1: of the variety of his work, he knows that his labour,
2:49:33
Speaker 1: whatever its form, is but the activity of one and
2:49:36
Speaker 1: the same Robinson, and consequently that it consists of nothing
2:49:40
Speaker 1: but different modes of human labour. Necessity itself compels him
2:49:45
Speaker 1: to apportion his time accurately between his different kinds of work.
2:49:49
Speaker 1: Whether one kind occupies a greater space in his general
2:49:52
Speaker 1: activity than another depends on the difficulties greater or less
2:49:56
Speaker 1: as the case may be, to be overcome in attaining
2:49:59
Speaker 1: the useful affair aimed at this our friend. Robinson soon
2:50:03
Speaker 1: learns by experience, and, having rescued a watch, ledger, and
2:50:08
Speaker 1: pen and ink from the wreck, commences, like a true
2:50:11
Speaker 1: born Briton to keep a set of books. His stock
2:50:15
Speaker 1: book contains a list of the objects of utility that
2:50:18
Speaker 1: belong to him, of the operations necessary for their production,
2:50:21
Speaker 1: and lastly, of the labour time that definite quantities of
2:50:25
Speaker 1: those objects have, on average cost him. All the relations
2:50:30
Speaker 1: between Robinson and the objects that form this wealth of
2:50:33
Speaker 1: his own creation are here so simple and clear as
2:50:36
Speaker 1: to be intelligible without exertion, even to mister Sedley Taylor,
2:50:41
Speaker 1: and yet those relations contain all that is essential to
2:50:44
Speaker 1: the determination of value. Let us now transport ourselves from
2:50:51
Speaker 1: Robinson's island bathed in light, to the European Middle Ages,
2:50:55
Speaker 1: shrouded in darkness. Here, instead of the independent man, we
2:51:00
Speaker 1: they find everyone dependent, serfs and lords, vassals and caesareans,
2:51:05
Speaker 1: laymen and clergy. Personal dependent here characterizes the social relations
2:51:11
Speaker 1: of production just as much as it does the other
2:51:13
Speaker 1: spheres of life organized on the basis of that production.
2:51:17
Speaker 1: But for the very reason that personal dependence forms the
2:51:20
Speaker 1: groundwork of society, there is no necessity for labour in
2:51:24
Speaker 1: its products to assume a fantastic form different from their reality.
2:51:29
Speaker 1: They take the shape in the transitions of society of
2:51:32
Speaker 1: services in kind and payments in kind. Here the particular
2:51:36
Speaker 1: and natural form of labour, and not as in a
2:51:39
Speaker 1: society based on production of commodities, its general abstract form
2:51:44
Speaker 1: is the immediate form of social labour. Compulsory labour is
2:51:48
Speaker 1: just as properly measured by time as commodity producing labour.
2:51:52
Speaker 1: But every serf knows that what he expends in the
2:51:55
Speaker 1: service of his lord is a definite quantity of his
2:51:58
Speaker 1: own personal labour power, the tithe to be rendered to
2:52:01
Speaker 1: the priest is more a matter of fact than his blessing.
2:52:05
Speaker 1: No matter then, what we may think of the parts
2:52:07
Speaker 1: played by the different classes of people themselves in this society,
2:52:11
Speaker 1: the social relations between individuals in the performance of their
2:52:15
Speaker 1: labour appear at all events as their own mutual personal relations,
2:52:19
Speaker 1: and are not disguised under the shape of social relations
2:52:23
Speaker 1: between the products of labour. For an example of labour
2:52:26
Speaker 1: in common or directly associated labour, we have no occasion
2:52:30
Speaker 1: to go back to that spontaneously developed form which we
2:52:33
Speaker 1: find on the threshold of the history of all civilized races. Footnote.
2:52:39
Speaker 1: A ridiculous presumption has latterly got abroad that common property
2:52:43
Speaker 1: in its primitive form is specifically a Slavonian or even
2:52:47
Speaker 1: exclusively Russian form. It is the primitive form that we
2:52:51
Speaker 1: can prove to have existed amongst Romans, Tutans, and Celts,
2:52:55
Speaker 1: and even to this day we find numerous examples ruins,
2:52:59
Speaker 1: though they may be in India. A more exhaustive study
2:53:02
Speaker 1: of Asiatic and especially Indian forms of common property, which
2:53:06
Speaker 1: show how from the different forms of primitive property different
2:53:10
Speaker 1: forms of its dissolution have been developed. Thus, for instance,
2:53:14
Speaker 1: the various original types of Roman and Teutonic private property
2:53:17
Speaker 1: are deducible from different forms of Indian common property en
2:53:23
Speaker 1: car marks, zoo, critique, et cetera. End footnote. We have
2:53:28
Speaker 1: one close at hand in the patriarchal industries of a
2:53:31
Speaker 1: peasant family that produces corn, cattle, yarn, linen, and clothing
2:53:36
Speaker 1: for home use. These different articles are, as regards the family,
2:53:41
Speaker 1: so many products of its labor, but as between themselves,
2:53:45
Speaker 1: they are not commodities. The different kinds of labor, such
2:53:48
Speaker 1: as tillage, cattle tending, spinning, weaving, and making clothes, which
2:53:52
Speaker 1: result in the various products, are in themselves, and such
2:53:56
Speaker 1: as they are direct social functions, becost functions of the family, which,
2:54:02
Speaker 1: just as much as society based on the production of commodities,
2:54:06
Speaker 1: possesses a spontaneously developed system of division of labour. The
2:54:10
Speaker 1: distribution of the work within the family and the regulation
2:54:14
Speaker 1: of the labour time of the several members depend as
2:54:17
Speaker 1: well upon the differences of age and sex, as upon
2:54:20
Speaker 1: the natural conditions of varying with the seasons. The labour
2:54:23
Speaker 1: power of each individual, by its very nature, operates in
2:54:27
Speaker 1: this case merely as a definite portion of the whole
2:54:30
Speaker 1: labour power of the family, and therefore the measure of
2:54:33
Speaker 1: the expenditure of individual labour by its duration appears here
2:54:37
Speaker 1: by its very nature as a social character of their labour.
2:54:42
Speaker 1: Let us now picture to ourselves, by way of change,
2:54:45
Speaker 1: a community of free individuals carrying on their work with
2:54:48
Speaker 1: the means of production in common, in which the labour
2:54:51
Speaker 1: power of all the different individuals is consciously applied as
2:54:55
Speaker 1: the combined labour power of the community. All the characteristics
2:54:59
Speaker 1: of Robinson labour are here repeated, but with this difference
2:55:03
Speaker 1: that they are social instead of individual. Everything produced by
2:55:07
Speaker 1: him was exclusively the result of his own personal labour,
2:55:11
Speaker 1: and therefore simply an object of use for himself. The
2:55:15
Speaker 1: total product of our community is a social product. One
2:55:20
Speaker 1: portion serves as fresh means of production and remain social,
2:55:24
Speaker 1: but another portion is consumed by the members as means
2:55:27
Speaker 1: of subsistence. A distribution of this portion amongst them is
2:55:32
Speaker 1: consequently necessary. The mode of this distribution will vary with
2:55:36
Speaker 1: the productive organization of the community and the degree of
2:55:40
Speaker 1: historical development attained by the producers. We will assume but
2:55:44
Speaker 1: merely for the sake of a parallel with the production
2:55:47
Speaker 1: of commodities, that the share of each individual producer in
2:55:50
Speaker 1: the means of subsistence is determined by his labour time.
2:55:54
Speaker 1: Labour time would in that case play a double part.
2:55:58
Speaker 1: Its apportionment is in accordance with a definite social plan,
2:56:02
Speaker 1: maintains the proper proportion between the different kinds of work
2:56:05
Speaker 1: to be done and the various wants of the community.
2:56:09
Speaker 1: On the other hand, it also serves as a measure
2:56:12
Speaker 1: of the portion of the common labour born by each
2:56:14
Speaker 1: individual and of his share in the part of the
2:56:18
Speaker 1: total product destined for individual consumption. The social relations of
2:56:22
Speaker 1: the individual producers with regard both to their labour and
2:56:26
Speaker 1: to its products, are in this case perfectly simple and intelligible,
2:56:31
Speaker 1: and that with regard not only to production but also
2:56:34
Speaker 1: to distribution. The religious world is but the reflex of
2:56:39
Speaker 1: the real world. And for a society based upon the
2:56:42
Speaker 1: production of commodities in which the producers in general enter
2:56:46
Speaker 1: into social relations with one another by treating their products
2:56:49
Speaker 1: as commodities and values, whereby they reduce their individual private
2:56:53
Speaker 1: labour to the standard of homogeneous human labour. For such
2:56:58
Speaker 1: a society, Christianity, with its cultus of abstract man, more
2:57:03
Speaker 1: especially in its bourgeois developments, Protestantism, Deism, etc. Is the
2:57:08
Speaker 1: most fitting form of religion. In the ancient Asiatic and
2:57:12
Speaker 1: other ancient modes of production, we find that the conversion
2:57:16
Speaker 1: of products into commodities, and therefore the conversion of men
2:57:19
Speaker 1: into producers of commodities, holds a subordinate place, which, however,
2:57:24
Speaker 1: increases in importance as the primitive communities approach nearer and
2:57:28
Speaker 1: nearer to their dissolution. Trading nations properly so called exist
2:57:34
Speaker 1: in the ancient world only in its interstices, like the
2:57:38
Speaker 1: gods of Epicurus in the Intermundia, or like Jews in
2:57:43
Speaker 1: the pores of Polish society. Those ancient social organisms of
2:57:48
Speaker 1: production are, as compared with bourgeois society, extremely simple and transparent.
2:57:55
Speaker 1: But they are founded either on the immature development of
2:57:58
Speaker 1: man individually, who has not yet severed the umbilical cord
2:58:02
Speaker 1: that unites him with his fellow men in a primitive
2:58:05
Speaker 1: tribal community, or upon direct relations a subjection. They can
2:58:10
Speaker 1: arise and exist only when the development of the productive
2:58:13
Speaker 1: power of labour has not risen beyond a low stage,
2:58:16
Speaker 1: and when therefore the social relations within the sphere of
2:58:20
Speaker 1: material life between man and man and between man and
2:58:23
Speaker 1: nature are correspondingly narrow. This narrowness is reflected in the
2:58:29
Speaker 1: ancient worship of nature and in the other elements of
2:58:32
Speaker 1: the popular religions. The religious reflex of the real world can,
2:58:38
Speaker 1: in any case, only then finally vanish when the practical
2:58:42
Speaker 1: relations of everyday life offer to man none but perfectly
2:58:46
Speaker 1: intelligible and reasonable relations with regard to his fellow men
2:58:50
Speaker 1: and to nature. The life process of society, which is
2:58:54
Speaker 1: based on the process of material production, does not strip
2:58:58
Speaker 1: off its mystical veil until it is treated as production
2:59:01
Speaker 1: by freely associated men and is consciously regulated by them
2:59:06
Speaker 1: in accordance with a settled plan. This, however, demands for
2:59:10
Speaker 1: society a certain material groundwork or set of conditions of existence,
2:59:15
Speaker 1: which in their turn are the spontaneous product of a
2:59:18
Speaker 1: long and painful process of development. Political economy has indeed analyzed, however,
2:59:26
Speaker 1: incompletely value and its magnitude, and is discovered what lies
2:59:31
Speaker 1: beneath these forms. Footnote The insufficiency of Ricardo's analysis of
2:59:37
Speaker 1: the magnitude of value, and his analysis is by far
2:59:40
Speaker 1: the best will appear from the third and fourth books
2:59:43
Speaker 1: of this work. As regards value. In general, it is
2:59:46
Speaker 1: the weak point of the classical school of political economy
2:59:49
Speaker 1: that it nowhere expressly and with full consciousness, distinguishes between
2:59:54
Speaker 1: labour as it appears in the value of a product
2:59:57
Speaker 1: and the same labour as it appears in the use
2:59:59
Speaker 1: value of them. Of course, the distinction is practically made,
3:00:04
Speaker 1: since this school treats labour at one time under its
3:00:07
Speaker 1: quantitative aspect and at another under its qualitative aspect. But
3:00:11
Speaker 1: it has not the least idea that, when the difference
3:00:14
Speaker 1: between various kinds of labour is treated is purely quantitative,
3:00:18
Speaker 1: their qualitative unity or equality, and therefore their reduction to
3:00:22
Speaker 1: abstract human labour is implied. For instance, Ricardo declares that
3:00:28
Speaker 1: he agrees with Destute de tracy in this proposition, as
3:00:33
Speaker 1: it is certain that our physical and moral faculties are
3:00:36
Speaker 1: alone our original riches. The employment of those faculties labour
3:00:40
Speaker 1: of some kind, is our only original treasure, and it
3:00:44
Speaker 1: is always from this employment that all those things are
3:00:48
Speaker 1: created which we call riches. It is certain too that
3:00:52
Speaker 1: all those things only represent the labour which has created them,
3:00:56
Speaker 1: And if they have a value, or even two distinctives values,
3:01:00
Speaker 1: they can only derive them from that the value of
3:01:04
Speaker 1: the labour from which they emanate en Ricardo the principles
3:01:09
Speaker 1: of political economy. We would here only point out that
3:01:13
Speaker 1: Ricardo puts his own more profound interpretation on the words
3:01:17
Speaker 1: of Destout. What the latter really says is that on
3:01:21
Speaker 1: the one hand, all things which constitute wealth represent the
3:01:24
Speaker 1: labour that creates them, But on the other hand, they
3:01:27
Speaker 1: acquire their two different values use value and exchange value
3:01:32
Speaker 1: from the values of labour. He thus falls into the
3:01:35
Speaker 1: commonplace error of the vulgar economists who assume the value
3:01:39
Speaker 1: of one commodity, in this case labour, in order to
3:01:42
Speaker 1: determine the values of the rest. But Ricardo reads him
3:01:46
Speaker 1: as if he had said that labour not the value
3:01:49
Speaker 1: of labour is embodied both in use value and exchange value. Nevertheless,
3:01:55
Speaker 1: Ricardo himself pays so little attention to the twofold character
3:01:59
Speaker 1: of the labour, which has a twofold embodiment, that he
3:02:02
Speaker 1: devotes the whole of his chapter on value enriches their
3:02:05
Speaker 1: distinctive properties to a laborious examination of the trivialities of A. JB. Say,
3:02:12
Speaker 1: And at the finish he is quite astonished to find
3:02:15
Speaker 1: that Destute on the one hand agrees with him as
3:02:18
Speaker 1: to labour being the source of value, and on the
3:02:21
Speaker 1: other hand with JB. Say as to the notion of
3:02:24
Speaker 1: value end footnote. But it has never at once asked
3:02:29
Speaker 1: the question why labour is represented by the value of
3:02:32
Speaker 1: its product, and labour time by the magnitude of that
3:02:35
Speaker 1: value footnote. It is one of the chief failings of
3:02:39
Speaker 1: classical economy that it has never succeeded by means of
3:02:42
Speaker 1: its analysis of commodities, and in particular of their value,
3:02:46
Speaker 1: in discovering that form under which value becomes exchange value.
3:02:50
Speaker 1: Even Adam Smith and Ricardo, the best representatives of the school,
3:02:55
Speaker 1: treat the form of value as a thing of no importance,
3:02:58
Speaker 1: as having no connection with the inherent nature of commodities.
3:03:02
Speaker 1: The reason for this is not solely because their attention
3:03:05
Speaker 1: is entirely absorbed in the analysis of the magnitude of value.
3:03:08
Speaker 1: It lies deeper. The value form of the product of
3:03:12
Speaker 1: labour is not only the most abstract, but is also
3:03:15
Speaker 1: the most universal form taken by the product in bourgeois production,
3:03:20
Speaker 1: and stamps that production as a particular species of social production,
3:03:23
Speaker 1: and thereby gives it its special historical character. If then
3:03:28
Speaker 1: we treat this mode of production as one eternally fixed
3:03:31
Speaker 1: by nature for every state of society, we necessarily overlook
3:03:36
Speaker 1: that which is the differentia specifica of the value form,
3:03:41
Speaker 1: and consequently of the commodity form, and of its further
3:03:44
Speaker 1: developments money form, capital form, etc. We consequently find that
3:03:49
Speaker 1: economists who are thoroughly agreed as to labour time being
3:03:53
Speaker 1: the measure of the magnitude of value, have the most
3:03:55
Speaker 1: strange and contradictory ideas of money, the perfected form of
3:03:59
Speaker 1: the general equivalent. This is seen in a striking manner
3:04:03
Speaker 1: when they treat of banking, where the commonplace definitions of
3:04:06
Speaker 1: money will no longer hold water. This led to the
3:04:10
Speaker 1: rise of a restored mercantile system Ganeel, etc. Which sees
3:04:14
Speaker 1: in value nothing but a social form, or rather the
3:04:17
Speaker 1: unsubstantial ghost of that form, once for all. I may
3:04:21
Speaker 1: state here that by classical political economy, I understand that economy,
3:04:26
Speaker 1: which since the time of W. Petty has investigated the
3:04:30
Speaker 1: real relations of production in bourgeois society, in contradistinction to
3:04:34
Speaker 1: vulgar economy, which deals with appearances only ruminates without ceasing
3:04:39
Speaker 1: on the materials long since provided by scientific economy. And
3:04:43
Speaker 1: there seeks plausible explanations of the most obtrusive phenomena for
3:04:48
Speaker 1: bourgeois daily use, but for the rest confines itself to
3:04:52
Speaker 1: systematizing in a pedantic way and proclaiming for everlasting truths
3:04:57
Speaker 1: the trite ideas held by the self compar p bourgeoisie
3:05:01
Speaker 1: with regard to their own world, to them the best
3:05:04
Speaker 1: of all possible worlds end footnote these formulae which bear
3:05:10
Speaker 1: it stamped upon them in unmistakable letters, that they belong
3:05:14
Speaker 1: to a state of society in which the process of
3:05:17
Speaker 1: production has the mastery over man instead of being controlled
3:05:20
Speaker 1: by him. Such formerly appear to the bourgeois intellect to
3:05:24
Speaker 1: be as much a self evident necessity imposed by nature
3:05:28
Speaker 1: as productive labour itself. Hence, forms of social production that
3:05:33
Speaker 1: preceded the bourgeois form are treated by the bourgeoisie in
3:05:37
Speaker 1: much the same way as the fathers of the Church
3:05:39
Speaker 1: treated pre Christian religions. Footnote lesikoumiste ento in singuliers manier
3:05:47
Speaker 1: de rossidi ignapou good du sort de institution cell de
3:05:52
Speaker 1: lard is sele de la natiur les anstitution de la
3:05:55
Speaker 1: fiodlidi son des anstitution artificiel sell de la burgeoisi son
3:06:02
Speaker 1: des institution naturelles irresenblen sici, or THEEO logian qui ou
3:06:09
Speaker 1: si etablis de sarte de religion tout religion guinepllalur etu
3:06:16
Speaker 1: na vencion dejon don dique les pro religion et emmanascion
3:06:22
Speaker 1: de dieu a si llare de lestoire me innapolis car Marx,
3:06:30
Speaker 1: missiere de la philosophy reprience a la philosphi del missier
3:06:35
Speaker 1: par monsieur prudent. Truly comical is Monsieur Bastia, who imagines
3:06:42
Speaker 1: that the ancient Greeks and Romans lived by plunder alone,
3:06:46
Speaker 1: and when people plunder for centuries, there must always be
3:06:49
Speaker 1: something at hand for them to seize. The objects of
3:06:52
Speaker 1: plunder must be continually reproduced. It would thus appear that
3:06:56
Speaker 1: even Greeks and Romans had some process of production, consequently,
3:07:00
Speaker 1: an economy which just as much constituted the material basis
3:07:04
Speaker 1: of their world as bourgeois economy constitutes that of our
3:07:08
Speaker 1: modern world. Or perhaps Bastia means that a mode of
3:07:12
Speaker 1: production based on slavery is based on a system of plunder,
3:07:16
Speaker 1: in that case, he treads on dangerous ground. If a
3:07:20
Speaker 1: giant thinker like Aristotle aired in his appreciation of slave labor,
3:07:25
Speaker 1: why should a dwarf economist like Bastiat be right in
3:07:29
Speaker 1: his appreciation of wage labour. I seize this opportunity of
3:07:33
Speaker 1: shortly answering an objection taken by a German paper in
3:07:36
Speaker 1: America to my work, Zoo Critique eighteen fifty nine. In
3:07:41
Speaker 1: the estimation of that paper, my view that each specific
3:07:45
Speaker 1: mode of production and the social relations corresponding to it
3:07:48
Speaker 1: enshured that the economic structure of society is the real
3:07:52
Speaker 1: basis on which the juridical and political superstructure is raised,
3:07:56
Speaker 1: and to which definite social forms of thought correspond. That
3:07:59
Speaker 1: the mode of production determines the character of the social, political,
3:08:03
Speaker 1: and intellectual life generally. All this is very true for
3:08:07
Speaker 1: our own times, in which material interests preponderate, but not
3:08:11
Speaker 1: for the Middle Ages, in which Catholicism, not for Athens
3:08:15
Speaker 1: in Rome, where politics reigned supreme. In the first place,
3:08:20
Speaker 1: it strikes one as an odd thing for anyone to
3:08:23
Speaker 1: suppose that these well worn phrases about the Middle Ages
3:08:26
Speaker 1: and the ancient world are unknown to anyone else. This
3:08:30
Speaker 1: much however, is clear that the Middle Ages could not
3:08:33
Speaker 1: live on Catholicism, nor the ancient world on politics. On
3:08:36
Speaker 1: the contrary, it is the mode in which they gained
3:08:39
Speaker 1: a livelihood that explains why here politics and their Catholicism
3:08:44
Speaker 1: played the chief part. For the rest, it requires but
3:08:47
Speaker 1: a slight acquaintance with the history of the Roman Republic,
3:08:50
Speaker 1: for example, to be aware that its secret history is
3:08:54
Speaker 1: the history of landed property. On the other hand, Don
3:08:57
Speaker 1: Quixote long ago paid the penalty for wrongly imagining that
3:09:01
Speaker 1: knight errantry was compatible with all economic forms of society.
3:09:07
Speaker 1: End footnote. To what extent some economists are misled by
3:09:11
Speaker 1: the fetishism inherent in commodities or by the objective appearance
3:09:15
Speaker 1: of the social characteristics of labour is shown, amongst other ways,
3:09:19
Speaker 1: by the dull and tedious quarrel over the part played
3:09:22
Speaker 1: by nature in the formation of exchange value. Since exchange
3:09:26
Speaker 1: value is a definite social manner of expressing the amount
3:09:29
Speaker 1: of labour bestowed upon an object, nature has no more
3:09:33
Speaker 1: to do with it than it has in fixing the
3:09:35
Speaker 1: course of exchange. The mode of production in which the
3:09:38
Speaker 1: product takes the form of a commodity or is produced directly,
3:09:42
Speaker 1: for exchange is the most general and most embryonic form
3:09:45
Speaker 1: of bourgeois production. It therefore makes its appearance at an
3:09:49
Speaker 1: early date in history, though not in the same predominating
3:09:53
Speaker 1: and characteristic manner as nowadays. Hence, its fetish character is
3:09:58
Speaker 1: comparatively easy to be seen through. But when we come
3:10:01
Speaker 1: to more concrete forms, even this appearance of simplicity vanishes
3:10:06
Speaker 1: whence arose the illusions of the monetary system to it.
3:10:11
Speaker 1: Gold and silver, when serving as money, did not represent
3:10:15
Speaker 1: a social relation between producers, but were natural objects with
3:10:19
Speaker 1: strange social properties. And modern economy, which looks down with
3:10:23
Speaker 1: such disdain on the monetary system, does not its superstition
3:10:28
Speaker 1: come out as clear as noonday whenever it treats of capital.
3:10:32
Speaker 1: How long is it since economy discarded the physiocratic illusion
3:10:37
Speaker 1: that rents grow out of the soil and not out
3:10:39
Speaker 1: of society. But not to anticipate, we will content ourselves
3:10:45
Speaker 1: with yet another example, relating to the commodity form. Could
3:10:49
Speaker 1: commodities themselves speak, they would say, our use value may
3:10:53
Speaker 1: be a thing that interests men, It is no part
3:10:56
Speaker 1: of us as objects. What, however, does belong to us
3:11:00
Speaker 1: as objects? Is our value. Our natural intercourse as commodities
3:11:05
Speaker 1: proves it. In the eyes of each other. We are
3:11:09
Speaker 1: nothing but exchange values. Now listen how those commodities speak
3:11:14
Speaker 1: through the mouth of the economist. Value i e. Exchange
3:11:19
Speaker 1: value is a property of things. Riches i e. Use
3:11:24
Speaker 1: value of man. Value in this sense necessarily implies exchanges.
3:11:31
Speaker 1: Riches do not. Footnote Observations on certain verbal disputes in
3:11:36
Speaker 1: political economy, particularly relating to value and to demand and supply. London,
3:11:41
Speaker 1: eighteen twenty one end footnote. Riches use values are the
3:11:47
Speaker 1: attribute of men. Value is the attribute of commodities. A
3:11:52
Speaker 1: man or a community is rich. A pearl or a
3:11:55
Speaker 1: diamond is valuable as a pearl or a diamond. Footnote s.
3:12:01
Speaker 1: Bailey en footnote. So far, no chemist has ever discovered
3:12:06
Speaker 1: exchange value, either in a pearl or a diamond. The
3:12:10
Speaker 1: economic discoveries of this chemical element, who, by the Bye
3:12:14
Speaker 1: lay special claim to critical acumen, find, however, that the
3:12:18
Speaker 1: use value of objects belongs to them independently of their
3:12:22
Speaker 1: material properties, while their value, on the other hand, forms
3:12:26
Speaker 1: a part of them as objects. What confirms them in
3:12:30
Speaker 1: this view is the peculiar circumstance that the use value
3:12:33
Speaker 1: of objects is realized without exchange by means of a
3:12:38
Speaker 1: direct relation between the objects and man, while on the
3:12:41
Speaker 1: other hand, their value is realized only by exchange, that is,
3:12:46
Speaker 1: by means of social process. Who fails here to call
3:12:50
Speaker 1: to mind our good friend Dogbury, who informs neighbour Sea
3:12:54
Speaker 1: Coal that to be a well favored man is the
3:12:59
Speaker 1: gift of fortune, but reading and writing comes by nature. Footnote.
3:13:05
Speaker 1: The author of Observations and s Bailey accuse Ricardo of
3:13:09
Speaker 1: converting exchange value from something relative into something absolute. The
3:13:14
Speaker 1: opposite is the fact he has explained the apparent relation
3:13:18
Speaker 1: between objects such as diamonds and pearls, in which relation
3:13:23
Speaker 1: they appear as exchange values and disclose the true relation
3:13:27
Speaker 1: hidden behind the appearances, namely their relation to each other
3:13:31
Speaker 1: as mere expressions of human labour. If the followers of
3:13:35
Speaker 1: Ricardo answer Bailey somewhat rudely and by no means convincingly,
3:13:40
Speaker 1: the reason is to be sought in this that they
3:13:43
Speaker 1: were unable to find in Ricardo's own works any key
3:13:46
Speaker 1: to the hidden relations existing between value and its form
3:13:50
Speaker 1: exchange value. End footnote end of chapter one, Section four.
3:13:58
Speaker 3: Part one is of money. Chapter two exchange it is
3:14:06
Speaker 3: plain that commodities cannot go to market and make exchanges
3:14:09
Speaker 3: of their own account. We must therefore have recourse to
3:14:14
Speaker 3: their guardians, who are also their owners. Commodities are things,
3:14:20
Speaker 3: and therefore without power of resistance against man. If they
3:14:24
Speaker 3: are wanting in docility, he can use force. In other words,
3:14:28
Speaker 3: he can take possession of them. Footnote one. In the
3:14:34
Speaker 3: twelfth century, so renowned for its piety, they included amongst
3:14:38
Speaker 3: commodities some very delicate things. Thus a French poet of
3:14:43
Speaker 3: the period enumerates amongst the goods to be found in
3:14:46
Speaker 3: the market of land, not only clothing, shoes, leather, agricultural implements,
3:14:53
Speaker 3: et cetera, but also fam ma fal de le corps
3:14:58
Speaker 3: end of footnote. In order that these objects may enter
3:15:03
Speaker 3: into relation with each other as commodities, their guardians must
3:15:07
Speaker 3: place themselves in relation to one another as person whose
3:15:11
Speaker 3: will resides in those objects, and must behave in such
3:15:15
Speaker 3: a way that each does not appropriate the commodity of
3:15:19
Speaker 3: the other and part with his own, except by means
3:15:23
Speaker 3: of an act done by mutual consent. They must therefore
3:15:27
Speaker 3: mutually recognize in each other the rights of private proprietors.
3:15:33
Speaker 3: This juridical relation, which thus expresses itself in a contract,
3:15:38
Speaker 3: whether such contract be part of a developed legal system
3:15:42
Speaker 3: or not, is a relation between two wills, and is
3:15:46
Speaker 3: but the reflex of the real economic relation between the two.
3:15:51
Speaker 3: It is this economic relation that determines the subject matter
3:15:56
Speaker 3: comprised in each juridical act. Note two. Prudent begins by
3:16:04
Speaker 3: taking his ideal of justice, of justice etenelles from the
3:16:10
Speaker 3: juridical relations that correspond to the production of commodities. Thereby,
3:16:16
Speaker 3: it may be noted he proves to the consolation of
3:16:19
Speaker 3: all good citizens that the production of commodities is a
3:16:23
Speaker 3: form of production as everlasting as justice. Then he turns
3:16:28
Speaker 3: round and seeks to reform the actual production of commodities
3:16:32
Speaker 3: and the actual legal system corresponding thereto in accordance with
3:16:36
Speaker 3: this ideal. What opinion should we have of a chemist who,
3:16:42
Speaker 3: instead of studying the actual laws of the molecular changes
3:16:46
Speaker 3: in the composition and decomposition of matter, and on that
3:16:50
Speaker 3: foundation solving definite problems, claimed to regulate the composition and
3:16:56
Speaker 3: decomposition of matter by means of the eternal ideas of
3:17:02
Speaker 3: naturality and affinite Do we really know any more about
3:17:08
Speaker 3: usury when we say it contradicts justice eternl, aquite etnl,
3:17:15
Speaker 3: mutuality eternl, and other verites eternel than the fathers of
3:17:21
Speaker 3: the Church did when they said it was incompatible with
3:17:25
Speaker 3: grass anl. What eternl and la volonte eternel do dieux end?
3:17:34
Speaker 3: A footnote? The persons exist for one another merely as
3:17:39
Speaker 3: representatives of, and therefore as owners of commodities. In the
3:17:45
Speaker 3: course of our investigation, we shall find in general that
3:17:48
Speaker 3: the characters who appear on the economic stage are but
3:17:52
Speaker 3: the personifications of the economic relations that exist between them.
3:17:58
Speaker 3: What chiefly distinguishes commodity from its owner is the fact
3:18:02
Speaker 3: that it looks upon every other commodity as but the
3:18:05
Speaker 3: form of appearance of its own value. A born leveler
3:18:10
Speaker 3: and a cynic, it is always ready to exchange not
3:18:13
Speaker 3: only soul but body with any and every other commodity
3:18:18
Speaker 3: be the same more repulsive than maritonas herself. The owner
3:18:23
Speaker 3: makes up for this lack in the commodity of a
3:18:26
Speaker 3: sense of the concrete by his own five and more senses.
3:18:31
Speaker 3: His commodity possesses for himself no immediate use value, otherwise
3:18:37
Speaker 3: he would not bring it to the market. It has
3:18:40
Speaker 3: use value for others, but for himself. Its only direct
3:18:45
Speaker 3: use value is that of being a depository of exchange
3:18:49
Speaker 3: value and consequently a means of exchange. Footnote three quotes four.
3:18:58
Speaker 3: Two fold is the u use of every object. The
3:19:02
Speaker 3: one is peculiar to the object as such. The other
3:19:05
Speaker 3: is not. As a sandal, which may be worn and
3:19:10
Speaker 3: is also exchangeable. Both are uses of the sandal. For
3:19:16
Speaker 3: even he who exchanges the sandal for money or food
3:19:19
Speaker 3: he is in want of makes use of the sandal
3:19:23
Speaker 3: as a sandal, but not in its natural way, for
3:19:27
Speaker 3: it has not been made for the sake of being exchanged.
3:19:31
Speaker 3: Close quotes Aristotle, Dear republica Book one, chapter nine, and
3:19:38
Speaker 3: a footnote. Therefore he makes up his mind to part
3:19:43
Speaker 3: with it for commodities whose value in use is of
3:19:47
Speaker 3: service to him. All commodities are non use values for
3:19:52
Speaker 3: their owners and use values for their non owners. Consequently,
3:19:57
Speaker 3: they must all change hands. But this change of hands
3:20:01
Speaker 3: is what constitutes their exchange, and the latter puts them
3:20:05
Speaker 3: in relation with each other as values and realizes them
3:20:08
Speaker 3: as values. Hence, commodities must be realized as values before
3:20:14
Speaker 3: they can be realized as use. Values. On the other hand,
3:20:19
Speaker 3: they must show that they are use values before they
3:20:23
Speaker 3: can be realized as values. For the labour spent upon
3:20:28
Speaker 3: them counts effectively only in so far as it is
3:20:32
Speaker 3: spent in a form that is useful for others. Whether
3:20:36
Speaker 3: that labour is useful for others and its product consequently
3:20:41
Speaker 3: capable of satisfying the wants of others can be proved
3:20:45
Speaker 3: only by the act of exchange. Every owner of a
3:20:49
Speaker 3: commodity wishes to part with it in exchange only for
3:20:53
Speaker 3: those commodities whose use value satisfies some want of his.
3:20:59
Speaker 3: Looked at in this way, exchange is for him simply
3:21:03
Speaker 3: a private transaction. On the other hand, he desires to
3:21:08
Speaker 3: realize the value of his commodity, to convert it into
3:21:12
Speaker 3: any other suitable commodity of equal value, irrespective of whether
3:21:17
Speaker 3: his own commodity has or has not any use value
3:21:20
Speaker 3: for the owner of the other. From this point of view,
3:21:24
Speaker 3: exchanges for him a social transaction of a general character,
3:21:30
Speaker 3: but one of the same set of transactions cannot be
3:21:34
Speaker 3: simultaneously for all owners of commodities, both exclusively private and
3:21:40
Speaker 3: exclusively social and general. Let us look at the matter
3:21:45
Speaker 3: a little closer to the owner of a commodity, every
3:21:50
Speaker 3: other commodity is in regard to his own a particular equivalent,
3:21:55
Speaker 3: and consequently his own commodity is the universal equivalent for
3:22:00
Speaker 3: all of the others. But since this applies to every owner,
3:22:05
Speaker 3: there is in fact no commodity acting as universal equivalent,
3:22:11
Speaker 3: and the relative value of commodities possesses no general form
3:22:15
Speaker 3: under which they can be equated as values and have
3:22:18
Speaker 3: the magnitude of their values compared so far. Therefore, they
3:22:24
Speaker 3: do not confront each other as commodities, but only as
3:22:28
Speaker 3: products or use values in their difficulties. Our commodity owners
3:22:34
Speaker 3: think like Faust quotes ib Anfang far detact close quotes.
3:22:40
Speaker 3: In the beginning was the deed from gers Faust. They
3:22:46
Speaker 3: therefore acted and transacted before they thought instinctively. They conform
3:22:52
Speaker 3: to the laws imposed by the nature of commodities. They
3:22:56
Speaker 3: cannot bring their commodities into relation as values and therefore
3:23:01
Speaker 3: as commodities, except by comparing them with some one other
3:23:06
Speaker 3: commodity as the universal equivalent that we saw from the
3:23:12
Speaker 3: analysis of a commodity. But a particular commodity cannot become
3:23:17
Speaker 3: the universal equivalent except by a social act. The social
3:23:23
Speaker 3: action therefore of all other commodities sets apart the particular
3:23:28
Speaker 3: commodity in which they all represent their values. Thereby, the
3:23:34
Speaker 3: bodily form of this commodity becomes the form of the
3:23:38
Speaker 3: socially recognized universal equivalent to be the universal equivalent becomes
3:23:45
Speaker 3: by this social process the specific function of a commodity,
3:23:49
Speaker 3: thus excluded by the rest. Thus it becomes money. Quotes
3:23:58
Speaker 3: These have one mind, and shall give their power and
3:24:01
Speaker 3: strength unto the Beast Revelations seventeen thirteen quotes, and that
3:24:09
Speaker 3: no man might buy or sell save he that had
3:24:13
Speaker 3: the mark or the name of the beast, or the
3:24:16
Speaker 3: number of his name Revelations thirteen seventeen, from the Apocalypse.
3:24:24
Speaker 3: Money is a crystal formed of necessity in the course
3:24:28
Speaker 3: of the exchanges, whereby different products of labor are practically
3:24:33
Speaker 3: equated to one another, and thus by practice converted into commodities.
3:24:39
Speaker 3: The historical progress and extension of exchanges develops the contrast
3:24:45
Speaker 3: latent in commodities between use value and value. The necessity
3:24:51
Speaker 3: for giving an external expression to this contrast for the
3:24:55
Speaker 3: purposes of commercial intercourse urges on the establishment of an
3:24:59
Speaker 3: inn dependent form of value, and finds no rest until
3:25:04
Speaker 3: it is once for all satisfied by the differentiation of
3:25:08
Speaker 3: commodities into commodities and money at the same rate. Then
3:25:14
Speaker 3: as the conversion of products into commodities is being accomplished,
3:25:18
Speaker 3: so also is the conversion of one special commodity into
3:25:23
Speaker 3: money footnote four. From this we may form an estimate
3:25:29
Speaker 3: of the shrewdness of the fatim bourgeois socialism, which, while
3:25:34
Speaker 3: perpetuating the production of commodities, aims at abolishing the antagonism
3:25:41
Speaker 3: between money and commodities. And consequently, since money exists only
3:25:46
Speaker 3: by virtue of this antagonism, at abolishing money itself, we
3:25:52
Speaker 3: might just as well try to retain Catholicism without the Pope.
3:25:57
Speaker 3: For more on this point, see my work A Contribution
3:26:01
Speaker 3: to the Critique of Political Economy, page sixty one and
3:26:05
Speaker 3: following end of footnote The direct barter of products attains
3:26:12
Speaker 3: the elementary form of the relative expression of value in
3:26:16
Speaker 3: one respect, but not in another. That form is X
3:26:21
Speaker 3: commodity A equals y commodity B. The form of direct
3:26:28
Speaker 3: barter is X of use value A is equivalent of
3:26:34
Speaker 3: Y use value B. Footnote five. So long as instead
3:26:42
Speaker 3: of two distinct use values being exchanged, A chaotic mass
3:26:46
Speaker 3: of articles are offered as the equivalent of a single article,
3:26:50
Speaker 3: which is often the case with savages. Even the direct
3:26:54
Speaker 3: barter of products is in its first infancy end of footnote.
3:27:00
Speaker 3: The articles A and B in this case are not
3:27:02
Speaker 3: as yet commodities, but become so only by the act
3:27:07
Speaker 3: of barter. The first step made by an object of
3:27:11
Speaker 3: utility towards acquiring exchange value is when it forms a
3:27:16
Speaker 3: non use value for its owner, and that happens when
3:27:20
Speaker 3: it forms a superfluous portion of some article required for
3:27:24
Speaker 3: his immediate wants. Objects in themselves are external to man
3:27:30
Speaker 3: and consequently alienable by him. In order that this alienation
3:27:36
Speaker 3: may be reciprocal, it is only necessary for men, by
3:27:40
Speaker 3: a tacit understanding, to treat each other as private owners
3:27:45
Speaker 3: of those alienable objects, and by implication, as independent individuals.
3:27:52
Speaker 3: But such a state of reciprocal independence has no existence
3:27:56
Speaker 3: in a primitive society based on property in common, whether
3:28:01
Speaker 3: such society takes the form of a patriarchal family, an
3:28:05
Speaker 3: ancient Indian community, or a Peruvian inca state. The exchange
3:28:11
Speaker 3: of commodities therefore first begins on the boundaries of such communities,
3:28:17
Speaker 3: at their points of contact with other similar communities or
3:28:21
Speaker 3: with members of the latter. So soon, however, as products
3:28:26
Speaker 3: once become commodities in the external relations of a community,
3:28:31
Speaker 3: they also, by reaction, become so in its internal intercourse.
3:28:36
Speaker 3: The proportions in which they are exchangeable are at first
3:28:40
Speaker 3: quite a matter of chance. What makes them exchangeable is
3:28:45
Speaker 3: the mutual desire of their owners to alienate them. Meantime,
3:28:51
Speaker 3: the need for foreign objects of utility gradually establishes itself.
3:28:56
Speaker 3: The constant repetition of exchange make it a normal social
3:29:01
Speaker 3: act in the course of time. Therefore, some portion at
3:29:06
Speaker 3: least of the products of labour must be produced with
3:29:09
Speaker 3: a special view to exchange. From that moment, the distinction
3:29:15
Speaker 3: becomes firmly established between the utility of an object for
3:29:20
Speaker 3: the purposes of consumption and its utility for the purposes
3:29:25
Speaker 3: of exchange. Its use value becomes distinguished from its exchange value.
3:29:33
Speaker 3: On the other hand, the quantitative proportion in which the
3:29:37
Speaker 3: articles are exchangeable becomes dependent on their production itself. Custom
3:29:44
Speaker 3: stamps that as values with definite magnitudes. In the direct
3:29:50
Speaker 3: bart of products, each commodity is directly a means of
3:29:55
Speaker 3: exchange to its owner and to all other persons an equivalent,
3:30:00
Speaker 3: but that only in so far as it has use
3:30:03
Speaker 3: value for them. At this stage. Therefore, the articles exchanged
3:30:09
Speaker 3: do not acquire a value form independent of their own
3:30:13
Speaker 3: use value or of the individual needs of the exchangers.
3:30:18
Speaker 3: The necessity for a value form grows with the increasing
3:30:22
Speaker 3: number and variety of the commodities exchanged. The problem and
3:30:27
Speaker 3: the means of solution arise simultaneously. Commodity owners never equate
3:30:33
Speaker 3: their own commodities to those of others and exchange them
3:30:37
Speaker 3: on a large scale, without different kinds of commodities belonging
3:30:42
Speaker 3: to different owners being exchangeable for and equated as values
3:30:47
Speaker 3: two one and the same special article. Such last mentioned article,
3:30:54
Speaker 3: by becoming the equivalent of various other commodities, acquires at once,
3:30:59
Speaker 3: though with the narrow limits, the character of a general
3:31:03
Speaker 3: social equivalent. This character comes and goes with the momentary
3:31:09
Speaker 3: social acts that called it into life. In turns and transiently,
3:31:15
Speaker 3: it attaches itself first to this and then to that commodity.
3:31:20
Speaker 3: But with the development of exchange it fixes itself firmly
3:31:25
Speaker 3: and exclusively to particular sorts of commodities, and becomes crystallized
3:31:32
Speaker 3: by assuming the money form. The particular kind of commodity
3:31:37
Speaker 3: to which it sticks is at first a matter of accident. Nevertheless,
3:31:43
Speaker 3: there are two circumstances whose influence is decisive. The money
3:31:49
Speaker 3: form attaches itself either to the most important articles of
3:31:54
Speaker 3: exchange from outside, and these, in fact are primitive and
3:31:59
Speaker 3: natural forms in which the exchange value of home products
3:32:03
Speaker 3: finds expression, or else it attaches itself to the object
3:32:08
Speaker 3: of utility that forms, like catt or the chief portion
3:32:13
Speaker 3: of indigenous alienable wealth. No mad races are the first
3:32:18
Speaker 3: to develop the money form, because all their worldly goods
3:32:23
Speaker 3: consist of movable objects and are therefore directly alienable, and
3:32:29
Speaker 3: because their mode of life, by continually bringing them into
3:32:33
Speaker 3: contact with foreign communities, solicits the exchange of products. Man
3:32:39
Speaker 3: has often made man himself, under the form of slaves,
3:32:43
Speaker 3: serve as the primitive material of money, but has never
3:32:47
Speaker 3: used a land for that purpose. Such an idea could
3:32:51
Speaker 3: only spring up in a bourgeois society already well developed.
3:32:56
Speaker 3: It dates from the last third of the seventeenth century.
3:33:00
Speaker 3: The first attempt to put it in practice on a
3:33:02
Speaker 3: national scale was made a century afterwards, during the French
3:33:07
Speaker 3: Bourgeois Revolution. In proportion as exchange bursts its local bonds,
3:33:15
Speaker 3: and the value of commodities more and more expands into
3:33:18
Speaker 3: an embodiment of human labour in the abstract. In the
3:33:22
Speaker 3: same proportion, the character of money attaches itself to commodities
3:33:27
Speaker 3: that are by nature fitted to perform the social function
3:33:31
Speaker 3: of a universal equivalent. Those commodities are the precious metals.
3:33:40
Speaker 3: The truth of the proposition that quotes, although gold and
3:33:44
Speaker 3: silver are not by nature money, money is by nature
3:33:47
Speaker 3: gold and silver close quotes, is shown by the fitness
3:33:51
Speaker 3: of the physical properties of these metals. For the functions
3:33:54
Speaker 3: of money footnote six. Carl Marx Kitato, page one three
3:34:02
Speaker 3: five quotes the metals are, by their nature money close
3:34:07
Speaker 3: quotes Galiani della Moneta in Custodis Collection Parte Moderna, Book three.
3:34:16
Speaker 3: End of footnote and footnote seven. For further details on
3:34:22
Speaker 3: this subject, seeing my work cited above the chapter on
3:34:26
Speaker 3: quotes the precious metals close quotes, end of footnote. Up
3:34:33
Speaker 3: to this point, however, we are acquainted only with one
3:34:37
Speaker 3: function of money, namely to serve as the form of
3:34:41
Speaker 3: manifestation of the value of commodities, or as the material
3:34:46
Speaker 3: in which the magnitudes of their values are socially expressed
3:34:51
Speaker 3: an adequate form of manifestation of value, a fit embodiment
3:34:56
Speaker 3: of abstract, undifferentiated and therefore equal human labour. That material
3:35:03
Speaker 3: alone can be whose every sample exhibits the same uniform qualities.
3:35:10
Speaker 3: On the other hand, since the difference between the magnitudes
3:35:14
Speaker 3: of value is purely quantitative, the money commodity must be
3:35:20
Speaker 3: susceptible of merely quantitative differences, must therefore be divisible at
3:35:26
Speaker 3: will and equally capable of being reunited. Gold and silver
3:35:33
Speaker 3: possess these properties by nature. The use value of the
3:35:38
Speaker 3: money commodity becomes two fold. In addition to its special
3:35:44
Speaker 3: use value as a commodity gold, for instance, serving to
3:35:48
Speaker 3: stop teeth or to form the raw material of articles
3:35:52
Speaker 3: of luxury, et cetera, it acquires a formal use value
3:35:58
Speaker 3: originating in its specific social function. Since all commodities are
3:36:05
Speaker 3: merely particular equivalents of money, the latter being their universal equivalent,
3:36:12
Speaker 3: they with regard to the latter as the universal commodity,
3:36:16
Speaker 3: play the parts of particular commodities. Footnote eight quotes il
3:36:24
Speaker 3: danaro ela merce universale close quotes very local Kitato page sixteen,
3:36:34
Speaker 3: end of footnote. We have seen that the money form
3:36:39
Speaker 3: is but the reflex thrown upon one single commodity of
3:36:43
Speaker 3: the value relations between all the rest. Footnote nine three
3:36:51
Speaker 3: quotations quote. Silver and gold themselves, which we may call
3:36:57
Speaker 3: by the general name of bullion, are commodities rising and
3:37:01
Speaker 3: falling in value. Bullion then may be reckoned to be
3:37:06
Speaker 3: of higher value, where the smaller weight will purchase the
3:37:09
Speaker 3: greater quantity of the product or manufacture of the country.
3:37:14
Speaker 3: Close Quotes from a discourse of the general notions of money,
3:37:19
Speaker 3: trade and exchanges as they stand in relation to each
3:37:22
Speaker 3: other by a merchant London, sixteen ninety five, page seven quotes.
3:37:31
Speaker 3: Silver and gold, coined or uncoined, though they are used
3:37:36
Speaker 3: for a measure of all other things, are no less
3:37:40
Speaker 3: a commodity than wine, oil, tobacco, cloth, or stuffs. Close
3:37:45
Speaker 3: Quotes from a discourse concerning trade and that in particular
3:37:51
Speaker 3: of the East Indies London, sixteen eighty nine, page two
3:37:57
Speaker 3: quotes the stock and riches of the Kingdom cannot properly
3:38:02
Speaker 3: be confined to money, nor ought to gold, and silver
3:38:06
Speaker 3: to be excluded from being merchandise. Close Quotes from the
3:38:13
Speaker 3: East India trade a most profitable trade London, sixteen seventy seven,
3:38:20
Speaker 3: page four, end of footnote. That money is a commodity
3:38:27
Speaker 3: is therefore a new discovery only for those who, when
3:38:31
Speaker 3: they analyze it, start from its fully develop'd shape. The
3:38:36
Speaker 3: act of exchange gives to the commodity converted into money,
3:38:41
Speaker 3: not its value, but its specific value form. By confounding
3:38:47
Speaker 3: these two distinct things, some writers have been led to
3:38:51
Speaker 3: hold that the value of gold and silver is imaginary.
3:38:55
Speaker 3: Footnote ten. Some quotations gold and silver have value as
3:39:03
Speaker 3: metals before they are money. Galiardi look or Kittatum. Locke says,
3:39:10
Speaker 3: the universal consent of mankind gave to silver on account
3:39:14
Speaker 3: of its qualities, which made it suitable for money and
3:39:17
Speaker 3: imaginary value. Nor, on the other hand, how could different
3:39:24
Speaker 3: nations give an imaginary value to any single thing, or
3:39:28
Speaker 3: how could this imaginary value have maintained itself? Close quotes,
3:39:34
Speaker 3: But the following shows how little he himself understood about
3:39:38
Speaker 3: the matter. Quotes. Silver was exchanged in proportion to the
3:39:44
Speaker 3: value in use it possess'd, consequently in proportion to its
3:39:49
Speaker 3: real value. By its adoption as money, it receiv'd an
3:39:53
Speaker 3: additional value in the valeur adizionel Close quotes our law
3:40:01
Speaker 3: consideracial sile numere il a commerce in E. Dare's edition
3:40:08
Speaker 3: of Economist Financier the Dsutim, page four hundred and seventy
3:40:16
Speaker 3: end a footnote. The fact that money can, in certain
3:40:22
Speaker 3: functions be replaced by mere symbols of itself gave rise
3:40:26
Speaker 3: to that other mistaken notion that it is itself a
3:40:30
Speaker 3: mere symbol. Nevertheless, under this error lurked a presentiment that
3:40:35
Speaker 3: the money form of an object is not an inseparable
3:40:39
Speaker 3: part of that object, but is simply the form under
3:40:42
Speaker 3: which certain social relations manifest themselves. In this sense, every
3:40:48
Speaker 3: commodity is a symbol, since in so far as it
3:40:52
Speaker 3: is value, it is only the material envelope of the
3:40:56
Speaker 3: human labor spent upon it. Footnote eleven. Some quotations Money
3:41:06
Speaker 3: is there the commodity's symbol, and as a symbol it
3:41:11
Speaker 3: is attracted by the commodities close quotes v de forbone
3:41:17
Speaker 3: El Monte de commerce Novelle dicio, Leiden, seventeen sixty six,
3:41:22
Speaker 3: Book two, pages one, four, three and one five five
3:41:26
Speaker 3: quotes money is a symbol of a thing and represents
3:41:30
Speaker 3: it close quotes Montesquieu Esprit de lois. However, London, seventeen
3:41:37
Speaker 3: sixty seven, Book two, page two quotes, money is not
3:41:43
Speaker 3: a mere symbol, for it is itself wealth. It does
3:41:47
Speaker 3: not represent the values it is their equivalents close quotes
3:41:53
Speaker 3: Latronde Local Quitato, page nine hundred and ten quotes. The
3:42:00
Speaker 3: notion of value contemplates the valuable article as a mere symbol.
3:42:05
Speaker 3: The article counts not for what it is, but for
3:42:08
Speaker 3: what it is worth close quotes Hegel Logo Kitato, page
3:42:14
Speaker 3: one hundred. Nawyers started long before economists the idea that
3:42:20
Speaker 3: money is a mere symbol and that the value of
3:42:23
Speaker 3: the precious metals is purely imaginary. This they did in
3:42:28
Speaker 3: the psycophantic service of the crowned heads, supporting the right
3:42:33
Speaker 3: of the latter to debase the coinage during the whole
3:42:36
Speaker 3: of the Middle Ages, by the traditions of the Roman
3:42:39
Speaker 3: Empire and the conceptions of money to be found in
3:42:42
Speaker 3: the pandects. An apt scholar of Theirs Philip and Valua,
3:42:48
Speaker 3: in a decree of thirteen forty six, said quotes, let
3:42:53
Speaker 3: no one call into question that the trade and the
3:42:56
Speaker 3: composition the supply and the power of issuing ordinances on
3:43:01
Speaker 3: the currency belongs exclusively to us, and to our royal majesty,
3:43:06
Speaker 3: to fix such a rate and at such price as
3:43:10
Speaker 3: it shall please us and seem good to us close quotes.
3:43:15
Speaker 3: It was a maximum of the Roman law that the
3:43:18
Speaker 3: value of money was fixed by decree of the emperor.
3:43:22
Speaker 3: It was expressly forbidden to treat money as a commodity. Quotes. However,
3:43:28
Speaker 3: it shall not be lawful to anyone for to buy money,
3:43:33
Speaker 3: for as it was created for public use, it is
3:43:37
Speaker 3: not permissible for it to be a commodity close quotes.
3:43:42
Speaker 3: Some good work on this question has been done by G. F.
3:43:45
Speaker 3: Pangnini sagospra il Giusto Presio de la CorCE, seventeen fifty one,
3:43:53
Speaker 3: Costadi Part Demoderna, Book two. In the second part of
3:43:59
Speaker 3: his work, Niini directs his polemics, especially against the lawyers.
3:44:05
Speaker 3: And a footnote. But if it be declared that the
3:44:09
Speaker 3: social characters assumed by objects or the material forms assumed
3:44:14
Speaker 3: by the social qualities of labour under the regime of
3:44:17
Speaker 3: a definite mode of production are mere symbols, it is
3:44:22
Speaker 3: in the same breath also declared that these characteristics are
3:44:26
Speaker 3: arbitrary fictions sanctioned by the so called universal consent of mankind.
3:44:33
Speaker 3: This suited the mode of explanation in favor during the
3:44:37
Speaker 3: eighteenth century. Unable to account for the origin of the
3:44:42
Speaker 3: puzzling forms assumed by the social relations between man and man,
3:44:48
Speaker 3: people sought to denude them of their strange appearance by
3:44:52
Speaker 3: ascribing to them a conventional origin. It has already been
3:44:58
Speaker 3: remarked above. The the equivalent form of a commodity does
3:45:02
Speaker 3: not imply the determination of the magnitude of its value. Therefore,
3:45:08
Speaker 3: although we may be aware that gold is money and
3:45:12
Speaker 3: consequently directly exchangeable for all other commodities, yet that fact
3:45:18
Speaker 3: by no means tells us how much ten pounds, for instance,
3:45:23
Speaker 3: of gold, is worth. Money, like every other commodity, cannot
3:45:28
Speaker 3: express the magnitude of its value, except relatively in other commodities.
3:45:35
Speaker 3: This value is determined by the labor time required for
3:45:39
Speaker 3: its production, and is expressed by the quantity of any
3:45:43
Speaker 3: other commodity that costs the same amount of labour time.
3:45:49
Speaker 3: Footnote twelve quotes If a man can bring to London
3:45:55
Speaker 3: an ounce of silver out of the earth in Peru
3:45:59
Speaker 3: in the same time that he can produce a bushel
3:46:01
Speaker 3: of corn, then the one is the natural price of
3:46:05
Speaker 3: the other. Now, if by reason of new or more
3:46:09
Speaker 3: easier minds, a man can procure two ounces of silver
3:46:14
Speaker 3: as easily as he formerly did one, the corn will
3:46:18
Speaker 3: be as cheap at ten shillings the bushel as it
3:46:22
Speaker 3: was before at five shillings. Kaiteris paribus close quotes William Petty,
3:46:29
Speaker 3: a Treatise of Taxes and Contributions, London, sixteen sixty seven,
3:46:35
Speaker 3: page thirty two, end of footnote. Such quantitative determination of
3:46:42
Speaker 3: its relative value takes place at the source of its
3:46:46
Speaker 3: production by means of barter. When it steps into circulation
3:46:52
Speaker 3: as money, its value is already given. In the last
3:46:57
Speaker 3: decades of the seventeenth century, it are already been shown
3:47:01
Speaker 3: that money is a commodity. But this step marks only
3:47:05
Speaker 3: the infancy of the analysis. The difficulty lies not incomprehending
3:47:11
Speaker 3: that money is a commodity, but in discovering how, why,
3:47:16
Speaker 3: and by what means a commodity becomes money footnote thirteen.
3:47:25
Speaker 3: The learned Professor Roscher, after first informing us that quotes
3:47:31
Speaker 3: the false definitions of money may be divided into two
3:47:35
Speaker 3: main groups, those which make it more and those which
3:47:39
Speaker 3: make it less than A commodity close quotes gives us
3:47:44
Speaker 3: a long and very mixed catalog of works on the
3:47:48
Speaker 3: nature of money, from which it appears that he has
3:47:51
Speaker 3: not the remotest idea of the real history of the theory.
3:47:56
Speaker 3: And then he mooralizes thus quotes for the rest. It
3:48:02
Speaker 3: is not to be denied that most of the later
3:48:05
Speaker 3: economists do not bear sufficiently in mind the peculiarities that
3:48:10
Speaker 3: distinguish money from all other commodities close quotes. It is, then,
3:48:17
Speaker 3: after all, either more or less than a commodity. Continue
3:48:21
Speaker 3: the quote. So far, the semi mercantilist reaction of Gadiel
3:48:28
Speaker 3: is not altogether without foundation Close quotes from Wilhelm, Russia,
3:48:35
Speaker 3: Decrent Lagan, Dear Natural Economy, third edition, eighteen fifty eight,
3:48:42
Speaker 3: pages two hundred seventy two hundred and ten. More less,
3:48:49
Speaker 3: not sufficiently so far, not altogether what clearness and precision
3:48:56
Speaker 3: of ideas and language, and such a elected professorial twaddle
3:49:02
Speaker 3: is modestly baptized by mister Rossa quotes the anatomico physiological
3:49:09
Speaker 3: method close quotes of Political Economy. One discovery. However, he
3:49:15
Speaker 3: must have credit for, namely, that money is quotes a
3:49:20
Speaker 3: pleasant commodity end of footnote. We have already seen, from
3:49:27
Speaker 3: the most elementary expression of value X commodity A is
3:49:32
Speaker 3: y commodity B, that the object in which the magnitude
3:49:36
Speaker 3: of the value of another object is represented appears to
3:49:40
Speaker 3: have the equivalent form independently of this relation, as a
3:49:45
Speaker 3: social property given to it by nature. We followed up
3:49:50
Speaker 3: this false appearance to its final establishment, which is complete
3:49:55
Speaker 3: so soon as the universal equivalent form becomes identified with
3:50:00
Speaker 3: the bodily form of a particular commodity, and thus crystalliz'd
3:50:06
Speaker 3: into the money form. What appears to happen is not
3:50:11
Speaker 3: that gold becomes money in consequence of all other commodities
3:50:15
Speaker 3: expressing their values in it, but on the contrary, that
3:50:20
Speaker 3: all other commodities universally express their values in gold because
3:50:25
Speaker 3: it is money. The intermediate steps of the process vanish
3:50:31
Speaker 3: in the result and leave no trace behind. Commodities find
3:50:36
Speaker 3: their own value already completely represented, without any initiative on
3:50:41
Speaker 3: their part, in another commodity existing in company with them.
3:50:47
Speaker 3: These objects gold and silver, just as they come out
3:50:52
Speaker 3: of the bowels of the earth, are forthwith the direct
3:50:56
Speaker 3: incarnation of all human labor. Hence, the magic of money
3:51:04
Speaker 3: in the form of society. Now under consideration. The behavior
3:51:08
Speaker 3: of men in the social process of production is purely atomic.
3:51:14
Speaker 3: Hence their relations to each other in production assume a
3:51:18
Speaker 3: material character independent of their control and conscious individual action.
3:51:25
Speaker 3: These facts manifest themselves at first by products. As a
3:51:30
Speaker 3: general rule, taking the form of commodities, we have seen
3:51:35
Speaker 3: how the progressive development of a society of commodity produces stamps,
3:51:41
Speaker 3: one privileged commodity with the character of money. Hence, the
3:51:46
Speaker 3: riddle presented by money is but the riddle presented by commodities. Only.
3:51:52
Speaker 3: It now strikes us in its most glaring form of
3:52:00
Speaker 3: Part one, Chapter two.
3:52:03
Speaker 4: Part one Commodities and Money, Chapter three, Money or the
3:52:07
Speaker 4: circulation of Commodities. Section one The measure of values. Throughout
3:52:15
Speaker 4: this work I assume, for the sake of simplicity, gold
3:52:18
Speaker 4: as the money commodity. The first chief function of money
3:52:22
Speaker 4: is to supply commodities with the material for the expression
3:52:24
Speaker 4: of their values, or to represent their values of magnitudes
3:52:28
Speaker 4: of the same denomination qualitatively equal and quantitatively comparable. It
3:52:33
Speaker 4: thus serves as a universal measure of value, and only
3:52:37
Speaker 4: by virtue of this function does gold the equivalent commodity.
3:52:40
Speaker 4: Part excellence become money. It is not money that renders
3:52:45
Speaker 4: commodities commensurable, just the contrary. It is because all commodities
3:52:49
Speaker 4: as values are realized human labour and therefore commensurable, that
3:52:54
Speaker 4: their values can be measured by one and the same
3:52:56
Speaker 4: special commodity, and the later he converted into the common
3:52:59
Speaker 4: misaeure of their values, i e. Into money. Money as
3:53:03
Speaker 4: a measure of value is the phenomenal form that must,
3:53:06
Speaker 4: of necessity be assumed by that measure of value which
3:53:09
Speaker 4: is imminent in commodities labor time footnote. The question why
3:53:17
Speaker 4: does not money directly represent labor time, so that a
3:53:20
Speaker 4: piece of paper may represent, for instance, x hour's labor
3:53:24
Speaker 4: is at bottom the same as the question why, given
3:53:26
Speaker 4: the production of commodities, must products take the form of commodities.
3:53:31
Speaker 4: This is evident since they're taking the form of commodities,
3:53:34
Speaker 4: implies their differentiation into commodities and money. Or why cannot
3:53:38
Speaker 4: private labor labor for the account of private individuals be
3:53:41
Speaker 4: treated as its opposite immediate social labour. I have elsewhere
3:53:45
Speaker 4: examined thoroughly the utopian idea of labor money in a society,
3:53:49
Speaker 4: for founded on the production of commodities, loco Settato, Page
3:53:53
Speaker 4: sixty one sequentia. On this point, I will only say
3:53:57
Speaker 4: further that Owen's labor money, for instance, is no no
3:54:00
Speaker 4: more money than a ticket for the theater. Owen presupposes
3:54:03
Speaker 4: directly associated labor, a form of production that is entirely
3:54:06
Speaker 4: inconsistent with a production of commodities. The certificate of labor
3:54:10
Speaker 4: is merely evidence of the part taken by the individual
3:54:13
Speaker 4: in the common labor and of his right to a
3:54:15
Speaker 4: certain portion of the common produce destined for consumption. But
3:54:19
Speaker 4: it never enters into Owen's head to presuppose the production
3:54:22
Speaker 4: of commodities, and, at the same time, by juggling with money,
3:54:25
Speaker 4: to try to evade the necessary conditions of that production.
3:54:29
Speaker 4: End footnote. The expression of the value of a commodity
3:54:34
Speaker 4: in gold x commodity a equals y money. Commodity is
3:54:37
Speaker 4: its money form or price. A single equation, such as
3:54:41
Speaker 4: one ton of iron equals two ounces of gold, now
3:54:44
Speaker 4: suffices to express the value of the iron in a
3:54:47
Speaker 4: socially valid manner. There is no longer any need for
3:54:50
Speaker 4: this equation to figure as a link in the chain
3:54:52
Speaker 4: of equations that express the values of all other commodities,
3:54:56
Speaker 4: because the equivalent commodity. Gold now has the character of money.
3:55:00
Speaker 4: The general form of relative value has resumed its original
3:55:03
Speaker 4: shape of simple or isolated relative value. On the other hand,
3:55:07
Speaker 4: the experimented expression of relative value, the endless series of equations,
3:55:11
Speaker 4: has now become the form peculiar to the relative value
3:55:14
Speaker 4: of the money commodity. The series itself, too is now
3:55:18
Speaker 4: given and has social recognition. In the prices of actual commodities,
3:55:22
Speaker 4: we have only to read the quotations of a priceless
3:55:25
Speaker 4: backwards define the magnitude of the value of money expressed
3:55:28
Speaker 4: in all sorts of commodities. But money itself has no price.
3:55:32
Speaker 4: In order to put it on an equal footing with
3:55:34
Speaker 4: all other commodities, in this respect, we should be obliged
3:55:37
Speaker 4: to equate it to itself as its own equivalent. The
3:55:41
Speaker 4: price or money form of commodities is like their form
3:55:44
Speaker 4: of value, generally a form quite distinct from their palpable
3:55:47
Speaker 4: bodily form. It is therefore a purely ideal or mental form.
3:55:52
Speaker 4: Although invisible, the value of iron, linen, and corn has
3:55:55
Speaker 4: actual existence in these very articles. It is ideally made
3:55:59
Speaker 4: perceptible by their equality with gold, a relation that, so
3:56:03
Speaker 4: to say, exists only in their own heads. Their owner
3:56:06
Speaker 4: must therefore lend them his tongue or hang a ticket
3:56:09
Speaker 4: on them before their prices can be communicated to the
3:56:12
Speaker 4: outside world. Footnote Savages and half civilized races use the
3:56:17
Speaker 4: tongue differently. Captain Perry says of the inhabitants of the
3:56:20
Speaker 4: west coast of Baffin's Bay. Quote. In this case he
3:56:25
Speaker 4: refers to barter. They licked it the thing represented to
3:56:28
Speaker 4: them twice to their tongues, after which they seem to
3:56:30
Speaker 4: consider the bargain satisfactorily concluded end quote. In the same
3:56:35
Speaker 4: way the Eastern Eskimo licked the articles they received in exchange.
3:56:38
Speaker 4: If the tongue is thus used in the North as
3:56:40
Speaker 4: the organ of appropriation, no wonder that in the South
3:56:44
Speaker 4: the stomach serves as the organ of accumulated property, and
3:56:47
Speaker 4: that a kaffir estimates the wealth of a man by
3:56:49
Speaker 4: the size of his belly. That the kaffirs know what
3:56:52
Speaker 4: they are about is shown by the following. At the
3:56:55
Speaker 4: same time that the official British Health Report of eighteen
3:56:58
Speaker 4: sixty four disclosed the deficiency of fat forming food among
3:57:02
Speaker 4: a large part of the working class, a certain doctor
3:57:05
Speaker 4: Harvey not, however, the celebrated discoverer of the circulation of
3:57:08
Speaker 4: the blood made a good thing by advertising recipes for
3:57:12
Speaker 4: reducing the superfluous fat of the bourgeoisie and aristocracy. End footnote.
3:57:18
Speaker 4: Since the expression of the value of commodities in gold
3:57:21
Speaker 4: is a merely ideal act, we may use for this
3:57:24
Speaker 4: purpose imaginary or ideal money. Every trader knows that he
3:57:28
Speaker 4: is far from having turned his goods into money when
3:57:31
Speaker 4: he has expressed their value in a price or in
3:57:33
Speaker 4: imaginary money, and that it does not require the least
3:57:36
Speaker 4: bit of real gold to estimate in that metal millions
3:57:39
Speaker 4: of pounds worth of goods.
3:57:40
Speaker 1: One.
3:57:41
Speaker 4: Therefore, money serves as a measure of value. It is
3:57:43
Speaker 4: employed only as imaginary or ideal money. This circumstance has
3:57:48
Speaker 4: given rise to the wildest theories. Footnote see Koro Marx,
3:57:53
Speaker 4: zur Critique et cetera, Teorian fond der masenhite Descelda, page
3:57:59
Speaker 4: fifty three six quantia and footnote. But although the money
3:58:04
Speaker 4: that performs the functions of a measure of value is
3:58:06
Speaker 4: only at dial money, price depends entirely upon the actual substance,
3:58:10
Speaker 4: that is money. The value or in other words, the
3:58:13
Speaker 4: quantity of human labour contained in a ton of iron
3:58:16
Speaker 4: is expressed in imagination by such a quantity of the
3:58:19
Speaker 4: money commodity as contains the same amount of labour as
3:58:22
Speaker 4: the iron. According therefore, as the measure of value is gold, silver,
3:58:26
Speaker 4: or copper, the value of the ton of iron will
3:58:28
Speaker 4: be expressed by very different prices, or will be represented
3:58:31
Speaker 4: by very different quantities of those metals, respectively. If therefore,
3:58:36
Speaker 4: two different commodities, such as gold and silver, are simultaneously
3:58:41
Speaker 4: measures of value, all commodities have two prices, one a
3:58:44
Speaker 4: gold price, the other a silver price. These exist quietly
3:58:48
Speaker 4: side by side so long as the ratio of the
3:58:51
Speaker 4: value of silver to that of gold remains unchanged, say
3:58:54
Speaker 4: at fifteen to one. Every exchange in their ratio disturbs
3:58:57
Speaker 4: the ratio which exists between the gold gold prices and
3:59:00
Speaker 4: the silver prices of commodities, and thus proves by facts
3:59:04
Speaker 4: that a double standard of value is inconsistent with the
3:59:06
Speaker 4: functions of a standard footnote quote. Wherever gold and silver
3:59:12
Speaker 4: have by law been made to perform the function of
3:59:15
Speaker 4: money or of a measure of value side by side,
3:59:17
Speaker 4: it has always been tried, but in vain, to treat
3:59:20
Speaker 4: them as one. In the same material. To assume that
3:59:23
Speaker 4: there is an invariable ratio between the quantities of gold
3:59:26
Speaker 4: and silver in which a given quantity of labor time
3:59:28
Speaker 4: is incorporated is to assume in fact that gold and
3:59:31
Speaker 4: silver are of one and the same material, and that
3:59:34
Speaker 4: a given mass of the less valuable metal silver is
3:59:37
Speaker 4: a constant fraction of a given mass of gold. From
3:59:40
Speaker 4: the reign of Edward the Third to the time of
3:59:42
Speaker 4: George the Second, the history of money in England consists
3:59:45
Speaker 4: of one long series of perturbations caused by the clashing
3:59:50
Speaker 4: of the legally fixed ratio between the values of gold
3:59:52
Speaker 4: and silver with the fluctuations in their real values. At
3:59:57
Speaker 4: one time gold was too high, At another silver, the
4:00:00
Speaker 4: metal that for the time being was estimated below its value,
4:00:03
Speaker 4: was withdrawn from circulation, mated and exported. The ratio between
4:00:07
Speaker 4: the two metals was then again altered by law, but
4:00:09
Speaker 4: the new nominal ratio soon came into conflict again with
4:00:12
Speaker 4: the real one. In our own times, the slight and
4:00:16
Speaker 4: transient fall in the value of gold compared with silver
4:00:19
Speaker 4: was the consequence of the Indo Chinese demand for silver,
4:00:22
Speaker 4: produced on a far more extended scale in France. The
4:00:25
Speaker 4: same phenomena export of silver and its expulsion from circulation
4:00:29
Speaker 4: by gold. During the years eighteen fifty five, eighteen fifty
4:00:32
Speaker 4: six and eighteen fifty seven, the excess in France of
4:00:36
Speaker 4: gold imports over gold exports amounted to forty one million,
4:00:41
Speaker 4: five hundred eighty thousand pounds, while the exers of silver
4:00:45
Speaker 4: exports over silver imports was fourteen million, seven hundred four
4:00:50
Speaker 4: thousand pounds. In fact, in those countries in which both
4:00:54
Speaker 4: metals are legally measures of value and therefore both legal tender,
4:00:58
Speaker 4: so that everyone has the option of in either metal,
4:01:01
Speaker 4: the metal that rise in value is at a premium,
4:01:04
Speaker 4: and like every other commodity, measures its price in the
4:01:08
Speaker 4: over estimated metal, which alone serve in reality as the
4:01:11
Speaker 4: standard of value. The result of all experience in history
4:01:15
Speaker 4: with regard to this equation is simply that, where two
4:01:18
Speaker 4: commodities perform by law the functions of a measure of value,
4:01:21
Speaker 4: in practice one alone maintains that position. Choral marks Loco Citato,
4:01:27
Speaker 4: pages fifty two and fifty three. Commodities with definite prices
4:01:32
Speaker 4: present themselves under the form lowercase A commodity capital A
4:01:36
Speaker 4: equals x gold, lowercase B commodity capital b equals z gold,
4:01:43
Speaker 4: lower case C commodity, capital C equals y gold, et cetera.
4:01:47
Speaker 4: Where lowercase abc represent definite quantities of the commodities capital
4:01:53
Speaker 4: abc and xyz definite quantities of gold. The values of
4:01:58
Speaker 4: these commodities are there changed in imagination into so many
4:02:02
Speaker 4: different quantities of gold. Hence, in spite of the confusing
4:02:06
Speaker 4: variety of the commodities themselves, their values become magnitudes of
4:02:10
Speaker 4: the same denomination gold, magnitudes. They are now capable of
4:02:14
Speaker 4: being compared with each other and measured, and the want
4:02:17
Speaker 4: becomes technically feut of comparing them with some fixed quantity
4:02:21
Speaker 4: of gold as a unit measure. This unit, by subsequent
4:02:24
Speaker 4: division into aliquot parts, becomes itself the standard or scale
4:02:29
Speaker 4: before they become money. Gold, silver, and copper already possess
4:02:32
Speaker 4: such standard measures in their standards of weight, so that,
4:02:35
Speaker 4: for example, a pound weight, while serving as the unit,
4:02:38
Speaker 4: is on the one hand, divisible into ounces, and on
4:02:41
Speaker 4: the other may be combined to make up hundred weights.
4:02:45
Speaker 4: Footnote the peculiar circumstance that while the ounce of gold
4:02:49
Speaker 4: serves in England as the unit of the standard of money,
4:02:52
Speaker 4: the pound sterling does not form an aliquot. Part of
4:02:54
Speaker 4: it has been explained as follows. Our coinage was originally
4:02:59
Speaker 4: adapted to the employment of silver only. Hence an ounce
4:03:03
Speaker 4: of silver can always be divided into a certain adequate
4:03:05
Speaker 4: number of pieces of coin. But as gold was introduced
4:03:08
Speaker 4: at a later period into a coinage adapted only to silver,
4:03:11
Speaker 4: an ounce of gold cannot be coined into an al
4:03:14
Speaker 4: quat number of pieces. McLaren a Sketch of the History
4:03:18
Speaker 4: of the currency, London, eighteen fifty eight, page sixteen, end footnote.
4:03:23
Speaker 4: It is owing to this that in all metallic currencies
4:03:26
Speaker 4: the names given to the standards of money or of
4:03:28
Speaker 4: price were originally taken from the pre existing names of
4:03:31
Speaker 4: the standards of weight. As measure of value and as
4:03:35
Speaker 4: standard of price, money has two entirely distinct functions to perform.
4:03:40
Speaker 4: It is the measure of value inasmuch as it is
4:03:42
Speaker 4: the socially recognized incarnation of human labour. It is the
4:03:45
Speaker 4: standard of price inasmuch as it is a fixed weight
4:03:48
Speaker 4: of metal. As the measure of value, it serves to
4:03:51
Speaker 4: convert the values of all the manifold commodities into prices
4:03:54
Speaker 4: into imaginary quantities. Of gold. As the standard of price
4:03:58
Speaker 4: it measures those quantities of gold. The measure of values
4:04:01
Speaker 4: measures commodities considered as values. The standard price measures on
4:04:05
Speaker 4: the contrary quantities of gold by a unit quantity of gold,
4:04:09
Speaker 4: not the value of one quantity of gold by the
4:04:11
Speaker 4: weight of another. In order to make gold a standard
4:04:14
Speaker 4: of price, a certain weight must be fixed upon as
4:04:17
Speaker 4: the unit. In this case, as in all cases of
4:04:20
Speaker 4: measuring quantities of the same denomination, the establishment of an
4:04:23
Speaker 4: unvarying unit of measure is all important. Hence, the less
4:04:27
Speaker 4: the unit is subject to variation, so much the better
4:04:30
Speaker 4: does the standard of price fulfill its office. But only
4:04:33
Speaker 4: in so far as it is itself a product of
4:04:35
Speaker 4: labor and therefore potentially variable in value, can gold serve
4:04:39
Speaker 4: as a measure of value? Footnote. With English writers, the
4:04:44
Speaker 4: confusion between measure of value and standard of price standard
4:04:47
Speaker 4: of value is indescribable. Their functions as well as their names,
4:04:51
Speaker 4: are constantly interchanged. And footnote it is in the first
4:04:56
Speaker 4: place quite clear that a change in the value of
4:04:58
Speaker 4: gold does not in any way affect its function as
4:05:00
Speaker 4: a standard of price, no matter how this value varies.
4:05:04
Speaker 4: The proportions between the values of different quantities of the
4:05:06
Speaker 4: metal remain constant, however great the fall in its value,
4:05:10
Speaker 4: twelve ounces of gold still have twelve times the value
4:05:13
Speaker 4: of one ounce, And in prices, the only thing considered
4:05:16
Speaker 4: is the relation between different quantities of gold. Since, on
4:05:20
Speaker 4: the other hand, no rise or fall in the value
4:05:22
Speaker 4: of an ounce of gold can alter its weight, no
4:05:24
Speaker 4: alteration can take place in the weight of its aliquot parts.
4:05:28
Speaker 4: Thus gold always renders the same service as an invariable
4:05:31
Speaker 4: standard of price, however much its value may vary. In
4:05:35
Speaker 4: the second place, a change in the value of gold
4:05:37
Speaker 4: does not interfere with its functions as a measure of value.
4:05:40
Speaker 4: The change effects all commodities simultaneously, and therefore characteristic powerbus
4:05:45
Speaker 4: leaves their relatives values inter say, unaltered, although those values
4:05:49
Speaker 4: are now expressed in higher or lower gold prices. Just
4:05:53
Speaker 4: as when we estimate the value of any commodity by
4:05:55
Speaker 4: a definite quantity of the use value of some other commodity,
4:05:59
Speaker 4: so an estimated the value of the former in gold,
4:06:02
Speaker 4: we assume nothing more than that the production of a
4:06:04
Speaker 4: given quantity of gold costs at the given period a
4:06:07
Speaker 4: given amount of labour. As regards the fluctuations of prices,
4:06:10
Speaker 4: generally they are subject to the laws of elementary relative
4:06:13
Speaker 4: value investigated in a former chapter. A general rise in
4:06:17
Speaker 4: the prices of commodities can result only either from a
4:06:21
Speaker 4: rise in their values the value of money remaining constant,
4:06:24
Speaker 4: or from a fall in the value of money the
4:06:26
Speaker 4: values of commodities remaining constant. On the other hand, a
4:06:30
Speaker 4: general fall in prices can result only either from a
4:06:33
Speaker 4: fall in the values of commodities, the value of money
4:06:36
Speaker 4: remaining constant, or from a rise in the value of
4:06:39
Speaker 4: money the values of commodities remaining constant. It therefore, by
4:06:42
Speaker 4: no means follows that a rise in the value of
4:06:45
Speaker 4: money necessarily implies a proportional fall in the prices of commodities,
4:06:49
Speaker 4: or that a fall in the value of money implies
4:06:51
Speaker 4: a proportional rise in prices. Such change of price holds
4:06:55
Speaker 4: good only in the case of commodities whose value remains
4:06:58
Speaker 4: constant with those, for example, whose value rises simultaneously with
4:07:02
Speaker 4: and proportionally two that of money, there is no alteration
4:07:06
Speaker 4: in price, and if their value rise either slower or
4:07:09
Speaker 4: faster than that of money, the fall or rise in
4:07:12
Speaker 4: their prices will be determined by the difference between the
4:07:14
Speaker 4: change in their value and that of money, and so on.
4:07:18
Speaker 4: Let us now go back to the consideration of the
4:07:20
Speaker 4: price form by degrees. There arises a discrepancy between the
4:07:25
Speaker 4: current money names of the various weights of the precious
4:07:27
Speaker 4: metal figuring as money, and the actual weights which those
4:07:31
Speaker 4: names originally represented. This discrepancy is the result of historical causes,
4:07:36
Speaker 4: among which the chief are one the importation of foreign
4:07:40
Speaker 4: money into an imperfectly developed community. This happened in Rome
4:07:44
Speaker 4: in its early days, where gold and silver coins circulated
4:07:47
Speaker 4: at first as foreign commodities. The names that these foreign
4:07:50
Speaker 4: coins never coincide with those of the indigenous weights. Two.
4:07:55
Speaker 4: As wealth increases, the less precious metal is thrust out
4:07:59
Speaker 4: by the more precious for from its place as a
4:08:01
Speaker 4: measure of value copper by silver, silver by gold. However
4:08:05
Speaker 4: much this order of sequence may be in contradiction with
4:08:08
Speaker 4: poetical chronology footnote. Moreover, it has not general historical validity
4:08:15
Speaker 4: and footnote. The word pound, for instance, was the money
4:08:20
Speaker 4: name given to an actual pound weight of silver. When
4:08:23
Speaker 4: gold replaced silver as a measure of value, the same
4:08:26
Speaker 4: name was applied, according to the ratio between the values
4:08:28
Speaker 4: of silver and gold, to perhaps one fifteenth of a
4:08:32
Speaker 4: pound of gold. The word pound as a money name
4:08:35
Speaker 4: thus becomes differentiated from the same word as a weight name. Footnote.
4:08:41
Speaker 4: It is thus that the pound sterling in English denotes
4:08:43
Speaker 4: less than one third of its original weight, the pound
4:08:47
Speaker 4: scot before the Union only one thirty sixth, the French
4:08:50
Speaker 4: livre one seventy fourth, the Spanish maravedi less than one
4:08:56
Speaker 4: thousandth and the Portuguese ray a still smaller fraction. And
4:09:00
Speaker 4: footnote three. The debasing of money carried on for centuries
4:09:05
Speaker 4: by kings and princes to such an extent that of
4:09:08
Speaker 4: the original wage of the coins, nothing in fact remained
4:09:11
Speaker 4: but the names footnote quote le monoe, le couale, ogre
4:09:16
Speaker 4: son irial sone, les pui antique, donne nazzione e tutte
4:09:21
Speaker 4: furono un tempoial e perceorano reale con esse si contava
4:09:26
Speaker 4: end quote. The coins which to day are ideal are
4:09:32
Speaker 4: the oldest coins of every nation, and all of them
4:09:35
Speaker 4: were once real and precisionally, because they were real, they
4:09:38
Speaker 4: were used for calculation Galiani de la moneta Lochi Sitate,
4:09:44
Speaker 4: page one fifty three, and footnote. These historical causes convert
4:09:49
Speaker 4: the separation of the money name from the wake name
4:09:52
Speaker 4: into an established habit with the community. Since the standard
4:09:55
Speaker 4: of money is on the one hand, purely conventional, and must,
4:09:59
Speaker 4: on the other hand, find it general acceptance, it is
4:10:01
Speaker 4: in the end regulated by law. A given weight of
4:10:05
Speaker 4: one of the precious medals an ounce of gold, for instance,
4:10:08
Speaker 4: becomes officially divided into aliquot parts with legally bestowed names,
4:10:12
Speaker 4: such as pound, dollar, et cetera. These aliquot parts, which
4:10:16
Speaker 4: thenceforth serve as units of money, are then subdivided into
4:10:20
Speaker 4: other aliquot parts with legal names such as shilling, penny,
4:10:23
Speaker 4: et cetera. Footnote. David Urquhart remarks in his familiar words
4:10:29
Speaker 4: on the monstrosity that nowadays a pound sterling, which is
4:10:34
Speaker 4: the unit of the English standard of money, is equal
4:10:37
Speaker 4: to about a quarter of an ounce of gold.
4:10:40
Speaker 3: Quote.
4:10:40
Speaker 4: This is falsifying a measure, not establishing a standard end quote.
4:10:45
Speaker 4: He sees in this false denomination of the weight of gold,
4:10:49
Speaker 4: as in everything else, the falsifying hand of civilization. End footnote.
4:10:55
Speaker 4: But both before and after these divisions are made, a
4:10:59
Speaker 4: definite weight of metal is the standard of metallic money.
4:11:02
Speaker 4: The sole alteration consists in the subdivision and denomination the
4:11:06
Speaker 4: prices or quantities of golds into which the values of
4:11:09
Speaker 4: commodities are ideally changed, are therefore now expressed in the
4:11:13
Speaker 4: names of the coins, or in the legally valid names
4:11:15
Speaker 4: of the subdivisions of the gold standard. Hence, instead of
4:11:18
Speaker 4: saying a quarter of wheat is worth an ounce of gold,
4:11:22
Speaker 4: we say it is worth three pounds, seventeen shillings ten
4:11:25
Speaker 4: and a half pence. In this way, commodities express by
4:11:28
Speaker 4: their prices how much they are worth, and money serves
4:11:31
Speaker 4: as money of account whenever it is a question of
4:11:34
Speaker 4: fixing the value of an article in its money form. Footnote.
4:11:38
Speaker 4: When an Ocarsus was asked for what purposes the Greeks
4:11:42
Speaker 4: used money, he replied for reckoning. End footnote. The name
4:11:48
Speaker 4: of a thing is something distinct from the qualities of
4:11:51
Speaker 4: that thing. I know nothing of a man by knowing
4:11:54
Speaker 4: that his name is Jacob. In the same way, with
4:11:56
Speaker 4: regard to money, every trace of a value relation disappears
4:12:00
Speaker 4: in the names pound, dollar, frank, duke, it, et cetera.
4:12:04
Speaker 4: The confusion cause by attributing a hidden meaning to these
4:12:07
Speaker 4: capitalistic signs is all the greater because these money names
4:12:10
Speaker 4: express both the values of commodities and at the same
4:12:13
Speaker 4: time outqut parts of the weight of the metal that
4:12:16
Speaker 4: is the standard of money. Footnote quote owing to the
4:12:20
Speaker 4: fact that money, when serving as the standard of price,
4:12:23
Speaker 4: appears under the same reckoning names as do the prices
4:12:25
Speaker 4: of commodities, and that therefore the sum of three pound
4:12:29
Speaker 4: seventeen shillings ten and a half pence may signify, on
4:12:32
Speaker 4: the one hand, and ounce weight of gold, and on
4:12:34
Speaker 4: the other the value of a ton of iron. This
4:12:37
Speaker 4: reckoning name of money has been called its mint price.
4:12:40
Speaker 4: Hence there sprang up the extraordinary notion that the value
4:12:43
Speaker 4: of gold is estimated in its own material, and that,
4:12:46
Speaker 4: in contradistinction to all other commodities, its price is fixed
4:12:50
Speaker 4: by the state. It was erroneously thought that the giving
4:12:53
Speaker 4: of reckoning names to definite weights of golds is the
4:12:56
Speaker 4: same thing as fixing the value of those weights end
4:12:59
Speaker 4: quotes Charmrk's Local Scitati, page fifty two, and footnote. On
4:13:06
Speaker 4: the other hand, it is absolutely necessary that value, in
4:13:09
Speaker 4: order that it may be distinguished from the varied bodily
4:13:12
Speaker 4: forms of commodities, should assume this material and unmeaning, but
4:13:16
Speaker 4: at the same time purely social form. Footnote See Teorian
4:13:22
Speaker 4: von der Massingheit des Geldis in to order Critique der
4:13:26
Speaker 4: pol Econ et cetera, page fifty three, sequentia the fantastic
4:13:31
Speaker 4: notions about raising or lowering the mint price of money
4:13:35
Speaker 4: by transferring to greater or smaller weights of gold or
4:13:38
Speaker 4: silver the names already legally appropriated to fixed weights of
4:13:41
Speaker 4: those medals. Such notions, at least in those cases in
4:13:45
Speaker 4: which they aim not at clumsy financial operations against creditors,
4:13:49
Speaker 4: both public and private, but at economic quack remedies, have
4:13:52
Speaker 4: been so exhaustively treated by William Petty in his Pontilum
4:13:56
Speaker 4: Kunqua concerning Money the Lord Marquis of Halifax sixteen eighty two,
4:14:01
Speaker 4: that even his immediate followers Sir Dudley North and John Locke,
4:14:06
Speaker 4: not to mention later ones, could only dilute him. Quote
4:14:10
Speaker 4: if the wealth of a nation, he remarks, could be
4:14:13
Speaker 4: decoupled by a proclamation, it were strange that such proclamations
4:14:18
Speaker 4: have not long since been made by our governors. End
4:14:21
Speaker 4: quote Loco citato, page thirty six.
4:14:26
Speaker 1: End.
4:14:26
Speaker 4: A footnote price is the money name of the labor
4:14:30
Speaker 4: realized in a commodity. Hence the expression of the equivalence
4:14:35
Speaker 4: of a commodity with a sum of money constituting its
4:14:37
Speaker 4: price is a tautology, just as in general, the expression
4:14:42
Speaker 4: of the relative value of a commodity is a statement
4:14:45
Speaker 4: of the equivalents of two commodities. Footnote quote ubion ilfo
4:14:51
Speaker 4: concentia dear convaleur donjan vauplu convaleur egal en montrentie end
4:14:58
Speaker 4: quote quote. Or indeed must be admitted that a million
4:15:02
Speaker 4: in money is worth more than an equal value in commodities.
4:15:06
Speaker 4: End quote the Trasna Loco Sartato, page nine one nine,
4:15:10
Speaker 4: which amounts to saying, quote coun valeur voplu cunvaleur egal
4:15:16
Speaker 4: end quote. Quote that one value is worth more than
4:15:20
Speaker 4: another value which is equal to it, end quote. End footnote.
4:15:26
Speaker 4: But although price, being the exponent of the magnitude of
4:15:29
Speaker 4: a commodity's value, is the exponent of its exchanged ratio
4:15:33
Speaker 4: with money, it does not follow that the exponent of
4:15:37
Speaker 4: this exchange ratio is necessarily the exponent of the magnitude
4:15:41
Speaker 4: of the commodity's value. Suppose two equal quantities of socially
4:15:46
Speaker 4: necessary labor to be respectively represented by one quarter of
4:15:49
Speaker 4: wheat and two pounds sterling, nearly half an ounce of gold.
4:15:53
Speaker 4: Two pound sterling is the expression in money of the
4:15:55
Speaker 4: magnitude of the value of the quarter of wheat, or
4:15:58
Speaker 4: is its price. If now circumstances allow of this price
4:16:02
Speaker 4: being raised to three pound sterling, or compel it to
4:16:05
Speaker 4: be reduced to one pound sterling, then although one pound
4:16:09
Speaker 4: sterling and three pound sterling may be too small or
4:16:13
Speaker 4: too great properly to express the magnitude of the wheat's value,
4:16:17
Speaker 4: nevertheless they are its prices, for they are, in the
4:16:21
Speaker 4: first place, the form under which the value appears i e. Money,
4:16:25
Speaker 4: and in the second place, the exponents of its exchange
4:16:28
Speaker 4: ratio with money. If the conditions of production, in other words,
4:16:32
Speaker 4: if the productive power of labor remain constant, the same
4:16:36
Speaker 4: amount of social labor time must both before and after
4:16:39
Speaker 4: the change in price, be expended in the reproduction of
4:16:42
Speaker 4: a quarter of wheat. This circumstance depends neither on the
4:16:46
Speaker 4: will of the wheat producer nor on that of the
4:16:48
Speaker 4: owners of other commodities. Magnitude of value expresses a relation
4:16:53
Speaker 4: of social production. It expresses the connection that necessarily exists
4:16:57
Speaker 4: between a certain article and the portion of the total
4:17:00
Speaker 4: labour time of society required to produce it as soon
4:17:04
Speaker 4: as magnitude of value is converted into price. The above
4:17:07
Speaker 4: necessary relation takes the shape of a more or less
4:17:10
Speaker 4: accidental exchange ratio between a single commodity and another, the
4:17:15
Speaker 4: money commodity. But this exchange ratio may express either the
4:17:19
Speaker 4: real magnitude of that commodity's value or the quantity of
4:17:22
Speaker 4: gold deviating from that value, for which, according to circumstances,
4:17:26
Speaker 4: it may be parted. With the possibility therefore of quantitative
4:17:31
Speaker 4: incongruity between price and magnitude of value, or the deviation
4:17:35
Speaker 4: of the former from the latter, is inherent in the
4:17:38
Speaker 4: price form itself. This is no defect, but on the contrary,
4:17:42
Speaker 4: admirably adapts the price form to a mode of production
4:17:45
Speaker 4: whose inherent laws impose themselves only as the mean of
4:17:49
Speaker 4: apparently lawless irregularities that compensate one another. The price form, however,
4:17:55
Speaker 4: is not only compatible with the possibility of a quantitative
4:17:58
Speaker 4: incongruity between magnet to value and price, i e. Between
4:18:02
Speaker 4: the former and its expression and money, but it may
4:18:05
Speaker 4: also conceal a qualitative inconsistency, so much so that although
4:18:09
Speaker 4: money is nothing but the value form of commodities, price
4:18:12
Speaker 4: ceases altogether to express value. Objects that in themselves are
4:18:17
Speaker 4: no commodities, such as conscience, honor, etc. Are capable of
4:18:21
Speaker 4: being offered for sale by their holders, and of thus
4:18:24
Speaker 4: acquiring through their price the form of commodities. Hence, an
4:18:28
Speaker 4: object may have a price without having value. The price
4:18:32
Speaker 4: in that case is imaginary, like certain quantities in mathematics.
4:18:36
Speaker 4: On the other hand, the imaginary price form may sometimes
4:18:39
Speaker 4: conceal either a direct or indirect real value relation. For instance,
4:18:44
Speaker 4: the price of uncultivated land, which is without value because
4:18:48
Speaker 4: no human labour has been incorporated in it. Price like
4:18:52
Speaker 4: relative value in general, expresses the value of a commodity
4:18:55
Speaker 4: e g. A ton of iron by stating that a
4:18:58
Speaker 4: given quantity of the equivalent e g. An ounce of
4:19:01
Speaker 4: gold is directly exchangeable for iron, but it by no
4:19:04
Speaker 4: means states the converse that iron is directly exchangeable for gold.
4:19:08
Speaker 4: In order therefore, that a commodity may in practice act
4:19:11
Speaker 4: effectively as an exchange value, it must quit its bodily shape,
4:19:15
Speaker 4: must transform itself from mere imaginary into real gold, although
4:19:19
Speaker 4: to the commodity such transubstantiation may be more difficult than
4:19:23
Speaker 4: to the Hegelian concept. The transition from necessity to freedom,
4:19:28
Speaker 4: or to a lobster the casting of his shell, or
4:19:30
Speaker 4: to Saint Jeremy, the putting off of the old atom. Footnote.
4:19:36
Speaker 4: Jeremy had to wrestle hard, not only in his youth
4:19:38
Speaker 4: with the bodily flesh, as is shown by his fight
4:19:41
Speaker 4: in the desert with the handsome woman of his imagination,
4:19:44
Speaker 4: but also in his old age with the spiritual flesh.
4:19:48
Speaker 4: I thought, he says, I was in the spirit before
4:19:51
Speaker 4: the judge of the universe, who art thou? Asked a voice,
4:19:57
Speaker 4: I am a Christian, thou Liaist, thundered back the great judge,
4:20:03
Speaker 4: thou art not but a Ciceronian end footnote. Though a
4:20:11
Speaker 4: commodity may side by side with its actual form, iron,
4:20:14
Speaker 4: for instance, take in our imagination the form of gold,
4:20:17
Speaker 4: yet it cannot, at one and the same time actually
4:20:20
Speaker 4: be both iron and gold. To fix its price, it
4:20:23
Speaker 4: suffices to equate it to gold in imagination, but to
4:20:27
Speaker 4: enable it to render to its owner the service of
4:20:30
Speaker 4: a universal equivalent, it must be actually replaced by gold.
4:20:34
Speaker 4: If the owner of the iron were to go to
4:20:36
Speaker 4: the owner some other commodity offered for exchange, and were
4:20:39
Speaker 4: to refer him to the price of the iron as
4:20:42
Speaker 4: proof that it was already money. He would get the
4:20:44
Speaker 4: same answer as Saint Peter gave in Heaven to Dante
4:20:48
Speaker 4: when the latter recited the creed aasadpene a trascorsa desdemonetta
4:20:54
Speaker 4: jia la lega al peso madimi setulai nellatoi borsa. A
4:21:01
Speaker 4: price therefore implies both that a commodity is exchangeable for money,
4:21:06
Speaker 4: and also that it must be so exchanged. On the
4:21:09
Speaker 4: other hand, gold serves as an ideal measure of value
4:21:13
Speaker 4: only because it has already, in the process of exchange,
4:21:16
Speaker 4: established itself as the money commodity. Under the ideal measure
4:21:20
Speaker 4: of values, there lurks the hard cache and of Part one,
4:21:26
Speaker 4: Chapter three. Section one. Part one Commodities and Money. Chapter three,
4:21:33
Speaker 4: Money or the Circulation of Commodities. Section two, The medium
4:21:37
Speaker 4: of circulation. Section a The metamorphosis of commodities. We saw
4:21:44
Speaker 4: in a former chapter that the exchange of commodities implies
4:21:47
Speaker 4: contradictory and mutually exclusive conditions. The differentiation of commodities into
4:21:53
Speaker 4: commodities and money does not sweep away these inconsistencies, but
4:21:57
Speaker 4: develops a modus vivendi, a form in which they can
4:22:00
Speaker 4: exist side by side. This is generally the way in
4:22:03
Speaker 4: which real contradictions are reconciled. For instance, it is a
4:22:07
Speaker 4: contradiction to depict one body as constantly falling towards another,
4:22:11
Speaker 4: and as at the same time constantly flying away from it.
4:22:15
Speaker 4: The ellipse is a form of motion which, while allowing
4:22:18
Speaker 4: this contradiction to go on, at the same time, reconciles it.
4:22:23
Speaker 4: Insofar as exchange is a process by which commodities are
4:22:26
Speaker 4: transferred from hands in which they are non use values,
4:22:28
Speaker 4: two hands in which they become use values, it is
4:22:31
Speaker 4: a social circulation of matter. The product of one form
4:22:34
Speaker 4: of useful labor replaces that of another. When once a
4:22:37
Speaker 4: commodity has found a resting place where can serve as
4:22:40
Speaker 4: a use value, it falls out of the sphere of
4:22:42
Speaker 4: exchange into that of consumption. But the form of sphere
4:22:45
Speaker 4: alone interests us at the present. We have, therefore now
4:22:48
Speaker 4: to consider exchange from a formal point of view, to
4:22:51
Speaker 4: investigate the change of form or metamorphosis of commodities, which
4:22:55
Speaker 4: effectuates this social circulation of matter. The comprehension of this
4:23:00
Speaker 4: change of form is, as a rule very imperfect. The
4:23:04
Speaker 4: cause of this imperfection is apart from indistinct notions of
4:23:07
Speaker 4: value itself, that every change of form in a commodity
4:23:10
Speaker 4: results from the exchange of two commodities, an ordinary one
4:23:13
Speaker 4: and the money commodity. If we keep in view the
4:23:16
Speaker 4: material fact alone that a commodity has been exchanged for gold,
4:23:20
Speaker 4: we overlook the very thing that we ought to observe, namely,
4:23:24
Speaker 4: what has happened to the form of the commodity. We
4:23:26
Speaker 4: overlook the facts that gold, when a mere commodity, is
4:23:29
Speaker 4: not money, and that when other commodities express their prices
4:23:32
Speaker 4: in gold, this gold is but the money form of
4:23:35
Speaker 4: those commodities themselves. Commodities, first of all, enter into the
4:23:40
Speaker 4: process of exchange just as they are. The process then
4:23:43
Speaker 4: differentiates them into commodities in money, and thus produces an
4:23:46
Speaker 4: external opposition corresponding to the internal opposition inherent in them.
4:23:51
Speaker 4: As being at once use values and values. Commodities as
4:23:55
Speaker 4: use values now stand opposed to money as exchange value.
4:23:59
Speaker 4: On the other hand, both opposing sides are commodities unities
4:24:02
Speaker 4: of use value and value. But this unity of differences
4:24:06
Speaker 4: manifests itself at two opposite poles, and at each pole
4:24:09
Speaker 4: in an opposite way, being poles, they are as necessarily
4:24:13
Speaker 4: opposite as they are connected. On the one side of
4:24:16
Speaker 4: the equation, we have an ordinary commodity which is in
4:24:20
Speaker 4: reality a use value. Its value is expressed only ideally
4:24:24
Speaker 4: in its price, by which it is equated to its opponent,
4:24:27
Speaker 4: the gold, as to the real embodiment of its value.
4:24:32
Speaker 4: On the other hand, the gold, in its metallic reality
4:24:35
Speaker 4: ranks as the embodiment of value as money. Gold as gold,
4:24:40
Speaker 4: is exchange value itself as to its use value, that
4:24:44
Speaker 4: has only an ideal existence, represented by the series of
4:24:47
Speaker 4: expressions of relative value in which it stands face to
4:24:50
Speaker 4: face with all other commodities, the sum of whose uses
4:24:54
Speaker 4: makes up the sum of the various uses of gold.
4:24:57
Speaker 4: These antagonistic forms of commodity are the real forms in
4:25:01
Speaker 4: which the process of their exchange moves and takes place.
4:25:05
Speaker 4: Let us now accompany the owner of some commodity. Say
4:25:08
Speaker 4: our old friend, the weaver of linen, to the scene
4:25:10
Speaker 4: of the action the market. His twenty yards of linen
4:25:14
Speaker 4: has a definite price two pound sterling. He exchanges it
4:25:17
Speaker 4: for the two pound sterling, and then, like a man
4:25:20
Speaker 4: of the good old stamp that he is, he parts
4:25:22
Speaker 4: with a two pound sterling for a family bible of
4:25:24
Speaker 4: the same price. The linen, which in his eyes is
4:25:28
Speaker 4: a mere commodity, a depository of value, he alienates in
4:25:32
Speaker 4: exchange for gold, which is the linin's value form, and
4:25:35
Speaker 4: this form he again parts with for another commodity, the bible,
4:25:39
Speaker 4: which is destined to enter his house as an object
4:25:41
Speaker 4: of utility and of edivocation to its inmates. The exchange
4:25:46
Speaker 4: becomes an accomplished fact by two metamorphoses of opposite yet
4:25:50
Speaker 4: supplementary character, the conversion of the commodity into money and
4:25:54
Speaker 4: the reconversion of the money into a commodity.
4:25:58
Speaker 1: Footnote.
4:26:00
Speaker 4: As Heirclitis says, all things are exchanged for fire, and
4:26:04
Speaker 4: fire for all things, as wares are exchanged for gold,
4:26:07
Speaker 4: and gold for wares. F Lassal de Philosophy, her titles
4:26:13
Speaker 4: Des Duncan, Berlin, eighteen fifty eight, Volume one, page two
4:26:18
Speaker 4: twenty two. Lasol, in his note on this passage, page
4:26:21
Speaker 4: two twenty four, Note three, erroneously makes gold a mere
4:26:25
Speaker 4: symbol of value and footnote. The two phases of this
4:26:30
Speaker 4: metamorphosis are both of them distinct transactions of the weaver
4:26:34
Speaker 4: selling or the exchange of the commodity for money buying,
4:26:38
Speaker 4: or the exchange of the money for a commodity, and
4:26:41
Speaker 4: the unity of the two acts selling in order to buy.
4:26:45
Speaker 4: The result of the whole transaction, as regards the weaver,
4:26:48
Speaker 4: is this that, instead of being in possession of the linen,
4:26:52
Speaker 4: he now has the Bible. Instead of his original commodity,
4:26:55
Speaker 4: he now possesses another of the same value, but of
4:26:58
Speaker 4: different utility. In like manner he procures his other means
4:27:02
Speaker 4: of subsistence and means of production. From his point of view,
4:27:06
Speaker 4: the whole process effectuates nothing more than the exchange of
4:27:09
Speaker 4: the product of his labor for the product of someone else's,
4:27:13
Speaker 4: nothing more than an exchange of products. The exchange of
4:27:17
Speaker 4: commodities is therefore accompanied by the following changes in their
4:27:20
Speaker 4: form commodity to money to commodity.
4:27:23
Speaker 1: C to M to C.
4:27:25
Speaker 4: The result of the whole process is, so far as
4:27:28
Speaker 4: concerns the objects themselves C to C, the exchange of
4:27:32
Speaker 4: one commodity for another, the circulation of materialized social labour.
4:27:36
Speaker 4: When this result is attained, the process is at an end.
4:27:41
Speaker 2: C to M.
4:27:42
Speaker 4: First metamorphosis or sale, the leap taken by the value
4:27:47
Speaker 4: from the body of the commodity into the body of
4:27:50
Speaker 4: the gold is, as I have elsewhere called it, the
4:27:52
Speaker 4: salto mortale of the commodity. If it falls short, then
4:27:56
Speaker 4: although the commodity itself is not harmed, its owner decidedly is.
4:28:00
Speaker 1: It is.
4:28:01
Speaker 4: The social division of labour causes his labour to be
4:28:04
Speaker 4: as one sided as his wants are many sided. This
4:28:08
Speaker 4: is precisely the reason why the product of his labour
4:28:10
Speaker 4: serves him solely as exchange value. But it cannot acquire
4:28:14
Speaker 4: the properties of a socially recognized universal equivalent, except by
4:28:18
Speaker 4: being converted into money. That money, however, is in someone
4:28:22
Speaker 4: else's pocket. In order to entice the money out of
4:28:25
Speaker 4: that pocket, our friend's commodity must, above all things, be
4:28:29
Speaker 4: a use value to the owner of the money. For this,
4:28:32
Speaker 4: it is necessary that the labour expended upon it be
4:28:35
Speaker 4: of the kind that is socially useful, of a kind
4:28:38
Speaker 4: that constitutes a branch of the social division of labour.
4:28:42
Speaker 4: But division of labour is a system of production which
4:28:45
Speaker 4: has grown up spontaneously and continues to grow behind the
4:28:48
Speaker 4: backs of the producers. The commodity to be exchanged may
4:28:51
Speaker 4: possibly be the product of some new kind of labour
4:28:55
Speaker 4: that pretends to satisfy new lirism requirements, or even to
4:28:58
Speaker 4: give rise itself to new requirement. A particular operation, though
4:29:03
Speaker 4: yesterday perhaps forming one out of the many operations conducted
4:29:07
Speaker 4: by one producer in creating a given commodity, may today
4:29:10
Speaker 4: separate itself from this connection, may establish itself as an
4:29:14
Speaker 4: independent branch of labour, and send its incomplete product to
4:29:18
Speaker 4: market as an independent commodity. The circumstances may or may
4:29:22
Speaker 4: not be ripe for such a separation. Today the product
4:29:25
Speaker 4: satisfies a social want. Tomorrow the article may either altogether
4:29:29
Speaker 4: or partially be superseded by some other appropriate product. Moreover,
4:29:34
Speaker 4: although our weaver's labour may be a recognized branch of
4:29:37
Speaker 4: the social division of labour, yet the fact is by
4:29:39
Speaker 4: no means sufficient to guarantee the utility of his twenty
4:29:42
Speaker 4: yards of linen. If the community's want of linen, and
4:29:46
Speaker 4: such a want has a limit, like every other want,
4:29:48
Speaker 4: should already be saturated by the products of rival weavers,
4:29:52
Speaker 4: our friend's product is superfluous, redundant, and consequently useless. Although
4:29:58
Speaker 4: people do not look a gift we horse in the mouth,
4:30:01
Speaker 4: our friend does not frequent the market for the purpose
4:30:03
Speaker 4: of making presents. But suppose his product turn out a
4:30:07
Speaker 4: real use value, and thereby attracts money. The question arises,
4:30:11
Speaker 4: how much will it attract? No doubt, the answer is
4:30:15
Speaker 4: already anticipated in the price of the article, in the
4:30:17
Speaker 4: exponent of the magnitude of its value. We leave out
4:30:21
Speaker 4: of consideration here any accidental miscalculation of value by our friend,
4:30:25
Speaker 4: a mistake that is soon rectified in the market. We
4:30:28
Speaker 4: suppose him to have spent on his product only that
4:30:31
Speaker 4: amount of labour time that is, on average socially necessary.
4:30:35
Speaker 4: The price then is merely the money name of the
4:30:37
Speaker 4: quantity of social labour realized in his commodity. But without
4:30:42
Speaker 4: the leave and behind the back of our weaver, the
4:30:45
Speaker 4: old fashioned mode of weaving undergoes a change. The labour
4:30:49
Speaker 4: time that yesterday was without doubt socially necessary to the
4:30:52
Speaker 4: production of a yard of linen ceases to be so today,
4:30:55
Speaker 4: a fact which the owner of the money is only
4:30:58
Speaker 4: too eager to prove from the price's quoted by our
4:31:00
Speaker 4: friend's competitors. Unluckily for him, weavers are not few and
4:31:05
Speaker 4: far between. Lastly, suppose that every piece of linen in
4:31:09
Speaker 4: the market contains no more labour time than is socially
4:31:11
Speaker 4: necessary in spite of this, all these pieces, taken as
4:31:16
Speaker 4: a whole, may have had superfluous labour times spent upon them.
4:31:20
Speaker 4: If the market cannot stomach the whole quantity at the
4:31:22
Speaker 4: normal price of two shillings a yard, this proves that
4:31:26
Speaker 4: too great a portion of the total labour of the
4:31:28
Speaker 4: community has been expended in the form of weaving. The
4:31:32
Speaker 4: effect is the same as if each individual weaver had
4:31:35
Speaker 4: expended more labour time upon his particular product than is
4:31:39
Speaker 4: socially necessary. Here we may say, with the German proverb
4:31:43
Speaker 4: caught together hung together, all the linen in the market
4:31:47
Speaker 4: counts as but one article of commerce, of which each
4:31:51
Speaker 4: piece is only an aliquot part. And as a matter
4:31:54
Speaker 4: of fact, the value also of each single yard is
4:31:57
Speaker 4: but the materialized form of the same definite and so
4:32:00
Speaker 4: socially fixed quantity of homogeneous human labour. Footnote note by
4:32:06
Speaker 4: the Institute of Marxism Leninism in the Russian edition. In
4:32:10
Speaker 4: his letter of November twenty eighth, eighteen seventy eight to N. F. Danielsson,
4:32:15
Speaker 4: Marx proposed that this sentence be corrected to read as follows.
4:32:20
Speaker 4: And as a matter of fact, the value of each
4:32:22
Speaker 4: single yard is but the materialized form of a part
4:32:25
Speaker 4: of the social labour expended on the whole number of
4:32:28
Speaker 4: yards end. An analogous correction was made in a copy
4:32:33
Speaker 4: of the second German edition of the first volume of Capital,
4:32:35
Speaker 4: belonging to Marx, however, not in his handwriting end footnote.
4:32:42
Speaker 4: We see, then, commodities are in love of money, but
4:32:45
Speaker 4: the course of true love never did run smooth. The
4:32:49
Speaker 4: quantitative division of labor is brought about in exactly the
4:32:52
Speaker 4: same spontaneous and accidental manner as its qualitative division. The
4:32:56
Speaker 4: owners of commodities therefore find out that the same division
4:32:59
Speaker 4: of labours that turns them into independent private producers, also
4:33:03
Speaker 4: frees the social process of production and the relations of
4:33:06
Speaker 4: the individual producers to each other within that process, from
4:33:09
Speaker 4: all dependence on the will of those producers, and that
4:33:13
Speaker 4: the seeming mutual independence of the individuals is supplemented by
4:33:16
Speaker 4: a system of general and mutual dependence through or by
4:33:20
Speaker 4: means of the products. The division of labour converts the
4:33:24
Speaker 4: product of labour into a commodity, and thereby makes necessary
4:33:27
Speaker 4: its further conversion into money. At the same time, it
4:33:31
Speaker 4: also makes the accomplishment of this transubstantiation quite accidental. Here, however,
4:33:37
Speaker 4: we are only concerned with the phenomenon in its integrity,
4:33:41
Speaker 4: and we therefore assume its progress to be normal. Moreover,
4:33:45
Speaker 4: if the conversion take place at all, that is, if
4:33:48
Speaker 4: the commodity be not absolutely unsaleable, its metamorphosis does take place.
4:33:53
Speaker 4: Although the price realized may be abnormally above or below
4:33:57
Speaker 4: the value. The seller has his commodity replaced by gold,
4:34:00
Speaker 4: the buyer has his gold replaced by a commodity. The
4:34:04
Speaker 4: fact which here stares us in the face is that
4:34:07
Speaker 4: a commodity in gold, twenty yards of linen and two
4:34:10
Speaker 4: pound sterling have changed hands in places. In other words,
4:34:14
Speaker 4: they have been exchanged. But for what is the commodity
4:34:18
Speaker 4: exchanged for the shape assumed by its own value, the
4:34:21
Speaker 4: universal equivalent? And for what is the gold exchanged for
4:34:25
Speaker 4: a particular form of its own use value. Why does
4:34:29
Speaker 4: gold take the form of money face to face with
4:34:31
Speaker 4: the linen, Because the linen's price of two pound sterling
4:34:35
Speaker 4: its denomination and money has already equated the linen to
4:34:39
Speaker 4: gold in its character of money. A commodity strips off
4:34:43
Speaker 4: its original commodity form on being alienated.
4:34:46
Speaker 1: I e.
4:34:47
Speaker 4: On the instance, its use value actually attracts the gold
4:34:51
Speaker 4: that before existed only ideally in its price. The realization
4:34:57
Speaker 4: of a commodity's price, or of its ideal value value form,
4:35:01
Speaker 4: is therefore, at the same time the realization of the
4:35:03
Speaker 4: ideal use value of money. The conversion of a commodity
4:35:07
Speaker 4: into money is the simultaneous conversion of money into a commodity.
4:35:12
Speaker 4: The apparently single process is in reality a double one.
4:35:16
Speaker 4: For the pole of the commodity owner, it is a sale.
4:35:19
Speaker 4: From the opposite pole of the money owner, it is
4:35:22
Speaker 4: a purchase. In other words, a sale is a purchase.
4:35:27
Speaker 4: C two M is also M to C. Footnote quote
4:35:33
Speaker 4: to an event at a shaw, every sale is a
4:35:36
Speaker 4: purchase end quote Doctor Quesny, Diologue sur la commerce e
4:35:43
Speaker 4: la trevo des artizan physiocrats descient dere premiere partis Paris,
4:35:50
Speaker 4: eighteen forty six, page one seventy or as Quesne in
4:35:54
Speaker 4: his Maximeae Generales puts it vendre eight aschatee to sell
4:36:02
Speaker 4: is to buy. End footnote. Up to this point we
4:36:07
Speaker 4: have considered men in only one economic capacity, that of
4:36:11
Speaker 4: owners of commodities, a capacity in which they appropriate the
4:36:15
Speaker 4: produce of the labor of others by alienating that of
4:36:18
Speaker 4: their own labor. Hence, for one commodity owner to meet
4:36:22
Speaker 4: with another who has money, it is necessary either that
4:36:26
Speaker 4: the product of the labor of the latter person, the buyer,
4:36:28
Speaker 4: should be in itself money should be gold, the material
4:36:32
Speaker 4: of which money consists, or that his product should already
4:36:36
Speaker 4: have changed its skin and have stripped off its original
4:36:39
Speaker 4: form of a useful object, in order that it may
4:36:42
Speaker 4: play the part of money. Gold must, of course enter
4:36:45
Speaker 4: the market at some point or other. This point is
4:36:48
Speaker 4: to be found at the source of production of the metal,
4:36:51
Speaker 4: at which place gold is bartered as the immediate product
4:36:54
Speaker 4: of labor for some other product of equal value. From
4:36:59
Speaker 4: that moment it always represents the realized price of some commodity.
4:37:05
Speaker 4: Footnote Le prix don merchandise ner pouven et trepeier que
4:37:10
Speaker 4: par la prix don ultra merchandise mercier de la riviere
4:37:16
Speaker 4: lorder and naturale etescential de societe politique. The price of
4:37:21
Speaker 4: one commodity can only be paid by the price of
4:37:24
Speaker 4: another commodity fisiocat addison der Dusian partis, page five fifty
4:37:30
Speaker 4: four end footnote. Apart from its exchange for other commodities
4:37:36
Speaker 4: at the source of its production. Gold, in whosoever hands
4:37:39
Speaker 4: it may be, is the transformed shape of some commodity
4:37:42
Speaker 4: alienated by its owner. It is the product of a sale,
4:37:46
Speaker 4: or of the first metamorphosis c.
4:37:48
Speaker 1: Two m.
4:37:50
Speaker 4: Footnote pours vois cet urjean il faut vois vendus. In
4:37:56
Speaker 4: order to have this money, one must have made a
4:37:59
Speaker 4: sale local Scitato, page five forty three. Gold, as we saw,
4:38:06
Speaker 4: became ideal money or a measure of values in consequence
4:38:10
Speaker 4: of all commodities measuring their values by it, and thus
4:38:13
Speaker 4: contrasting it ideally with their natural shape as useful objects,
4:38:17
Speaker 4: and making it the shape of their value. It became
4:38:20
Speaker 4: real money by the general alienation of commodities, by actually
4:38:24
Speaker 4: changing places with their natural forms as useful objects, and
4:38:28
Speaker 4: thus becoming in reality the embodiment of their values. When
4:38:33
Speaker 4: they assumed this money shape, commodities strip off every trace
4:38:36
Speaker 4: of their natural use value and of the particular kind
4:38:40
Speaker 4: of labor to which they owe their creation, in order
4:38:43
Speaker 4: to transform themselves into the uniform, socially recognized incarnation of
4:38:47
Speaker 4: homogeneous human labor. We cannot tell from the mere look
4:38:52
Speaker 4: of a piece of money for what particular commodity it
4:38:54
Speaker 4: has been exchanged. Under their money form. All commodities look alike.
4:39:00
Speaker 4: Hence money may be dirt, although dirt is not money.
4:39:05
Speaker 4: We will assume that the two gold pieces in consideration
4:39:08
Speaker 4: of which our weaver has parted with his linen are
4:39:11
Speaker 4: the metamorphosed shape of a quarter of wheat. The sale
4:39:15
Speaker 4: of the linen C to M is at the same
4:39:18
Speaker 4: time its purchase M to C. But the sale is
4:39:22
Speaker 4: the first act of a process that ends with a
4:39:25
Speaker 4: transaction of an opposite nature, namely the purchase of a bible.
4:39:29
Speaker 4: The purchase of the linen, on the other hand, ends
4:39:32
Speaker 4: a movement that began with a transaction of the opposite nature,
4:39:36
Speaker 4: namely with the sale of the wheat C to M,
4:39:40
Speaker 4: linen to money, which is the first phase of C
4:39:43
Speaker 4: to M prime to CE, linen to money to bible
4:39:47
Speaker 4: is also M to CE, money to linen, the last
4:39:51
Speaker 4: phase of another movement C to M to C wheat
4:39:55
Speaker 4: to money to linen. The first metamorphosis of one commodity,
4:40:00
Speaker 4: its transformation from a commodity into money, is therefore also
4:40:04
Speaker 4: invariably the second metamorphosis of some other commodity. The re
4:40:08
Speaker 4: transformation of the latter from money into a commodity footnote.
4:40:15
Speaker 4: As before remarked, the actual producer of gold or silver
4:40:19
Speaker 4: forms an exception he exchanges his product directly for another
4:40:23
Speaker 4: commodity without having first sold it, and footnote m to
4:40:30
Speaker 4: c or purchase the second and concluding metamorphosis of a commodity.
4:40:37
Speaker 4: Because money is the metamorphosed shape of all other commodities,
4:40:41
Speaker 4: the result of their general alienation. For this reason, it
4:40:45
Speaker 4: is alienable itself without restriction or condition. It reads all
4:40:50
Speaker 4: prices backwards, and thus, so to say, depicts itself in
4:40:53
Speaker 4: the bodies of all other commodities, which offer to it
4:40:56
Speaker 4: the material for the realization of its own use value.
4:41:01
Speaker 4: At the same time, the prices wooing glances cast at
4:41:04
Speaker 4: money by commodities define the limits of its convertibility by
4:41:08
Speaker 4: pointing to its quantity. Since every commodity, on becoming money
4:41:13
Speaker 4: disappears as a commodity, it is impossible to tell from
4:41:17
Speaker 4: the money itself how it got into the hands of
4:41:20
Speaker 4: its possessor, or what article has been changed into it.
4:41:24
Speaker 4: No no let from whatever source it may come representing
4:41:29
Speaker 4: on the one hand, a sold commodity, it represents, on
4:41:32
Speaker 4: the other a commodity to be bought. Footnote see largent
4:41:38
Speaker 4: represent do'noumin les Chau's quesneuve prouvon des rey d'ur chate
4:41:44
Speaker 4: ilier represent o cill le Chau's quesnoudauvent vendu pour set argent.
4:41:50
Speaker 4: If money represents in our hands the things we can
4:41:53
Speaker 4: wish to buy, it also represents the things we have
4:41:56
Speaker 4: sold to obtain that money. End quote Ercier de la riviere,
4:42:01
Speaker 4: Loco Stato, page five eighty six. M to C a
4:42:07
Speaker 4: purchase is at the same time C to M a sale.
4:42:11
Speaker 4: The concluding metamorphosis of one commodity is the first metamorphosis
4:42:16
Speaker 4: of another. With regard to our weaver, the life of
4:42:19
Speaker 4: his commodity ends with the Bible into which he has
4:42:22
Speaker 4: reconverted to his two pounds sterling. But suppose the seller
4:42:26
Speaker 4: of the Bible turns the two pounds sterling set free
4:42:29
Speaker 4: by the weaver into brandy. M to C. The concluding
4:42:33
Speaker 4: phase of C to M to C Linen to money
4:42:36
Speaker 4: to Bible is also C to M. The first phase
4:42:39
Speaker 4: of C to M to C Bible to money to brandy.
4:42:43
Speaker 4: The producer of a particular commodity has that one article
4:42:46
Speaker 4: alone to offer. This he sells very often in large quantities,
4:42:51
Speaker 4: but his many and various wants compel him to split
4:42:54
Speaker 4: up the price realized the sum of money set free
4:42:58
Speaker 4: into numerous purchases. Hence, a sayal leads to many purchases
4:43:02
Speaker 4: of various articles. The concluding metamorphosis of a commodity thus
4:43:08
Speaker 4: constitutes an aggregation of first metamorphoses of various other commodities.
4:43:14
Speaker 4: If we now consider the completed metamorphosis of a commodity
4:43:18
Speaker 4: as a whole, it appears in the first place that
4:43:21
Speaker 4: it is made up of two opposite and complementary movements
4:43:24
Speaker 4: C to M and M to C. These two antithetical
4:43:28
Speaker 4: transmutations of a commodity are brought about by two antithetical
4:43:32
Speaker 4: social acts on part of the owner, and these acts,
4:43:35
Speaker 4: in their turn, stamp the character of the economic parts
4:43:38
Speaker 4: played by him. As the person who makes a sale,
4:43:41
Speaker 4: he is a seller. As the person who makes a purchase,
4:43:45
Speaker 4: he is a buyer. But just as upon every such
4:43:49
Speaker 4: transmutation of a commodity, its two forms, commodity form and
4:43:54
Speaker 4: money form exist simultaneously but at opposite polls. So every
4:43:59
Speaker 4: seller has a buyer opposed to him, and every buyer
4:44:02
Speaker 4: a seller. While one particular commodity is going through its
4:44:06
Speaker 4: two transmutations in succession, from a commodity into money, and
4:44:11
Speaker 4: from money into another commodity. The owner of the commodity
4:44:14
Speaker 4: changes in succession his part from that of seller to
4:44:17
Speaker 4: that of buyer. These characters of seller and buyer are
4:44:21
Speaker 4: therefore not permanent, but attach themselves in turns to the
4:44:24
Speaker 4: various persons engaged in the circulation of commodities. The complete
4:44:29
Speaker 4: metamorphosis of a commodity in its simplest form implies four
4:44:33
Speaker 4: extremes and three dramatic person i. First, a commodity comes
4:44:37
Speaker 4: face to face with money. The latter is the form
4:44:40
Speaker 4: taken by the value of the former, and exists in
4:44:42
Speaker 4: all its hard reality in the pocket of the buyer.
4:44:45
Speaker 4: A commodity owner is thus brought into contact with a
4:44:48
Speaker 4: possessor of money. So soon now as the commodity has
4:44:51
Speaker 4: been changed into money, the money becomes its transient equivalent form,
4:44:56
Speaker 4: the use value of which equivalent form is to be
4:44:58
Speaker 4: found in the bodies of others commodities money. The final
4:45:02
Speaker 4: term of the first transmutation is at the same time
4:45:06
Speaker 4: the starting point for the second. The person who is
4:45:09
Speaker 4: a seller in the first transaction thus becomes a buyer
4:45:12
Speaker 4: in the second, in which a third commodity owner appears
4:45:15
Speaker 4: on the scene as a seller. Footnote quote iliadnt quatretin
4:45:21
Speaker 4: etois contracton do nin intervienne du fois. There are therefore
4:45:26
Speaker 4: four terms and three contracting parties, one of whom intervenes twice.
4:45:31
Speaker 4: End quote the trasna loco scitato, page nine O nine
4:45:36
Speaker 4: end footnote. The two phases, each inverse to the other,
4:45:40
Speaker 4: that make up the metamorphosis of commodity constitute together a
4:45:43
Speaker 4: circular movement, a circuit commodity form, stripping off of this
4:45:48
Speaker 4: form and return to the commodity form. No doubt, the
4:45:52
Speaker 4: commodity appears here under two different aspects. At the starting point,
4:45:57
Speaker 4: it is not a use value to its owner. At
4:46:00
Speaker 4: the finishing point, it is so too. The money appears
4:46:04
Speaker 4: in the first phase as a solid crystal of value,
4:46:07
Speaker 4: a crystal into which the commodity eagerly solidifies, and in
4:46:11
Speaker 4: the second dissolves into the mere transient equivalent form destined
4:46:15
Speaker 4: to be replaced by a use value. The two metamorphoses
4:46:19
Speaker 4: constituting the circuit are at the same time two inverse
4:46:23
Speaker 4: partial metamorphoses of two other commodities. One on the same commodity,
4:46:28
Speaker 4: the linen opens the series of its own metamorphoses and
4:46:31
Speaker 4: completes the metamorphosis of another, the wheat. In the first
4:46:36
Speaker 4: phase or sale, the linen plays these two parts in
4:46:39
Speaker 4: its own person, but then changed into gold, it completes
4:46:44
Speaker 4: its own second and final metamorphosis, and helps at the
4:46:48
Speaker 4: same time to accomplish the first metamorphosis of a third commodity. Hence,
4:46:53
Speaker 4: the circuit made by one commodity in the course of
4:46:55
Speaker 4: its metamorphoses is inextricably mixed with the circuits of other commodities.
4:47:01
Speaker 4: The total of all the different circuits constitutes the circulation
4:47:06
Speaker 4: of commodities. The circulation of commodities differs from the direct
4:47:10
Speaker 4: exchange of products barter not only in form, but in substance.
4:47:16
Speaker 4: Only consider the course of events. The weaver has, as
4:47:19
Speaker 4: a matter of fact, exchanged his linen for a bible,
4:47:23
Speaker 4: his own commodity for that of someone else. But this
4:47:26
Speaker 4: is true only so far as he himself is concerned.
4:47:29
Speaker 4: The seller of the bible, who prefers something to warm
4:47:32
Speaker 4: his inside, no more thought of exchanging his bible for
4:47:35
Speaker 4: linen than our weaver knew that wheat had been exchanged
4:47:38
Speaker 4: for his linen. B's commodity replaces that of A. But
4:47:42
Speaker 4: A and B do not mutually exchange those commodities. It may,
4:47:46
Speaker 4: of course happen that A and B make simultaneous purchases
4:47:50
Speaker 4: the one from the other, but such exceptional transactions are
4:47:54
Speaker 4: by no means the necessary result of the general conditions
4:47:58
Speaker 4: of the circulation of commodity. We see here, on the
4:48:03
Speaker 4: one hand, how the exchange of commodities breaks through all
4:48:06
Speaker 4: local and personal bounds, inseparable from direct barter, and develops
4:48:11
Speaker 4: the circulation of the products of social labor, and on
4:48:15
Speaker 4: the other hand, how it develops a whole network of
4:48:17
Speaker 4: social relations, spontaneous in their growth and entirely beyond the
4:48:21
Speaker 4: control of the actors. It is only because the farmer
4:48:25
Speaker 4: has sold his wheat, that the weaver is enabled to
4:48:27
Speaker 4: sell his linen. Only because the weaver has sold his
4:48:30
Speaker 4: linen that our hotspur is enabled to sell his bible,
4:48:34
Speaker 4: And only because the latter has sold the water of
4:48:36
Speaker 4: everlasting life, that the distiller is enabled to sell his
4:48:40
Speaker 4: ou de v and so on. The process of circulation therefore,
4:48:46
Speaker 4: does not, like direct border, products, become extinguished upon the
4:48:50
Speaker 4: use values changing places and hands. The money does not
4:48:53
Speaker 4: finish on dropping out of the circuit of the metamorphosis
4:48:56
Speaker 4: of a given commodity. It is constantly being precipitated into
4:49:00
Speaker 4: new places in the arena of circulation vacated by other commodities.
4:49:06
Speaker 4: In the complete metamorphosis of the linen, for example, linen
4:49:09
Speaker 4: to money to Bible, the linen first falls out of
4:49:12
Speaker 4: circulation and money steps into its place. Then the Bible
4:49:16
Speaker 4: falls out of circulation, and again money takes its place.
4:49:20
Speaker 4: When one commodity replaces another, the money commodity always sticks
4:49:24
Speaker 4: to the hands of some third person. Footnote. Self evident
4:49:30
Speaker 4: as this may be, it is nevertheless, for the most
4:49:33
Speaker 4: part unobserved by political economists, and especially by the quote
4:49:38
Speaker 4: free trader. Vulgaris end quote end footnote. Circulation sweats money
4:49:44
Speaker 4: from every pore. Nothing can be more childish than the
4:49:48
Speaker 4: dogma that, because every sale is a purchase, and every
4:49:51
Speaker 4: purchase a sale, therefore the circulation of commodities necessarily implies
4:49:56
Speaker 4: an equilibrium of sales and purchases. If this means that
4:49:59
Speaker 4: the the number of actual sales is equal to the
4:50:02
Speaker 4: number of purchases, it is mere tautology, but its real
4:50:06
Speaker 4: purport is to prove that every seller brings his buyer
4:50:08
Speaker 4: to market with him nothing of the kind. The sale
4:50:12
Speaker 4: and the purchase constitute one identical act, an exchange between
4:50:15
Speaker 4: a commodity owner and an owner of money between two
4:50:18
Speaker 4: persons as opposed to each other. As the two poles
4:50:21
Speaker 4: of a magnet, they form two distinct acts of polar
4:50:25
Speaker 4: and opposite characters when performed by one single person. Hence,
4:50:29
Speaker 4: the identity of sale and purchase implies that the commodity
4:50:32
Speaker 4: is useless if, on being thrown into the alchemistical retort
4:50:36
Speaker 4: of circulation, it does not come out again in the
4:50:39
Speaker 4: shape of money. If, in other words, it cannot be
4:50:43
Speaker 4: sold by its owner and therefore be bought by the
4:50:45
Speaker 4: owner of the money. That identity further implies that the exchange,
4:50:50
Speaker 4: if it do take place, constitutes a period of rest
4:50:53
Speaker 4: in interval long or short in the life of the commodity.
4:50:58
Speaker 4: Since the first metamorphosis of a go commodity is at
4:51:00
Speaker 4: once a sale and a purchase, it is also an
4:51:03
Speaker 4: independent process in itself. The purchaser has the commodity, this
4:51:07
Speaker 4: seller has the money, i e. A commodity ready to
4:51:11
Speaker 4: go into circulation at any time. No one can sell
4:51:14
Speaker 4: unless someone else purchases, but no one is forthwith bound
4:51:18
Speaker 4: to purchase because he has just sold. Circulation bursts through
4:51:22
Speaker 4: all restrictions as to time, place, and individuals imposed by
4:51:26
Speaker 4: direct barter, and this it affects by splitting up into
4:51:29
Speaker 4: the antithesis of sale and a purchase. The direct identity
4:51:33
Speaker 4: that in barter does exist between the alienation of one's
4:51:36
Speaker 4: own and the acquisition of some other man's product. To
4:51:40
Speaker 4: say that these two independent and antithetical acts have an
4:51:44
Speaker 4: intrinsic unity are essentially one is the same to say
4:51:47
Speaker 4: that this intrinsic oneness expresses itself in an external antithesis.
4:51:53
Speaker 4: If the interval in time between the two complementary phases
4:51:56
Speaker 4: of the complete metamorphosis of a commodity become too great,
4:52:00
Speaker 4: if the split between the sale and the purchase become
4:52:03
Speaker 4: too pronounced, the intimate connection between them their oneness asserts
4:52:08
Speaker 4: itself by producing a crisis. The antithesis use value and value.
4:52:15
Speaker 4: The contradictions that private labours bound to manifest itself as
4:52:19
Speaker 4: direct social labour, that a particularized, concrete kind of labour
4:52:22
Speaker 4: has to pass for abstract human labour. The contradiction between
4:52:27
Speaker 4: the personification of objects and the representation of persons by things.
4:52:31
Speaker 4: All these antitheses and contradictions which are imminent in commodities,
4:52:36
Speaker 4: assert themselves and develop their modes of motion in the
4:52:39
Speaker 4: antithetical phases of the metamorphosis of a commodity. These modes
4:52:43
Speaker 4: therefore imply the possibility and no more than the possibility
4:52:47
Speaker 4: of crises. The conversion of this mere possibility into a
4:52:52
Speaker 4: reality is the result of a long series of relations that,
4:52:55
Speaker 4: from our present standpoint of simple circulation, have as yet
4:52:59
Speaker 4: no existence footnote see my observations on James mill in
4:53:03
Speaker 4: cur Critique et cetera, Pages seventy four to seventy six.
4:53:07
Speaker 4: With regard to this subject, we may notice two methods
4:53:10
Speaker 4: characteristic of apologetic economy. The first is the identification of
4:53:14
Speaker 4: the circulation of commodities with the direct barter of products
4:53:18
Speaker 4: by simple abstraction from their points of difference. The second
4:53:22
Speaker 4: is the attempts to explain away the contradictions of capitalists
4:53:25
Speaker 4: production by reducing the relations between the persons engaged in
4:53:28
Speaker 4: that mode of production to the simple relations arising out
4:53:32
Speaker 4: of the circulation of commodities. The production and circulation of
4:53:36
Speaker 4: commodities are, however, phenomenon that occur to a greater or
4:53:40
Speaker 4: less extent in modes of production the most diverse. If
4:53:43
Speaker 4: we are acquainted with nothing but the abstract categories of circulation,
4:53:47
Speaker 4: which are common to all these modes of production, we
4:53:50
Speaker 4: cannot possibly know anything of these specific points of difference
4:53:53
Speaker 4: of these modes, nor pronounce any judgment upon them. In
4:53:57
Speaker 4: no science is such a big fuss made with the
4:54:00
Speaker 4: commonplace trosens as in political economy, for instance, JBSA sets
4:54:05
Speaker 4: himself up as a judge of crises, because forsooth he
4:54:09
Speaker 4: knows that a commodity is a product. End a footnote,
4:54:15
Speaker 4: end of Chapter three, Section two A of Capital, Volume one,
4:54:20
Speaker 4: Part one, Commodities and Money. Chapter three, Money or the
4:54:26
Speaker 4: Circulation of Commodities, Section two The medium of circulation b
4:54:35
Speaker 4: the currency of money. There is a footnote on the
4:54:39
Speaker 4: word currency. Translator's note. This word is here used in
4:54:45
Speaker 4: its original signification of the course or track pursued by
4:54:49
Speaker 4: money as it changes from hand to hand, a course
4:54:52
Speaker 4: which essentially differs from circulation. End footnote. The change of
4:54:59
Speaker 4: form C to M to C by which the circulation
4:55:03
Speaker 4: of the material products of labour is brought about requires
4:55:07
Speaker 4: that a given value in the shape of a commodity,
4:55:10
Speaker 4: shall begin the process, and shall also, in the shape
4:55:13
Speaker 4: of a commodity, end it. The movement of the commodity
4:55:18
Speaker 4: is therefore a circuit. On the other hand, the form
4:55:22
Speaker 4: of this movement precludes a circuit from being made by
4:55:25
Speaker 4: the money. The result is not the return of the money,
4:55:30
Speaker 4: but its continued removal further and further away from its
4:55:33
Speaker 4: starting point. So long as the seller sticks fast to
4:55:38
Speaker 4: his money, which is the transformed shape of his commodity,
4:55:42
Speaker 4: that commodity is still in the first phase of its
4:55:45
Speaker 4: metamorphosis and has completed only half its course. But so
4:55:51
Speaker 4: soon as he completes the process, so soon as he
4:55:54
Speaker 4: supplements his sale by a purchase, the money again leaves
4:55:58
Speaker 4: the hands of its possessor. It is true that if
4:56:02
Speaker 4: the weaver, after buying the Bible, sell more linen, money
4:56:06
Speaker 4: comes back into his hands. But this return is not
4:56:10
Speaker 4: owing to the circulation of the first twenty yards of linen.
4:56:13
Speaker 4: That circulation resulted in the money getting into the hands
4:56:16
Speaker 4: of the seller of the bible. The return of money
4:56:20
Speaker 4: into the hands of the weaver is brought about only
4:56:22
Speaker 4: by the renewal or repetition of the process of circulation
4:56:26
Speaker 4: with a fresh commodity, which renewed process ends with the
4:56:30
Speaker 4: same result as its predecessor did. Hence, the movement directly
4:56:36
Speaker 4: imparted to money by the circulation of commodities takes the
4:56:40
Speaker 4: form of a constant motion away from its starting point,
4:56:43
Speaker 4: of a course from the hands of one commodity owner
4:56:46
Speaker 4: into those of another. This course constitutes its currency corps
4:56:51
Speaker 4: de la monet. The currency of money is the constant
4:56:57
Speaker 4: and monotonous repetition of the same process. The commodity is
4:57:02
Speaker 4: always in the hands of the seller, the money as
4:57:05
Speaker 4: a means of purchase, always in the hands of the buyer,
4:57:08
Speaker 4: and money serves as a means of purchase by realising
4:57:12
Speaker 4: the price of the commodity. This realization transfers the commodity
4:57:17
Speaker 4: from the seller to the buyer and removes the money
4:57:20
Speaker 4: from the hand of the buyer into those of the seller,
4:57:23
Speaker 4: where it again goes through the same process with another commodity.
4:57:28
Speaker 4: That this one sided character of the money's motion arises
4:57:32
Speaker 4: out of the two sided character of the commodity's motion.
4:57:35
Speaker 4: Is a circumstance that is veiled over the very nature
4:57:41
Speaker 4: of the circulation of commodities, begets the opposite appearance. The
4:57:46
Speaker 4: first metamorphosis of a commodity is visible not only in
4:57:50
Speaker 4: the money's movement, but also in that of the commodity itself.
4:57:55
Speaker 4: In the second metamorphosis, on the contrary, the movement appears
4:57:59
Speaker 4: to us as the movement of the money alone. In
4:58:03
Speaker 4: the first phase of its circulation, the commodity changes place
4:58:06
Speaker 4: of money. Thereupon, the commodity, under its aspect as a
4:58:11
Speaker 4: useful object, falls out of circulation into consumption footnote. Even
4:58:18
Speaker 4: when the commodity is sold over and over again, a
4:58:21
Speaker 4: phenomenon that at present has no existence for us, it
4:58:25
Speaker 4: falls one definitely sold for the last time, out of
4:58:29
Speaker 4: the sphere of circulation into that of consumption, where it
4:58:33
Speaker 4: serves either as a means of subsistence or means of
4:58:37
Speaker 4: production and footnote. In its stead we have its value
4:58:43
Speaker 4: shape the money. It then goes through the second phase
4:58:47
Speaker 4: of its circulation, not under its own natural shape, but
4:58:51
Speaker 4: under the shape of money. The continuity of the movement
4:58:55
Speaker 4: is therefore kept up by the money alone, and the
4:58:58
Speaker 4: same movement that as regards which the commodity consists of
4:59:01
Speaker 4: two processes of an antithetical character, is one considered as
4:59:06
Speaker 4: the movement of the money always one, and the same
4:59:09
Speaker 4: process a continued change of places with ever fresh commodities. Hence,
4:59:16
Speaker 4: the result brought about by the circulation of commodities, namely,
4:59:20
Speaker 4: the replacing of one commodity by another, takes the appearance
4:59:23
Speaker 4: of having been affected not by means of the change
4:59:26
Speaker 4: of form of the commodities, but rather by the money
4:59:30
Speaker 4: acting as a medium of circulation, by an action that
4:59:34
Speaker 4: circulates commodities to all appearance motionless in themselves, and transfers
4:59:40
Speaker 4: them from hands in which they are non use values
4:59:43
Speaker 4: to hands in which there are use values, and that
4:59:46
Speaker 4: in a direction constantly opposed to the direction of the money.
4:59:50
Speaker 4: The latter is continually withdrawing commodities from circulation and stepping
4:59:55
Speaker 4: into their places, and in this way continually moving further
4:59:59
Speaker 4: and further from its starting point. Hence, although the movement
5:00:04
Speaker 4: of the money is merely the expression of the circulation
5:00:06
Speaker 4: of commodities, yet the contrary appears to be the actual fact,
5:00:11
Speaker 4: and the circulation of commodities seems to be the result
5:00:14
Speaker 4: of the movement of the money. Footnote quote it money
5:00:20
Speaker 4: has no other motion than that imparted to it by
5:00:24
Speaker 4: the products end quote. The Trasna Loco citato, page eight
5:00:31
Speaker 4: eighty five, end footnote. Again, money functions as a means
5:00:37
Speaker 4: of circulation only because in it the values of commodities
5:00:41
Speaker 4: have independent reality. Hence, its movement as the medium of
5:00:46
Speaker 4: circulation is in fact merely the movement of commodities while
5:00:51
Speaker 4: changing their forms. This fact must therefore make itself plainly
5:00:55
Speaker 4: visible in the currency of money. Thus, the linen, for instance,
5:01:00
Speaker 4: first of all, changes its commodity form into its money
5:01:03
Speaker 4: form the second term of its first metamorphosis, C to M.
5:01:09
Speaker 4: The money form then becomes the first term of its
5:01:12
Speaker 4: final metamorphosis, M to C its reconversion into the Bible.
5:01:18
Speaker 4: But each of these two changes of form is accomplished
5:01:21
Speaker 4: by an exchange between commodity and money by their reciprocal displacement.
5:01:27
Speaker 4: The same pieces of coin come into the cellar sand
5:01:30
Speaker 4: as the alienated form of the commodity, and leave it
5:01:34
Speaker 4: as the absolutely alienable form of the commodity. They are
5:01:38
Speaker 4: displaced twice. The first metamorphosis of the linen puts these
5:01:43
Speaker 4: coins into the weaver's pocket, the second draws them out
5:01:46
Speaker 4: of it. The two inverse changes undergone by the same
5:01:51
Speaker 4: commodity are reflected in the displacement twice repeated, but in
5:01:55
Speaker 4: opposite directions, of the same pieces of coin. If, on
5:02:00
Speaker 4: the contrary, only one phase of the metamorphosis is gone through.
5:02:05
Speaker 4: If there are only sales or only purchases, then a
5:02:09
Speaker 4: given piece of money changes its place only once. Its
5:02:13
Speaker 4: second change of place always expresses the second metamorphosis of
5:02:17
Speaker 4: the commodity, its reconversion from money. The frequent repetition of
5:02:23
Speaker 4: the displacement of the same coins reflects not only the
5:02:26
Speaker 4: series of metamorphoses that a single commodity has gone through,
5:02:31
Speaker 4: but also the inter twenty of the innumerable metamorphoses in
5:02:35
Speaker 4: the world of commodities in general. It is a matter
5:02:39
Speaker 4: of course that all this is applicable to the simple
5:02:43
Speaker 4: circulation of commodities alone, the only form that we are
5:02:47
Speaker 4: now considering. Every commodity, when it first steps into circulation
5:02:53
Speaker 4: and undergoes its first change of form, does so only
5:02:57
Speaker 4: to fall out of circulation again and to be replaced
5:03:00
Speaker 4: other commodities. Money. On the contrary, as the medium of
5:03:04
Speaker 4: circulation keeps continually within the sphere of circulation and moves
5:03:09
Speaker 4: about in it. The question therefore arises how much money
5:03:13
Speaker 4: the sphere constantly absorbs in a given country, there take
5:03:18
Speaker 4: place every day at the same time, but in different localities,
5:03:22
Speaker 4: one sided metamorphoses of commodities, or in other words, numerous
5:03:26
Speaker 4: sales and numerous purchases. The commodities are equated beforehand in
5:03:31
Speaker 4: imagination by their prices to definite quantities of money. And
5:03:36
Speaker 4: since in the form of circulation now under consideration, money
5:03:40
Speaker 4: and commodities always come bodily face to face, one at
5:03:44
Speaker 4: the positive pole of purchase, the other at the negative
5:03:47
Speaker 4: pole of sale, it is clear that the amount of
5:03:51
Speaker 4: the means of circulation required is determined beforehand by the
5:03:54
Speaker 4: sum of the prices of all these commodities. As a
5:03:59
Speaker 4: matter of fact, the money in reality represents the quantity
5:04:03
Speaker 4: or sum of gold, ideally expressed beforehand by the sum
5:04:06
Speaker 4: of the prices of the commodities. The equality of these
5:04:10
Speaker 4: two sums is therefore self evident. We know, however, that
5:04:15
Speaker 4: the values of commodities, remaining constant, their prices vary with
5:04:19
Speaker 4: the value of gold, the material of money, rising in
5:04:22
Speaker 4: proportion as it falls, and falling in proportion as it rises. Now,
5:04:27
Speaker 4: if in consequent of such a rise or fall in
5:04:30
Speaker 4: the value of gold, the sum of the prices of
5:04:33
Speaker 4: commodities fall or rise, the quantity of money and currency
5:04:37
Speaker 4: must fall or rise to the same extent. The change
5:04:41
Speaker 4: in the quantity of the circulating medium is. In this case,
5:04:45
Speaker 4: it is true caused by the money itself, yet not
5:04:48
Speaker 4: in virtue of its function as a medium of circulation,
5:04:51
Speaker 4: but of its function as a measure of value. First,
5:04:56
Speaker 4: the price of commodities varies inversely as the value of
5:04:59
Speaker 4: the money, and then the quantity of the medium of
5:05:02
Speaker 4: circulation varies directly as the price of commodities. Exactly the
5:05:07
Speaker 4: same thing would happen if, for instance, instead of the
5:05:10
Speaker 4: value of gold falling, gold were replaced by silver as
5:05:13
Speaker 4: the measure of value, or if, instead of the value
5:05:16
Speaker 4: of silver rising, gold were to thrust silver out from
5:05:19
Speaker 4: being the measure of value. In the one case, more
5:05:23
Speaker 4: silver would be current than gold was before. In the
5:05:26
Speaker 4: other case, less gold would be current than silver was before.
5:05:31
Speaker 4: In each case, the value of the material of money,
5:05:33
Speaker 4: i e. The value of the commodity that serves as
5:05:36
Speaker 4: the measure of value, would have undergone a change, and
5:05:39
Speaker 4: therefore so too would the prices of commodities which express
5:05:43
Speaker 4: their values in money, And so too would the quantity
5:05:46
Speaker 4: of money current whose function it is to realize those prices.
5:05:51
Speaker 4: We have already seen that the sphere of circulation has
5:05:54
Speaker 4: an opening through which gold, or the material of money,
5:05:58
Speaker 4: generally enters into it as a commodity with a given value. Hence,
5:06:04
Speaker 4: when money enters on its function as a measure of value,
5:06:07
Speaker 4: when it expresses prices, its value is already determined. If
5:06:13
Speaker 4: now its value fall, this fact is first evidenced by
5:06:16
Speaker 4: a change in the prices of those commodities that are
5:06:19
Speaker 4: directly bartered for the precious metals at the sources of
5:06:21
Speaker 4: their production. The greater part of all other commodities, especially
5:06:27
Speaker 4: in the imperfectly developed stages of civil society, will continue
5:06:31
Speaker 4: for a long time to be estimated by the former,
5:06:33
Speaker 4: antiquated and illusory value of the measure of value. Nevertheless,
5:06:39
Speaker 4: one commodity infects another through their common value relation, so
5:06:43
Speaker 4: that their prices expressed in gold or in silver, gradually
5:06:47
Speaker 4: settle down into the proportion determined by their comparative values,
5:06:51
Speaker 4: until finally the values of all commodities are estimated in
5:06:54
Speaker 4: terms of the new value of the metal that constitutes money.
5:06:59
Speaker 4: This process is accompanied by the continued increase in the
5:07:02
Speaker 4: quantity of the precious metals an increase caused by their
5:07:06
Speaker 4: streaming in to replace the articles directly bartered for them
5:07:09
Speaker 4: at their sources of production in proportion. Therefore, as commodities
5:07:14
Speaker 4: in general acquire their true prices in proportion as their
5:07:17
Speaker 4: values become estimated according to the fallen value of the
5:07:21
Speaker 4: precious metal in the same proportion, the quantity of that
5:07:24
Speaker 4: metal necessary for realizing those new prices is provided beforehand.
5:07:29
Speaker 4: A one sided observation of the results that followed upon
5:07:33
Speaker 4: the discovery of fresh supplies of gold and silver led
5:07:36
Speaker 4: some economists in the seventeenth and particularly in the eighteenth century,
5:07:40
Speaker 4: to the false conclusion that the prices of commodities had
5:07:43
Speaker 4: gone up in consequence of the increased quantity of gold
5:07:46
Speaker 4: and silver serving as the means of circulation. In the following,
5:07:51
Speaker 4: the value of gold will be taken as a given,
5:07:54
Speaker 4: as in fact it is at the moment when we
5:07:56
Speaker 4: estimate the price of a commodity on this supposition, then
5:08:01
Speaker 4: the quantity of the medium's circulation is determined by the
5:08:04
Speaker 4: sum of the prices that have to be realized. If
5:08:08
Speaker 4: now we further suppose the price of each commodity to
5:08:11
Speaker 4: be given the sum of the prices clearly depends on
5:08:15
Speaker 4: the mass of commodities in circulation. It requires but little
5:08:19
Speaker 4: racking of brains to comprehend that if one quarter of
5:08:22
Speaker 4: wheat costs two pound sterling, one hundred quarters will cost
5:08:27
Speaker 4: two hundred pound sterling, two hundred quarters four hundred pounds sterling,
5:08:33
Speaker 4: and so on that consequently, the quantity of money that
5:08:37
Speaker 4: changes place with the wheat one sold must increase with
5:08:40
Speaker 4: the quantity of that wheat. If the mass of commodities
5:08:44
Speaker 4: remain constant, the quantity of circulating money varies with the
5:08:48
Speaker 4: fluctuations in the prices of those commodities. It increases and
5:08:52
Speaker 4: diminishes because the sum of the prices increases or diminishes
5:08:56
Speaker 4: in consequence of the change of price. To produce this effect,
5:09:01
Speaker 4: it is by no means requisite that the prices of
5:09:03
Speaker 4: all commodities should rise or fall simultaneously. A rise or
5:09:08
Speaker 4: fall in the prices of a number of leading articles
5:09:11
Speaker 4: is sufficient in the one case to increase, in the
5:09:14
Speaker 4: other to diminish the sum of the prices of all commodities,
5:09:18
Speaker 4: and therefore to put more or less money in circulation.
5:09:23
Speaker 4: Whether the change in the price correspond to an actual
5:09:26
Speaker 4: change of value in the commodities, or whether it be
5:09:28
Speaker 4: the result of mere fluctuations in market prices, the effect
5:09:33
Speaker 4: on the quantity of the medium in circulation remains the same.
5:09:38
Speaker 4: Suppose the following articles are to be sold or partially
5:09:41
Speaker 4: metamorphosed simultaneously in different localities, say one quarter of wheat,
5:09:47
Speaker 4: two hundred yards of linen, one bible, and four gallons
5:09:51
Speaker 4: of brandy. If the price of each article be two
5:09:56
Speaker 4: pounds sterling, and the sum of the prices to be
5:09:58
Speaker 4: realised be consequently eight pound sterling, it follows that eight
5:10:02
Speaker 4: pounds sterling in money must go into circulation. If, on
5:10:07
Speaker 4: the other hand, these same articles are links in the
5:10:10
Speaker 4: following chain of metamorphoses one quarter of wheat to two
5:10:14
Speaker 4: pound sterling, two twenty yards of linen, two two pound
5:10:18
Speaker 4: sterling to one bible to two pound sterling, two four
5:10:23
Speaker 4: gallons of brandy to two pound sterling, a chain that
5:10:27
Speaker 4: is already well known to us. In that case, the
5:10:30
Speaker 4: two pound sterling caused the different commodities to circulate one
5:10:33
Speaker 4: after the other, and after realizing their prices successively, and
5:10:38
Speaker 4: therefore the sum of those prices eight pound sterling, they
5:10:41
Speaker 4: come to rest at last in the pocket of the distiller.
5:10:45
Speaker 4: The two pounds sterling thus make four moves. This repeated
5:10:50
Speaker 4: change of place of the same pieces of money correspond
5:10:53
Speaker 4: to the double change in form of the commodities, to
5:10:56
Speaker 4: their motion in opposite directions through stages of circulation, and
5:11:00
Speaker 4: to the interlacing of the metamorphoses of different commodities. Footnote.
5:11:06
Speaker 4: It is products which set it money in motion and
5:11:09
Speaker 4: make it circulate. The velocity of its moneies motion supplements
5:11:15
Speaker 4: its quantity. When necessary. It does nothing but slide from
5:11:20
Speaker 4: hand to hand without stopping for a moment. The trasne
5:11:27
Speaker 4: loco scitato, pages nine one five and nine one six end. Footnote.
5:11:35
Speaker 4: These antithetic and complimentary phases of which the process of
5:11:39
Speaker 4: metamorphosis consists, are gone through not simultaneously, but successively. Time
5:11:46
Speaker 4: is therefore required for the completion of the series. Hence,
5:11:50
Speaker 4: the velocity of the currency of money is measured by
5:11:53
Speaker 4: the number of moves made by a given piece of
5:11:55
Speaker 4: money in a given time. Suppose the circulation of the
5:11:59
Speaker 4: four arts takes a day, The sum of the prices
5:12:03
Speaker 4: to be realized in the day is eight pound sterling.
5:12:06
Speaker 4: The number of moves of the two pieces of money
5:12:09
Speaker 4: is four, and the quantity of money circulating is two
5:12:12
Speaker 4: pounds sterling. Hence, for a given interval of time during
5:12:16
Speaker 4: the process of circulation, we have the following relation. The
5:12:20
Speaker 4: quantity of money functioning as the circulating medium is equal
5:12:24
Speaker 4: to the sum of the prices of the commodities divided
5:12:27
Speaker 4: by the number of moves made by the coins of
5:12:29
Speaker 4: the same denomination. This law holds generally. The total circulation
5:12:36
Speaker 4: of commodities in a given country during a given period
5:12:39
Speaker 4: is made up on the one hand, of numerous isolated
5:12:42
Speaker 4: and simultaneous partial metamorphoses, sales which are at the same
5:12:46
Speaker 4: time purchases in which each coin changes its place only
5:12:50
Speaker 4: once or makes only one move, on the other hand,
5:12:54
Speaker 4: of numerous distinct series of metamorphoses, partly running side by
5:12:58
Speaker 4: side and partly coalescing with each other, in each of
5:13:02
Speaker 4: which series each coin makes a number of moves, the
5:13:06
Speaker 4: number being greater or less according to circumstances. The total
5:13:12
Speaker 4: number of moves made by all the circulating coins of
5:13:15
Speaker 4: one denomination being given, we can arrive at the average
5:13:20
Speaker 4: number of moves made by a single coin of that denomination,
5:13:23
Speaker 4: or at the average velocity of the currency of money.
5:13:28
Speaker 4: The quantity of money thrown into the circulation at the
5:13:31
Speaker 4: beginning of each day, is of course determined by the
5:13:34
Speaker 4: sum of the prices of all the commodities circulating simultaneously
5:13:38
Speaker 4: side by side. But once in circulation, coins are so
5:13:42
Speaker 4: to say, made responsible for one another. If the one
5:13:46
Speaker 4: increase its velocity, the other retards its own, or altogether
5:13:50
Speaker 4: falls out of circulation. For the circulation can absorb only
5:13:55
Speaker 4: such a quantity of gold as, when multiplied by the
5:13:57
Speaker 4: mean number of moves made by one sai coin or element,
5:14:01
Speaker 4: is equal to the sum of the prices to be realized. Hence,
5:14:07
Speaker 4: if the number of moves made by the separate pieces increase,
5:14:11
Speaker 4: the total number of those pieces in circulation diminishes. If
5:14:15
Speaker 4: the number of the moves diminish, the total number of
5:14:18
Speaker 4: pieces increases. Since the quantity of money capable of being
5:14:22
Speaker 4: absorbed by the circulation is given for a given mean
5:14:26
Speaker 4: velocity of currency, all that is necessary in order to
5:14:30
Speaker 4: abstract a given number of sovereigns from the circulation is
5:14:34
Speaker 4: to throw the same number of one pound notes into it,
5:14:37
Speaker 4: a trick well known to all bankers. Just as the
5:14:41
Speaker 4: currency of money generally considered is but a reflex of
5:14:45
Speaker 4: the circulation of commodities, or of the antithetical metamorphoses they undergo.
5:14:51
Speaker 4: So too, the velocity of that currency reflects their rapidity
5:14:55
Speaker 4: with which commodities change their forms, the continued interlacing of
5:15:00
Speaker 4: one series of metamorphosies with another, the hurried social interchange
5:15:04
Speaker 4: of matter, the rapid disappearance of commodities from the sphere
5:15:08
Speaker 4: of circulation, and the equally rapid substitutions of fresh ones
5:15:13
Speaker 4: in their places. Hence, in the velocity of the currency
5:15:18
Speaker 4: we have the fluent unity of the antithetical and complementary phases,
5:15:24
Speaker 4: the unity of the conversion of the useful aspect of
5:15:27
Speaker 4: commodities into their value aspect and their reconversion from the
5:15:31
Speaker 4: latter aspect to the former, or the unity of the
5:15:34
Speaker 4: two processes of sale and purchase. On the other hand,
5:15:39
Speaker 4: the retardation of the currency reflects the separation of these
5:15:43
Speaker 4: two processes into isolated antithetical phases, reflects the stagnation in
5:15:49
Speaker 4: the change of form and therefore in the social interchange
5:15:52
Speaker 4: of matter. The circulation itself, of course, gives no clue
5:15:57
Speaker 4: to the origin of this stagnation, puts in evidence the
5:16:01
Speaker 4: phenomenon itself. The general public, who simultaneously with the retardation
5:16:07
Speaker 4: of the currency see money appear and disappear less frequently
5:16:10
Speaker 4: at the periphery of circulation. Naturally attribute this retardation to
5:16:14
Speaker 4: a quantitative deficiency in the circulating medium. Footnote quote money
5:16:22
Speaker 4: being the common measure of buying and selling. Everybody who
5:16:26
Speaker 4: hath anything to sell and cannot procure chapman. For it
5:16:29
Speaker 4: is presently apt to think that want of money in
5:16:32
Speaker 4: the kingdom or country is the cause why his goods
5:16:35
Speaker 4: do not go off, And so want of money is
5:16:38
Speaker 4: the common cry, which is a great mistake. What do
5:16:41
Speaker 4: these people want who cry out for money? The farmer complains,
5:16:45
Speaker 4: he thinks that were more money in the country, he
5:16:48
Speaker 4: should have a price for his goods. Then it seems
5:16:51
Speaker 4: money is not his want, but a price for his
5:16:53
Speaker 4: corn and cattle, which he would sell but cannot. Why
5:16:57
Speaker 4: cannot he get a price? There is too much corn
5:17:01
Speaker 4: and cattle in the country, so that those who come
5:17:03
Speaker 4: to market have need of selling as he hath, and
5:17:07
Speaker 4: few of buying. Or two there wants the usual vent
5:17:10
Speaker 4: abroad by transportation. Or three the consumption fails, as when men,
5:17:16
Speaker 4: by reason of poverty do not spend so much in
5:17:19
Speaker 4: their houses as formerly they did. Wherefore it is not
5:17:23
Speaker 4: the increase of specific money which would at all advance
5:17:27
Speaker 4: the farmer's good, but the removal of any of these
5:17:29
Speaker 4: three causes which do truly keep down the market. The
5:17:34
Speaker 4: merchant and shopkeeper want money in the same manner, that is,
5:17:38
Speaker 4: they want a vent for the goods they deal in.
5:17:40
Speaker 4: By reason that the markets fail, a nation never thrives
5:17:44
Speaker 4: better than when riches are tossed from hand to hand.
5:17:48
Speaker 1: End.
5:17:50
Speaker 4: Sir Dudley North, Discourses upon Trade, London, sixteen ninety one,
5:17:55
Speaker 4: pages eleven to fifteen. Harringefont's fanciful notions amount merely to this,
5:18:03
Speaker 4: that the antagonism which has its origin in the nature
5:18:06
Speaker 4: of commodities and is reproduced in their circulation, can be
5:18:10
Speaker 4: removed by increasing the circulating medium. But if, on the
5:18:14
Speaker 4: one hand, it is a popular delusion to ascribe stagnation
5:18:17
Speaker 4: in production and circulation to insufficiency of the circulating medium,
5:18:23
Speaker 4: it by no means follows on the other hand, that
5:18:26
Speaker 4: in actual paucity of the medium in consequence e g.
5:18:30
Speaker 4: The bungling legislative interference with the regulation of currency may
5:18:34
Speaker 4: not give rise to such stagnation. End footnote the total
5:18:42
Speaker 4: quantity of money functioning during a given period as the
5:18:45
Speaker 4: circulating medium is determined on the one hand by the
5:18:48
Speaker 4: sum of the prices of the circulating commodities, and on
5:18:52
Speaker 4: the other hand by the rapidity with which the antithetical
5:18:55
Speaker 4: phases of the metamorphoses follow one another. On this rapidity
5:19:00
Speaker 4: depends what proportion of the sum of the prices can
5:19:03
Speaker 4: on the average be realized by each single coin. But
5:19:08
Speaker 4: the sum of the prices of the circulating commodities depends
5:19:11
Speaker 4: on the quantity as well as on the prices of
5:19:13
Speaker 4: the commodities. These three factors, however, state of prices, quantity
5:19:19
Speaker 4: of circulating commodities, and velocity of money currency are all variable. Hence,
5:19:26
Speaker 4: the sum of the prices to be realized, and consequently
5:19:29
Speaker 4: the quantity of the circulating medium depending on that sum,
5:19:33
Speaker 4: will vary with the numerous variations of these three factors.
5:19:36
Speaker 4: In combination of these variations, we shall consider those alone
5:19:42
Speaker 4: that have been the most important in the history of prices.
5:19:45
Speaker 4: While prices remain constant, the quantity of the circulating medium
5:19:50
Speaker 4: may increase owing to the number of circulating commodities increasing,
5:19:54
Speaker 4: or to the velocity of currency decreasing, or to a
5:19:57
Speaker 4: combination of the two. On the other other hand, the
5:20:00
Speaker 4: quantity of the circulating medium may decrease with a decreasing
5:20:04
Speaker 4: number of commodities or with an increasing rapidity of their
5:20:08
Speaker 4: circulation with a general rise in the prices of commodities.
5:20:12
Speaker 4: The quantity of the circulating medium will remain constant provided
5:20:16
Speaker 4: the number of commodities in circulation decrease proportionally to the
5:20:20
Speaker 4: increase in their prices, or provided the velocity of currency
5:20:24
Speaker 4: increase at the same rate as prices rise, the number
5:20:28
Speaker 4: of commodities in circulation remaining constant. The quantity of the
5:20:32
Speaker 4: circulating medium may decrease owing to the number of commodities
5:20:36
Speaker 4: decreasing more rapidly, or to the velocity of currency rise
5:20:41
Speaker 4: with a general fall in the prices of commodities. The
5:20:44
Speaker 4: quantity of the circulating medium will remain constant provided the
5:20:48
Speaker 4: number of commodities increase proportionally to their fall in prices,
5:20:53
Speaker 4: or provided the velocity of currency decrease in the same proportion.
5:20:57
Speaker 4: The quantity of the circulating medium will increase provided the
5:21:01
Speaker 4: number of commodities increase quicker or the rapidity of circulation
5:21:06
Speaker 4: decrease quicker than the prices fall, the variations of the
5:21:11
Speaker 4: different factors may mutually compensate each other, so that, notwithstanding
5:21:15
Speaker 4: their continued instability, the sum of the prices to be
5:21:19
Speaker 4: realized and the quantity of money in circulation remain constant. Consequently,
5:21:24
Speaker 4: we find, especially if we take long periods into consideration,
5:21:29
Speaker 4: that the deviations from the average level of the quantity
5:21:32
Speaker 4: of money current in any country are much smaller than
5:21:35
Speaker 4: we should at first site expect, a part of course,
5:21:39
Speaker 4: from excessive perturbations periodically arising from industrial and commercial crises,
5:21:45
Speaker 4: or less frequently from fluctuations in the value of money.
5:21:50
Speaker 4: The law that the quantity of the circulating medium is
5:21:52
Speaker 4: determined by the sum of the prices of the commodities circulating,
5:21:56
Speaker 4: and the average increasing more rapidly than the prices of
5:21:59
Speaker 4: vlacit of currency may also be stated as follows, given
5:22:04
Speaker 4: the sum of the values of commodities and the average
5:22:07
Speaker 4: rapidity of their metamorphoses. The quantity of precious metal current
5:22:11
Speaker 4: as money depends on the value of that precious metal. Footnote.
5:22:18
Speaker 4: There is a certain measure and proportion of money requisite
5:22:21
Speaker 4: to drive the trade of a nation more or less
5:22:24
Speaker 4: than which would prejudice the same just as there is
5:22:27
Speaker 4: a certain proportion of farthings necessary in a small retail
5:22:31
Speaker 4: trade to change silver money, and to even such reckonings
5:22:35
Speaker 4: as cannot be adjusted with the smallest silver pieces. Now,
5:22:39
Speaker 4: as the proportion of the number of farthings requisite in
5:22:42
Speaker 4: commerce is to be taken from the number of people
5:22:45
Speaker 4: the frequency of their exchanges, as also and principally from
5:22:49
Speaker 4: the value of the smallest silver pieces of money, so
5:22:52
Speaker 4: in like manner, the proportion of money gold and silver
5:22:55
Speaker 4: specie requisite in our trade is to be likewise taken
5:22:59
Speaker 4: from the frequency of co mutations and from the bigness
5:23:02
Speaker 4: of the payments. William Petty, A Treatise of Taxes and Contributions, London,
5:23:09
Speaker 4: sixteen sixty seven, page seventeen. The theory of Hume was
5:23:14
Speaker 4: defended against the attacks of J. Stewart and others by
5:23:18
Speaker 4: A Young in his Political Arithmetic, London, seventeen seventy four,
5:23:23
Speaker 4: in which work there is a special chapter entitled Prices
5:23:26
Speaker 4: depend on Quantity of Money at page one hundred twelve.
5:23:31
Speaker 4: I have stated in sure critique et cetera, page one
5:23:34
Speaker 4: forty nine. He Adam Smith passes over without remark the
5:23:38
Speaker 4: question as to the quantity of coins in circulation, and
5:23:41
Speaker 4: treats money quite wrongly as a mere commodity. This statement
5:23:46
Speaker 4: applies only in so far as Adam Smith ex Officio
5:23:50
Speaker 4: treats of money now and then. However, as in his
5:23:54
Speaker 4: criticism of the earlier systems of political economy, he takes
5:23:58
Speaker 4: the right view.
5:24:00
Speaker 3: Quote.
5:24:01
Speaker 4: The quantity of coin in every country is regulated by
5:24:04
Speaker 4: the value of the commodities which are to be circulated
5:24:06
Speaker 4: by it. The value of the goods aidly bought and
5:24:09
Speaker 4: sold in any country requires a certain quantity of money
5:24:12
Speaker 4: to circulate and distribute them to their proper consumers, and
5:24:16
Speaker 4: can give employment to know more, The channel of circulation
5:24:20
Speaker 4: necessarily draws to itself a sum sufficient to fill it,
5:24:24
Speaker 4: and never admits any more end quote Wealth of Nations,
5:24:29
Speaker 4: Book four, chapter one. In like manner ex Officio, he
5:24:35
Speaker 4: opens his work with an apotheosis on the division of labor. Afterwards,
5:24:40
Speaker 4: in the last book, which treats of the sources of
5:24:42
Speaker 4: public revenue, he occasionally repeats the denunciations of the division
5:24:47
Speaker 4: of labor made by his teacher A. Ferguson, and footnote
5:24:53
Speaker 4: the erroneous opinion that it is on the contrary prices
5:24:56
Speaker 4: that are determined by the quantity of the circulating medium,
5:25:00
Speaker 4: and that the latter depends on the quantity of the
5:25:02
Speaker 4: precious metals in the country. This opinion was based by
5:25:06
Speaker 4: those who first told it on the absurd hypothesis that
5:25:09
Speaker 4: commodities are without a price and money without a value
5:25:13
Speaker 4: when they first enter into circulation, and that once in
5:25:16
Speaker 4: the circulation, an aloquate part of the medley of commodities
5:25:20
Speaker 4: is exchanged for an aloquate part of the heap of
5:25:23
Speaker 4: precious metals. There are two footnotes. First footnote that the
5:25:29
Speaker 4: price of each single kind of commodity forms a span
5:25:33
Speaker 4: of the sum of the prices of all the commodities
5:25:35
Speaker 4: in circulation is a self evident proposition. But how use
5:25:40
Speaker 4: values which are incommensurable with regard to each other are
5:25:43
Speaker 4: to be exchanged and mass for a total sum of
5:25:46
Speaker 4: gold or silver in a country is quite incomprehensible. If
5:25:50
Speaker 4: we start from the notion that all commodities together form
5:25:54
Speaker 4: one single commodity, of which each is but an aloquat part,
5:25:58
Speaker 4: we get the following beautiful result. The total commodity equals
5:26:03
Speaker 4: x carrot weight of gold. Commodity A equals an eloquate
5:26:07
Speaker 4: part of the total commodity equals the same aliquot part
5:26:10
Speaker 4: of ex carrot weight of gold. This has stated in
5:26:14
Speaker 4: all seriousness by Montesquieu. If one compares the amount of
5:26:20
Speaker 4: gold and silver in the world with the sum of
5:26:22
Speaker 4: the commodities available, it is certain that each product or
5:26:25
Speaker 4: commodity taken in isolation could be compared with a certain
5:26:30
Speaker 4: portion of the total amount of money. Let us suppose
5:26:33
Speaker 4: that there is only one product or commodity in the world,
5:26:38
Speaker 4: or only one that can be purchased, and that it
5:26:41
Speaker 4: can be divided in the same way as money. A
5:26:43
Speaker 4: certain part of this commodity would then correspond to a
5:26:46
Speaker 4: part of the total amount of money. Half the total
5:26:50
Speaker 4: of the one would correspond to half the total of
5:26:53
Speaker 4: the other, etc. The determination of the prices of things
5:26:58
Speaker 4: always depend fundamentally on the relation between the total amount
5:27:02
Speaker 4: of things and the total amount of their monetary symbols.
5:27:07
Speaker 4: Montesquie Local Scitato, Title three, pages twelve and thirteen. As
5:27:13
Speaker 4: to the further development of this theory by Ricardo and
5:27:16
Speaker 4: his disciples James Mill, Lord Overstone, and others, see Sur
5:27:21
Speaker 4: Critique et cetera, pages one forty to one forty six
5:27:25
Speaker 4: and page one fifty. John Stuart Mill, with his usual
5:27:30
Speaker 4: eclectic logic, understands how to hold at the same time
5:27:34
Speaker 4: the view of his father, James Mill, and the opposite
5:27:38
Speaker 4: view on a comparison of the text of his compendium
5:27:43
Speaker 4: Principles of Political Economy, with his preface to the first edition,
5:27:48
Speaker 4: in which preface he announces himself as the Adam Smith
5:27:51
Speaker 4: of his day. We do not know whether to admire
5:27:54
Speaker 4: more the simplicity of the man or that of the
5:27:56
Speaker 4: public who took him in good faith. For the Adam
5:28:00
Speaker 4: Smith he announced himself to be, although he bears about
5:28:03
Speaker 4: as much resemblance to Adam Smith as say, General Williams
5:28:07
Speaker 4: of Cars to the Duke of Wellington. The original researches
5:28:11
Speaker 4: of mister J. S. Mill, which are neither extensive nor
5:28:15
Speaker 4: profound in the domain of political economy, will be found
5:28:19
Speaker 4: mustered in rank and file in his little work Some
5:28:23
Speaker 4: Unsettled Questions of Political Economy, which appeared in eighteen forty four,
5:28:29
Speaker 4: Locke asserts point blank the connection between the absence of
5:28:32
Speaker 4: value in gold and silver and the determination of their
5:28:35
Speaker 4: values by quantity alone. Quote mankind having consented to put
5:28:41
Speaker 4: an imaginary value upon gold and silver. The intrinsic value
5:28:45
Speaker 4: regarded in these metals is nothing but the quantity endue
5:28:51
Speaker 4: some considerations, et cetera. Sixteen ninety one, Works Edition seventeen
5:28:56
Speaker 4: seventy seven, Volume two, page fifteen and footnote, second footnote.
5:29:05
Speaker 4: It lies, of course, entirely beyond my purpose to take
5:29:08
Speaker 4: into consideration such details as the segurage, unmitting I will, however, cite,
5:29:14
Speaker 4: for the benefit of the romantic sycophant Adam Mueller, who
5:29:17
Speaker 4: admires the generous liberality with which the English government coins
5:29:20
Speaker 4: gratuitously the following opinion of Sir Dudley North quote. Silver
5:29:26
Speaker 4: and gold, like other commodities, have their ebbings and flowings.
5:29:30
Speaker 4: Upon the arrival of quantities from Spain, it is carried
5:29:33
Speaker 4: into the tower and coined. Not long after there will
5:29:36
Speaker 4: come a demand for bullion to be exported again. If
5:29:39
Speaker 4: there is none, but all happens to be in coin.
5:29:42
Speaker 4: What then melt it down again? There is no loss
5:29:45
Speaker 4: in it. For the coining cost the owner nothing. Thus
5:29:48
Speaker 4: the nation has been abused and made to pay for
5:29:50
Speaker 4: the twisting of straw for asses to eat. If the
5:29:54
Speaker 4: merchant were made to pay the price of the coinage,
5:29:56
Speaker 4: he would not have sent his silver to the tower
5:29:58
Speaker 4: without consideration, and coin money would always keep a value
5:30:02
Speaker 4: above uncoined silver. End quote North Local Satatu, page eighteen.
5:30:09
Speaker 4: North was himself one of the foremost merchants in the
5:30:12
Speaker 4: reign of Charles. The second end footnote end of Chapter three,
5:30:17
Speaker 4: Section two B of Capital, Volume.
5:30:20
Speaker 3: One, Part one, Commodities of Money. Chapter three, Money or
5:30:28
Speaker 3: the Circulation of Commodities. Section two. The medium of circulation
5:30:35
Speaker 3: c Coins and symbols of value. That money takes. The
5:30:41
Speaker 3: shape of coin springs from its function as the circulating medium.
5:30:46
Speaker 3: The weight of gold, represented in imagination by the prices
5:30:50
Speaker 3: or money names of commodities, must confront those commodities within
5:30:55
Speaker 3: the circulation in the shape of coins or pieces of
5:30:58
Speaker 3: gold of a given denomination. Coining, like the establishment of
5:31:03
Speaker 3: a standard of prices, is the business of the state.
5:31:08
Speaker 3: The different national uniforms worn at home by gold and
5:31:12
Speaker 3: silver as coins and doft again in the market of
5:31:15
Speaker 3: the world, indicate the separation between the internal or national
5:31:20
Speaker 3: spheres of the circulation of commodities and their universal sphere.
5:31:26
Speaker 3: The only difference therefore, between coin and bullion is one
5:31:30
Speaker 3: of shape, and gold can at any time pass from
5:31:34
Speaker 3: one form to the other footnote thirty four. It lies,
5:31:41
Speaker 3: of course entirely beyond my purpose to take into consideration
5:31:45
Speaker 3: such details as the sign your edge on minting. I will, however,
5:31:51
Speaker 3: cite for the benefit of the romantic sycophant Adam Muller,
5:31:55
Speaker 3: who admires thee quote's generous liberality with which the English
5:32:00
Speaker 3: Wish government coins gratuitously the following opinion of Sir Dudley
5:32:04
Speaker 3: Dorth quote. Silver and gold, like other commodities, have their
5:32:09
Speaker 3: ebbings and flowings. Upon the arrival of quantities from Spain,
5:32:15
Speaker 3: it is carried into the tower and coin'd. Not long
5:32:19
Speaker 3: after there will come a demand for bullion to be
5:32:21
Speaker 3: exported again. If there is none, but all happens to
5:32:25
Speaker 3: being coin what then belt it's down again. There's no
5:32:31
Speaker 3: loss in it, for the coining costs the owner nothing.
5:32:35
Speaker 3: Thus the nation has been abused and made to pay
5:32:39
Speaker 3: for the twisting of straw for asses to eat. If
5:32:43
Speaker 3: the merchant were made to pay the price of the coinage,
5:32:46
Speaker 3: he would not have sent his silver to the tower
5:32:48
Speaker 3: without consideration, and coin'd money would always keep a value
5:32:53
Speaker 3: above uncoined silver. Close quotes North Loco Citato, page eighteen
5:33:02
Speaker 3: North was himself one of the foremost merchants in the
5:33:05
Speaker 3: reign of Charles. The second end of footnote, But no
5:33:10
Speaker 3: sooner does the coin leave the mint than it immediately
5:33:13
Speaker 3: finds itself on the high road to the melting pot.
5:33:17
Speaker 3: During their currency coins were away some more others less
5:33:23
Speaker 3: name and substance. Nominal weight and real weight begin their
5:33:28
Speaker 3: process of separation. Coins of the same denomination become different
5:33:34
Speaker 3: in value because they are different in weight. The weight
5:33:39
Speaker 3: of gold fixed upon as the standard of prices deviates
5:33:42
Speaker 3: from the weight that serves as the circulating medium, and
5:33:46
Speaker 3: the latter thereby ceases any longer to be the real
5:33:50
Speaker 3: equivalent of the commodities whose prices it realizes. The history
5:33:55
Speaker 3: of coinage during the Middle Ages and down into the
5:33:58
Speaker 3: eighteenth century records the ever renewed confusion arising from this cause.
5:34:04
Speaker 3: The natural tendency of circulation to convert coins into a
5:34:09
Speaker 3: mere semblance of what they profess to be, into a
5:34:13
Speaker 3: symbol of the weight of metal they are officially supposed
5:34:16
Speaker 3: to contain, is recognized by modern legislation, which fixes the
5:34:21
Speaker 3: loss of weight sufficient to demonetize a gold coin, or
5:34:26
Speaker 3: to make it no longer legal tender the fact that
5:34:31
Speaker 3: the currency of coins itself effects a separation between their
5:34:35
Speaker 3: nominal and their real weight, creating a distinction between them
5:34:39
Speaker 3: as mere pieces of metal on the one hand, and
5:34:42
Speaker 3: as coins with a definite function on the other. This
5:34:46
Speaker 3: fact implies the latent possibility of replacing metallic coins by
5:34:51
Speaker 3: tokens of some other material, by symbols serving the same
5:34:56
Speaker 3: purposes as coins, The practical difficulty in the way of
5:35:00
Speaker 3: coining extremely minute quantities of gold or silver, and the
5:35:05
Speaker 3: circumstance that at first the less precious metal is used
5:35:10
Speaker 3: as a measure of value instead of the more precious
5:35:13
Speaker 3: copper instead of silver, silver instead of gold, And that
5:35:17
Speaker 3: the less precious circulates as money until dethroned by the
5:35:22
Speaker 3: more precious. All these facts explain the parts historically played
5:35:27
Speaker 3: by silver and copper tokens as substitutes for gold coins.
5:35:32
Speaker 3: Silver and copper tokens take the place of gold in
5:35:36
Speaker 3: those regions of the circulation where coins pass from hand
5:35:40
Speaker 3: to hand most rapidly and are subject to the maximum
5:35:43
Speaker 3: amount of wear and tear. This occurs where sales and
5:35:48
Speaker 3: purchases on a very small scale are continually happening. In
5:35:53
Speaker 3: order to prevent these satellites from establishing themselves permanently in
5:35:58
Speaker 3: the place of gold. Positive enactments determine the extent to
5:36:03
Speaker 3: which they must be compulsively received as payment instead of gold.
5:36:09
Speaker 3: The particular tracts pursued by the different species of coining
5:36:13
Speaker 3: currency run naturally into each other. The tokens keep company
5:36:19
Speaker 3: with gold to pay fractional parts of the smallest gold coin.
5:36:24
Speaker 3: Gold is, on the one hand, constantly pouring into retail circulation,
5:36:30
Speaker 3: and on the other hand, is as constantly being thrown
5:36:34
Speaker 3: out again by being changed into tokens Footnote thirty five.
5:36:41
Speaker 3: If silver never exceed what is wanted for the smaller payments,
5:36:46
Speaker 3: it cannot be collected in sufficient quantities for the larger payments.
5:36:51
Speaker 3: The use of gold in the main payments necessarily implies
5:36:55
Speaker 3: also its use in the retail trade. Those who have
5:36:59
Speaker 3: gold coin offering them for small purchases and receiving with
5:37:03
Speaker 3: the commodity purchased a balance of silver in return, by
5:37:07
Speaker 3: which means the surplus of silver that would otherwise encumber
5:37:10
Speaker 3: the retail dealer is drawn off and dispersed into the
5:37:14
Speaker 3: general circulation. But if there is as much silver as
5:37:19
Speaker 3: will transact the small payments, independent of gold. The retail
5:37:24
Speaker 3: trader must then receive silver for small purchases, and it
5:37:28
Speaker 3: must of necessity accumulate in its hands. David Buchanan Inquiry
5:37:35
Speaker 3: into the Taxation and Commercial Policy of Great Britain, Edinburgh,
5:37:40
Speaker 3: eighteen forty four, Pages two forty eight and two forty nine,
5:37:46
Speaker 3: end of footnote. The weight of metal in the silver
5:37:50
Speaker 3: and copper tokens is arbitrarily fixed by law. When in currency,
5:37:56
Speaker 3: they wear away even more rapidly than gold coins. Hence
5:38:01
Speaker 3: their functions are totally independent of their weight and consequently
5:38:06
Speaker 3: of all value. The function of gold as coin becomes
5:38:10
Speaker 3: completely independent of the metallic value of that gold. Therefore,
5:38:15
Speaker 3: things that are relatively without value, such as paper notes,
5:38:19
Speaker 3: can serve as coins in its place. This purely symbolic
5:38:24
Speaker 3: character is to a certain extent masked in metal tokens.
5:38:29
Speaker 3: In paper money, it stands out plainly in fact snake
5:38:34
Speaker 3: le premier pa quicut. We allude here only to inconvertible
5:38:41
Speaker 3: paper money issued by the state and having compulsory circulation.
5:38:47
Speaker 3: It has its immediate origin in the metallic currency. Money
5:38:52
Speaker 3: based upon credit implies, on the other hand, conditions which,
5:38:57
Speaker 3: from our standpoint of the simple circulation of commodities are
5:39:02
Speaker 3: as yet totally unknown to us, but we may affirm
5:39:06
Speaker 3: this much that just as true paper money takes its
5:39:10
Speaker 3: rise in the function of money as the circulating medium,
5:39:14
Speaker 3: so money based upon credit takes roots spontaneously in the
5:39:18
Speaker 3: function of money as the means of payment. Footnote thirty six.
5:39:25
Speaker 3: The Mandarin Juan mau Inn, the Chinese Chancellor of the Exchequer,
5:39:31
Speaker 3: took it into his head one day to lay before
5:39:34
Speaker 3: the Son of Heaven a proposal the secretly aimed at
5:39:37
Speaker 3: converting the asenia of the Empire into convertible banknotes. The
5:39:43
Speaker 3: Asenia Committee, in its report of eighteen fifty four gives
5:39:48
Speaker 3: him a severe snubbing. Whether he also received the traditional
5:39:52
Speaker 3: drubbing with bamboos is not stated. The concluding part of
5:39:57
Speaker 3: the report is as follows. Quote the Committee has carefully
5:40:02
Speaker 3: examined his proposal and finds that it is entirely in
5:40:06
Speaker 3: favor of the merchants and that no advantage will result
5:40:10
Speaker 3: to the Crown. Close quotes ar Bite and kaisisly Corusician
5:40:16
Speaker 3: Gassat Shaft Supi, King Hubert China, Our Stay, Russian Fon
5:40:23
Speaker 3: doctor k Arbel own f a Mecklenburg Estebant, Berlin, eighteen
5:40:30
Speaker 3: fifty eight, page forty seven, and following in his evidence
5:40:35
Speaker 3: before the Committee of the House of Lords on the
5:40:37
Speaker 3: Bank Acts, a Governor of the Bank of England says,
5:40:42
Speaker 3: with regard to the abrasion of gold coins during currency quotes,
5:40:47
Speaker 3: every year a fresh class of sovereigns becomes too light.
5:40:52
Speaker 3: The class which one year passes with full weight loses
5:40:56
Speaker 3: enough by wear and tear to draw the scales next
5:40:59
Speaker 3: year against it close quotes House of Lords Committee, eighteen
5:41:04
Speaker 3: forty eight, Note four two nine, end of footnote. The
5:41:11
Speaker 3: state puts into circulation bits of paper on which their
5:41:16
Speaker 3: various denominations, say one pound, five pounds, et cetera, are printed.
5:41:22
Speaker 3: In so far as they actually take the place of
5:41:25
Speaker 3: gold to the same amount, their movement is subject to
5:41:28
Speaker 3: the laws that regulate the currency of money itself. A
5:41:33
Speaker 3: law peculiar to the circulation of paper money can spring
5:41:37
Speaker 3: up only from the proportion in which that paper money
5:41:41
Speaker 3: represents gold. Such a law exists, stated simply, it is
5:41:47
Speaker 3: as follows. The issue of paper money must not exceed
5:41:52
Speaker 3: in amount the gold or silver, as the case may be,
5:41:56
Speaker 3: which would actually circulate if not replaced by symbols. Now,
5:42:02
Speaker 3: the quantity of gold which the circulation can absorb constantly
5:42:07
Speaker 3: fluctuates about a given level. Still, the mass of the
5:42:12
Speaker 3: circulating medium in a given country never sinks below a
5:42:16
Speaker 3: certain minimum, easily ascertained by actual experience. The fact that
5:42:22
Speaker 3: this minimum mass continually undergoes changes in its constituent parts,
5:42:28
Speaker 3: or that the pieces of gold of which it consists
5:42:31
Speaker 3: are being constantly replaced by fresh ones, causes, of course
5:42:36
Speaker 3: no change either in its amount or in the continuity
5:42:40
Speaker 3: of its circulation. It can therefore be replaced by paper symbols. If,
5:42:48
Speaker 3: on the other hand, all the conduits of circulation were
5:42:52
Speaker 3: today filled with paper money to the full extent of
5:42:56
Speaker 3: their capacity for absorbing money, they bite tomorrow be overflowing
5:43:01
Speaker 3: in consequence of a fluctuation in the circulation of commodities,
5:43:07
Speaker 3: there would no longer be any standard. If the paper
5:43:11
Speaker 3: money exceed its proper limit, which is the amount in
5:43:15
Speaker 3: gold coins of the like denomination that can actually be current,
5:43:20
Speaker 3: it would, apart from the danger of falling into general disrepute,
5:43:25
Speaker 3: represent only that quantity of gold which, in accordance with
5:43:30
Speaker 3: the laws of the circulation of commodities, is required and
5:43:34
Speaker 3: is alone capable of being represented by paper. If the
5:43:39
Speaker 3: quantity of paper money issued be double what it ought
5:43:43
Speaker 3: to be, then as a matter of fact, one pound
5:43:46
Speaker 3: would be the money name not of one quarter of
5:43:50
Speaker 3: an ounce, but of one eighth of an ounce of gold.
5:43:54
Speaker 3: The effect would be the same as if an alteration
5:43:57
Speaker 3: had taken place in the function of gold as the
5:43:59
Speaker 3: state under of prices, Those values that were previously expressed
5:44:04
Speaker 3: by the price of one pound would now be expressed
5:44:08
Speaker 3: by the price of two pounds. Paper money is a
5:44:13
Speaker 3: token representing gold or money. The relation between it and
5:44:19
Speaker 3: the values of commodities is this that the latter are
5:44:23
Speaker 3: dearly expressed in the same quantities of gold that are
5:44:28
Speaker 3: symbolically represented by the paper. Only in so far as
5:44:32
Speaker 3: paper money represents gold, which like all other commodities, has value,
5:44:38
Speaker 3: is it a symbol of value? Footnote thirty seven. The
5:44:43
Speaker 3: following passage from Fullerton shows the want of clearness on
5:44:48
Speaker 3: the part of even the best writers on money in
5:44:51
Speaker 3: their comprehension of its various functions. Quotes that, as far
5:44:58
Speaker 3: as concerns our de domestic exchanges, all the modetary functions
5:45:03
Speaker 3: which are usually performed by gold and silver coins may
5:45:07
Speaker 3: be performed as effectually by a circulation of inconvertible notes
5:45:13
Speaker 3: paying no value, but that factitious and conventional value they
5:45:18
Speaker 3: derive from the law is a fact which admits I
5:45:22
Speaker 3: conceive of no denial value of This description may be
5:45:27
Speaker 3: made to answer all the purposes of intrinsic value, and
5:45:31
Speaker 3: supersede even the necessity for a standard, provided only the
5:45:36
Speaker 3: quantity of issues be kept under due limitation. Close quotes Fullerton,
5:45:44
Speaker 3: Regulation of Currencies, London, eighteen forty five, page twenty one.
5:45:51
Speaker 3: Because the commodity that serves as money is capable of
5:45:54
Speaker 3: being replaced in circulation by mere symbols of value, therefore
5:46:00
Speaker 3: its functions as a measure of value and a standard
5:46:03
Speaker 3: of prices are declared to be superfluous. End a footnote. Finally,
5:46:11
Speaker 3: some one may ask why gold is capable of being
5:46:15
Speaker 3: replaced by tokens that have no value, But as we
5:46:19
Speaker 3: have already seen, it is capable of being so replaced
5:46:23
Speaker 3: only in so far as it functions exclusively as coin
5:46:27
Speaker 3: or the circulating medium, and as nothing else. Now, money
5:46:33
Speaker 3: has other functions besides this one, and the isolated function
5:46:37
Speaker 3: of serving as the mere circulating medium is not necessarily
5:46:42
Speaker 3: the only one attached to gold coin, although this is
5:46:46
Speaker 3: the case with those a braided coins that continue to circulate.
5:46:51
Speaker 3: Each piece of money is a mere coin or means
5:46:54
Speaker 3: of circulation only so long as it actually circulates. But
5:47:00
Speaker 3: this is just the case with that minimum mass of gold,
5:47:04
Speaker 3: which is capable of being replaced by paper money. That
5:47:08
Speaker 3: mass remains constantly within the sphere of circulation, continually functions
5:47:14
Speaker 3: as a circulating medium, and exists exclusively for that purpose.
5:47:20
Speaker 3: Its movement therefore represents nothing but the continued alternation of
5:47:25
Speaker 3: the inverse phases of the metamorphosis C to M to C,
5:47:31
Speaker 3: phases in which commodities confront their value forms, only to
5:47:35
Speaker 3: disappear again immediately. The independent existence of the exchange value
5:47:41
Speaker 3: of a commodity is here a transient apparition by means
5:47:46
Speaker 3: of which the commodity is immediately replaced by another commodity. Hence,
5:47:52
Speaker 3: in this process which continually makes money pass from hand
5:47:56
Speaker 3: to hand, the mere symbolical existence of money suffices. Its
5:48:02
Speaker 3: functional existence absorbs, so to say, its material existence. Being
5:48:09
Speaker 3: a transient and objective reflex of the prices of commodities,
5:48:14
Speaker 3: it serves only as a symbol of itself, and is
5:48:18
Speaker 3: therefore capable of being replaced by a token Footnote thirty
5:48:24
Speaker 3: eight from the fact that gold and silver, so far
5:48:29
Speaker 3: as they are coins or exclusively serve as the medium
5:48:32
Speaker 3: of circulation, become mere tokens of themselves. Nicholas Barbon deduces
5:48:39
Speaker 3: the right of governments quote to raise money close quotes,
5:48:43
Speaker 3: that is, to give to the weight of silver that
5:48:46
Speaker 3: is called a shilling the name of a greater weight,
5:48:49
Speaker 3: such as a crown, and so to pay creditors shillings
5:48:53
Speaker 3: instead of crowns. Quotes. Money does wear and grow lighter
5:48:59
Speaker 3: by often telling over it is the denomination and currency
5:49:04
Speaker 3: of the money that men regard in bargaining, not the
5:49:08
Speaker 3: quantity of silver. Tis the public authority upon the metal
5:49:13
Speaker 3: that makes it money close quotes en Barban Loco Citato,
5:49:19
Speaker 3: pages twenty nine, thirty and twenty five end a footnote.
5:49:26
Speaker 3: One thing is, however, requisite. This token must have an
5:49:31
Speaker 3: objective social validity of its own, and this the paper
5:49:36
Speaker 3: symbol acquires by its forced currency. This compulsory action of
5:49:42
Speaker 3: the state can take effect only within that inner sphere
5:49:46
Speaker 3: of circulation, which is coterminous with the territories of the community.
5:49:52
Speaker 3: But it is also only within that sphere, that money
5:49:55
Speaker 3: completely responds to its function of being the circular eating medium,
5:50:01
Speaker 3: or becomes coin. End of Part one, Chapter three, Section
5:50:10
Speaker 3: two c