tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6245381193993153721.post2419558896562144136..comments2024-03-17T00:23:24.896-07:00Comments on Social Democracy for the 21st Century: A Realist Alternative to the Modern Left: Two Important Instances in Volume 1 of Marx’s Capital where Labour Values determine individual Commodity PricesLord Keyneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06556863604205200159noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6245381193993153721.post-34489347584322670382015-08-07T22:17:11.379-07:002015-08-07T22:17:11.379-07:00(1) It is laughable you can't respond to the a...(1) It is laughable you can't respond to the <i>actual</i> statements of Marx in vol. 1 and instead cite a Marxist apologist like you who is a cultist committed to the view that all volumes of <i>Capital</i> are totally consistent.<br /><br />(2) You have an explicit and specific statement by Marx of what he believes:<br /><br /><i>“It is true, commodities may be sold at prices deviating from their values, but these deviations are to be <b>considered as infractions of the laws of the exchange of commodities, which, in its normal state is an exchange of equivalents</b>, consequently, no method for increasing value.”</i> (Marx 1906: 176–177).<br /><br />No doubt your pathetic ignorance of Marx and the collapse of your TSSI nonsense is making you very angry, and the only thing you can do is cite the same Marxist hacks who agree with you.<br /><br />(3) <i>"OR that prices and values are equal in aggregate, as I've said."</i><br /><br />That would make no sense at all. Commodities only rarely exchange for pure labour values, but you can determine the value of skilled labour by looking at the exchange values of products of skilled labour as against products of unskilled labour?? lol... This is the sort of absolute idiocy and stupidity to which people life you are reduced.<br /><br />(4) you fall back on two highly obscure quotes in footnotes (one in Chapter 5 and in Chapter 8) where Marx does appear to let his different theory of prices and value in vol. 3 intrude into the analysis in vol. 1. <br /><br />But that is not surprising because drafts of volumes 2 and 3 were written before vol. 1, and it is likely that, under pressure from Engels to produce a work in defence of communism, Marx’s ideological commitments skewed vol.1 so that it presented capitalism in the worst light possible and with an extreme and dogmatic defence of the labour theory of value, which, in view of his work on the draft of volume 3 of Capital, he knew to have severe problems, such as the transformation problem. That is very probably why Marx never bothered to publish vol. 2 and 3 of <i>Capital</i> in his lifetime, and the suspicion is that he never did so because he was unsatisfied with his attempts to defend the labour theory in volume 3.<br /><br />You will never accept this as the best and most probable explanation of the severe contradictions between vol. 1 and vol. 3 because you are a Marxist cultist who have wasted your life on this B.S.<br />Lord Keyneshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06556863604205200159noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6245381193993153721.post-67740292989526667342015-08-07T14:04:05.790-07:002015-08-07T14:04:05.790-07:00"If Marx had really maintained [in volume 1] ...<i>"If Marx had really maintained [in volume 1] that, apart from irregular oscillations, commodities could only be exchanged one for another because equivalent quantities of labor are incorporated in them, or only in the ratios corresponding to the amounts of labor incorporated in them, Böhm-Bawerk would be perfectly right. But in the first volume Marx is only discussing exchange relationships as they manifest themselves when commodities are exchanged for their values; and solely on this supposition do the commodities embody equivalent quantities of labor. But exchange for their values is not a condition of exchange in general, even though, under certain specific historical conditions, exchange for corresponding values is indispensable, if these historical conditions are to be perpetually reproduced by the mechanism of social life. Under changed historical conditions, modifications of exchange ensue, and the only question is whether these modifications are to be regarded as taking place according to law, and whether they can be represented as modifications of the law of value. If this be so, the law of value, though in modified form, continues to control exchange and the course of prices. All that is necessary is that we should understand the course of prices to be a modification of the pre-existing course of prices, which was under direct control of the law of value."</i><br /><br />-Rudolf Hilferding, and author you really ought to take a moment out of your day to read.<br /><br /><i>It is clearly the case that the theory of value in volume 1 of Capital is that individual commodity prices are determined by their labour values or the labour value embodied in units of gold or silver, at least in the long-run. Marx admits that prices can and do diverge from labour values (Marx 1906: 114), but he appears to think that are driven back to these values which are the anchors for the system:</i><br /><br />Don't play dumb. That's not what either of those quotes mean. We've been over this.<br /><br /><i>this makes no sense unless Marx really believes that commodities tend to exchange at pure labour values.</i><br /><br />OR that prices and values are equal in aggregate, as I've said. This has the effect of both eliminating the apparent contradiction you claim, AND conforming to all three volumes of Capital.<br /><br />But that would be devastating to your case, so I guess we Can't Have That.Hedlundnoreply@blogger.com