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Gil Skillman wrote:
> Ajit writes:
>
> >On another note: I don't think Gil's value-price identity for the
> >argument in chapter five is very faithful to Marx. It seems to me
> >that Marx is arguing in terms of labor as substance (as let's say
> >corn in one commodity model). In this case he wants to show that
> >even when we assume that equal labor exchange in the market, a
> >surplus of labor emerges due to a particular exchange that is a
> >peculiarity of capitalist mode of production.
>
> As far as being "faithful to Marx," what Marx *claims* he's doing in Ch. 5
> is very different from Ajit's representation. According to Ajit, Marx
> wants only to show that it is *possible* to account for surplus value on
> the (arbitrary?) assumption that prices equal values, a matter of logical
> *sufficiency.* But Marx is manifestly insisting on something stronger, to
> the effect that it analytically important, even in some sense *necessary*
> to start with the condition of price-value equivalence in explaining
> surplus value. Indeed, this is how he describes the "double result* he
> claims to have established by the end of Ch. 5. And Marx makes another
> claim about the *necessary* consequences of positing price-value
> equivalence at the beginning of Ch. 6. [For what it's worth, his
> *sufficiency* argument with respect to surplus value is set up in the
> remainder of Ch. 6 and then detailed in Ch. 7 and beyond.] Gil
_______________________
Gil, as you know I don't have much at stake here. My position is that Marx's
concept of exploitation can be explained prior to the introduction of the
concept of value. The point I was trying to make is that one may try to draw a
parallel with the Physiocrates here. For the Physiocrates there is only one
kind of exchange that results into surplus production, and that is the
exchange between humans and nature. Similary Marx could be arguing that there
is only one exchange in the commodity producing system that could produce
surplus. The question ultimately is the *production* of surplus and not
unequal exchange. Cheers, ajit sinha
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