From: Philip Dunn (pscumnud@DIRCON.CO.UK)
Date: Tue Apr 12 2005 - 03:10:04 EDT
Hi Jerry Quoting Gerald_A_Levy@MSN.COM: > > I originally used Ricardo's theory to illustrate that differential rent > > could seen as the wages of non-human labour-power. This means > > that the landlord is selling a commodity but not, qua landlord, > > producing one capitalistically. This idea is not tied to Ricardo. > > Hi Phil, > > It is tied to the Ricardian inability to formulate a theory of surplus > value. Once such a theory is formulated -- and once one recognizes > divergences of value from price -- then one can conceptualize the > *transfer of surplus value* among capitalists and from capitalists to > landlords in the form of rent. > > In solidarity, Jerry > The capitalist farmer pays the landlord some money. The landlord gives something in return - access to infra-marginal land. To reject the idea that the landlord is selling a commodity, especially the producer commodity, labour-power, is perhaps understandable. The landlord is, qua landlord, idle. She just banks the cheques. But it should not be dismissed if the alternative is to allow that landlords can get hold of surplus value - they are not capitalists. How can they do that? Non-dualist approaches have the smallest scope of price value deviations, confined to profit surplus value deviations. They achieve this by allowing produced commodities to have two values. A commodity is produced with one value and consumed, productively or unproductively, with another. The transfer of surplus value is between supplier and customer. There is non-conservation of value in circulation at the disaggregated level, but at least the transfers take place between parties that have commodity relations. I doubt this is the case in other approaches. The penalty is the non-conservation of value. Phil
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