Re: [OPE-L] Question

From: ajit sinha (sinha_a99@YAHOO.COM)
Date: Tue Apr 10 2007 - 08:24:50 EDT 

Paul, I see the problem. In the original I had used
lamda (subscript x, etc.), where lamda stands for
labour. The e-mail font has translated it as lx etc.,
which makes it look like 1. I'm sorry about it. I
should have checked. Cheers, ajit sinha
--- Paul Cockshott <wpc@DCS.GLA.AC.UK> wrote:

> You have
>
> 10 lx + 20/3 ly + 10 l --> 30 lx     (1')
> 10 lx + 5 ly + 10 l --> 30 ly   (2'),
>
> since ly = 2/3 there is a mistake here
> you are multiplying by ly twice surely it should be
>
> 10 lx + 10 ly + 10 l --> 30 lx     (1')
> 10 lx + 5 ly + 10 l --> 30 ly   (2'),
>
> substituting in 1 and 2/3
>
> 10 + 20/3 + 10 -> 30
> 20 + 10/3 + 10 -> 20
>
> which still is wrong and makes your point
> -----Original Message-----
> From: OPE-L [mailto:OPE-L@SUS.CSUCHICO.EDU] On
> Behalf Of ajit sinha
> Sent: 10 April 2007 12:11
> To: OPE-L@SUS.CSUCHICO.EDU
> Subject: Re: [OPE-L] Question
>
> --- Allin Cottrell <cottrell@WFU.EDU> wrote:
>
> > That, I believe, is a mistake: it is warping the
> > definition of
> > value to match market price (hence my "dissolving"
> > comment).
> ________________________
> Its not only a mistake, it simply cannot be done.
> Anybody who comes down from verbal statements and
> tries to work out the meaning of the proposition
> through mathematical example will quickly learn
> that.
> I have discussed three major ways by which the money
> argument is brought by Marx in the value theory and
> their failures in my paper,'Some Critical
> Reflections
> on Marx's Theory of Value', in Value and the World
> Economy Today, (eds.) R. Westra and A. Zuege,
> Palgrave, 2003. But not many people seem to have
> seen
> it. In any case, here is a short excerpt from the
> paper that shows where Jerry might be coming from
> and
> why it does not work (I have taken one
> interpretation
> here but all other interpretation would fail in a
> similar way):
>
> Another strategy of relating labor to commodity
> exchange ratios is provided in Marx's famous letter
> of
> July 11, 1868, to Ludwig Kugelmann. In this letter
> Marx writes,
>
> ... All that palaver about the necessity of proving
> the
> concept of value comes from complete ignorance both
> of
> the subject dealt with and of scientific method.
> Every
> child knows that a nation which ceased to work, I
> will
> not say for a year, but even for a few weeks, would
> perish. Every child knows, too, that the volume of
> products corresponding to the different needs
> require
> different and quantitatively determined amounts of
> the
> total labour of society. That this necessity of the
> distribution of social labour in definite
> proportions
> cannot possibly be done away with by a particular
> form
> of social production but can only change the mode of
> its appearance, is self-evident. Natural laws cannot
> be abolished at all. What can change in historically
> different circumstances is only the form in which
> these laws assert themselves. And the form in which
> this proportional distribution of labour asserts
> itself, in a social system where the interconnection
> of social labour manifests itself through the
> private
> exchange of individual products of labour, is
> precisely the exchange value of these products.
> (Marx
> and Engels 1982, 196).
>
> This letter has been invoked most frequently in the
> defense of Marx's 'labor theory of value'.
> Unfortunately the meaning of the passage quoted
> above
> is not "self-evident". Leaving aside what every
> child
> might or might not know, let us analyze the
> statement,
> "And the form in which this proportional
> distribution
> of labour asserts itself, in a social system where
> the
> interconnection of social labour manifests itself
> through the private exchange of individual products
> of
> labour, is precisely the exchange value of these
> products." Does this mean that in a
> commodity-producing economy the exchange ratios
> between commodities are determined by taking the
> ratios of total labor employed in various sectors?
> This interpretation will have no problem only in a
> situation where there are no means of production in
> the system. In that case the ratios of total labor
> spent in various sectors of the economy will be the
> same as the embodied labor ratios of commodities.
> This
> case, however, is not interesting; not only because
> it
> is universally agreed that the so-called simple
> labor
> theory of value is valid in such cases, but more
> importantly, a capitalist mode of production is
> inconceivable without means of production. Once we
> introduce means of production in the above given
> interpretation, we find that the above proposition
> comes to naught.
>
> For example, let us assume there are only two
> sectors
> in the economy producing two commodities x and y,
> and
> the system of production is given by:
> 10x + 10y + 10l --> 30x     (1)
> 10x + 5y + 10l --> 30y     (2),
>
> where l represents simple homogeneous direct labor
> measured in terms of hours of labor. By the usual
> embodied labor measure it can be easily verified
> that
> in this system of production the value of x is equal
> to 7/8 hours of labor and the value of y is equal to
> 3/4 hours of labor. Thus 1x should exchange for 7/6y
> according to the simple labor theory of value.
>
> Now, let us interpret Marx's above statement in the
> light of our given production system. Here 10 hours
> of
> labor in total is distributed to the production of
> 10
> units of net output of x. Thus the value of x should
> be equal to 1 hour of labor. Similarly, 10 hours of
> total labor is distributed to producing 15 units of
> net output of y. Thus the value of y should be equal
> to 2/3 hours of labor. And the exchange value of the
> two commodities turns out to be 1x for 3/2y. When we
> impute these values of x and y so determined to our
> means of production in the system, it turns out to
> be:
>
> 10 lx + 20/3 ly + 10 l --> 30 lx     (1')
> 10 lx + 5 ly + 10 l --> 30 ly   (2'),
>
> where lx and ly represent values of x and y
> respectively. Since all the l's are simple
> homogeneous
> labor time they can all be added up and the arrows
> should be replaced by the = sign. However, as it is
> quite clear from (1') and (2'), in this case the
> left
> hand side of the equation will not be equal to the
> right hand side of the equation. Hence defining the
> labor values and the exchange values on the basis of
> distribution of total labor not only gives a measure
> different from Marx's own practice but, more
> importantly, leads to contradiction when means of
> production are measured consistently on their basis.
> Thus any attempt to erect a defense of labor-values
> on
> this basis must lead to a dead end, and can only
> create verbal confusion.
>
> Cheers, ajit sinha
>
>
>
>
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