Re: [OPE] intrinsic value

On Fri, 2009-03-20 at 09:46 +0000, Paul Cockshott wrote:
>
> > In effect the VFT argument ultimately seems to disolve this
> > distinction between labour-content and price.
>
> The _distinction_ is not dissolved by the non-deviation of prices from
> values. A price is a sum of money. The intrinsic value of that sum of
> money can equal the intrinsic value of the commodity it buys while the
> distinction stands.
>
> ----------------------------------
>
> What is the intrinsic value of an account standing at $100 with a solvent US bank?
> It is a magnetic record on the database of the bank, using up to date costings for
> storage media obtained from current adverts
>
> cost per terabyte $150
> cost per byte $0.00000000015
> bytes per record 80
> cost per record $0.000000012
> storage management $0.000000036
> total $0.000000048
>
> we could presumably use the MELT to back estimate the number of seconds in this
> we assume a MELT of about $20 an hour which will be correct to a factor of about 2
> Melt per hour $20
>
> Hour per record 0.0000000024
> Seconds 0.00000864
> nanoseconds 8640
>
> So we obtain a result that the intrinsic value of our $100 dollar account is a few microseconds
> of labour. Of course, the labour commanded by that account is about 5 hours of labour, so
> it seems unlikely that the intrinsic value of money has anything to do with what it will buy.
>

I have never suggested that the intrinsic value of money should be
understood as embodied labour. In fact, I regard the value of money as
its intrinsic power to command labour-time. Quantitatively, it is the
reciprocal of the MELT, total value over total price. In TSSI, the
reciprocal of the MELT is also equal to aggregate value-added (aggregate
labour-time) over aggregate money value added. The value of a unit of
money is then aggregate labour-time over aggregate money value added
(clock hours per dollar, say).

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Received on Fri Mar 20 15:57:14 2009