RE: [OPE] peanut butter value-form theory

>> Now put one orange in each hand. In your left hand there is an orange that
>> fell
>> from a tree and hit you in the head on public lands and in your right
>> hand there is an orange produced as a commodity by a capitalist firm which
>> you purchased with money. Not so easy to tell them apart if one is only
>> looking at their material form, is not? What is the "physical difference"
>> between the two oranges?
> Orange trees in public lands are usually watered and tended by people, so
> their fruit contains human labor too. You need to compare an orange that has
> not been cultivated with one that has.
 
 
 
 
Paula:
 
 
I guess by public lands you were thinking only of parks and properties
where there are municipal buildings, etc. rather than also forests and
natural preserves. In any event, yes, assume that the orange in one hand
was not cultivated. It's also quite easy to envision the two oranges being
identical in size, texture, appearance, and taste. Now what?

>> So, the means of production which are purchased by "service capitalists"
>> are, from your perspective, merely a "collection of use-values"? Don't
>> these
>> "use-values" (the means of production employed by service capitalists)
>> also have an exchange value?
> Obviously I would not call them means of production,
 
 
 
Why is that obvious? *Even if* it doesn't constitute variable capital they
can still represent means of production.
 
 
I gather that you also would say, then, that the state doesn't own any
means of production? [I suspect you are, once again, taking an expression
too literally: i.e. if tools and machinery aren't used in capitalist
_production_ then they can't be means of _production_?]
 
 
 
> but, yes, they do have
> an exchange value. My point is that service capitalists are final buyers of
> these objects, therefore they exchange for the purposes of obtaining their
> use-values - just like you do when you buy oranges.
 
 
 
No, when I buy oranges it is for the purposes of _individual consumption_.
This is not *AT ALL* why "service capitalists" buy tools and machinery.
{NB: There are some commodities which have dual uses: e.g. the same model
of computer which is used as a means of consumption by individuals
[a home computer] can also be means of production if purchased by a
capitalist firm}.
 
 
Auto firms also are the 'final buyers' of industrial robots and the
auto firms buy the robots for their use-value. Like the "service capitalists"
they don't individually consume the tools. Just as the auto firms pass
along the cost of tooling to consumers (i.e. it forms one component of
cost price), so too "service capitalists" charge a price which not only
reflects the cost of service labor but also tooling and machinery (part
of the means of production).
 
 
In solidarity, Jerry_______________________________________________
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Received on Thu Apr 9 09:02:10 2009