Fundamentals of Marx: The Monetary Expression of Labor Time

[@samuelrosander1048]

"Value, Price and Profit" is a good "book" to read to get some more context. It's an easier and MUCH shorter read than Capital, and actually summarizes the ideas as a response to arguments made by capitalists of his time...which are still being made today by capitalists because they find it useful to repeat propaganda that most people will just accept as true without question.

[@danielvictor3262]

I can't recommend this enough this shit should be basic of the basics it's actually astonishing how A LOT of arguments from coming from layman to the academic against Marxism is basically a misreading and not understanding the types of values and how labor time works

[@animeis4eva]

Merry Christmas, Comrades! Karl Marx is the real santa

[@g.f.martianshipyards9328]

My mind has MELTed. Need to watch this again when I'm more receptive.

[@changedmynamebcyallwouldnt..]

right. i just smoked so idk if it's that but i dont understand a wprd he is saying im getting so frustrated

[@jakeaustria5445]

I need concrete examples for this abstract concept. I just can't get a hold of it. Thanks. The video is highly appreciated.

[@alextsitovich9800]

In summary, the bigger productivity => the more units of goods are produced per day (year) => less labour each unit of goods contains. But with the same price for each unit of goods, a unit of goods costs the same money whatever amount of labour it contains. 8:24 At bigger productivity a worker produces the same Value per day (year) but bigger amount of goods => and with the same price per unit => more Money (revenue) per day (year) for all produced goods . Each unit of goods has less value than average (world) value, but sells by the same price. That's why the price of a unit of goods is "overvalued in exchange". Having more money for the same added value gives opportunity to say that the same amount of labour (an hour, a day, a year) produces more money, has more MELT. 9:36 Underdeveloped countries usually have to exchange their undervalued goods for overvalued goods from developed countries. That results in giving more labour for less labour in world prices. It wasn't mentioned, that in developed countries workers have to buy for their living purposes almost the same set of goods with overvalued prices. And that results in having salaries higher than value of their labour force. So their salaries also should be overvalued. Because of that the salaries in other economic branches will be overvalued too. So, capitalists should pay more money for the same jobs in developed countries than in underdeveloped ones.

[@rossplendent]

"Inarticulable by dominant liberal frameworks" is putting it mildly. Said frameworks were explicitly developed to obfuscate the centrality of both the exploitation of labor and imperialism in the functioning of capitalist economy.

[@manjunathjeerla6816]

Thank you Boss🥰

[@AntonioDs-gw8fr]

Great video!

[@verodamacc9497]

great video comrade!

[@DadeSociety]

Our recent animated explainer (with English subtitles) about Marx's labour theory of value talks about abstract and concrete labour in terms of labour theory of value. The calculations for monetary expression of labor time seem quite complicated, but thanks for your explanation. We would love to hear some thoughts and comments on our take on Marxist theory as well.

[@Brytons_Thoughts]

What a lovely Christmas present.

[@52flyingbicycles]

I think the closest liberal theory to this would be purchasing power parity. Poorer countries have a lower PPP therefore it requires less money to have a similar quality of life. Thus a rich country can spend less to get more by offshoring, assuming efficient international trade. Though of course, this also assumes that people in the poorer countries are getting the same quality of life for their wages as a worker in a rich country, which obviously doesn’t happen. They are underpaid even more than PPP would suggest, which is a major reason why their PPP is lower in the first place

[@QuantumPolyhedron]

The difference in PPP is not something explained by labor value theories or subjective value theories. Subjective value theories cannot predict any absolute changes in prices at all as prices are entirely subjective so going up or down over time is up to the subjective whims of any particular society. Labor value theories in fact predict the opposite of lower PPP for poorer countries: poor countries should have higher cost of living since productivity is lower, so it should require more labor time to produce commodities. The higher PPP for poorer countries is only explained not by value theories themselves, but by rent. As Adam Smith argued, markets only naturally tend towards labor values when there is market competition. The "law of value" does not apply to monopoly markets. In fact, this is how Smith _defines_ rent. Rent is a monopoly price formed by a person having control over a commodity which is in demand but has limited reproducibility. This prevents demand equilibrating with supply, causing the market price to remain continually above its labor content. _All_ commodities require land to produce them. You cannot have a business without land for the workers to work on. Even if you have some business where all your employees are contracted without a central office, those employees still will live in their own homes where they have to pay rent, which will need to be covered by their salary. All production implies land use, it is impossible to produce anything without land use, as all production is tied to land use. Yet, land is an inherently nonreproducible resource. You cannot, typically, "create" land. It has a fixed quantity. The _demand_ for land is always growing with a growing population, but the _supply_ of land always remains fixed. This leads to land in the long term always increasing in price. Since all commodities require land to produce, this leads to a rippling effect where all commodities must necessarily become more expensive in order to pay off the land rent cost down the supply chain. From the perspective of Smithian and Marxian economics, deviations between value and price also tend to imply a reduction in productive efficiency of the market, as prices would not reflect the actual real cost it takes to produce things, leading to wealth being allocated in places where there is no production taking place at all (in this case, to the landlords). You would thus also predict the GDP growth of a nation to therefore be inversely proportional to its total GDP: as an economy becomes larger, a higher percentage of its wealth would be allocated irrationally to unproductive sectors, leading to its relative development to be less efficient.

[@MideoKuze]

Absolute banger.

[@o.s.h.4613]

Great work.

[@fernandoarista3302]

I need a dictionary when listening to vids like these

[@alextsitovich9800]

Sometimes dictionary is essential. It is necessary to differentiate lots of terms like value, use-value, exchange value, added value, surplus value, price, price of production. And the most difficult - labour value and labour force value.

[@ASHS444]

Congratulations for the channel and videos. I suggest a video about the MELT according to the Temporal Single System Interpretation (TSSI) of Marx's economic theory. Read Alejandro Ramos 90s paper, Kliman's and Freeman's debate in the 2000s with Mohun and Veneziani, and Freeman's 2020 paper. I also suggest to explain TSSI thoroughly. It is crucial for Marxist economic theory and Marxism in general.

[@doit3409]

Thank you

[@icantaimpg3d776]

Would be nice if you can make a video on dark aspects of the Soviet Union and discussing wether it was quote unquote social-imperialist. I’m a Vietnamese far-leftist and support socialism but I think that we should be honest confront the dark side of former and current socialist countries.

[@samuelrosander1048]

And label them properly as "statist" countries. States that do better at governing economically and politically aren't socialist, just "less bad statist." Calling them "socialist" countries should come with some implications of progressive (continuously increasing) democratization of the economy and the state, but it never actually does because people more and more use terms colloquially. Statism was a term Marx was aware of and understood, so socialists claiming Marxist roots should be the first to reject statism as socialism, and point to "Conspectus of Bakunin's Statism and Anarchy" as why the distinction is more valid than the conflation.

[@JohnT.4321]

You should check out Socialism for All's channel and look for the Evner Hoxha playlist concerning Khrushchev's and Tito's revisionism.

[@PC42190]

@@samuelrosander1048 they were the first efforts to build a different social order based on the working class interest, for them they were trying to build socialism. To think it shouldn’t have been called socialism is the most idealist thing ever. I think Cockshott’s concise argument regarding this issue in his book “How the World Works” is pretty convincing. Even a shorter reading of Michael Parenti’s “Blackshirts & Reds” is much more convincing than your point to be honest, much more grounded on reality and praxis. Is like thinking Adam Smith shouldn’t have thought what he saw as capitalism but rather “market feudalism”, because it wasn’t much different from the latter.

[@PC42190]

Fellow Traveler made a very long video about the theory of “Social Imperialism”. I think it encapsulates the main arguments very well, highly recommended

[@PC42190]

Regarding the darker side of all socialists experiments, Hakim made a good video about that

[@balaramkusari5706]

❤❤❤

[@auferstandenausruinen]

Does this still stand in the age of Imperialism, when monopoly and barriers in technology blocks free exchange of value?

[@themarxistproject]

I think it is even more pertinent. Monopoly power allows for additional surplus exctraction, on top of the intrinsic inequality in exchange.

[@felipetalavera7761]

@@themarxistproject the socialist policies that look for a stronger state, create more barriers and that allow monopolies

[@QuantumPolyhedron]

@@felipetalavera7761 Free markets always create monopolies over poorer states every time it has ever been tried. To deny this is to just deny the overwhelming evidence in the historical record. Nestlé alone has a net revenue of over $95 billion. The combined GDP of the bottom third of all countries in Africa is less than $95 billion. When you have a single _company_ that has a revenue multiple times greater than the entire revenue of your whole country, then that single company could easily buy up all assets in your country. If you have free trade policies, then they could easily form a monopoly. Remember, this is just one company. Western countries have over a thousand multi-billion dollar companies, each one with the possibility of buying up your entire nation's assets and subjecting it to a monopoly. This just happens every time your faith has ever been tried. Free market absolutism has been debunked repeatedly by empirical evidence. Poor countries that put everything up for sale are just bought out by some megacorporations in rich countries and then the whole country becomes a banana republic under one or two monopolies. The profits then flow overseas which causes them to be reinvested into western countries and not into developing those poor countries, so they remain poor. Capitalism also destroys all incentive for innovation. Why would any business in Russia buy a Russian CPU, which are technologically far behind, rather than buying a western CPU which are cheaper and more powerful? Any Russian business that is trying to remain profitable will thus buy western products, and thus making it inherently nonprofitable for any business to try and innovate upon and improve Russian CPUs. We saw this after the USSR dissolved: eastern European industry largely collapsed and their countries de-industrialized because for private businesses there was no incentive to invest in local industry. Eastern European industry dried up, factories fell into ruin. Eastern European products were just replaced with western products funded by natural resource exports. When capitalism destroys all incentive for innovation in poor countries, they shift to a greater focus on natural resource exportation. They don't develop or improve upon their industry, but just focus on selling off natural resources like oil, gas, cobalt, etc, in exchange for western industrial products. They not only remain poor due to western monopolies as capitalism destroys all competition, but they do not industrialize due to capitalism destroying all incentive for innovation. It also leads to corruption problems as politicians become more subservient to those foreign monopolies than to their own people. If you were standing in Cuba under Batista for example, you were likely standing in US-owned land, because almost all land was owned by US corporations. The country was largely just a puppet colony of the US. Countries that have overcome this have done so precisely through controlling trade as well as using public investment into domestic industry. Countries like China and Vietnam with rapidly developing economies achieve this by heavily controlling foreign investments and protecting domestic industry. The public sector directly owns and funds a lot of domestic industry so there is incentive to develop that is not tied to the profit motive. There is a lot of regulations and controls on foreign investments to prevent them from forming monopolies over local markets and to restrict their ability to influence local politics. Your failed faith in endless free markets just doesn't work.

[@redoktopus3047]

even in marx's time money was not gold. i think this is very important. gold could back money but this is a misconception. gold simply had a state-fixed price like many commodities throughout history. fiat money, interpersonal lending, and all the types of debt that capitalists claim were invented in the west in the 20th century are all much older than physical money. fiat currency is and was what money has always been. even in the days of money being "backed" by gold, states and banks would never have enough in the vaults to cover all the bills in circulation.

[@felipetalavera7761]

u can blame keynes for that, BTW the money is not back gold anymore

[@redoktopus3047]

@@felipetalavera7761 money was never "backed" by gold.

[@felipetalavera7761]

​@@redoktopus3047 u r weak in history pal

[@waspwrap1235]

I have a question, how does supply and demand affect melt? Personally, I don’t think supply and demand really plays into how capitalism works today because supply and demand doesn’t take into account cost of production, investment, monopolization, and a rising cost of basic needs, along with advertising. Just curious on what your thoughts are of how the idea of supply and demand plays into MELT

[@gwynbleidd1917]

Supply and demand doesn't really come into play too much, though it's used by capitalist economists to obfuscate the truth of capitalist economics to average working class people who don't have the knowledge on the topics, or the time to really learn it all because they're too busy barely getting by. I think a lot of people don't know how to deal with the cognitive dissonance these blatant lies cause when most people have a gut feeling that something is wrong, and that's one of the reasosn right-wing propaganda is so effective, because it steers that feeling towards something unrelated like race

[@waspwrap1235]

@@gwynbleidd1917 very good explanation comrade

[@gwynbleidd1917]

@waspwrap1235 thanks, comrade. I highly recommend checking out the channel "Socialism for all" if you're not already familiar with them. They're seriously an invaluable resource with all their free leftist audiobooks by Marx, Engels, Lenin and many many more.

[@themarxistproject]

On an individual level, supply and demand of course directly influences the prices of goods in any markets, which in turn affects MELT. But Marx almost always operates in the space of equilibrium, where supply and demand considerations are not really relevant. With MELT we are talking about aggregate figures for an entire society (or even the world), in equilibrium. So we are not particularly concerned with the MELT of a single, specific firm or even a particular laborer. MELT is supposed to speak to social patterns. Generally speaking, the Marxist theory of prices seeks to explain why equilibrium prices are what they are, and not why there might be fluctuations around those equilibrium prices, which are the product of supply and demand pulls.

[@felipetalavera7761]

wrong , supply and demand is a very important in capitalism theory

[@monkowell]

Why is labor value the inverse of productivity? This has always confused me that labor value has only been measured via average socially necessary labor time. What if I work less time to produce same quality product? How come my value is less because my time is less? Likewise how come my value is more if I take longer to produce the same quality item? It’s not just about time is my point and what I feel is missing from the theory. To me it’s about the quality done within whatever time accomplished. Maybe I’m missing something. But this has frustrated me for a while.

[@themarxistproject]

A lot of people have hold ups about this because value in a colloquial sense is normative (it has an almost moral component): to be valuable to a company by working hard, efficiently, diligently, etc. is not at all the point in Marx's analysis. Marx is concerned with how things are produced and distributed at the system level. As such, value is a *social* category describing *social* standards. Lower value content in a commodity is neither good nor bad, it is simply a descriptor of the output of an individual production process *relative* to society as a whole. As for why it is an inverse relationship, consider that as societies become more productive, their unit outputs become relatively cheaper. Think, for example, of televisions, which went from being a privileged good to a household staple in most middle and high-income countries. To the extent that in the aggregate prices and values correspond, we can see how over time rising productivity has meant lower values (and therefore prices).

[@monkowell]

@@themarxistproject thank you. That clears a lot up. I certainly have a lot more studying to do but I appreciate you taking the time to shed light.

[@QuantumPolyhedron]

This is addressed in the first section of the first chapter of the first volume of _Capital._ Your statements contradict each other, you first state that value is an average of socially necessary labor time, then you say that your value is less because the time you take is less. It simply is not. Value is, as you say yourself, the social average, it is not how an individual produces. This isn't even something you have to read Marx for because even Smith pointed this out: if a single firm is more or less efficient than the market average, all firms in a single market bring their products to the same market. If they are indeed the same market, they would have the same market price, independent of the productivity of any individual firm. A firm that produces more cheaply _could_ sell for less than its value if they wanted to, but they could also sell at its value despite producing it for less labor time than embodied in the value. Your second question just repeats your same misconception in the reverse.

[@monkowell]

@@QuantumPolyhedron I see and part of me realizes that. I just have seen things from like Paul Cockshott and even Stalin where he eventually envisions people being payed in labor time credits rather than money and my understanding that communism would abolish the law of value all together and it would be more akin to a gift/library economy rather than a system of exchange value (from each’s ability to each’s need).

[@QuantumPolyhedron]

@@monkowell Law of value is an economic law in markets. Paying people affording to labor performed is not the same as the law of value because it is a conscious political choice rather than some sort of economic law, it does not _arise_ from unconscious forces like supply and demand and market competition, but is a conscious political decision. It's really just a method of _accounting._ Since resources are not infinite, you have to make sure what you distribute doesn't exceed what is produced, but it is difficult to distribute resources to people directly because it's hard to predict what they want. So it is easier to give them some sort of generic token and let them pick what they want in a store. There is no exchange here. In a fully planned economy, there is just a single firm. Workers work for that firm, and then the firm gives them tokens to then acquire products from the firm's "store." There is no exchange _between_ firms. Distribution according to needs is communism, but the USSR was not communist, it was the Union of Soviet *_Socialist_* Republics. Socialism is distribution according to _labor performed,_ not needs. I would recommend reading _The State and Revolution_ and _Critique of the Gotha Programme_ where these are explained. Of course, the USSR was not a fully planned economy, there a market sector, so the law of value did still apply in a very limited sense. Stalin writes about this in his book _Economic Problems._ No socialist country has ever been _pure._ Building a pure economy without any markets is too difficult in a marketized world.

[@christressler3857]

Are there more books that go into detail? Anything between a "Das capital for dummies" to more formulas and mathematical analysis, but in the spirit of this video?!?!?!

[@gamdanyunizar7849]

I think it's better to give a simple, kindergarten example in the video, like "Mike is a worker in X Company..." That way common folk like me can understand easier.

[@ludviglidstrom6924]

Interesting

[@scoopidywhoop7484]

I am not a communist, in fact you may hate me for my beliefs, but I agree that socialism is the future. You make amazing content, keep it up, and thank you!

[@felipetalavera7761]

socialist policies create more poverty , evidence is large enough

[@amihart9269]

What does that mean? You believe in socialism but believe it should be stagnant forever?

[@felipetalavera7761]

U contradict urself

[@scoopidywhoop7484]

@@amihart9269 no, I merely believe that any further integration of Marxist belief is more harmful than helpful. I don’t see a stateless entity that does not have any real identity past ideology as a basis for government.

[@caramelldansen2204]

@@scoopidywhoop7484 Ah, so you don't like communism because you don't know what it is. You should actually try reading Marx and figuring out what communism actually _is_ before you embarrass yourself again.

[@balaramkusari5706]

🇳🇵🇨🇳🇳🇵

[@felipetalavera7761]

the value express in "price" is subjective. that destroy all the monetary theory of marx

[@tovjuca-nr5yu]

Vai no mercado e fala que o preço da carne é subjetivo tbm. Tenho certeza que vão concordar e te vender mais barato.

[@monkeymox2544]

Value is not the same as price.

[@felipetalavera7761]

@@monkeymox2544 I didn't say that

[@QuantumPolyhedron]

How can defining a term definitely possibly destroy anything? If you define value in terms of subjective evaluations of the monetary cost of a product, it would not be the same as the value discussed in Marxian terms, which refers to the actual physical cost in takes to produce a produce measured in physical units of time, averaged out over a given market. Simply defining the term differently cannot "debunk" anything because you would not be talking about the same concepts at all. It would be like if I claimed to debunk the earth being "round" by disagreeing over how the term "round" should be defined. It doesn't "destroy" anything. It is just quibbling over the definition of words.

[@felipetalavera7761]

@@QuantumPolyhedron is like a castle make of cards. U take one card and all the castle fall

[@rainerlippert]

Are you sure the image you show at 00:23 is correct? An entrepreneur would be very happy if that were correct, because then all he would have to do is produce something and thereby achieve his goal, namely making a profit, without having to sell his products. This view is shown to be false by reality. “Profit” is also not correct according to Marx; it is surplus value that should replace the term “profit”. But only a buyer on the market can pay for the surplus value. An entrepreneur only achieves surplus value if a buyer buys one of the entrepreneur's products, completely replaces the costs c + v and pays even more - the surplus value. On the production side of the commodity society, an entrepreneur can only estimate the amount of surplus value he can obtain under current market conditions. In addition, the surplus value is not paid on the costs c + v, but, by the buyer, on the reimbursement of the costs. This is what happens in the market. Even if an angel were to hand the entrepreneur the sum of money m from heaven, that would not be any surplus value because it would only replace a part of the costs. Since surplus value is part of the value, there can only be one expected value on the production side of the commodity society through the expected surplus value. The real value is only created during exchange on the market when it is clear whether the buyer is paying surplus value and, if so, to what extent. On the production side of the commodity society there is only private work that does not create value. If the work products cannot be sold, it remains that way - the work put in was not socially useful and therefore not value-creating. This means that it cannot be qualified as abstract. With the sale of a work product, value is assigned to the work/labor results, i.e. the work product, at the social level through a value equivalent. Only then can the work put in, in accordance with the value of the value equivalent, be qualified as socially useful, therefore as value-creating, as labor and therefore also as abstract.

[@AcidCommunistAachen]

You're confusing money and value. Of course the finished product doesn't just spontaneously transform into money any more than the starting capital magically transformed into raw materials before that. But neither value nor money are created in exchange, otherwise we could create wealth simply by passing things around. At the moment of of exchange it is revealed whether value was created in production but production remains the moment in which value was (possibly) created. After the capitalist has sold the finished product at a profit we know that the finished product had a higher value than the sum of all materials and labor employed to produce it.

[@rainerlippert]

@@AcidCommunistAachen Thank you for the reaction! The value is created during exchange! You write it yourself, even if not exactly exactly: Quote „At the moment of of exchange it is revealed whether value was created in production but production remains the moment in which value was (possibly) created.“ If an entrepreneur cannot sell a product, it becomes apparent that no value is being created, so that no costs are being reimbursed. If he succeeds in selling the product, but without receiving surplus value, the value is only calculated in the amount of the costs. If he succeeds in selling the product, but without fully reimbursing the costs, the value will be created in an amount that is lower than the value creation that was necessary for production. Marx never really considered these cases! Money is not identical with value. During exchange, the value is assigned equally to both the goods and the money. The amount of money reflects a right to a percentage share of all goods subject to economic exchange. Money is not identical with value. During exchange, the value is assigned equally to both the goods and the money. The amount of money reflects a right to a percentage share of all goods subject to economic exchange. Money with a certain expression thus reflects the amount of value that is assigned to a good when exchanged for this amount of money. If an amount of money (or another value equivalent) is never assigned to a good during exchange, no value is ever formed based on this good.

[@AcidCommunistAachen]

@@rainerlippert "You write it yourself, even if not exactly exactly: Quote „At the moment of of exchange it is revealed whether value was created in production but production remains the moment in which value was (possibly) created.“ " Wow, you're dense. My quote says exactly the opposite of what you say it says. Determinability and existence are not the same thing. And neither are value and price. At the moment of exchange, the price is determined, and at that moment you know whether value was created in production. Finding out in that moment in no way logically implies that it was created in that moment. Your logic: Your phone falls on its screen, you don't know if the screen is shattered or not. You choose to wait 30 seconds and then pick up the phone. Your see it is shattered and proclaim that the screen shattered the moment you picked it up.

[@QuantumPolyhedron]

*_>"An entrepreneur would be very happy if that were correct, because then all he would have to do is produce something and thereby achieve his goal, namely making a profit, without having to sell his products."_* Please actually go to the timestamp you referenced and look at the image. There is clearly depicted C' transitioning into M'. How do you think the produced commodities turn themselves into money without _selling them?_ *_>"'Profit' is also not correct according to Marx; it is surplus value that should replace the term 'profit'."_* Sometimes Marxists do use surplus value and profit interchangeably, but it depends upon context. *_>"But only a buyer on the market can pay for the surplus value. An entrepreneur only achieves surplus value if a buyer buys one of the entrepreneur's products, completely replaces the costs c + v and pays even more - the surplus value."_* Of course they cannot realize a profit without selling the product. They cannot sell a product without producing the product, either. This is just being pedantic and missing the overall point. *_>"Even if an angel were to hand the entrepreneur the sum of money m from heaven, that would not be any surplus value because it would only replace a part of the costs."_* If an angel handed money from heaven, it would be counterfeit if they used it and they would go to jail... I don't even mean that as a joke, you seem to think money has inherent properties that can just be handed down from heaven. Money is derivative of the industrial base, it has no power in and of itself. All its powers are derivative of the material industrial base, tied up in the relations between production and exchange, and not inherent to the green pieces of papers themselves. *_>"The real value is only created during exchange on the market when it is clear whether the buyer is paying surplus value and, if so, to what extent."_* Value is continuously created over the entire circuit of capital. Exchange is part of this but so is production. It is often in practice actually quite difficult to draw a hard-and-fast line as to where a part of the circuit begins and ends. It's a continuous process. *_>"With the sale of a work product, value is assigned to the work/labor results, i.e. the work product, at the social level through a value equivalent. Only then can the work put in, in accordance with the value of the value equivalent, be qualified as socially useful, therefore as value-creating, as labor and therefore also as abstract."_* Your entire argument boils down to the logical fallacy of stating that "because X requires Y to occur, then Y must be the only cause at the exclusion of everything else." This is obviously fallacious because production is just as necessary for exchange to take place as exchange is for production to take place. Both are integral in the circuit of capital. All your arguments can be turned against you by just repeating that "production is necessary for exchange so production is what creates value, not exchange!" But such a thing would be equally fallacious: both production and exchange play a role in value production. Exchange is the realization of value in relation to the productive capacity of the firm. They are _defined in relation to one another._

[@rainerlippert]

@@QuantumPolyhedron Hello! >"An entrepreneur would be very happy ..." - The time stamp makes it clear that the value is not created during production, but only on the market when the product is sold. And only if the entrepreneur can sell the product so well that the buyer pays more in return than the replacement of c + v, namely surplus value, then the entrepreneur also receives surplus value. Contrary to Marx's statement that surplus value would be produced, it is not produced but is only paid for on the market under certain conditions. You can only produce the prerequisites for surplus-value payments and values, but neither surplus-values nor values directly. Since, according to Marx, surplus value is part of value, it becomes clear that value is only created on the market, together with positive, negative or no surplus value payment. This means that the value is not created from the expenses plus an expected surplus value, but rather with the recognition of expenses - in the amount of the recognition. >"But only a buyer on the market ..." No, that's not pedantic, but rather it explains where the value is formed and to what extent - see previous comment. >"Even if an angel..." The point is that even a sum of money equal to the expected surplus value that the entrepreneur would receive from somewhere would not be surplus value because it would only replace part of the costs for his product. He only receives surplus value if a buyer reimburses him for the costs in full (!) and pays even more, namely the surplus value. That's right, there are no intrinsic values! Value is created on the market by the exchange partners and assigned the same amount to the goods exchanged for and during the exchange. Before and after the exchange, there is only one expected value for a good, including money. When it comes to money, you don't notice this in normal times, but it's very noticeable in times of crisis. >"The real value is only created during ..." No, production takes place in the area of the entrepreneur's private property and the work products remain there until they are sold. Even according to Marx, private labor does not create value. According to Marx, a product of labor only becomes a commodity when it becomes a use value for others through exchange (!). Only then will the work put in be qualified as socially useful and therefore value-creating. You should be able to tell from Marx's formula that value includes surplus value. If the entrepreneur does not receive the expected surplus value on the market, the value there would be changed - what a nonsense; if he cannot sell it at all, no value is created at all - the work that was put into the product cannot be qualified as socially useful and therefore as value-creating. This makes it clear that the value is not given before the sale. As written above, only prerequisites for surplus-value payments and values can be produced - this happens all the time in the production process, but not the values and surplus-values directly. >"With the sale of a work product ..." What you write here is not correct! Quote: “This is obviously fallacious because production is just as necessary for exchange to take place as exchange is for production to take place.” Production is necessary for exchange and exchange is necessary for production. But the creation of value in relation to each product is not necessary for production. If values are not formed in the market, the entrepreneur can no longer pay for raw materials, electricity, labor, etc. He has to file for bankruptcy. If he can sell his products through exchange for money, corresponding values are formed and he can continue his production. According to you, he could screw something together, create value, and not even need to sell his creation. Marx's value formula, W = c + v + m, is generally wrong, since the surplus value is not paid on the costs, but on the replacement of the costs - that is a huge difference (!), i.e. on the market and therefore only there the value is formed. This is where your confusion in value formation comes from! But it can be used, even if it is not exact, to explain how the values must be formed if production is to be continued, improved and, if possible, expanded.

[@nokia-gm8gv]

hyeah

[@tensortab8896]

Lol!

[@ploughjogger]

“There was an old bastard named Lenin Who did two or three million men in. That's a lot to have done in But where he did one in That old bastard Stalin did ten in.” ― Robert Conquest

[@QuantumPolyhedron]

Lenin murdered zero people and capitalism has killed billions of people.