Re: AUT: Remarks on Midnight Notes

[Paul Mattick <mattickp@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Thu, 5 Feb 1998, Doug Henwood wrote:

> Paul Mattick wrote:
>
> >Yes: but what is produced by cooking, eating, etc. is not "labor power"
> >the commodity but the laborer herself. LP is, so to speak, an attribute of
> >the person, who is its "owner". This is why, in Marx's analysis, the value
> >of LP is determined not by the time necessary to produce the laborer but
> >the commodities required for that production: this is where socially
> >necessary labor time (value) enters into the story.
>
> And what does this fine distinction do for you politically, aside from
> providing an elegant excuse for the value theorist to ignore household
> relations?
>
> Doug
This strikes me as an obnoxious, as opposed to comradely, comment, but I
will answer it anyway. The distinction provides no excuse for the value
theorist, or anyone else, to ignore household relations; it only excludes
them from value theory. But there is more to life than value theory. The
political gain it provides is as roundabout as theoretical gains usually
are: it makes it possible to comprehend the functioning of capitalism, as
a system regulated by the representation--and misrepresentation--of labor
as "value", and it makes it possible to see through the mystifications of
economic theory.
Paul



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