Re: Marx's Value Theory--a potential critique

["Charlotte S. Wellen" <cwellen@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Subject: Re: Marx and value--a potential critique.


Let us examine the potential critique.  WE have it expressed in
this way:

"Consumers set the price, and therefore the value of goods
since there is no other *real* way to define the value of
goods.  Laborers labor in the hopes of receiving exchange
value.

. . . .

 There is clearly and absolutely no such thing as embodied
labor.  To the extent that Marx argues such a point he is
clearly and plainly wrong. Expressing in what way the exchange
value of goods can be modified, or is informed by the
conditions of labor is another story.  "

Capitalist theory (not Marxist theory) came up with the
Theories of Labor Value and Surplus Value.  The ideas are
explicitly put forth in Adam Smith and Ricardo.  Once Marx
developed it from the point of view of the worker's role in the
process of production to unveil exploitation, theorists sought
not to refute the theory, but to cover up the fact of surplus
value.

 Don't take my word for it.  Examine Keynes Theory of Economics
and look at his production equations.  As Afanasyev points out
in his "History of Bourgeois Economics" (Progress publishers),
the equations mask the labor value component, but do not by any
means exclude it.  They depend on the fact of labor value.
Every Economic Theory contains the an assumption of the Labor
Value Theory.  To think otherwise is like speaking of the tides
without having as a basic assumption the existence of water.
Without Labor there is no Product.  It is that simple.  (As to
the relation between value and price, THAT is another story).

Sincere Regards,

--A man called Wei En Lin





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