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[OPE-L:5254] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: [Mike W] Re: use-value as quantitative

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re 5247

Hi Rakesh.

You remind us of some good points Marx made about Ricardo's world
view, but I was talking more narrowly about the concept of the
"use-value" of a machine.

Duncan 

Dear Duncan,
Marx's dynamics centers on the contradictory use value of the machine
(and you would surely put the point much better than I do here).

 On the one hand, the machine is useful to the capitalist because it
allows him to reduce unit values by substituting a lesser sum of
indirect labor for a greater sum of paid direct labor on a per unit
basis (of course if capitalists had to pay for the total labor
performed, instead of simply labor power, the use value of the
machine would even have a greater scope). On the other hand, the
machine is useful in that it allows for the absorption of surplus
labor or production of newly added value. However, the less direct
labor employed relative to total capital--that is, the more unit
values are reduced--the more difficult it becomes for the capitalist
to absorb surplus labor.

However, Marx does not only consider the use of machines from the
perspective of value or net revenue. On the one hand, Marx emphasizes
the use of machines on gross revenue, i.e., in terms of the use
values available for working class consumption. On the other hand,
Marx emphasizes that even from the narrow perspective of valorization
or absorption of surplus labor, what matters is not only the value of
machinery but its quantity in use value terms. So as I said in my
last post with an expanded  mass of the elements of production, even
if their value is the same, more workers can be introduced into the
productive process and in the next cycle of production these workers
will be producing more value.

That is,  it does seem to me that qualitative improvements in the
machine producing sector are quite important for Marx. This is where
I seem to be disagreeing with you.  That is,  use value (in the sense
of the quantity of machines as use values) plays a different role in
Marx's theory than in political economy and Ricardo's theory in
particular.

It seems to me that the question we are trying to answer is why Marx
emphasized in his notes on A Wagner that use value is not only not
ignored in his theory, it plays a novel role.

Sweezy's denial of the importance of use value is one approach;
Steve's answer is another .  Grossman's interpretation of Marx is
yet another. It's strange to me that Steve would laud several people
but Grossman for emphasizing the centrality of use value to Marx
though Rosdolsky whom Steve praises to the sky is only summarizing
Grossman's argument. I am hoping that Steve is not ignoring Grossman
because I have associated myself with him.

Yours, Rakesh











re 5231

 So they try to find measures of the "qualitative improvement" of
capital. (The new machine, which costs the same as the old one,
can shape twice as many pieces of metal or execute twice as many
instructions.) This is completely foreign to the Marxian/Classical
(and even /Sraffian) way of looking at capital, and, as far as I
can tell, just adds confusing noise to the macroeconomic data. If,
as Marx argues, the use-value of a machine to the capitalist is
the amount of wage cost it saves, changes in the concrete
performance of the machine are irrelevant.

Duncan 

Hi Duncan,
It seems to me that Marx is not so exclusively interested in the
value surplus at the expense of use value. For example,   Marx
criticizes Ricardo for only being concerned with net revenue (pure
profit), the value surplus of price over costs, and not gross
revenue, i.e., the mass of use values necessary for the subsistence
of the working population.  Marx criticizes Ricardo precisely for
only figuring these use values as costs which are to be pushed down
as low as possible. So for an employer who makes $2000 profit on a
capital of
$20,000--10%--it is utterly irrelevant whether his capital sets 100
or 1000 people into motion...as long as in all instances profit
does not fall below $2,000. Since as you say above anything other
than this value surplus is, as you say above, noise to the
macroeconomic data, Marx writes: "By denying the importance of
gross revenue, i.e, the volume of production and consumption--apart
from the value surplus--and hence denying the importance of life
itself, political economy's abstraction reaches the peak of infamy."

Moreover, as I suggested in my last post, the expansion in the mass
of use values in which a given sum of value is represented is
indeed of great INDIRECT significance for the valorization process.
For example,

There is indeed for Marx a dialectic of use value and value in more
than just the consumption of labor power. Steve credits Rosdolsky
for rescuing this key element of Marx's theory. But if Steve were
to study the footnotes of Rosdolsky, he will find that he is
drawing from Grossmann's work. In both HG's magnum opus and
dynamics book there is attention to said dialectic.

Yours, Rakesh 

--
Duncan K. Foley
Leo Model Professor
Department of Economics
Graduate Faculty
New School University
65 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10003
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messages: (212)-229-5717
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