[OPE-L:5599] is value (a form of) labor?

["Gerald_A_Levy" <Gerald_A_Levy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>From Howard's [5594]:

> To say that value exists only in exchange would
> seem to obliterate a key
> acquisition of Marx's analysis -- that value is in
> fact a form of labor
> whereby relations of producers in their reciprocal > activities are
represented or become manifest as
> relations of objects

Hi Howard. It looks like you are enjoying
OPE-L.  If so, great.

Would you comment on the following short
quote from Chris A's article "Value, Labour
and Negativity" (_Capital & Class_, 73, p. 31)?

"Ernest Mandel went so far as to say 'For Marx
*labour is value*' (Mandel, 1990: 11) --
emphasizing the point. Mandel is directly refuted
by Marx's own text. Marx says that 'labour is
not itself value'; although 'labour creates value'
it 'becomes value' only in 'objective form' when
the labour embodied in one commodity is equated
with the labour embodied in another commodity
(Marx, 1976a [Capital I, Penguin ed, JL]: 142).
Moreover labour is socially validated thereby only
as 'abstract', and this in turn requires the presence
of the money commodity to ground the universal
dimension required. In brief, Mandel overlooked
the importance of the value *form* in the labour
theory of value".

In a footnote to the above, Chris notes that
(Mino) Carchedi said something similar to
Mandel. Carchedi: "Often one runs into
expressions such as ... labour being 'the
substance of value', etc....But... value is *not*
created by (abstract) labour. Value *is*
labour....' (Carchedi, 1991: 102)" {Ibid, footnote
17, p. 37}

In solidarity, Jerry