I promise I’m not a wrecker, I just have trouble finding Marxist sources for these things that aren’t big books on top of what I’m already reading. I think I understand that it says the exchange value of a product is proportionate to the labor time used to create it. Am I getting that correct? More labor-intensive commodities, or products requiring more specialized tools to make would cost more. And I know I’ve heard the criticism before. Heard it pretty much all my life. “Is a cookie still worth its labor if it’s burnt? Is a pie worth the labor if it’s a shit pie?” I have heard people say that Marx addresses such criticisms in Capital, but I haven’t gotten around to those tomes yet. Could someone explain to me how they are addressed and maybe straighten out other things I may have gotten wrong?
The burnt cookies are factored in because it is all based on averages. If 1 in 100 cookies are burnt the burnt cookies are worthless but the unburnt ones make up that loss. The guy who can burn no cookies will profit more than average.
The exchange value of a commodity is derived by the average labor time it takes to create the product. “Labor time” also includes all the time not working that is required to be spent maintain and reproducing the labourers. A job that is hard on the body needs more rest time, a job that requires more training takes more time to reproduce workers. Automation lowers commodity prices because it reduces both the physical strain and training required thus making workers able to spend more of their lives producing.
I never got though capital because I found the best way to understand it was to re read the whole thing from the start after reading a new chapter.
Thank you, I think this makes sense.