Talk:Labor theory of value

message: “Finally, it is not labor per se that creates value, but labor power sold by free wage workers to capitalists. Another distinction is between productive and unproductive labor. Only wage workers of productive sectors of the economy produce value.”
This is incorrect, Marx does not specify that wage labor is necessary for the production of value, but simply labor having as its result a commodity to be exchanged. This labor doesn’t have to be performed as wage labor: the laborer could, alternatively, own the product of their own labor and sell it themselves. This would still count as production of value. The snippet shouldn’t be removed entirely but simply modified to reflect this, as the fact that the product exchanged must be exchanged in order to be realized as “value” is still an important component of Marx’s definitions.
In Capital Volume 1, Chapter 1, Section 1:
“Let us now consider the residue of each of these products; it consists of the same unsubstantial reality in each, a mere congelation of homogeneous human labour, of labour power expended without regard to the mode of its expenditure. All that these things now tell us is, that human labour power has been expended in their production, that human labour is embodied in them. When looked at as crystals of this social substance, common to them all, they are – Values.
We have seen that when commodities are exchanged, their exchange value manifests itself as something totally independent of their use value. But if we abstract from their use value, there remains their Value as defined above. Therefore, the common substance that manifests itself in the exchange value of commodities, whenever they are exchanged, is their value. The progress of our investigation will show that exchange value is the only form in which the value of commodities can manifest itself or be expressed.”
And later in the same section:
“A thing can be a use value, without having value. This is the case whenever its utility to man is not due to labour. Such are air, virgin soil, natural meadows, &c. A thing can be useful, and the product of human labour, without being a commodity. Whoever directly satisfies his wants with the produce of his own labour, creates, indeed, use values, but not commodities. In order to produce the latter, he must not only produce use values, but use values for others, social use values. (And not only for others, without more. The mediaeval peasant produced quit-rent-corn for his feudal lord and tithe-corn for his parson. But neither the quit-rent-corn nor the tithe-corn became commodities by reason of the fact that they had been produced for others. To become a commodity a product must be transferred to another, whom it will serve as a use value, by means of an exchange.) Lastly nothing can have value, without being an object of utility. If the thing is useless, so is the labour contained in it; the labour does not count as labour, and therefore creates no value.”
And from Chapter 2:
“On the other hand, they must show that they are use-values before they can be realised as values. For the labour spent upon them counts effectively, only in so far as it is spent in a form that is useful for others. Whether that labour is useful for others, and its product consequently capable of satisfying the wants of others, can be proved only by the act of exchange.”
:Just noting my agreement with this. I will likely correct this at the same time I fix the other text that confuses value, exchange value, use value, labour, abstract labour and concrete labour. KetchupSalt (talk) 19:34, 23 July 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Incorrect statement in section History / Karl Marx 

message: The section "Distinctions of economically pertinent labor" states
:In his terms, value is the 'socially necessary abstract labor' embodied in a commodity
This is incorrect. With Marx, abstract labour is the source of exchange value, not value. Value is socially necessary labour time (SNLT). The following three relations hold: abstract labour => exchange value, concrete labour => use value and SNLT => value. I will change this in a few days if I see no objections. The sentence "Finally, it is not labor per se that creates value, but labor power sold by free wage workers to capitalists" is similarly incorrect but I see it has its own section on this talk page. KetchupSalt (talk) 19:14, 23 July 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: [Bichler and Nitzan] argue that, according to Marx, the value of a commodity indicates the abstract labor time required for its production
contains the same error. KetchupSalt (talk) 19:29, 23 July 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  "socially necessary abstract labor" 

message: This section is simply wrong and strikes me as trying to make a hen out of a feather. Marx repeatedly makes the point that machines do not create value, they merely transfer it and add their depreciation on top. Machines can only perform work, not labour. A short review of the cited papers follows:
The Pokrovskii paper: does not properly distinguish between work and labour. The quote "Marx could suggest that the substitution affects the mechanism of production of value" is especially telling, because Marx spills much ink emphasizing that machines do not create value, only use-values. Marx "could" follow Pokrovskii's reasoning but he doesn't, for reasons that are apparent to anyone who has read Capital.
The Beaudreau-Pokrovskii paper: here a unit conversion to MJ/$ similar to the Pokrovskii paper is done. "For example, the growth rate of the use of labour in production appeared to be less than the growth rate of output in developed economies, the fact which prompted scholars to look elsewhere" this is entirely expected from Marx' theory. Capital deploys ever-more productive machinery, thus lowering the value of the relevant commodities. More of the same use-values are produced for the same unit of labour. The resulting change in the nature of labour is also anticipated by Marx. The concrete forms of labour change, but the fact that abstract labour is the sole source of value does not. There is also an attempt to suggest that machines can run themselves, which is not the case with actually existing machines: "Today, we are witnessing another fundamental transformation as control devices and information technology are rapidly transforming the workplace, rendering human forms of supervision redundant". So the paper goes on.
I do not have a copy of the Beaudreau book, but I see no mention of Marx in summaries of it.
I wouldn't be opposed to mentioning other value theories in this page, but passing them off as extensions of Marx' LTV when they are clearly rejections of it amounts to spreading falsehoods. KetchupSalt (talk) 10:23, 3 October 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: agreed ProofCreature (talk) 21:07, 7 October 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  "A generalization"