: Say the line Marx

: M - C - M’

Qualitatively or formally considered, money is independent of all limits, that is it is the universal representative of material wealth because it is directly convertible into any other commodity. But at the same time every actual sum of money is limited in amount, and therefore has only a limited efficacy as a means of purchase. This contradiction between the quantitative limitation and the qualitative lack of limitation of money keeps driving the hoader back to his Sisyphean task: accumulation. He is in the same situation as a world conqueror, who discovers a new boundary with each country he annexes.

And so it begins

reporting in for posting duty o7

currently making a word document with quotes ive highlighted in my copy of capital, as well as terms/concepts explained in previous threads here

do i get an extra sticker in my communist homework book?

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Really feels like we're at the heart of Marx's disagreement with liberal economics here in these chapters. He's just listing things I learned in economics classes as examples of stupid things people say.

Going through pretty slowly and taking notes but I'm getting there and am determined to stick with it until the end

<---- me waiting for the capitalists to "give back voluntarily the greater part of the profit in order to begin the game again"

(chapter 4 footnote 4, Fowkes p. 251)

It's interesting how he hasn't explicitly mentioned dialectics or Hegel, but you can see his style of constant thinking is constantly about dualities.

It's funny: people say Chap 1-3 are "hard", and right on the 1st page of Ch.4 I found myself thinking "yep, this is easier"

"Ah, Superintendent Chalmers, welcome. I hope you're prepared for an unforgettable consumption of commodities!"

"Commodities are not the terminating object of the trading capitalist, money is his terminating object."

(Chapter 4, footnote 7 - Fowkes p.254)

Oh boy here I go reading again

I went to the bookstore on Saturday and bought a physical copy (Penguin edition). Worth every yard!

Summarising everything so far:

Things have use-value (comes in all kinds) and value (differs only quantitatively)

The amount of value in a thing is the average amount of labour-time needed to make it.

To trade things is to trade things of equal quantities of value. Obviously you need to do this sometimes because you require various use-values.

Any commodity's value can be expressed in terms of other commodities. A diamond is as good as three slaves, 5000 yards of linen, a million tons of manure. Money is one particular fungible commodity that is used as a measuring stick.

Because barter is inconvenient, every commodity gets swapped for money (selling), then money gets swapped for every commodity (buying).

But then people stop caring about trading for use-values / to fulfill needs. Money becomes an end in itself. They trade in order to grow their supply of money. Money is called capital when it's used in this way.

The capitalist knows that all commodities, however scurvy they may look, or however badly they may smell, are in faith and in truth money, inwardly circumcised Jews, and what is more, a wonderful means whereby out of money to make more money.

This part should honestly have a [TN: it's a bible reference], it has pretty bad vibes if you don't know that. It's even worse in some other translations.

Gah! I'm behind!

Starting chapter 3 now! The semester is starting this week for uni so I’m gonna be carrying my copy everywhere and replacing doomscrolling with theory. Priorities

Quite busy the next two weeks, will probably be falling behind on these next few chapters. Hopefully I'll not be too far behind and can catch up next month.

I feel like I'm getting a little bit hung up on value vs exchange value (which I guess is kinda like price). And gold. I'm happy enough to move along with value defined as "socially necessary labour" (or SNL+naturally occurring+chance stuff? idk) and exchange value as "price, give or take", but I feel like the arguments kinda got glossed over. I did rush last week's reading because I was very busy (and then sick). I can just hear the campus libertarian in the back of my head saying "ho ho ho labour value". Ultimately, SNL compared to the SNL mass of all commodities in society is what creates exchange value (or LT compared to SNness and desire?), and SNL is a combination of technology, training, and ability of each participant in a society.

I did a forklift certification today and yesterday, and I feel like I'm doubting some of my classmates ability to do these chapters. Maybe if they were really invested in it?

Trade doesn’t create value. Circulation doesn’t create value. Because “surplus” to the individual producer of a commodity isn’t “surplus value.” It’s just surplus of that one thing and they must use its exchange value for other necessities.

Materialism is basically "It's the economy, stupid"

Like if libs ask, "How can you like China?! They don't respect civil rights like privacy the way USA does!" Answer: "It's the economy, stupid"

Setting a new goal (just for myself) to read Mon-Sat so I can review the section on Sunday.

I'll post my notes on the end of Ch.3 tomorrow. Flick me in the nuts if I don't.

I'd encourage everyone to post notes as they go . It helps everyone.

I'm one section behind. Gotta catch up tomorrow.

I finished this week reading and it was nice that it was not so dense. A little bit of a breather.

Use-values must therefore never be looked upon as the real aim of the capitalist;

like I know its obvious but it was nice seeing Marx say that? but it just reminded me how like capitalist make a bunch of junk that don't function fully or like break down and stuff. just like not good stuff that wont last for years usually and needing to be replaced.

Suppose then, that by some inexplicable privilege, the seller is enabled to sell his commodities above their value, what is worth 100 for 110, in which case the price is nominally raised 10%. The seller therefore pockets a surplus-value of 10. But after he has sold he becomes a buyer. A third owner of commodities comes to him now as seller, who in this capacity also enjoys the privilege of selling his commodities 10% too dear. Our friend gained 10 as a seller only to lose it again as a buyer. [11] The net result is, that all owners of commodities sell their goods to one another at 10% above their value, which comes precisely to the same as if they sold them at their true value. Such a general and nominal rise of prices has the same effect as if the values had been expressed in weight of silver instead of in weight of gold. The nominal prices of commodities would rise, but the real relation between their values would remain unchanged.

I dunno why but that reminded me of like landlords and them raising rent? I'm not sure why it made me think of landlords for some reason? I guess it just reminded me of landlords because like, for example, I heard people say if UBI was given, landlords would increase rent, and it just sounded a lot like what was said in that paragraph? or if like someone getting a raise or tons of people getting a raise, landlords again raising rent. I dunno, im not sure how much of it applies to landlords and stuff

Our friend, Moneybags, who as yet is only an embryo capitalist,

and this has nothing to do with anything, I just thought it was funny to see Marx calling a capitalist, Moneybags

Next week will be all of Chapters 6, 7, and 8

Chapter 5: Contradictions in the General Formula

Colin Capitalist buys a fish from Frankie Fisherman. Colin Capitalist sells it to Consuela Consumer. Frankie and Consuela are both playing a C-M-C game; they are not capitalists. Only Colin in playing an M-C-M game.

At the beginning of the chapter, Marx looks at a fair barter (C-C) and a fair C-M-C, and says they are similar: no value is gained or lost. They are both fair. C-M-C is just more convenient than barter but is not exploitative.

• "The same value, i.e. the same quantity of objectified social labour, remains throughout in the hands of the same commodity-owner, first in the shape of his own commodity, then in the shape of the money into which the commodity has been transformed, and finally in the shape of the commodity into which this money has been re-converted."

One reason to do fair C-M-C is that someone who sews all the time gets more sewing done in an hour than I would (coz they're slicker), so I trade an hour of my time (transformed into money) for an our of their sewing-produce.

• "It is true that commodities may be sold at prices which diverge from their values, but this divergence appears as an infringement of the laws governing the exchange of commodities."
• • "The continual oscillations in prices, their rise and fall, compensate each other, cancel each other out, and carry out their own reduction to an average price which is their internal regulator. This average price is the guiding light of the merchant or the manufacturer in every undertaking of a lengthy nature. The manufacturer knows that if a long period of time is considered, commodities are sold neither over nor under, but at, their average price"

This is pretty questionable in the 21st century; e.g. Beats By Dre headphones cost $20 to make, sell for $200

Marx is eager to show that the exchange of commodities is not the source of surplus-value/profit.

• "If commodities, or commodities and money, of equal exchange-value, and consequently equivalents, are exchanged, it is plain that no one abstracts more value from circulation than he throws into it. The formation of surplus-value does not take place. In its pure form, the circulation process necessitates the exchange of equivalents, but in reality processes do not take place in their pure form."

Marx dismissees the claim that profit comes from selling at (say) 110% of production costs. If everyone overpaid for everything, the producer would overpay for his raw materials, the man who takes his wages to market would have gotten those wages by overcharging: it would all balance out. Everything would be marked up 10% and it would be the same as a fair (equitable) C-M-C.

'The idea of profits being paid by the consumers, is, assuredly, very absurd. Who are the consumers?' (G. Ramsay, An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth)

"The consistent upholders of the mistaken theory that surplus-value has its origin in a nominal rise of prices or in the privilege which the seller has of selling too dear assume therefore that there exists a class of buyers who do not sell, i.e. a class of consumers who do not produce. The existence of such a class is inexplicable"

Profit, in the usual condition of the market, is not made by exchanging. Had it not existed before, neither could it after that transaction' (Ramsay)

There are cases where the seller outsmarts the consumer and charges too much, but these can't explain the origin of profit in the big picture of the economy: the "perplexity may perhaps have arisen from conceiving people merely as personified categories, instead of as individuals."

"However much we twist and tum, the final conclusion remains the same. If equivalents are exchanged, no surplus-value results, and if non-equivalents are exchanged, we still have no surplus-value. Circulation, or the exchange of commodities, creates no value."

Marx considers the profits made by userers and merchants to be a pre-capitalist M-C-M', saying that because circulation can't explain surplus-value.

*"In the course of our investigation, we shall find that both merchants' capital and interest-bearing capital are derivative forms, and at the same time it will become clear why, historically, these two forms appear before the modern primary form of capital." So he's not explaining it yet.

"In usurers' capital the form M-C-M' is reduced to the unmediated extremes M-M'"

Aristotle: "the usurer is most rightly hated, because money itself is the source of his gain, and is not used for the purposes for which it was invented. For it originated for the exchange of commodities, but interest makes out of money, more money."

A producer labouring produces one hour worth of value per hour. So there's no "surplus" there either; he doesn't produce 1.1 value-unit per labour-unit.

The main point of this chapter on 'Contradictions in the General Formula [of Capital]' is: "the formation of capital must be possible even though the price and the value of a commodity be the same, for it cannot be explained by referring to any divergence between price and value"

This quote gives some insight into the labour theory of value and the difference between price and value: "How can we account for the origin of capital on the assumption that prices are regulated by the average price, i.e. ultimately by the value of the commodities? I say 'ultimately' because average prices do not directly coincide with the values of commodities, as Adam Smith, Ricardo, and others believe."

Marx ends the chapter with a problem to be solved: "The money-owner, who is as yet only a capitalist in larval form, must buy his commodities at their value, sell them at their value, and yet at the end of the process withdraw more value from circulation than he threw into it at the beginning. His emergence as a butterfly must, and yet must not, take place in the sphere of circulation. These are the conditions of the problem."