McCulloch, by arguing that it is monopoly, or the action of agents produced by labour, that creates value, gets into all sorts of problems. By monopoly, he means, for example, the ownership of land, and, by agents produced by labour, he means capital.
“For example, the labour of the wind produces the desired effect on the ship (produces a change in it).
“… but the value of that change is not increased by, and is in no degree dependent on, the operation or labour of the natural agents concerned, but on the amount of capital, or the produce of previous labour, that cooperated in the production of the effect; just as the cost of grinding corn does not depend on the action of the wind or water that turns the mill, but on the amount of capital wasted in the operation” (op. cit., p. 79 [Note I]).” (p 184)
By “wasted”, here, McCulloch means the wear and tear of the millstone. In which case, it is not, here, that the millstone “labours”, in its operation that is the source of the value it contributes, but the fact that it contributes a portion of its use value, and this portion has value, because it is the product of past labour. But, then the dilemma arises as later seen in, say, the work of Walras. If profit is this return to capital, or the wages of capital, how is that possible, on this basis? The capital, here, the millstone, receives back from the sale of the corn, an amount of value equal to that it has contributed to the corn via its wear and tear. But, it only, thereby, gets back an equal amount of value to what is required for its own reproduction. As Walras described, if there were perfect competition, then, on the basis of such a factor contribution theory of value, profit becomes impossible, because it is competed away, as each factor of production only gets back what it costs itself to produce.
McCulloch says,
““… the word labour means … in all discussions respecting value … either the immediate labour of man, or the labour of the capital produced by man, or both” (op. cit., p. 84 [note to Note II]).” (p 184)
The capital, i.e. the products of past labour, on this basis, create value by their application or consumption in the production process. In this way, the use value and exchange-value of these products is conflated.
“Consequently, by the exchange-value of the products of labour, we [are to] understand the use-value of these products, for this use-value consists only in its action, or, as Mac calls it, “labour”, in consumption, regardless of whether this is industrial consumption or not.” (p 184)
This simply brings us back to the problem of all theories of subjective value, which try to derive value from use value. The use value of all the various means of production is endlessly varied, and there is no practical or rational basis for quantifying, and thereby equating, the use value contributed by any one of them as opposed to another.
“Thus, with the identification of use-value and exchange-value ends this vulgarisation of Ricardo, which we must therefore consider as the last and most sordid expression of the decline of the Ricardian school as such.
“The profits of capital are only another name for the wages of accumulated labour” (J. R. McCulloch, The Principles of Political Economy, London, 1825, p. 291),
that is, for the wages paid to commodities for the services they render as use-values in production.” (p 185)
No comments:
Post a Comment