At the same time that the length of time that commodities remain in circulation declines, the extent of the market expands. Improved communications and transport means that commodities can be shipped to ever more distant markets. The development of refrigeration means that perishable goods can be shipped by road, rail, sea and air. That, in turn, has economic consequences, such as the rise of Chicago as a centre for the meat packing industry. But, even non-perishable goods are held in the least possible stocks. And, again presaging the development of built in obsolescence, and then flexible specialisation, Marx notes that this very process encourages rapid changes in tastes and fashions.
“The fact that consumption lives from hand to mouth, changes its linen and its coat as rapidly as it does its opinions and does not wear the same coat ten years running, etc. is connected with the speed of reproduction, or is another expression of it.” (p 288)
Marx gives the example of the way changes in production also influence consumption. When it became possible to maintain cattle over the Winter, as a result of the use of silage etc., all of those types of commodity such as pickled or smoked meats, previously used as an alternative to fresh meat, disappeared.
Marx sets out five reasons why commodity circulation expands massively, as a consequence of capitalist production. Firstly, products only become commodities when they enter circulation. Direct producers only place a small proportion of their production into circulation to obtain those products they cannot efficiently produce themselves. But, very little of what a capitalist produces is what they require for themselves. All, or nearly all of what they produce is for the market. The only time even a significant portion of what they produce is for their own consumption, is where that output also forms a significant part of their constant capital. For example, a coal mine may require a significant amount of coal to power its steam engines, a farmer uses some of the grain they produce as seed, livestock for breeding and so on.
At the same time that capitalist production entails a larger proportion of output for sale rather than direct consumption, it also involves production itself on a vastly increased scale so that the quantity of output thrown into circulation rises accordingly.
Secondly, the division of labour means that a wider range of commodities is produced. Division of labour, in society, means that this diversification of production is extended, but, division of labour within the factory means that individual components themselves become commodities, produced by separate capitals. And, Marx notes a point I have also made in relation to the long wave, in relation to the development of new commodities for personal consumption. So, Marx says, for example, that the use of steam locomotion arose due to the need to develop more rapid and universal means of transport and communication. In other words, it is driven by the needs of production. But, once developed this steam locomotion leads to the development of whole new use values. For example, it leads to passenger rail transport, an expansion of travel and leisure, the development of tourism and seaside holidays, and so on. The development of video recording technology arose in the TV industry, as a means of being able to store TV programmes, for reuse, to be able to produce programmes that no longer had to be recorded live, and so on. But, it meant that a large consumer market for video recorders, was developed, which, in turn created a multi-billion dollar porn industry, and so on.
“All this amounts to the following: successive phases or states of one product are converted into separate commodities. New products or new values in use are created and become commodities.” (p 289)
Thirdly, the vast mass of the population, who previously were direct producers, who met their own needs from their own production, become wage labourers, who now have to buy wage goods in the market.
Fourthly, the tenant farmers become industrial capitalists as agriculture is conducted on an industrial scale. Rent assumes the form of money rent under feudalism, as its most mature form, as it is dissolved into capitalist rent. But, under capitalism all rent becomes money rent, just as all taxes, tithes etc., assume the money form. And, along with it all of the inputs of agriculture become commodities, rather than produced in kind. Seeds are bought from specialist seed merchants, livestock from livestock breeders, fertiliser from chemical producers, machinery from specialist agricultural machinery producers.
Fifthly, a mass of property is turned into commodities. Landed property was formerly handed down from one generation to another, preserved by primogeniture. But, capitalism sees land itself turned into a commodity, bought and sold on the market, as with any other. The buyers of the land, who have no interest in farming it themselves, are merely “rent farmers”, interested in the rent they can obtain from it, in the same way they might be interested in the coupon they obtain from a bond, or the dividend on a share. And, especially following the passing of the Limited Liabilities Act, in 1855, there is also a massive expansion of this form of property, of fictitious capital, in the shape of bonds and shares that are sold as commodities on the market.
“On the one hand, alienation of landed property (the lack of property of the masses causes them, for example, to regard the dwelling in which they live as a commodity). [On the other hand,] railway shares, in short, all kinds of shares.” (p 289-90)
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