NOTE 16: Who are you going to believe? Your lying eyes or the BLS?
If not all labor creates value, how can we distinguish labor that creates value from labor that does not create value. Marx proposed that labor that creates value must be expressed as exchange value; which is to say, value producing labor contained in one commodity must be expressed in the bodily form of another commodity having value for which the first product of value creating labor is exchanged.
Marx’s definition provides a testable statement regarding value:
If a product of labor has value, this value must be expressed as exchange value.
An important caveat to Marx’s theory must be stated here: while the value of a product of labor must be expressed as exchange value, the converse statement will not necessarily be true: the value of a product of labor will be expressed in the form of exchange value, but not every object with exchange value actually has value.
The value-form school’s definition of value directly contradicts Marx’s argument in that, for value-form theory, value does not necessarily take the form of exchange value, but only some definite quantity of the material of a “value-form” (i.e., a money), irrespective of whether this material itself has value or not. Thus the value-form school also produces a testable statement:
If a product of labor has value, it will have a price denominated in some material granted forced circulation by the State, and having the key determination of immediate exchangeability. (Arthur, 2003.)
According to Heinrich in his Introduction to the three volumes of Capital, there is no reason to prove value exists. However, the problem we face is not whether we need prove value itself exists, but which of these two distinct and incompatible definitions of value is accurate.
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