This post was made in response to my required reading for Foundations of Economic Exchange. On Fetishism by Karl Marx:
How can Marx see value in a good as how many hours went into it. Just because someone put 10 hours into making a shoe does not make it more valuable to me than a shoe that was professionally produced in 10 minutes. I want the good that is of higher quality and will give me more use and acceptance. Marx claims that goods do not have inherent value and the only use of trade is to exchange “social value,” that is the want of need of the producer to satisfy his life necessities. This, in and of itself, is to me paradoxical. If someone needs something to survive it obviously has value to them, some value that they have assigned to the meat of their neighbors cow or the wheat of their neighbors field. They will certainly be more willing to pay for the meat to feed their family than they will for the shoes that took the same amount of time to make as the meat, and under Marx’s assessment of value should therefore cost the same amount.
How could Marx overlook such a powerful motivator in people as survival? People will pay much more for a good that extends their life and well being than they will for a craft their neighbor made to sell. This flies right in the face of Marx’s entire theory that the only value of a good is social value. How Marx could have overlooked such a motivating factor as survival and comfort makes me question the rest of his thinking. How could he blatantly ignore something that seems so obvious to us?
People always have different tastes. No two people are going to look at a piece of art and experience the same emotions evoked by it. No two people are going to extract equal amounts of enjoyment out of a new game. No two people are going to eat the same food and feel the same way about. And likewise no two people are ever going to have the exact same value for a good they both see. People by goods based on what fits their lives best and what they see as most beneficial to them. Not to help other people. Marx describes the peasants working together to benefit the “community” at large. This seems like such an idealized and perfect concept of the world. No one puts the community above themselves and no one is going to value a good solely based on the hours someone put into it.
Now of course Marx claims that this value system I have just argued exists is “The Fetishism” of commodities, but this just seem like a way to ignore the real world and instead talk about his idealized, perfect society. Since the beginning of time man has traded what he has excess of for that which he has a need for. This example reveals again that things have values that people assign to them because it is the most efficient method. If someone has a lot of something already they are not going to want more of it just because someone spent a lot of time making it. Let us say, for example, that I have 500 pairs of socks, way too many socks for me to use in the foreseeable future. Now let us also say that my friend Fred makes socks. Now it takes him 5 hours to knit a pair of socks while I can make one table in about 50 hours. Now regardless of whether or not I really think this table is worth 10 socks I do not want those 10 socks and I will most likely not trade my table for them because I do not need more socks in my already overflowing drawer. Likewise, I will not trade someone something that I have no need for. If I never dig any holes I have no point for a shovel, even if my neighbor made it and needs to trade it for food or a table.
In conclusion, Marx’s system seems like one idealized and presented as what could be if everyone worked together and thought of the “community” before one’s self. But, since we live in a world where altruism is all but nonexistent we must face the fact that Marxism simply is not viable in modern society. So in conclusion if we were all selfless beings with no personal drive for self improvement than we could all live in peace and economic equality through Marxism. But then again that would make us something not human.
No comments:
Post a Comment