Doesn't the law of value still apply in labor voucher society? Isn't the voucher a measure of the value of the product?

Doesn't the law of value still apply in labor voucher society? Isn't the voucher a measure of the value of the product?

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yes

wait, since when was the point to abolish the "law of value"?…

That's basically the point, user. FFS.

Here, obviously, the same principle prevails as that which regulates the exchange of commodities, as far as this is exchange of equal values. Content and form are changed, because under the altered circumstances no one can give anything except his labor, and because, on the other hand, nothing can pass to the ownership of individuals, except individual means of consumption. But as far as the distribution of the latter among the individual producers is concerned, the same principle prevails as in the exchange of commodity equivalents: a given amount of labor in one form is exchanged for an equal amount of labor in another form.

No. It's a "measure" of socially necessary labor time.

No.

No, it's a certificate of someone's amount of concrete labour.


Since Marx.

OP, your thread where we discuss this is still in the catalog:

People don't exchange their products; all products are directly social hence 'no one can give anything except his labor'. Thus the only 'exchange' that happens is you getting back from society what you put in, measured directly in labor time (in the form of labor vouchers, let's say), not in a roundabout way through value. This is of course, "a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society".

What does this mean and what does it look like in practice?

Isn't labour time literally what value is measured in, in the Marxian sense? Doesn't sound like a huge difference tbh.

I don't like these discussion because they usually become so abstract and disconnected from reality that it's hard to imagine what any of it would mean in practice.

This is what I understand to be the definition of the law of value:

Let's imagine a society where no individual producers exchange their products with each other, and all production is done for use according to a plan. All the products of labour are distributed according to how much a person works (through labour vouchers).

Now, if I start, for example, growing weed in my basement (and we assume weed is illegal which means you can't go to the "official" store to get weed for your labour vouchers). If we believe the LTV is correct, then the amount of other products (or just labour vouchers, unless there was a good system in place to make any exchange of labour vouchers between people impossible) people would be willing to give me for some weed would generally have a similar SNLT to that specific amount of weed they want (+ maybe extra because of higher demand than supply). Does not the fact that I can come with some product not currently available and if people wanted it they would trade something for it in accordance with the SNLT prove that the law of value in fact still exists?

You could say "but then people are exchanging stuff and it's not real socialism" but these sort of situations will always exist. Another example would be if, let's say there for whatever reason was a shortage of product X, and I happen to have quite a lot of product X stored up in my basement. Then people who really wanted product X would probably be willing to trade some product Y or Z (or their labour vouchers) with me. The exchange ratios here would still be decided by the SNLTs (+ the fact that the supply is lower than the demand), which means the law of value is still there?

The only way I see the law of value could be abolished is if there's a complete super abundance of pretty much everything, so that everyone can just take the shit they want for free, completely independent of how much work they themselves have put in.

No. Commodity exchange does not take place under Socialism, there is no capital or profit or value involved. Measuring the labour time itself does not equal to value in the Capitalist sense, as human labour power is the /substance/ of value, not value itself. This substance only becomes actual value when goods are taken to a market as commodities. No such thing takes place under Socialism, and therefore value ceases to exist. Labour is directly social from the point of production, rather than private and then becoming social via taking on the form of value

This is all very basic Marx.

I recommend to read Chapter 13 from "the conquest of bread" by Kropotkin.

Now what would these products be?

Anything they have used their labour vouchers to "buy" that also interests me.

These things took them from the stock for free. And so can you, you don't need them. So why would you sell them weed?

Buts its not functionally different?

>These things took them from the stock for free
No, now you're talking about a different thing (post-scarcity, no labour vouchers or currency). They worked a certain amount of time, got a certain amount of labour vouchers for that work, which allowed them to "buy" a limited amount of products.

markets don't exist, production for exchange doesn't exist, surplus labour doesn't exist, capital doesn't exist, money doesn't exist…

but besides that yea the exact same

But labor voucher exchange is funtionally the same as commodity exchange of equivilants?

In that sense yes, Marx points this out in critique of the gotha:

"Here, obviously, the same principle prevails as that which regulates the exchange of commodities, as far as this is exchange of equal values. Content and form are changed, because under the altered circumstances no one can give anything except his labor, and because, on the other hand, nothing can pass to the ownership of individuals, except individual means of consumption. But as far as the distribution of the latter among the individual producers is concerned, the same principle prevails as in the exchange of commodity equivalents: a given amount of labor in one form is exchanged for an equal amount of labor in another form."

What's important though is, as Marx points out, content and form are changed. Labor does not appear as the value of a product in terms of being objectified or as a material trait of the product. In a word, labor is not manifested as value or in the value-form

No, you don't get it. Labour vouchers are not a currency. You don't give them in exchange for goods. It's a certificate, with how much work you have done written on it. You show it as a proof you are entitled to the good you're taking, but you don't give it. You can't just get anything you want, but what you can get, you get it for free.

What the fuck? If I have to perform a certain amount of work to get a certain amount of goods then it's not free in any meaningful sense.

The idea is that you're gonna be working either way, because why wouldn't you

In a sense. read:
paulcockshott.wordpress.com/2017/03/05/why-law-of-value-really-applies-in-socialist-economies/

Because work is boring and I would rather play vidya?

It is though. You're not giving anything in exchange of any of the goods you get.

these are liberal tier arguments, do I even need to explain it

lol

If you think this means food is technically free then fine, but it's only free in a very trivial sense. For the worker it's not really different. Work so you get the paper so you can eat, or don't work and starve.

That's what "free" means, yes: you don't have to pay for it.

It's extremely different: he doesn't get exploited by capital.

And this is a bad thing how?

We'd likely have some form of UBI for the bare basics so if people /really/ didn't wanna work they wouldn't have to, but that's besides the point. To help you understand things lets go over the main differences between the worker under Capitalism and Socialism.

Under Capitalism as a worker you own nothing but your own labour power as a free labourer, and so in order to produce are forced to work for an employer for a wage which you then spend on commodities, usually necessities, in a market, with the prices and distribution dictated by market forces. As you know, part of your labour is surplus labour, and this goes towards sustaining your employer and producing the value required to reinvest in more production. Society as a whole is under the command of capital, and before production takes place the end goal of said production is already decided - the expansion of capital. You are also alienated from your labour, and your fellow workers, though I'm not too read up on Marx's alienation so I won't go into detail on that.

Under Socialism, you are not forced to work, however historically people always prefer to work than to not as it gives their lives purpose. Where ever you do work, the means of production there are owned in common with society rather than the specific employer you fall under. This means of course not only that you democratically input on the running of things, but you also use this means of production only for the reason that it will be useful to you or society, as that's who it's owned by. Under lower-phase communism, abstract labour, that being labour performed that you don't directly use the fruits of yourself, will still exist by necessity, which is where labour vouchers come in. You carry out some work, and then depending on how long you worked, you can then take back from society an equal amount in the form of any goods you may wish. These goods are of course produced too directly for their use value, rather than any profitability that may be attained for them. Your labour vouchers only reflect the actual work you've done, rather than any market forces like wages would. Lastly, alienation wouldn't exist, but again I can't detail on why or how because I don't know enough on it, but it's meant to be a pretty big part too.

This is only from the point of the individual worker, without going into any detail on society as a whole.

I'm not interested in arguing semantics here, but when I hear "free food" I imagine getting it without being expected to do a bunch of work for it. If I get x amount of food for working 1 hour, and 2x amount of food for working 2 hours, and no food if I don't work, then I personally wouldn't say I'm getting food for free. Whatever, this isn't important.

I meant that specific aspect of it. Wake up early, go to work, get some pieces of paper (money or labour vouchers), give pieces of paper to a person at a store in order to get access to food.

No.

It is, since:

In capitalism, you're not forced to work. it's just that you will starve to death if you don't. The same thing is true here (unless there is that kind of UBI you talked about, but you can have that in capitalism too).

Source on that? Do people really choose to work shitty jobs even if it's not necessary for their survival and prosperity?

I could see how this would be a big difference, but I think you could achieve that in a system where there is still money as well.


>>These things, they took them from the stock for free. And so can you, you don't need these people. So why would you sell them weed?
In this scenario I would be working a "real job" a lot less or not at all (growing and selling weed instead) so no I wouldn't be able to just get all that "free" stuff since I wouldn't get those labour vouchers. In the end I would hopefully be able to get more stuff relative to the labour time I put in though, by producing a low-supply-high demand product and the exchanging it (in some black market) for more labour vouchers/products than I would have if I had only worked the "real job".

That sounds like a stupid plan: by participating directly into the social work, you'd be able to get more stuff, directly from the stores.

Except there won't be any "low-supply-high demand product".

Assuming 1 hour of work = 1 labour voucher, and the labour time for X amount of weed would be 1 hour, people might be willing to give me 2 labour vouchers for X amount of weed in the black market (despite the fact that I only worked 1 hour to produce it), because they can't get weed anywhere else (due to it being illegal, like I said when I set up this scenario).

Why? If a certain product is illegal while there is still a demand for it, it obviously becomes low-supply-high-demand (since there are few people willing or able to produce it and the same amount of people that want it). And even in full communism natural disasters, bad weather, etc. could happen which has the potential to make some resource scarce and therefore some products low in supply.

If there's a significant demand for it then it's not gonna be illegal.

>And even in full communism natural disasters, bad weather, etc. could happen which has the potential to make some resource scarce and therefore some products low in supply.
Low in supply in general, and even lower in supply in your basement.

Literally why. Even if you have the world's most democratic system, 70% could vote to keep a product illegal while there is still enough demand for it for there to be an incentive for someone to try to satisfy that demand.

Lol, you absolutely can't say that for sure.

Literally why?

Of course I can, and you know it.

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