The Socialism of to-day

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 835096955

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-28834

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Laveleye, Émile de

Title:: The Socialism of to-day

Place of publication:: London

Publisher:: Field & Tuer

Year of publication:: 1884

Scope:: 1 Online-Ressource (XLIV, 331 S.)

Collection:: Economics Books

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24 THE SOCIALISM OF TO-DAY. multitude of their followers. As we know, in reaction against the physiocrats who used to derive all wealth from nature, Smith asserts that labour is the sole source of value. He even wishes to make labour the measure of values. “ Labour alone,” he says, “ is the ultimate and real standard by which the value of all commodities can at all times and places be estimated and compared—equal quantities of labour, at all times and places, may be said to be of equal value to the labourer.” This is precisely Bastiat’s idea, when he affirms that in societies it is services that are always exchanged for services. Almost all economists, including M. Thiers, who on this point is the mouthpiece of the generally received opinion, maintain that the legitimate source of property is labour. Admit this premiss, and Marx will prove with irrefutable logic that capital is the product of spoliation. In short, if all value proceeds solely from labour, the wealth produced ought to belong entirely to the labourers, and if labour is the only legitimate source of property, working men ought to be the only proprietors. Those Economists who look upon labour as the source of value and property cannot but admit the reasoning of Marx. Like Proudhon, he builds up his deductions on a definition of value. Let us follow his chain of syllogisms, in which one may recognize a disciple of Hegel. It is worth while trying to understand these abstractions in their mathe matical dress when we reflect that, translated into common language in petty socialist journals, they have become the working man’s catechism throughout Germany. The wealth of communities, under the régime of capitalist production, appears in the form of an immense accumulation of merchandise. Wares, that is to say products intended for exchange, are the elementary form of wealth in modem com munities. Every article which possesses any utility has two kinds of value. It is valuable in so far as it answers by its properties to any human need. That is its “value in use,” which ends in the consumption of commodities. It is also valuable in so far as it permits ■ its owner, by giving it up, to obtain some other article which he desires. That is its “value in exchange.” These two values are far from always

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