106 ECONOMIC THEORY OF LEISURE CLASS 
(2) The estimation of the commodity by the purchasers. On 
this point, Bohm-Bawerk writes: “The magnitude of the 
value is determined . . . in general by the magnitude of the 
marginal utility.” (Ibid., p. 515.) We have already examined 
this principle at length and have found that the purchasers by 
no means evaluate the commodity by its marginal utility. 
The corrective which Béhm-Bawerk seeks to introduce in the 
form of his substitution theory is merely, however, a theoret- 
ical circle. 
3) The subjective value of the commodity for the pros- 
pective purchasers. All of Bohm-Bawerk’s elucidations are 
concentrated in the following sentence: “In general, therefore, 
the rich man will put a lower subjective value on the unit of 
money than the poor man.” (Ibid. p. 520.) In its essence, 
the theory of money consists in the fact that the subjective 
value of money—for sellers as well as for buyers—is its own 
subjective exchange value, which is in turn determined by the 
market prices of the commodities. Thus, this “determination 
of prices” is explained by the prices themselves. 
(4) The number of specimens of the commodity available, 
The determining factors are (a) purely natural conditions 
(such as limited available real estate); (b) social and legal 
conditions (monopolies); (c¢) “in particularly great extent, 
however”, the magnitude of the production costs. But we find 
no explanation for the latter figure, as pointed out above, in 
Béhm-Bawerk’s theory, since this quantity is determined on 
the one hand by the product’s marginal utility and on the 
other hand by the product itself. 
(5) The subjective value of the commodity for the seller. 
Bohm-Bawerk formulates this matter in two ways: The first 
is that “ . . . the immediate marginal utility and also the sub- 
jective consumption value possessed by a single specimen in 
their [the sellers’] eyes is usually extremely low”. (Ibid., p. 
521.) This formulation, as has been shown in detail, is not in 
accordance with fact, since there exists no evaluation of the 
commodities offered for sale, according to their utility, z.e., 
this evaluation is mathematically equal to zero. On the other 
hand, it is obvious that the sellers estimate the value of their 
commodities and do not put it “extremely low”. Now let us