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Nope, I'm not the one that's got it wrong.
You're wrong. Again.
You're wrong. Again. Things have a use value and an exchange value. They only have an exchange value when they are traded.
Yes. But you (as usual) leave out the most important part - the fact that things have to be produced before they are traded.
Oh the irony. Its you that has misunderstood, because you can't get your head around basic facts.
You can't even tell me what you mean by "free market".
Oh dear klintock, more basic mistakes. Your conflating two issues again. Technical authority and political authority. You really should get over your fear of education y'know.
Let's start right back where I start laughing at you. Just going "your wrong, your wrong" is straight nowhere.
So, come on, what is money?
Yes, how terrible that something that is always the case has remained the case. It's funny how we don't usually focus on the colour of the sky in economic debates either. :rolleyes:
Anyway, fuck that, lets have some idea of what you think money is......
This is where a knowledge of history comes in. Y'know, from those books that you so despise. :rolleyes:
See how far off the mark you are?
How is that measure of exchange value decided upon?
You don't actually have a clue do you?
:rolleyes:
Yeah, that'll work.
How is that measure of exchange value decided upon?
Come on mate, you don't need that much more of a clue do you?
(this should be good
Lol ok.
Nah, not really, it's kinda the key to freedom.
There are two main ways to decide what money is.
One way is for people to voluntarily decide upon a substance between themselves.
The other is for someone with a gun to decide it for you.
Money is anything you can trade for goods or services.
It's normally thought of as the the substance that is most often traded within an economy. Gold is the perfect money as decided upon by all civilisations at all times throughout history for example.
If i remember righty, wasn't gold was a good currency because it had an intrinsic scarcity?
Then things got a little messed up when gold started to be represented through the paper money system?
Yup. It's distinctive, it's attractive, it doesn't decay and theres not much of it. It's also bloody heavy, which is another important consideration in days before motorised transport.
Too right. The banks started to pretend they had money they didn't actually have, resulting in the bankruptcy of 29 amongst others. It's why we have the comedy mickey mouse currency we currently use. If you want a laugh, ask your credit card company for proof of their loss.
I remember reading "A Second Look at the Federal Reserve". Quite a fascinating read really. Odd to think that we are operating with a monetary system which exists purely because people believe it does!
Which of course proves my point that anything can be money if you can trade with it. You can even trade belief, and all you have to worry about is keeping the belief alive.
Common sense says that there isn't a trillion pound coins knocking about, even a trillion in fivers would have us all wading to the shops. Of course, people don't think properly about the things that benefit them in some way unless they have a good reason.
You're stating how you'd like the world to be, not how it actually is.
That's a very simplistic view of human nature.
Hmm...maybe you and klint have more in common than at first glance.
Instead of a dismissal, let's have something a bit more specific, like what specificially is inaccurate about my statements?
Errr....no. I'm describing how capitalism works as it is now. People sell their labour to survive, surplus value is expropriated as profit. Money is symbol, a way in which we can draw equivalences between commodities (but which can also be traded as a commodity itself). Because people are paid for their labour (which produces use value), money is ultimately an expression of what labour is worth on the market.
You haven't stated anything apart from what we already knew - money is a medium of exchange. Well, I'd already stated that, Mr Brainiac.
So first it's rubbish and then it's something you'd already said?
Do fuck off.
No, you are describing how capitalism is thought of by you right now. You are focusing on one area - that is state run capitalism.
What surplus value? There isn't any. If there is no mutual benefit, trade simply doesn't occur. Now you can say that the state creates a climate of fear which puts pressure on people to accept a lower benefit than they normally would and I can agree with that, but the simple fact is that there isn't any surplus value.
Everybody makes a profit, don't forget.
See, utter ignorance of economics. What is normally thought of as money isn't a symbol, it's the most commonly traded item in an economy. The market always chooses gold (sometimes silver) and the state forces most people to use it's paper.
That paper only gains any value because it can be used to keep the state from attacking you, that is you can give it the violent men and women in the tax office and they will leave you alone for a bit.
Great, except that labour is in itself a form of money.
You can pick any good or service in the market and measure all other goods and services as units of that good or service. You have chosen labour as your ultimate good, not because of any rational basis but because of some emotional investment in the idea of "the workers".
You could have picked pickles, or car repair, lead or dentistry.
My car is worth 43 trips to the dentist or a ton of pickles or half the lead off my roof or having my car itself fixed half a dozen times. See, you can measure anything in terms of anything else, none of them are better than others, some might be more useful.
Your also using state imposed "capital" for your analysis, which leaves out the vast majority of non state money transactions.
don't yell at me but... how does this arguement not make money (the paper stuff with Bank of England written on it for clarity's sake) a symbol? It seems to me that the above arguement explains how money IS a symbol.
Otherwise I could just invent symbols all day and get rich. I did explain it kinda badly tbh.
Sure, but it's ability to be money isn't down to it's being a symbol, it's down to the fact that you can trade it. Money is anything you can trade for goods and services.
Also, we can't hold the same opinion or conclusion about anything, let alone a symbol. A hundred pounds to you and a hundred pounds to Richard Branson are very different things, although objectively you might say it's the same.