Karl Marx and the Close of his System by Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk

Author:Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk [Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-61016-008-7
Publisher: H. Wolff
Published: 1949-03-24T16:00:00+00:00

1 Capital and Interest, p. 377.

1 Karl Knies makes the following pertinent objection against Marx: “There is no reason apparent in Marx’s statement why the equation, i quarter wheat = a cwts. wild-grown wood = b acres of virgin soil = c acres of natural pasture-land, should not be as good as the equation, i quarter wheat = a cwts. of forest-grown wood” (Das Geld, 1st edition, p. 121, 2nd edition, p. 157).

1 In a quotation from Barbon, in this same paragraph, the difference between commodities and things is again effaced: “One sort of wares are as good as another, if the value be equal. There is no difference or distinction in things of equal value.”

1 For example, p. 48: “Lastly, nothing can be a value without also being an object of use. If it is useless, the labor contained in it is also useless; it does not count as labor [sic!], and therefore creates no value.” Knies has already drawn attention to the logical fallacy animadverted upon in the text (see Das Geld, Berlin, 1873, pp. 123 ff.; 2nd edition, pp. 160 ff.). Adler (Grundlagen der Karl Marxschen Kritik, Tubingen, 1887, pp. 211 ff.) has strangely misunderstood my argument when he contends against me that good voices are not commodities in the Marxian sense. It did not concern me at all whether “good voices” could be classed as economic goods under the Marxian law of value or not. It only concerned me to present an argument of a logical syllogism which showed the same fallacy as that of Marx. I might for this purpose just as well have chosen an example which was in no way related to the domain of economics. I might, for example, just as well have shown that according to Marx’s logic the common factor of variously colored bodies might consist in heaven knows what, but not in the blending of various colors. For any one combination of colors—for example, white, blue, yellow, black, violet—is as regards variety worth just as much as any other combination, say green, red, orange, sky-blue, etc., if only it is present “in proper proportion”; we therefore apparently abstract from the color and combination of colors!

1 The position which is taken by Smith and Ricardo towards the doctrine that value is wholly labor I have discussed exhaustively in the Geschichte und Kritik, pp. 428 ff. and have there also shown especially that no trace of a proof of this thesis is to be found in the so-called classical writers. Compare also Knies, Der Kredit, 2nd section, pp. 60 ff.

1 Deutsche Worte, Vol. XV (March, 1895), p. 155.

1 For example, Vol. I, pp. 176 ff., 184, 185, 191, and often; also in the beginning of the third volume, pp. 65, 176, 177, 181.

2 For example, Vol. I, p. 184n.

3 As to Rodbertus, see the exhaustive account in my Capital and Interest, PP. 354 ff., 356n.

1 Ibid., p. 388.

1 See above.

2 Of course I here quite disregard comparatively small differences of opinion.

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