Relative and Equivalent Form

[Misodoctakleidist]

In the section of Das Kapital concerning the relative and equivalent forms in an exchange relationship between two commodities Marx says that the value of the commodity in relative form is expressed in terms of the use-value of the equivalent.

I was under the impression that use-value was purely qualitative and that the exchange-value was purely quantities. How can a qualitative value be expressed in terms of a qualitative value? Or have i misunderstood this?

[percept¡on]

Use-value can be quantified, it's just a lot more difficult to quantify than exchange-value. Exchange-value seems more naturally quantitative because that's the way it's expressed in everyday use, in the form of price. When people trade goods with one another, they don't bartar in terms of use-value; they don't think, "what is that good worth to me?", they think, "what is this good worth to someone else?"

What Marx is saying is that in a more 'pure' economic transaction or measurement, we would compare the goods' use-values to determine their relative values. A good example is if you are on a desert island, a lighter would be equal to two books of matches, because you get the the same use-value from a lighter as you could get from two books of matches, i.e. you could start the same number of fires with each. In an exchange-value based transaction you would consider the cost of production of each, the relative scarcity of each, and other extraneous factors; hence the exchange-value is many degrees seperated from the use-value. Maybe the exchange-value in a regular economy is 1 lighter = 5 books of matches.

Of course the problem with trying to quantify use-value is that it's a)subjective and b)different for the same person at different times. For example, if the goal is hydration, 1 glass of ice water = 2 cups of coffee. If the goal is 'waking up' for the day's work, 1 cup of coffee = several glasses of ice water.