Hi class,
As I’m reading through the many excellent and detailed discussion board posts you have written, I have noticed that a number of students are completing these assignments by Commenting under my post for each discussion board assignment.
This is not the correct way to submit discussion board posts. The correct way is outlined in Discussion Board 3.1 by a video of mine. Most students are correctly Posting their discussion board assignments.
I have around 120 students, who are using the OpenLab one way or another, so it is crucial that all assignments are entered in a uniform way. Please, if you are completing discussion boards by simply commenting underneath my post, then you will not receive credit for such work.
Please post your assignments by following my instructions. If you are unsure how to do this, simply email me and I’ll be more than happy to go over the process.
Again, no credit will be given for any discussion board posts that are incorrectly entered as Comments underneath my post for each discussion board.
The M-C-M’ concept is a crucial framework for understanding how capitalist wealth accumulation works. Karl Marx explained that this cycle begins with an initial sum of money (M) used to acquire commodities (C), such as raw materials, labor, and machinery for production. These commodities are not the end goal, but rather the means to achieve more wealth.
After production, the commodities are sold for a higher sum, M’, representing a successful transaction where the capitalist ends up with more money than initially spent. This profit, or surplus value, is essential to the capitalist system. According to Marx, surplus value arises because workers are compensated less than the value of what they produce. This difference between wages and output cost enables the capitalist to accumulate wealth.
The cycle continues as the profit, M’, is reinvested to acquire new commodities, repeating the M-C-M’ loop. The process is all about accumulating capital, which is only sustainable if the capitalist generates more from each cycle than what was initially invested. Therefore, the capitalist’s success lies in strategically managing the reinvestment of capital and maintaining the extraction of surplus value from labor to ensure ongoing wealth expansion.
This continuous cycle not only highlights profit generation dynamics but also underscores the extractive nature of capitalist labor relations. The capitalist’s motivation is to perpetuate this cycle endlessly, leading to what Marx described as the “invisible hand” driving the self-expansion of capital. Thus, the M-C-M’ diagram is not just a representation of economic transactions but also a lens into the fundamental motivations driving capitalist economies.