- The means of production is everything that goes in to making a product, including the labor. It includes equipment, a facility to work in, supplies, etc. Labor, to my understanding is the actual physical act of producing a product and is the only thing that can increase the value of the product. Labor is measured in time and, under capitalism, is exchanged for money.
- Value is how much something is worth in market and depends on how much labor is necessary to make the product.
- Labor and value are related because the amount of labor it takes to produce something under normal conditions determines its value. Time is money, so if a product requires more labor, or requires a specialized skill that takes time to develop, it is more expensive. If you can automate the manufacturing process it can make a product cheaper because the product requires less labor.
- I understand labor power as the requirements that go into being in a physical position to be able to labor, such as food, clothing, and rest. There is cost to maintain those things, so when you are actively laboring, there is a certain amount of money you have to make in order to break even on what you put in to yourself in order to labor in the first place.
- Surplus value is essentially additional value that is made before the laborer has broke even on their cost of labor power. This additional value goes directly to the owner of the product and not the laborer.
- In the video, I learned that “means of production” refers to the resources that are used to provide a service. For instance, the man in the video used his camera, microphone, and editing software to create his videos. The video also explained that labor is what increases the value of a product. To illustrate this point, the man used the example of a block of wood. If you buy a block of wood and do nothing with it, its value will remain the same. However, if you put in the labor to carve it into a chair, the value will increase, making the product more valuable than it was when you bought it. Essentially, the more time it takes to produce something, the more valuable it becomes in normal circumstances.
- When determining the value, it is measured by the amount of labor that is typically put into it in normal circumstances. Value is essentially a product that increases in price when sold.
- Labor and value have a strong connection, as labor is what creates value. The video explains that the more time invested in producing a product, the greater the value becomes. Therefore, labor and value usually go together.
- The way I would differentiate labor and labor power is; from what I understand labor is the time that is put into a product to gain value while labor power is an investment.
- “Surplus value” refers to the profit that is generated by the labor of employees. While the employees put in the effort, it is the employer or the company that earns the profits. This means that the worker earns less than the person in charge of the company. This is an important concept to understand because it highlights the inequalities that exist in society and how some valuable individuals may not receive fair compensation. Essentially, people are trading their time and effort for money. For instance, if someone works at a real estate firm and handles every aspect of a deal, the owner of the firm may still make a 50% profit without contributing anything to the process.
Arthur Provost – Discussion Board 4.1
- Means of production and labor are linked, production couldn’t append without them. In fact when making a product, a house for example we will need those two things. First the means of production most of the time they are privately owned instead of owned by the laborers. Those represent all the material you will need in order to make the production like the construction tools for a house. That leads us to the labor this is the only way to increase the value of what we have (like when we use bricks to build a house). Labor is measured in time, meaning that the more time we take to build some things in normal condition the more it increases is value.
- The meaning of value can be mistaken with the price since generally Prices are proportional to the value. But, the value is more about the work (the labor) we need in order to produce an object. So that means that in order to give value to an object the time of production needs to be the longest in normal conditions since the labor is measured in time and the more labor you put into something, the more the value increases.
- As I explained in the two prior answer, labor and value are related by the fact that in order to get more value you need a longer labor time. This is why the two of them are bonded.
- Labor power can be seen as the only commodity that can increase the value of what we have. It is the abilities and the energy we have to put into work. For that we need to entertain and build our body and abilities. As in another side, the labor is more about the time off work we put into something.
- The surplus values are really important since it is the result of the production, and so by the means of production and the labor. In the process of production, we are going to buy a commodity for example a house that we are going to rebuild with the means of production and the labor. This action will then increase the value and give us this surplus value. This is one of the things that created and entertain a huge gap between social classes. We might be led to believe that this process is an equal exchange in order to produce and separate surplus values in equal parts but it isn’t. The capitalist took the control of this process in order to gain more of the surplus values. The commodity of the beginning and all means of production are brought by the highest social class, the capitalist, and they get the biggest part of the surplus value. As all the work, the labor is put on by the working class, and we have seen that the surplus values come from the labor. We can see that at the end of the production the value added by the working class doesn’t really benefit them but make the high social class richer.
Discussion Board 4.1
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a) Identify which discussion question you are answering in your comment by placing the relevant number at the start of your answer. For example:
2. Crime has often been used as a form of social control by…
4. Michelle Alexander’s argument about segregation…
b) Respond to one other student’s comments.
NOTE: As usual, follow the guidelines from previous discussion board assignments, in answering by creating a new post…
- Do you notice any similarities in the way social class is discussed in readings 4.1 and 4.2? Do you notice any differences in the way these two readings DIFFERENTIATE between social classes?
- Pick the station closest to where you live. Using the concepts from Reading 4.1, what social class tends to live in your neighborhood? Are you surprised (or not) by the answer? Do you feel it is an accurate representation of the people living in your neighborhood?
- Based on Reading 4.2, do you notice a general pattern about social classes in NYC?