causticus | Marx's Labor Theory of Value is Total Garbage (Reply)

Great summary on this colossally stupid idea [Marx's Labor Theory of Value] that just can't seem to die. From Z:

The idea is garbage. It's a waste of time. If I paint something and it takes me eight weeks to paint it and complete it, should it be worth the same as something that Da Vinci painted in an eight week span, when we used the same materials? Well, no. Because my painting would not be nearly as great. He might have used the same amount of labor as I did, but his product is undoubtedly superior. The Labor Theory of Value completely ignores the quality of the product. I won't pay an apprentice plumber at the same rate as I'd pay a master plumber - because the master plumber would do the job in a shorter amount of time and with a greater success rate. He shouldn't earn less because he is more capable. To the contrary, he should earn significantly more because he is competent.

This same criticism of Marxism can be made all over. People are individually different. They have different skill sets, and each of them will produce a different quantity or quality of something in a different amount of time. To ignore this is to ignore the fact that we are working with living beings. Marxism assumes that the individual is equal to any other individual in terms of capability. This is simple not true. Go look at some sports stats and it is clear as day. In 28 minutes Stephen Curry can score 47 points on 15/26 from the field, 8/14 from three, 9/9 from the free throw line, with 7 assists, 4 rebounds, 3 steals and two turnovers. In those same 28 minutes Lu Williams might score 26 points on 10/26 from the field, 3/9 from three, 3/4 from the free throw line, 0 assists, 4 rebounds, 0 steals, and four turnovers. Should these players labor be paid the same? They took the same amount of shots. Perhaps they possessed the ball for the same amount of time.

The fact is people are different. Some people are better at things than others. To ignore that is to be ignorant, and to ignore that on a large scale it to be self destructively ignorant. Supply and Demand is flawed, but it certainly is not this flawed. Because, at least with supply and demand, the people demanding get what they want at a price they are consentualy willing to pay and the people supplying are consenting to a price point that they too feel is far judging by the market. In a LToV "market", people have no idea what they will get, just how much work went into it. And, people have no reason to improve at what they're doing, because if they do they will not benefit from it.

Any ideology that blindly assumes that everyone is the same is plain evil and an affront to Natural Law. Nothing but terrible things happen from very the moment there is any serious effort to implement Socialism/Communism in the real world.