There were a few new comments on one of the more recent posts on ARPLAN, the one which I referred to as “Pan-Germanic Socialists against Capitalism.” A few technical errors occurred while I was sending my latest comment, so I decided to post it in the Conversations page of my account’s dashboard. It is not the first set of issues that I encountered in the comments section of that post.
Anyway, the new comments mentioned about Pan-Germanic Socialism’s attempts at trying to create its own Theory of Value, which means that neither the Marxist Labor Theory of Value (LTV) nor the Liberal Capitalist Utility Theory of Value (UTV) found any support among Pan-Germanic Socialists. I am currently waiting for further word about that proposed Theory of Value, because I would love to write another post where I discuss more about the Work-Standard’s Theory of Value, the Reciprocal Theory of Value (RTV) and its relation to the Work Theory of Money (WTM).
The following is my comment in response to the latest ones on ARPLAN:
I have to agree with Kai, Bogumil, because I too am curious about whether there was an attempt at proposing a Socialistic alternative to the Labor Theory of Value (LTV) and the Liberal Capitalists’ Utility Theory of Value (UTV). Its significance serves as an important detail in understanding how the concurring proposals for distinct conceptions of economic and monetary systems came together.
Just by looking at that brief excerpt from Hans Buchner, we can assume that LTV was already known and rejected due to its inherent limitations, such as the difficulty of making value-judgments based on units of time and what can be considered as Meaningful Work under Pure Socialism. If you do get a chance to read what Dietrich Klagge had to write regarding a Theory of Value and manage to post the relevant information on ARPLAN, I might be able to outline its specifications and determine how it differs from other competing Theories of Value.
In general, a Theory of Value will provide us with the philosophical basis from which we can make value-judgments about how much certain goods and services are worth, what is considered “wealth” or “growth,” the economic activities which create it, and how the incomes from those activities are distributed. It also outlines why the Price of one item might differ from that of another and vice versa, thereby laying the foundations for a corresponding “Theory of Money.” Once I deduced the Theory of Money, I can then make empirical observations and informed arguments about different national economies and financial institutions.
But until we have enough information about Klagge’s proposed Theory of Value, I will have to save my discussions for later.
Categories: Philosophy
The Fourth Estate 
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