PREFACE TO FRENCH EDITION (p. 104)

Please note Marx’s warning about the difficulty of the first chapter.
See also pp. 89-80 on this same point.

SECTION 1

1. What are Marx’s definitions of use-value and exchange-value?

2. Summarize Marx’s argument that the exchange-values of commodities are determined by their values. (There are three of four main points in this argument. Try to pick them out.)
Why does the exchange of commodities as equals require a common property?

3. What does Marx mean by “abstract labor”?

4. What is Marx’s definition of “socially necessary labor-time”?

5. What is Marx’s definition of the “productivity of labor”?
What is the effect of an increase in the productivity of labor on the value of the total commodities produced? On the value of each commodity produced?

SECTION 2

1. What does Marx mean by “concrete labor” and “abstract labor”?

2. How does Marx deal with skilled labor (or what he called “complex labor”)?
Does an hour of skilled labor produce the same amount of value as an hour of unskilled labor or more value than an hour of unskilled labor?

3. What is the effect of an increase in the productivity of labor on the quantity of use-values or material wealth? Constrast this effect with the effect of an increase of productivity on the value of commodities.