Concept
Value (economics)
Overview
measure of the benefit provided by a good or service to an economic agent
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where Value (economics) is discussed.
In this school, value is the service rendered by any one who supplies the article for the use of another. This is also Bastiat’s idea,(193) “_le rapport de deux services échangés_.” Following Bastiat, A. L.
John Stuart Mill, Principles of Political Economy
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is; opens on it
On the other hand, the exchange value of all commodities is expressed in gold. In this expression, the qualitative aspect is to be distinguished from the quantitative: there is the exchange value of the commodity as the embodiment of the same uniform labor-time; while the magnitude of value is exhaustively expressed, since in the same proportion in which commodities are equated to gold they are equated to one…
Karl Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is; author linked in the graph; opens on it
It means, that is, the act of cherishing something, holding it dear, and also the act of passing judgment upon the nature and amount of its value as compared with something else. To value in the latter sense is to valuate or evaluate. The distinction coincides with that sometimes made between intrinsic and instrumental values.
John Dewey, Democracy and Education
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is
In other words value as it exists to-day is a monopoly price. If all wares have this monopoly price, as according to this theory, only two things are possible. Either every buyer, as buyer, loses what he made as seller, for prices have only changed their names, they are really the same, everything remains as it was and the much talked of exchange value is merely imaginary, or the imposed cost represents real values…
Friedrich Engels, Landmarks of Scientific Socialism
names the idea; states what it is; opens on it
No bounty upon exportation, no monopoly of the home market, can raise that value. The freest competition cannot lower it, Through the world in general, that value is equal to the quantity of labour which it can maintain, and in every particular place it is equal to the quantity of labour which it can maintain in the way, whether liberal, moderate, or scanty, in which labour is commonly maintained in that place…
Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
names the idea; states what it is; author linked in the graph; opens on it
Related ideas
- Equity (economics)
- Karl Marx
- Labor theory of value
- Capital (economics)
- Adam Smith
- Price
- Neoclassical economics
- Classical economics
- Efficiency
- Subjective theory of value
- Value theory
- Marxian economics
- Ludwig von Mises
- The Wealth of Nations
- Cambridge University Press
- David Ricardo
- Economics
Opposing perspectives
Place in the tradition
Part of Value (ethics).