The Process of Circulation of Capital (Capital Vol. II). Karl Marx

parts of the aggregate social capital, of which individual capitals are merely components performing independent functions, mutually replace one another in the process of circulation (in regard to capital as well as surplus-value), is not apparent from the simple intermingling of the metamorphoses in the circulation of commodities. Such intermingling occurs in the transactions of capital circulation as it does in all other circulation of commodities, but it requires a different method of analysis. Hitherto nothing but general phrases have been employed by economists for his purpose, and if we test those phrases, they contain nothing but indefinite ideas borrowed from the intermingling of metamorphoses common to all circulations of commodities.

      One of the most obvious peculiarities of the process of rotation of industrial capital, and therefore of capitalist production, is the fact that on the one side, the component elements of productive capital are derived from the commodity-market, are continually renewed out of it, and are sold as commodities; that, on the other side, the product of the labor-process comes forth from it as a commodity and must be continually sold over and over as a commodity. Compare, for instance, a modern tenant of Lower Scotland with an old-fashioned small farmer on the continent. The former sells his entire product and has therefore to reproduce all its elements, even his seeds, by means of the market; the latter consumes the greater part of his product directly, buys and sells as little as possible, fashions tools, clothing, etc., so far as possible himself.

      Such comparisons have led to the classification of production into natural economy, the money-system, and the credit-system, as being the three characteristic stages of economy in the development of social production.

      But in the first place, these three forms do not represent any equivalent phases of development. The so-called credit-system is itself merely a modification of the money-system, so far as both terms express transactions between the producers themselves. In the developed capitalist production, the money-system appears only as the basis of the credit-system. The money-system and credit-system thus correspond only to different stages in the development of capitalist production, but they are by no means independent modes of economy as compared to natural economy. With the same justification, one might place the various forms of natural economy as equivalents by the side of those two systems.

      In the second place, it is not the process of production itself which is emphasized as the distinguishing mark of the two systems of that classification, the money-system, the credit-system, but rather the mode of transaction between the various producers under those systems. Then the same should apply to the natural economy, which should in that case be classified as the exchange-system. A completely rounded system of natural economy, such as the state of the Inkas in Peru, would not fall under any of these classifications.

      In the third place, the money-system is common to all production of commodities, and the product appears as a commodity in the most varied organisms of social production. The characteristic mark of capitalist production would then be only the extent to which the product is manufactured for purposes of trade, as a commodity, and the extent to which its own elements of formation enter as commodities into the economy which creates that product.

      It is true, that capitalist production has for its general form the production of commodities. But it is so and becomes more so in its development, only because labor itself here appears as a commodity, because the laborer sells labor, that is to say the function of his labor-power, and our assumption is that he sells it at a value determined by its cost of reproduction. To the extent that labor becomes wage-labor, the producer becomes an industrial capitalist. For this reason capitalist production (and the production of commodities) does not reach its full scope, until the agricultural laborer becomes a wage-laborer. In the relation of capitalist and wage-laborer, the relation between the buyer and the seller, the money-relation, becomes an imminent relation of production. And this relation has its foundation in the social character of production, not of circulation. The character of the circulation rather depends on that of production. It is however, quite characteristic of the bourgeois horizon, which is entirely bounded by the craze for making money, not to see in the character of the mode of production the basis of the corresponding mode of circulation, but vice versa.7

      The capitalist throws less value in the form of money into the circulation than he draws out of it, because he throws into it more value in the form of commodities than he had withdrawn from it. To the extent that he is simply a personification of capital, an industrial capitalist, his supply of commodity-value is always larger than his demand for that value. The equality of his supply and demand in this respect would indicate that his capital had not produced any surplus-value; it would not have performed the functions of productive capital; the productive capital would have been converted into commodity-capital which would not be impregnated with surplus-value; it would not have drawn any surplus-value in commodity-form out of labor-power during the process of production, it would not have performed any capital-functions at all. The capitalist must indeed "sell dearer than he has bought," but he succeeds only in doing so, because the capitalist process of production enables him to transform the cheaper commodity, which contains less value, into a dearer commodity with increased value. He sells dearer, not because he gets more than the value of his commodity, but because his commodity contains a greater value than that contained in the natural elements of its production.

      The rate at which value is added to the capital of the capitalist increases in proportion to the difference between his supply and his demand, that is to say in proportion as the surplus of the commodities which he places on the market exceeds the value of the commodities which he has taken from it. His aim is not to equalize his supply and demand, but to make the difference between them as much as possible in favor of his supply.

      What is true of the individual capital, also applies to the capitalist class.

      In so far as the capitalist personifies but his industrial capital, his own demand is only for means of production and labor-power. His demand for Pm, expressed in value, is smaller than his advanced capital; he buys means of production of a value smaller than his capital, and therefore much smaller than the value of the commodity-capital which he takes back to the market.

      As regards his demand for labor-power, its value is determined by the proportion of his variable capital to his total capital, as expressed by V÷C. Its proportion in capitalist production decreases continually more than his demand for means of production. His purchases of Pm steadily increase over his purchases of L.

      Inasmuch as the laborer generally converts his wages into means of existence, and for the overwhelmingly larger part necessities of life, the demand of the capitalist for labor-power is indirectly also a demand for the articles of consumption assimilated by the working class. But this demand is equal to v and not one atom greater. If the laborer saves a part of his wages—we do not consider any questions of credit at all—he converts a part of his wages into a hoard and does not perform the functions of a purchaser to that extent. The limit of the maximum demand of the capitalist is C, equal to c plus v, but his supply for the market is c plus v plus s. If the composition of his commodity-capital is 80c+20v+20s, his demand is equal to 80c+20v, or one fifth smaller in value than his supply. His demand as compared to his supply decreases in proportion as the percentage of the mass of surplus-value produced by him (his rate of profit) increases. Although the demand of the capitalist for labor-power, and thus indirectly for necessities of life, decreases continually compared to his demand for means of production in the further development of production, it must not be forgotten that day by day his demand for Pm is always smaller than his capital. His demand for means of production must, therefore, be always smaller in value than the commodity-product of the capitalist who, working with a capital of equal value and conditions like his, furnishes him with those means of production. It does not alter the case, if many capitalists instead of one furnish him with means of production. Take it that his capital is 1,000 pounds sterling, and its constant part 800 pounds sterling; then his demand on all the capitalists supplying him is equal in value to 800 pounds sterling. Together they supply for each 1,000 pounds sterling means of production valued at 1,200 pounds sterling, assuming that the rate of profit is the same for all of them, regardless of the rate at which they share in the 1,000 and of the proportion which the share of each one may represent in his total capital. The demand of the buying capitalist covers only two-thirds of the supply of the sellers, while his total demand equals only