What Is A Commodity?

1. The first chapter in the book is about the market and its inner workings. The book briefly explains the idea of supply and demand, in which the price of a certain good or service will reach the point where all the demand is equivalent to the supply. However, the value of something is not determined by its necessity, but its desire within society, as seen by the difference in cost between a diamond and life giving water. Markets operate as they do because people try to maximize the amount of utility for themselves. Nevertheless, a strict rationalism model cannot be used for predicting all the occurrences of a market because of the ever changing behavior of people; thus economists must take precautions against

Marx’s commodity theory is a two-category theory; objects become commodities when they have more use than their standard value. When commodities are traded they can either have exchange or sign exchange value. Exchange value occurs when monetary value is placed on an object and is traded and sign exchange value is when a commodity is exchanged social status is obtained (Tyson 62). As Tiana goes along her adventure to achieve her goal of buying a building to open her restaurant she, as well as other characters use their commodities in hopes to gain something in

ANSWER KEY Chapter 1 Chapter 1–1 II.D. the accumulation of those economic products that are tangible, scarce, useful, and transferable 1. scarcity of resources, which results from society not III.A. the market having enough resources to produce all of the things people would like to have III.B. the markets in which productive resources are bought and sold 2. A need is a basic requirement for survival and III.C. in product markets IV.A. the amount of output produced by a given amount of inputs in a specific period of time

A commodity is a raw material or primary agricultural product that can be bought and sold. The market treats it as equipment or nearly so with no regard to who produced it. The original producer does not make the “big” money from the good that has become a commodity demanded by consumers. A commodity’s supply and demand is part of one universal market like corn, or wheat. A stereo is something that would not be considered a commodity. Other things are important about a stereo not that it is just a stereo but what brand and quality is in consideration when purchasing a stereo. Demand for one type might be much larger than the demand for another. This is not the case with commodities; they lose differentiation across their supply base. An

Prices in a market economy are very important. Price allows us to give out goods appropriately to those who are able to pay.

IT, according to Carr, has become affordable to all and therefore, it has been a commodity. He further argues that the use commodities do not lead to a completive advantage, and believes that IT has become commoditized for the following reasons:

Surplus Value - The idea that in a capitalist economy, the workers capacity to produce a commodity does not add up to the revenue that it will be sold as.

Highly productive security manager with 15 years of related military experience and an active Top Secret/SCI security clearance. A proven commodity with a stellar performance record capable of working independently or as part of a team to produce accurate and timely results with minimal supervision. An effective communicator with organizational skills, flexibility, and adaptability accustomed to multitasking and functioning in a dynamic work environment.

What also characterizes market society is the emergence of the concept of “fictitious commodities”. Fictitious commodities refer to labor, land, and money (Polanyi 72). “fictitious” implies that they are actually not commodities (Polanyi 72). They are turned into commodities for the effective operation of market society (Polanyi 72). In market society, everything is provided as a commodity. As the major elements of industry, labor, land , and money need to be provided for maintaining productivity and they can only be provided when they are on the market for sale (Polanyi 72). Differently, “Under the feudalism and the gild system land and labor formed part of the social organization itself ” (Polanyi 69). Land were crucial for feudal order, status and function of which “were determined by legal and customary

Price is the assignment of value of a product or service. Not only paid with currency, but in multiple manners these could consist of digital money such as the “bitcoin”. The bit coin has merged in to financial market and many firms are starting to use this type of virtual currency. These currencies cannot be controlled by one party (government) that is why it has been such a controversial issue.

When a good is a necessity it is something that is needed; unlike a simple desire to have something. These items have more of an inelastic demand even if the prices fluctuate. Wheat is a rich commodity in our country. The demand for wheat is inelastic. No matter how high the price rise the demand will still remain high in view of the fact that the price is determined by supply and demand. There are many producers of wheat which does not raise the profit level much for the farmers since their competition are all selling identical products. Other items, such as; basics in personal care, food, commodities, and medicine. The basic items that are needed to survive. Demands for these items may change over time but will not change very much. Their value can fluctuate if there are comparable substitutes available. Personal care items such as clothes and shoes are not in a single category where choices are concerned. There are a wide variety of manufactures and stores that sell them. So if the price raises the demand would be elastic because of substitutes. Food as a basic need is inelastic. However, if the prices were to rise on beef consumers could choose to substitute eating chicken, turkey, or pork instead. So even though the prices rose the demand would not increase because of acceptable substitutes. Medical service as a necessity is inelastic in demand. This is a service that is unquestionably needed for survival.

Markets are the institutions where the exchange of goods and services among individuals collective agents occurs. The exchange of these goods and services utilizes money as the medium through which equivalence of worth and value is given to the goods and services (Keech and Munger 4). This leads to the formation of prices given for the goods and services. Additionally, markets may be categorized in accordance with the commodities and services traded in them where these categories entail financial markets, labor markets, and housing markets. Similarly, the scope under which these items are traded may provide another level of categorization where some may occur throughout a region, nationally or internationally (Pinotti 2). These may be coupled with categorization in terms of structure where various entities include competitive markets, oligopolistic markets, and monopolistic markets.

Probably the most commonly used and basic economic method to determine prices of a commodity is the supply and demand method. While this method states that both demand and supply are equally important and it is their intersection that determines the price of a good, both theories of value emphasize only one function of this model. As the advocates of labour theory cared mostly about the inputs of production, they mainly focused on the supply side. For example, Ricardo mentioned in his letter to Malthus “it is supply which regulates value—and supply is itself controlled by comparative cost of production.” (Ricardo, 1951, 279). In contrast the theory of marginal utility states that it is not the supply but demand that is the main factor in the supply demand model. This theory emphasizes the importance of the consumer attitude towards the good and what kind of value does it provide for him. Its supporters pointed out that despite how much labour is used to provide certain good or service without demand it will be worthless. The supporters of the utility theory of value such as Jevons and Menger sometimes ignored supply and based their theories exclusively on the demand and made assumptions supposing that the rate of supply was given rather than changing (Landreth & Colander, 2001). Thus, while labor theory suggest that usually supply determines the value of a good, the theory of utility emphasize the importance of

Pricing of commodities are arrived at basically from the forces of demand and supply, a decrease in supply of a basic commodity or a commodity with a high utility value causes the demand to rise suddenly. There are

Supply and demand is perhaps one of the most fundamental concepts of economics and it is the backbone of a market economy. Demand refers to how much (quantity) of a product or service is desired by buyers. The quantity demanded is the amount of a product people are willing to buy at a certain price; the relationship between price and quantity demanded is known as the demand relationship. Supply represents how much the market can offer. The quantity supplied refers to the amount of a certain good producers are willing to supply when receiving a certain price. The correlation between price and how much of a good or service is supplied to the market is known as the supply relationship. Price, therefore, is a reflection of supply and demand.