For what, after all, is value? Is Marx's definition of it in the least correct? No. Value is not an inherent relation (whatever that may mean) of a commodity to labour; it is essentially a social estimate of the relative importance of commodities to the society that forms the estimate. It is not an immanent property of an object at all; it is a social opinion expressed upon an object in comparison with others. This social opinion is at present collected in an informal but effective way, through a certain subtle tact acquired in the market, by dealers representing groups of customers on the one hand, and manufacturers representing groups of producers on the other; and it may be said to be pronounced in the verdict of exchange, _i.e._, according to Mill's definition of value, in the quantity of one commodity given in exchange for a given quantity of another. Now, on what does this social estimate of the relative importance of commodities turn? In other words, by what is value and difference in value determined? Value is constituted in every object by its possession of two characteristics: 1st, that it is socially useful; 2nd, that it costs some labour or trouble to procure it. No commodity lacks value which possesses both of these characteristics; and no commodity has value which lacks either of them. Now there are two kinds of commodities. Some may be produced to an indefinite amount by means of labour, and since all who desire them can obtain them at any time for the labour they cost, their social desirableness, their social utility, has no influence on their value, which, therefore, always stands in the ratio of their cost of production alone. Other classes of commodities cannot be in this way indefinitely multiplied by labour; their quantity is strictly limited by natural or other causes; those who desire them cannot get them for the mere labour of producing them; and the value of commodities of this sort will consequently always stand in excess of their relative cost of production, and will be really determined by their relative social utility. In fact, so far from the labour required for their production being any guide to their value, it is their value that will determine the amount of labour which will be ventured in their production. A single word may be added in explanation of the conception of social utility. Of course a commodity which is of no use to any one but its owner has no economic value, unless it happens to get lost, and, in any case, it is of no consequence in the present question. The social utility of a commodity is its capacity to satisfy the wants of others than the possessor, and it turns on two considerations: 1st, the importance of the want the commodity satisfies, and, 2nd, the number of persons who share the want. All commodities which derive a value from their rarity or their special excellence belong to this latter class, and the vice of Marx's theory of value is simply this, that he takes a