MARXIAN POLITIC \L ECONOMY 49 world and becoming the most advanced capitalist country. With this very brief and summary introduction to the relevant technical aspects of production by machinery we now turn to its various implications. The introduction of machinery and the development of modern industry greatly heightens the productivity of labour. At the same time, however, a great deal of labour goes into the making of machines and other instruments of labour used in modern industry. On the one hand, the increase in labour productivity would imply cheapening of commodities. On the other hand, the use of machines and modern tools would imply a much greater importance of constant capital (dead labour) in relation to variable capital (living labour) than before the advent of modern industry. The question arises as to what the implications of these two factors are for the values, and the compositions of value, of commodities. Impact on Value Composition The introduction of machines in the production of a commodity would only take place if the result is cheapening of the commodity. Thus with the use of modern industrial methods in its production, the value of a commodity (the direct and indirect labour time socially necessary to produce it) will necessarily decline. The change in the value composition of the commodity, that is, the relative proportions of dead and living labour expended in its production, needs careful examination. L.et us use a numerical example. A hand-woven sheet of cloih of given dimensions and quality may have fifteen hours of labour time embodied in it, five hours of this labour time being directly expended in the weaving process, five hours contributed by the subject of the labour process (rawi materials) and the remaining five hours by the instruments of labour used up in the weaving process. With the introduction of a modern weaving machine, the total labour time required to produce the cloth may be reduced to ten hours of which two hours are the direct labour of weaving and three hours correspond to the used-up value of the new instrument of labour (the machine). The value contributed by the subject of the labour process—the raw material (yarn)—remains the same as before, namely five hours, since no change has taken place in the method of producing it. Now let us compare the two situations. Before the introduction of the weaving machine, the ratio of indirect labour to direct labour was 2:1. After the machine is introduced this ratio becomes (5 1- 3):3 or 4:1. At the same time, the total absolute value of indirect labour in the cloth has declined from 10 hours (54-5) to 8 hours (54-3). Thus we have the result that production by machinery leads not only to (i) a decrease in the value of the commodity, and (ii) an absolute decrease in the constant capital component of this value, but also (iii) a relative increase of the constant capital component (in relation to the direct labour component). Since the value of the raw material entering