INVESTMENT ON POOR 33 ption. In the former it is the blind mechanism of circulation that subjugates the direct producers under capital. The latter represents a combination of subjugation through circulation and subjugation through direct control, which is similar to the mechanism of the real subsumptive production processes. Both private owning producers and industrial entrepreneurs produce the same commodities for the market. Whether the labour time for producing commodities corresponds to the average socially necessary labour time for these products exceeds or falls below it is determined in the circulation. The peasants are not capitalists who orientate their cost calculation according to average profit; they produce not to accumulate but to survive. Hence their labour time is in general far above the average of socially necessary labour time for these products. In contrast to capitalist entrepreneurs, it is not possible for them to increase labour productivity through investments since the returns from the commodities are needed for consumption. Nor can they invest in other lucrative production sectors since their ^capital" is tied or fixed to land. The alternative of hiring themselves out as wage labourer is likewise obstructed because of the paucity of jobs. Hence they are forced to produce under conditions which are extremely disadvantageous for them: circulation treats them in the same way as capital without their being the same. For the craftsmen who are forced to enter into these exchange relations, the cost of physical reproduction of labour power will have to be lowered to a minimum if their products can be sold at all. It means, above all, the so-called phenomenon of "self-exploitation", that is, undernourishment, malnutrition and early death. The equal treatment of the unequal leads to their exploitation. This exploitative relationship rests on a capitalist relation of production since the independent value-generating law of the capitalist market asserts itself behind the back of the producer and manifests itself in the production sphere or what may be called market subsumption.1 The same process which spontaneously gives rise to the market subsumption, when controlled, results in the formal sub-sumption. The control arises from granting credits to the private-owning producers. Mediated through the credit, a given capital gains control over the producers which means a direct hold over their surplus labour. Unlike in the case of an enterprise, the administration of credit is not considered to be the business of the credit recipients; it remains in the hands of the credit-giving institution. In most cases the credit is given by instalments and