time . When regimented along the lines of the socially necessary labor-time governing a specific production process , labor-power inserts its own extracted value , which is measured in scientific time units , into the things it has been socially regimented to produce . For Marx , things acquire a value because labor-power , which has been bought for a period of time from the laborer by the capitalist , is worked into a finished product within the production process , a process that is regulated by socially necessary labortime , i . e . the average labor-time required within an economic sphere in order to produce a given commodity . As Marx states ,
socially necessary labor-time is the labor-time required to produce any use-value under the conditions of production normal for a given society and with the average degree of skill and intensity of labor prevalent in that society . Commodities which contain equal quantities of labor , or which can be produced in the same time , have therefore the same value .[ 8 ]
Any thing produced at the average expenditure of labor-time , at the average intensity of labor-power can be said to have been produced according to the parameters of socially necessary labor-time , and is thus valuable , i . e ., it possesses a certain quantifiable value reflecting the socially necessary labor-time indicative of a particular sphere of production . Of course , there are many factors that go into determining socially necessary labor-time . Marx names a few , such as “ degree of skill , the level of development of science and its technological application , the social organization of the process of production ”[ 9 ] and competition etc ., which influence production and socially necessary labor-time in a feed-back loop that continually stimulates production to expand and to refine its productive capacities , by stimulating scientific innovations , technological innovations and organizational innovations etc .
According to Marx , socially necessary labor-time is a law-like socio-economic-mechanism that regulates capitalist-production , driving this capitalist-production towards greater expansion , greater amelioration and greater levels of value-exploitation of the workforce via the coercive law of competition , which itself influences the parameters of socially necessary labor-time . For Marx , competition stimulates individual capitalists , within a particular sphere of production , to ameliorate their individual production processes in order to produce below the level of socially necessary labor-time . To do so means that these capitalists are more cost-effective and thus more apt to cultivate greater levels of surplus value and profits because they have cut costs , in relation to price , below the levels dictated by the regulating mechanism of socially necessary labor-time . As a result , these capitalists have expanded the ratio between cost of production and price at a greater level than that produced by the regulating mechanism of socially necessary labor-time , which translates into greater profits in relations to competitors . This drive to produce below the socially necessary labor-time , within their specific sphere of production , enables these cost-efficient capitalists to reap greater profits then their competitors who continue to produce at the socially necessary labor-time . As Marx states ,
There is a motive for each individual capitalist to cheapen his commodities , by increasing the productivity of labor … The increased production of surplus-value arises from the curtailment of the [ socially ] necessary labor-time , and the corresponding prolongation of the surplus labor . [ In essence ], Capital . . . has an immanent drive , and a constant tendency , towards increasing the productivity of labor , in order to cheapen commodities . . . The process both cheapens commodities and augments the surplus value contained in them .[ 10 ]
This cheapening of commodities via increased productivity enables capitalists to appropriate higher profits by producing below the socially necessary labor-time within their specific economic branch . By producing below the socially necessary labor-time , these cost-effective capitalists are able to sell their