Corresponding Author. Karl Marx does not attribute any mysterious characteristics to the use value of a commodity; these result from its exchange value. Through the social division of labor, the social characteristics of labor are reflected in commodities, and the ratios used for exchange are decided according to human relations, namely, the ratio of productivity of labor in producing each commodity e. Accordingly, the various properties assigned to commodities by the social division of labor are automatically treated as being natural, intrinsic properties of that commodity itself.
This is commodity fetishism: a reification peculiar to capitalist production in which commodities assume a godlike mystique. In non-capitalist production, the social division of labor is reified, not goods. Division of labor becomes the subject of the reification when exchanged for commodities [2]. To take an example, to earn a million yen selling watches, you could sell 10, people a yen watch each, or you could sell one watch to one person for one million yen.
You might say that talk is cheap, but in fact implementation is another story. So, what makes it so hard? In our example, the yen watch, and million-yen watch are both watches, but they are clearly different products. They have to be. We are talking about two different products. The prices are different, naturally-one at yen and the other at one million yen. Given price, they are also distributed through different channels: a yen store can sell yen watches, but if they were to put a million-yen watch on display alongside the other watches, no one would buy it.
You have to sell it in different stores and venues. Promotion is different as well; the price alone can sell a yen watch, but you need to sell the story and history of a million-yen watch to have any hope of selling one.
Thus, the biggest issue at hand is that the clientele for yen watches and million-yen watches are different. Here, innovation takes the form of changing clientele.
