ABSTRACT
Ricardo's theory of value originates from Adam Smith and represents a more developed form of the latter theory of labour bestowed. For Ricardo, like Malthus but unlike Smith, developing the theory of distribution was the main task of political economy. Smith distinguished between pre-capitalist and capitalist societies. For the former he proposed the labour theory of value, according to which the relative quantities of labour bestowed in the production of commodities, determines their exchangeable value, while for the latter he adopted the production cost theory, according to which it is the sum of wages, profit and rent that determines the value of commodities. Ricardo, just like Smith, considered capital as the material elements necessary to give effect to labour, so that he also recognised the existence of capital in the society that Smith described as primitive. According to Ricardo, money is a medium of circulation; not a special commodity but an ordinary one.
