ABSTRACT
Prices have been compared to tolls levied for private profit or to barriers which, again for private profit, keep the potential stream of commodities from the masses who need them. In order to show that price is a phenomenon incident to all forms of organization of society and to economic action in general, it is sufficient to look upon it as a coefficient of economic choice. That is to say, by paying a price for any commodity, buyers show a preference for that commodity as compared with other commodities which they could also buy if they wanted to, for the same money. An economic dimension is, therefore, always necessary for the guidance of production, and this economic dimension at all times and under all circumstances finds expression in coefficients of choice which are fundamentally the same thing as prices in capitalist society.
