Page:Georg Freidrich Knapp - The State Theory of Money (1924 translation).pdf/23

Rh is “real” satisfaction in every commodity which is taken in exchange. A man who barters a sheep for wooden dishes, takes the dishes only because they give real satisfaction, i. e. because he can use them. But the dishes do not thereby become socially recognised exchange-commodities. The possibility of “real” use is therefore essential if a commodity (e. g. a metal) is to be chosen as a socially recognised exchange-commodity; but this property is insufficient to make it a means of payment.

With the satisfaction derived from exchange the position is quite different, It is a necessary and sufficient property of every means of payment, and of the autometallistic in particular, A man who can employ the exchange-commodity he has received for some craft, but cannot pass it on in circulation, owns a commodity, bub not a means of payment. For example, the owner of a pound of copper would be in this position if in his country silver was the autometallistic means of payment.

It is of the greatest importance that this should be borne in mind, Even in autometallism (the simplest form of a means of payment) it is first the possibility of employing it in exchange that gives it the property of becoming a means of payment. The possibility of “real” use does not produce this property, otherwise all goods would be already potentially means of payment, for they all have a technical use.