But the mere justice that is implied in exchange is certainly only formal and relative; any one person should have neither more

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问题     But the mere justice that is implied in exchange is certainly only formal and relative; any one person should have neither more nor less than any other. Over and above that, exchange brings about an increase in the absolute number of values experienced. Since everybody offers for exchange only what is relatively useless to him, and accepts in exchange what is relatively necessary, exchange effects a continuously growing utilization of the values wrested from nature at any given time. If the world were really "given away" and as activity consisted only in the mere moving back and forth of an objectively unalterable quantity of values, then exchange would nevertheless produce, as it were, an intercellular growth of values. The objectively stable sum of values changes through a more useful distribution, effected by exchange, into a subjectively larger amount and higher measure of uses experienced. This is the great cultural task of every new distribution of rights and duties, which always implies an exchange. Even in the case of an apparently quite one-sided transfer of advantages, a truly social procedure will not disregard them. Thus, for example, it was essential during the liberation of peasants in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries not only to ensure that the landowners forfeited what the peasants were supposed to gain, but also to find a mode of distributing property and rights which enlarged the total amount of utilities.
    There are two qualities of money that, in this respect, suggest that the exchange of goods or services is best served by money: its divisibility and its unlimited convertibility. The former ensures that an objective equivalence between service and its return can take place. Natural objects can seldom be so determined and scaled in value that their exchange has to be accepted as completely just by both parties. Only money—because it is nothing but the representation of the value of other objects, and because there is almost no limit to its divisibility and accretion—provides the technical possibility for the exact equivalence of exchange values. However, this represents only the first stage in the progressive development away from the one-sidedness of exchange of ownership. The second quality of money derives from the fact that exchange in kind seldom gives both parties the desired object to an equal extent or is able to release them from equally superfluous ones. As a role, the more lively desire will be on the side of one party to the transaction while the other party will enter into the exchange only by being forced to do so or where they receive a disproportionately high compensation for doing so. In the case of the exchange of services or benefits against money, however, one party receives the object that they especially need while the other receives something that anyone in general desires. Because of the boundless usefulness and therefore its permanent desirability, every exchange becomes, at least in principle, equally advantageous to both parties. The one who takes the object will certainly do so only if he needs it at this point in time; the person who takes money will accept it because he can use it at any time. Exchange against money makes possible an increase in satisfaction for both parties, whereas with exchange in kind it is frequently the case that only one party will have a specific interest in the acquisition or disposal of the object. Thus exchange against money is so far the most perfect form of solution of the great cultural problem that evolves from the one-sided advantage of exchange of possessions, namely, to raise the objectively given amount of value to a greater amount of subjectively experienced values merely through the change in its owners. This, alongside the original creation of values, is clearly the task of social expediency as part of the general human task; to set free a maximum of the latent value that lies in the form that we give to the contents of life. Wherever we see money serving this purpose, the technical role of money also reveals that exchange is the essential social mode of solving this problem and that exchange itself is embodied in money.
Which of the following best describes the author’s main idea in this passage?

选项 A、To give a definition of money.
B、To show money’s value.
C、To describe the nature of exchange.
D、To show money solves the problems of exchange.

答案D

解析 根据第二段的“There are two qualities of money that…between service andits return can take place.”可知,商品或服务的交换最好以货币进行;货币具有可分性和无限的自由兑换性。前者确保了服务和回报之间客观的对等性。再根据该段的“The second quality of money derives from the fact that exchange in kind seldom gives both partiesthe desired object”和“Exchange against money makes possible an increase in satisfactionfor both parties”可知,货币的第二种特征来源于一种实际情况,即实物交换很少会使双方平等地得到所需的货物。以货币作为交换手段可能使双方都非常满意。据此可知,文中作者主要是要表明货币解决了交换的问题。D项正确。
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