commodity

Noun

commodity (countable and uncountable, plural commodities)

1. Anything movable (a good) that is bought and sold.
   • It is with the help of the commodity concept that the mechanism of the market is geared to the various elements of industrial life. Commodities are here empirically defined as objects produced for sale on the market; […]. But labor, land, and money are obviously not commodities; the postulate that...1957 [1944], Karl Polanyi, chapter 6, in The Great Transformation, Beacon Press: Boston, page 72
   • If a key part of shopping is the conversion of anonymous commodities into possessions, shopping is a cultural as much as an economic activity.1995, James G. Carrier, Gifts and Commodities: Exchange and Western Capitalism Since 1700, page 122
2. Something useful or valuable.
   • And Slade said: "It really makes me sad that football club chairmen and boards seem to have lost that most precious commodity - patience. "Sam's sacking at Newcastle had, I suppose, been on the cards for a while, but it is really ridiculous to fire a manager after such a short time.2008 January 14, Somerset County Gazette
3. Raw materials, agricultural and other primary products as objects of large-scale trading in specialized exchanges.
   • The price of crude oil is determined in continuous trading between professional players in World's many commodities exchanges.
4. Undifferentiated goods characterized by a low profit margin and (usually) fungibility, as distinguished from branded products not wholly fungible.
   • Although they were once in the forefront of consumer electronics, the calculators have become a mere commodity.
5. (Marxism) Anything which has both a use value and an exchange value.
6. (obsolete) Convenience; usefulness, suitability.
7. (obsolete) Self-interest; personal convenience or advantage.
   • Shall we employ the intelligence Heaven hath bestowed upon us for our greatest good, to our ruine? repugning natures desseign and the universal order and vicissitude of things, which implieth that every man should use his instruments and meanes for his owne commoditie?1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 40, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book I, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC
   • they commonly respect their own ends, commodity is the steer of all their action[…].1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC