this post was submitted on 13 Apr 2025
23 points (96.0% liked)

marxism

3809 readers
2 users here now

For the study of Marxism, and all the tendencies that fall beneath it.

Read Lenin.

Resources below are from r/communism101. Post suggestions for better resources and we'll update them.

Study Guides

Explanations

Libraries

Bookstores

Book PDFs

founded 4 years ago
MODERATORS
[email protected]
[email protected]
23
How do you define exploitation in the modern day? (hexbear.net)
submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
16 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Talking more about how we in the imperial core are exploited, rather than how imperialism exploits other countries' resources, labour etc. I'm trying to find a satisfying explanation for why "well-paid" workers are also exploited.

From my understanding of Marx, exploitation happens in capitalism by the worker producing more value than what they are paid. This is evident by the profit these companies make, as it wouldn't exist if their workers were not exploited. But I find it awkward to try to get this across to people not well versed in theory. You have job types like office workers that don't really produce anything and only contribute to the companies bottom line indirectly. I get that theres unproductive and productive labor, but this is also alot to explain to someone who is not deep into economics.

This also got me thinking that exploitation is broader than just underpaying workers. There's also psychological and physical abuse at the workplace that I feel has some connection to exploitation. The fact that the employer can threaten you with firing, or cutting some benefit also seems like exploitation to me.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I think it’s quite simple to explain to people that they generate the value of their wage for their boss in a fraction of the time they actually work, and then they work for the boss for free for the rest of the day. Especially obvious to explain to anyone that works in retail or sales or hospitality or whatever, when they can literally see the amount of money going into the register versus how much they make an hour.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 days ago

But you're aware that the money going in the register doesn't just cover the labour cost.

The employee also still keeps being paid even when there's no money entering the register at all.

The employee is likely just working for a place that has a lot of capital, that has been built up from scratch and now hires young inexperienced people.

If I go to my neighbour's shop and do a part time job there. Why would I expect the entire value of the labour? I'm not a owner of the store. I did not invest any of my wealth in it. I'm not risking anything. I'm just selling my labour and taking it home. Do with that money whatever I want.

I'm an accountant that booked the invoices of the clients, knowing exactly what my boss got paid for my labour.

Guess what. I left and got a higher paying job.

The solution is transparency. Young people are just inexperienced in negotiations, they don't know their market value. They don't have skills yet so they are without confidence.

All that needs to happen is to give them a bit of confidence.

Got my coworker 3000 euros gross wage on her first job as junior accountant just by telling her what she can actually ask.

Otherwise she would have accepted 2500 euros.

The EU has legislated to force more transparency when offering job positions. They have to say how much they offer as wage. How much people of the same position earn.

This transparency creates competition.