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Labour power AI simulator
(@Labour power_simulator)
Hub AI
Labour power AI simulator
(@Labour power_simulator)
Labour power
Labour power (German: Arbeitskraft; French: force de travail) is the capacity to work, a key concept used by Karl Marx in his critique of capitalist political economy. Marx distinguished between the capacity to do the work, i.e. labour power, and the physical act of working, i.e. labour. Human labour power exists in any kind of society, but on what terms it is traded or combined with means of production to produce goods and services has historically varied greatly.
The general idea of labour-power had existed previously in classical political economy. Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations and David Ricardo's On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation already referred to the "productive powers of labour". However, Marx made the concept much more precise, critically examining the functions of labour-power in production, how labour-power is used, organized and exploited, and how it is typically valued and priced in bourgeois society.
Under capitalism, according to Marx, the productive powers of labour appear as the creative power of capital. Indeed, "labour power at work" becomes a component of capital, it functions as working capital. Work becomes just work, workers become an abstract labour force, labour becomes an economic input or a factor of production, and the control over work becomes mainly a management prerogative.
Karl Marx introduces the concept in chapter 6 of the first volume of Capital, as follows:
He adds further on that:
Another explanation of labour-power can be found in the introduction and second chapter of Marx's Wage Labour and Capital (1847). Marx also provided a short exposition of labour power in Value, Price and Profit (1865).
For Marx, Arbeitskraft, which he sometimes instead refers to as Arbeitsvermögen ("labour-ability" or "labour-capacity") refers to a "force of nature": the physical ability of human beings and other living things to perform work, including mental labour and skills such as manual dexterity, in addition to sheer physical exertion. Labour power is, in this sense, also the aspect of labour that becomes a commodity within capitalist society and is alienated from labourers when it is sold to capitalists.
By contrast, "labour" may refer to all or any activity by humans (and other living creatures) that is concerned with producing goods or services (or what Marx calls use-values). In this sense, the usage of labour (per se) in Marxian economics is somewhat similar to the later concept, in neoclassical economics, of "labour services".
Labour power
Labour power (German: Arbeitskraft; French: force de travail) is the capacity to work, a key concept used by Karl Marx in his critique of capitalist political economy. Marx distinguished between the capacity to do the work, i.e. labour power, and the physical act of working, i.e. labour. Human labour power exists in any kind of society, but on what terms it is traded or combined with means of production to produce goods and services has historically varied greatly.
The general idea of labour-power had existed previously in classical political economy. Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations and David Ricardo's On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation already referred to the "productive powers of labour". However, Marx made the concept much more precise, critically examining the functions of labour-power in production, how labour-power is used, organized and exploited, and how it is typically valued and priced in bourgeois society.
Under capitalism, according to Marx, the productive powers of labour appear as the creative power of capital. Indeed, "labour power at work" becomes a component of capital, it functions as working capital. Work becomes just work, workers become an abstract labour force, labour becomes an economic input or a factor of production, and the control over work becomes mainly a management prerogative.
Karl Marx introduces the concept in chapter 6 of the first volume of Capital, as follows:
He adds further on that:
Another explanation of labour-power can be found in the introduction and second chapter of Marx's Wage Labour and Capital (1847). Marx also provided a short exposition of labour power in Value, Price and Profit (1865).
For Marx, Arbeitskraft, which he sometimes instead refers to as Arbeitsvermögen ("labour-ability" or "labour-capacity") refers to a "force of nature": the physical ability of human beings and other living things to perform work, including mental labour and skills such as manual dexterity, in addition to sheer physical exertion. Labour power is, in this sense, also the aspect of labour that becomes a commodity within capitalist society and is alienated from labourers when it is sold to capitalists.
By contrast, "labour" may refer to all or any activity by humans (and other living creatures) that is concerned with producing goods or services (or what Marx calls use-values). In this sense, the usage of labour (per se) in Marxian economics is somewhat similar to the later concept, in neoclassical economics, of "labour services".