Das Kapital

Karl Marx

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1867

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Download PDF

Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Appendix

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Part 6Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 6: “Wages”

Part 6, Chapter 19 Summary: “The Transformation of the Value (and Respectively the Price) of Labour-Power into Wages”

For Part 6, Marx begins by again approaching The Labor Theory of Value, specifically the question of what determines the price of labor, which comes in the form of wages. For Marx, it is the amount of time it takes a worker to produce a commodity that determines the value of a commodity. Labor itself is “the immanent measure of value, but it has no value itself” (677). This is why Marx challenges the classical economists’ idea that labor does have a value that its price can be determined from. What is being sold is not the act of working itself— labor—but labor power, which is the ability to do work. The distinction matters because “the capitalist always makes labour-power work longer than is necessary for the reproduction of its own value” (679). The value of this labor power is what determines a worker’s wages.

Drawing on The Relationship Between Base Structure and Superstructure, Marx reiterates that this system is different from historical modes of production. In the past, feudalism still had a distinction between the labor workers did for their own subsistence and the labor they did for their overlords. Both the slave and capitalist modes of production, however, do not make this distinction. In a slave system, all labor appears to be for the enslaver, even labor done by the enslaved people for themselves. Under the capitalist mode of production, all labor appears to be compensated to the worker, and surplus labor for the capitalist is hidden.

Get access to this full Study Guide and much more!

8,800+ In-Depth Study Guides
4,700+ Quick-Read Plot Summaries
Downloadable PDFs

An example of this Marx gives is a worker who works a 12-hour shift but is paid two shillings, which is the “value-production of, say, 6 hours of labour” (681). As Marx explains, the capitalist “wishes to receive as much labour as possible for as little money as possible” (682); therefore, capitalists do not actually pay for the value of labor.

This is further proven, according to Marx, by the fact that wages change according to the length of the working day and the fact that wages vary between workers who perform the same job. Marx accuses classical economists of failing to understand that wages do not reflect the actual value of labor. This inability is because classical economists are unable to shed their “bourgeois skin” (682).

Part 6, Chapter 20 Summary: “Time-Wages”

First, when discussing wages, Marx discusses “time-wages” (683), which are wages based on the days worked. There are two types of time wages. One is nominal wages, which are based on the value of the wages just in terms of how much money they are paid. The next is real wages, which are determined from the value of the means of subsistence a worker can actually purchase with the money from their wage. In other words, real wages also take into account factors like inflation and workers’ cost of living.

Marx calculates that one can determine the real wage by dividing the average value of labor power by the average number of hours worked. Further, if a daily nominal wage is fixed and longer hours are imposed, the real wage will decrease. If a daily nominal wage is fixed, then the capitalist can reduce working hours and make the worker only work toward surplus value. In Marx’s time, it had also become common for capitalists to pay overtime wages, which is a larger-than-usual wage to compensate for working longer than the normal workday. However, Marx notes that sometimes overtime is necessary for the worker to receive enough wages. He also argues that “the longer the working day in a branch of industry, the lower the wages are” (688). This is an example of how capitalists can work around government regulations to pay workers as little as possible. As Marx writes, “The capitalist can now wring from the worker a certain quantity of surplus labour without allowing him the labour-time necessary for his own subsistence” (686).

Part 6, Chapter 21 Summary: “Piece-Wages”

Piece wages are wages paid based on the number of commodities produced. However, Marx considers this just a “converted form of the time-wage” (692). Piece wages only appear to reflect the value of the labor or the commodities being produced. Since the worker can only produce so much and only experience can determine how much a worker can produce, this presents another way for capitalists to exploit workers. Also, since piece wages are based on production, capitalists can easily encourage an increase in the intensity of labor and a lengthening of the work shift. However, Marx notes that as production rises, capitalists will lower the value of the piece wages.

Part 6, Chapter 22 Summary: “National Differences in Wages”

Examining differences between average wages in nations, Marx argues that rates of intensity of labor differ between countries. The more a nation has the capitalist mode of production, the more that nation has intensity of labor and an increase in productivity. At the same time, Marx argues nations with a more developed capitalist mode of production may have a higher average of nominal wages, but even they may not have higher real wages.

Next, Marx argues against an economist, H. Carey, who wrote Essay on the Rate of Wages. Carey’s thesis was that the wages of different countries are determined by productivity. Marx criticizes Carey and other “free-trade optimists” (706), specifically for ignoring the production of surplus value and attributing anything that disproved his argument to the impact of taxation. Marx sarcastically notes, “His reasoning is quite worthy of the man who, first of all, declared that capitalist relations of production were eternal laws of nature and reason, whose free and harmonious working was only disturbed by the intervention of the state” (705).

Part 6 Analysis

Building on his past exploration of The Labor Theory of Value, Marx elaborates further on wages and what they reveal about the exploitation of workers. At the same time, he taps into a theme of analysis that recurs throughout much of Capital: that the real mechanisms of the capitalist mode of production are often “hidden” (682). The system of wages, whether paid in money or even through a share in agricultural production, hides the truth of worker exploitation and how much surplus value the employer wrings from their workers. The system makes it appear that workers are given a fair and rational compensation for their labor, but—as discussed in Part 5—that is not the case. Much of the worker’s labor remains unpaid, or, more specifically, it does not actually reflect how much profit the worker generates for the employer.

For Marx, the truth about the capitalist mode of production is not just hidden from workers. It is also hidden from classical economists like John Stuart Mill and H. Carey. They only “stumble approximately onto the true state of affairs” (682). In other words, the views of classical economists are rigged in favor of that of capitalists. Marx’s criticisms of these economists provide another example of his sarcastic and acidic writing style, especially when he dismisses H. Carey’s work as a “confused mass” (705). Finally, the reason Marx calls attention to national differences in average wages is that, despite significant national differences, the rule that the capitalist mode of production brings with it more productivity but not necessarily an increase in real wages—meaning an actual increase in the ability of workers to improve their subsistence and their ability to pay for leisure—holds true.

Get access to this full Study Guide and much more!

8,800+ In-Depth Study Guides
4,700+ Quick-Read Plot Summaries
Downloadable PDFs

At the same time, Marx revisits The Relationship Between Base Structure and Superstructure. He contrasts capitalism with the feudal mode of production, where at least a peasant serf would know what time and money they spent on themselves and their families and when they worked for their lord through making agricultural productions for them or by building and repairing roads. This supports Marx’s contention that the capitalist mode of production is characterized by how it breaks down distinctions of personal time and energy and the employers’ time.

Some modern examples of this include how the time workers take to commute to work is still considered the employees’ personal time and is not compensated by their employers. Likewise, employees are often expected to provide or find their own means of transportation, to pay for parking at or near their place of employment, to provide or pay for their own meals, and sometimes even to work “off the clock” by, for example, being available to answer emails. In sum, the workers’ own pay from their own wages and their own time goes into providing themselves the means to be available and able to work. For Marx, such a system is a larger detriment to the worker than feudalism and has more in common with slavery.