Page 56 - DSOC401_SOCIOLOGICAL_THOUGHT_ENGLISH

Sociological Thought

notes out of the labour of the worker, and the value given to the worker for it (in other words the value of
the necessary means for sustaining life for the worker and his family), and the difference between the
two is the surplus value. In other words, the real value that the worker produces through his labour,
the capitalist instead of paying him the same value in the form of salary, in comparison; and in this
way most of the value created by the worker, remains with the capitalist. This is the surplus value that
the capitalist retains for himself by deceit and injustice. This can be understood better by an example.
Suppose a worker works for eight hours in a factory, and during that span of time he makes products
worth eighty rupees, but for his labour, he is paid a salary on only twenty rupees. According to his
wage, he has worked only for two hours, while the remaining six hours he works for the profit of the
capitalist. The value of these six hours is what we call surplus value, which is the result of the workers
heavy labour, and which the capitalist misappropriates by snatching it from the worker.
The main objective of a capitalist is to earn maximum profit. The less the workers will get as wages,
the more profit will fill the pockets of the capitalist. For this reason they try their maximum to pay the
workers less and less. Mostly capitalist pay the workers a subsistence wage, which will keep hunger at
bay, and the worker can keep producing working children for the future. Not only this, the capitalist
includes the workers wages in his cost of production of the commodity; and the capitalist never sells
any commodity in the market less than this cost of production. Therefore it is clear that in the profit
that the capitalist gains by selling commodities produced by worker, the worker get nil share. This is
the injustice perpetuated against the worker, and their exploitation. The worker has no other means of
earning a living. That is why he sells his labour to somehow earn food for himself and other members
of his family. By this viewpoint, Marx theory of surplus value is related to his belief of subsistence–level
wages. Its general theory is that “workers are paid that price, which is equivalent to his labour, and
which price is under the laws of the market, is a sum, with that human–material (that is labour) will
always be available. In other words the wages are just sufficient to keep the worker and his family at
survival level; just enough means to keep them living.” These are the methods that capitalist use to
misappropriate the surplus value and continue with the explaitative–cycle.

self assessment
Fill in the blanks—
1. Therefore it is clear that like other ________ numerous economist Marx too believed that
labour creates value.
2. The measurement of the amount of labour is its ________
3. When fixing the value of any commodity we include not ________ the labour time span, but
also the value of the raw materials.
According to Marx, this, exploitative–cycle of capitalists has been going on for a long time. In reality
the capitalist society is different from the feudalistic society only in name. Just as in ancient times,
slaves and serf–farmers were forced to served their master and feudal lords to produce surplus value,
in the same way, today’s worker uses most of his labour to produce surplus value for the capitalist.
The only difference is that in ancient times, the worker worked in status of a slave or a serf, while
today’s worker works after a willing agreement or compromise, but in reality this compromise is an
agreement only in name, because the capitalists owns the means (machines tools etc.) of production,
through whose utility can the worker create value for himself and the capitalist. Otherwise not the
only thing that the worker owns is his labour, and no thing else. Having no means of production at
hand, the poor worker is forced to sell his labour for survival; for he has no other remedy; and they
do exactly that and sell their labour to the capitalist’ at such a cost, that is only sufficient to keep them
and their family alive.

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