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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. [1]
Arbeit macht frei ([ˈaʁbaɪt ˈmaxt ˈfʁaɪ] ⓘ) is a German phrase translated as "Work makes one free" or, more idiomatically, "Work sets you free" or "Work liberates". The phrase originates from the title of an 1873 novel by Lorenz Diefenbach and alludes to John 8:31–32 .
What he has given to it is his individual quantum of labor. For example, the social working day consists of the sum of the individual hours of work; the individual labor time of the individual producer is the part of the social working day contributed by him, his share in it.
For some, abstract labour is an economic category which applies only to the capitalist mode of production, [20] i.e. it applies only, when human labour power or work-capacity is universally treated as a commodity with a certain monetary cost or earnings potential. [21] Thus Professor John Weeks claims that
Labor done is often referred to nowadays as "effort" or "labor services". Labor-power might be seen as a stock which can produce a flow of labor. Labor, not labor power, is the key factor of production for Marx and the basis for earlier economists' labor theory of value. The hiring of labor power only results in the production of goods or ...
With a rapidly ageing population, Germany is urgently looking at how it can get more work from a labour force that enjoys the most ample leisure time in the rich world. Government measures ...
"What labor everywhere wants, what it ought to have, and will someday demand and receive, is an honest day's pay for an honest day's work. As the laborer becomes more intelligent he will develop what capital he already possesses—that is the power to organize and combine for its own protection."
Marx also introduces the labour theory of value, where labour power is a commodity within capitalism. This labour power produces value greater than what the workers exchange with the capitalist for wages. This is the source of relative pauperisation of the proletariat, and wages harm the growth of productive capital. [9]