Wage Labour and Capital & Value, Price and Profit

The most significant historical context for Karl Marx’s writing is the social, political, and economic change that was precipitated by the industrial revolution. Increased factory production, in combination with the enclosure of common land, drove more and more people to city centers for work. Meanwhile, technological advancements, such as the steam engine and other mechanized production methods, fundamentally changed the nature of labor.

The quality of life in these densely populated cities was low, and working conditions in the factories were harsh and exploitative. Moreover, despite rises in capital and more production of goods than ever before, the increase in wealth did not often spread to the working class. As a result, inequality rose and Europe experienced waves of political turmoil, marked by revolutions and uprisings of disenfranchised workers and other marginalized groups. These movements sought to challenge oppressive systems of governance, rising inequality, and poor working conditions by demanding greater rights and representation for the working class.

“Wage Labour and Capital” was written and delivered as a series of lectures more than two decades before “Value, Price and Profit,” and the edition used for this guide features terminology that was updated by Engels in 1891 to ensure that it was in line with Marx’s later—and more developed—works. The original text posited that workers sell their labor for wages, which Engels updated to specify it is their labor-power they sell. This small change is crucial to Marx’s labor theory of value, which in turn is foundational in understanding the concept of surplus value and his broader critiques of capitalism.

This clarity-based change highlights some other important pieces of context to keep in mind while reading: “Wage Labour and Capital” is an early example of Marx’s thought, but it introduces and gestures toward ideas he would go on to develop in much more detail in later works such as Das Kapital (1867). These essays were initially presented as lectures to educate, inform, and galvanize a popular audience. “Wage Labour and Capital” was delivered to the German Workers’ Society in Brussels in 1847, and “Value, Price and Profit” was presented to the General Council of the First International in 1865. The need for clarity and accessibility is tied to Marx’s desire to help workers understand their exploitation, but also the necessity to unite divergent leftists who did not all agree on a path forward.

This latter issue is especially evident in the first half of “Value, Price and Profit,” which responds directly to John Weston, a representative of English workers and an Owenite, who had previously argued that an increase in wages would not materially improve conditions for the working class. His arguments were based on the theory of wages as a fund, which posited that increases in wages wouldn’t work, because capitalists would simply respond by raising prices on necessities or by hiring fewer workers. Marx not only refutes this idea in “Value, Price and Profit,” but suggests that ideas like this are a tool for the capitalist class to encourage workers away from participating in class struggle.