å Thursday, September 29th, 2016

Toniann German

Assignment #4

SOC

In Karl Marx “Wage labour and capital” he opens by defining what are wages and how these wages connect to labor. Marx discusses that wages are particular amounts of money that one receives from capitalist for the amount of work they do or the amount of time they spend doing work.  He states we have allowed our labor to be bought from capitalist by placing a price tag on ourselves, therefore it appears that we sell our labor for money. However, this is not the case, in actuality what is being sold “to the capitalist for money is their labour-power” Marx explains that for wage workers labour power is a commodity that they sell in order to stay alive.

When Marx discusses the weaver he explains that the weaver is getting paid because of the amount of time it has taken to make the cloth. However, in order for the weaver to create this cloth the capitalist had to offer the commodities necessary in order to create the cloth such as the yarn and loom. However, the weaver now gets paid for his work but not from the profit that was made from the selling of the cloth. The profit made from the creation of the weaver’s cloth goes strictly to the capitalist. However now the weaver can take his earnings to buy commodities necessary for survival such as shelter and food. Therefor the weaver’s work is seen more as a trade.

What I took away from this reading is that unless you love your work, your work will be seen as a sacrifice you make in your life not actually apart of your life. I also feel that he was saying that we don’t get paid what we should, we are not getting paid for what we are creating or producing or how much money we are making our bosses. We are being payed wages based off of time and what the capitalist deem as appropriate.

Toniann German

Assignment #3

Soc

In Harry Bravemans “The making of the working class” he discusses how the working class is divided because the workers are divided in their work. He expresses that just because a person works it does not make them apart of the working class. Braveman gives examples of the farmer and the contractor to explain that these people would not be seen as working class rather than the people who are hired to work under them. Although business owners, farmers or contractors may do similar work as their employees it is there level of authority that is separating them from the working class, because these people work for themselves they are not considered working class.

Braveman separates the working class by productive vs nonproductive workers, Braveman states that productive vs nonproductive does not mean manual labor vs non manual labor. rather productive workers produce something useful. He gives the example of clerks who do things that contribute to the production of a product although they may not necessary be in direct contact with the product.  Unproductive workers on the other hand are described in Bravemans reading as the banks, insurance, investments, and real estate industries just to name a few. Unproductive labor is that which is unnecessary in the production of goods. Here I believe he is describing productive vs nonproductive as todays white collar worker’s vs blue collar workers. Another way to view productive vs unproductive is that which benefits society or government and that which does not bring profit or benefit society as a whole.

When looking at these terms I believe That Braveman is stating that although there are productive workers and unproductive workers both are seen as belonging to the working class because they are working under someone. I believe that people are moving into the direction of unproductive work because the productive work is starting to be taken over by the rise of technology.