this post was submitted on 13 Apr 2025
23 points (96.0% liked)

marxism

3809 readers
3 users here now

For the study of Marxism, and all the tendencies that fall beneath it.

Read Lenin.

Resources below are from r/communism101. Post suggestions for better resources and we'll update them.

Study Guides

Explanations

Libraries

Bookstores

Book PDFs

founded 4 years ago
MODERATORS
Alaskaball@hexbear.net
invalidusernamelol@hexbear.net
23
How do you define exploitation in the modern day? (hexbear.net)
submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by Cimbazarov@hexbear.net to c/marxism@hexbear.net
16 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Talking more about how we in the imperial core are exploited, rather than how imperialism exploits other countries' resources, labour etc. I'm trying to find a satisfying explanation for why "well-paid" workers are also exploited.

From my understanding of Marx, exploitation happens in capitalism by the worker producing more value than what they are paid. This is evident by the profit these companies make, as it wouldn't exist if their workers were not exploited. But I find it awkward to try to get this across to people not well versed in theory. You have job types like office workers that don't really produce anything and only contribute to the companies bottom line indirectly. I get that theres unproductive and productive labor, but this is also alot to explain to someone who is not deep into economics.

This also got me thinking that exploitation is broader than just underpaying workers. There's also psychological and physical abuse at the workplace that I feel has some connection to exploitation. The fact that the employer can threaten you with firing, or cutting some benefit also seems like exploitation to me.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Cimbazarov@hexbear.net 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

In modern capitalism, many people have the illusion that they are not exploited, because their ideas of exploitation and alienation are deeply liberal (the hegemonic ideology).

Curious what you mean by their ideas of exploitation are liberal. As in they will only feel exploited once they can't afford their necessities?

[–] sodium_nitride@hexbear.net 5 points 1 week ago

There's a lot of cultural stereotypes that go into the idea of "exploitation" in liberal ideology. Even many people who literally cannot afford necessities may not think of themselves as exploited, because liberal ideology teaches us that the markets give us what we deserve.

In some situations, such as factories in 19th century England or sweatshops, the brutality of wage labor can reach a level where liberals think "nobody deserves to be treated like this" and "the market is a force of goodness, but it should be regulated".

However, the thing that makes these ideas liberal is that like all ideologies of class societies, they are blind to the reality of what makes the market system perpetuate across the generations. Instead, ideologies make us go round and round in circles talking about morality and who should get what.

The simple physical reality on the other hand is that exploitation of humans is the lifeblood of every class society that has every existed and ever will exist. Every country in which an exploitable working class cannot be reproduced over time simply dies. This applies to societies as varied as the roman empire (which had to constantly conquer slaves to fuel itself) to modern south Korea (which is on track to ageing itself out of existence).

In my experience, everybody who has learns about this dynamic about class societies becomes 10 times more class conscious.