Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844: With linked Table of Contents

The capitalist is always free to use labor, and the worker is always forced to sell it. The value of labor is completely destroyed if it is not sold every instant. Labor can neither be accumulated nor even be saved, unlike true commodities. Labor is life, and if life is not each day exchanged for food, it suffers and soon perishes. To claim that hu

His power is the purchasing power of his capital, which noting can withstand.

Equally, the increase in the class of people wholly dependent on work intensifies competition among them, thus lowering their price.

The accumulation of capital increases the division of labor, and the division of labor increases the numbers of the workers. Conversely, the workers’ numbers increase the division of labor,

Everyone else has to carry on a business with his capital, or venture it in trade. As a result, the competition between capitals becomes more intense. The concentration of capitals increases, the big capitalists ruin the small, and a section of the erstwhile capitalists sinks into the working class,

“To develop in greater spiritual freedom, a people must break their bondage to their bodily needs—they must cease to be the slaves of the body. They must, therefore, above all, have time at their disposal for spiritual creative activity and spiritual enjoyment.

While according to the political economists labor is the sole constant price of things, there is nothing more contingent than the price of labor, nothing exposed to greater fluctuations.