Wage slavery
refers to a situation
where a person's livelihood depends on wages,
especially in a total and immediate way.
The term's
analogy between slavery
and
wage labor may refer only to an
"[un]equal bargaining situation between labor and capital,"
particularly where workers are paid comparatively low wages
(e.g. sweatshops).
Or it may draw similarities between owning and employing a person, which equates the term with a lack of workers' self-management.
This covers a wider range of employment choices bound by the pressures of a hierarchical social environment e.g. working for a wage not only under threat of starvation or poverty, but also of social stigma or status diminution.
Similarities between wage labor and slavery were noted at least as early as Cicero [10] and Aristotle.
A line in the original Star-Spangled Banner categorizes
"hirelings"
as being in the same category as slaves;
i.e.
people who weren't considered free.
With the advent of the industrial revolution, thinkers such as Proudhon and Marx elaborated these comparisons in the context of a critique of property not intended for active personal use.
Before the American Civil War, Southern defenders of African American slavery also invoked the concept of wage slavery to favorably compare the condition of their slaves to workers in the North.
The introduction of wage labor in 18th century Britain was met with resistance – giving rise to the principles of syndicalism.
The use of the term wage slave by labor organizations may originate from the labor protests of the Lowell Mill Girls in 1836.
The imagery of wage slavery was widely used by labor organizations during the mid-19th century to object to the lack of workers' self-management.
However, it was gradually replaced by the more pragmatic term
"wage work"
towards the end of the 19th century, as labor organizations shifted their focus to raising wages.
Historically, some groups and individual social activists,
have
espoused workers' self-management or worker cooperatives
as
possible alternatives to wage labor.
refers to a situation
where a person's livelihood depends on wages,
especially in a total and immediate way.
The term's
analogy between slavery
and
wage labor may refer only to an
"[un]equal bargaining situation between labor and capital,"
particularly where workers are paid comparatively low wages
(e.g. sweatshops).
Or it may draw similarities between owning and employing a person, which equates the term with a lack of workers' self-management.
This covers a wider range of employment choices bound by the pressures of a hierarchical social environment e.g. working for a wage not only under threat of starvation or poverty, but also of social stigma or status diminution.
Similarities between wage labor and slavery were noted at least as early as Cicero [10] and Aristotle.
A line in the original Star-Spangled Banner categorizes
"hirelings"
as being in the same category as slaves;
i.e.
people who weren't considered free.
With the advent of the industrial revolution, thinkers such as Proudhon and Marx elaborated these comparisons in the context of a critique of property not intended for active personal use.
Before the American Civil War, Southern defenders of African American slavery also invoked the concept of wage slavery to favorably compare the condition of their slaves to workers in the North.
The introduction of wage labor in 18th century Britain was met with resistance – giving rise to the principles of syndicalism.
The use of the term wage slave by labor organizations may originate from the labor protests of the Lowell Mill Girls in 1836.
The imagery of wage slavery was widely used by labor organizations during the mid-19th century to object to the lack of workers' self-management.
However, it was gradually replaced by the more pragmatic term
"wage work"
towards the end of the 19th century, as labor organizations shifted their focus to raising wages.
Historically, some groups and individual social activists,
have
espoused workers' self-management or worker cooperatives
as
possible alternatives to wage labor.
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