For labour-power to appear as a commodity, the worker must be 'free' in a double sense: legally free to sell their own capacity as a property owner, and economically 'free' (stripped) of all means of production and subsistence.

By Karl Marx, from Le Capital : Critique de l'économie politique

Key Arguments

  • The worker must be the free proprietor of their own person to treat labour-power as their own commodity
  • The worker must be compelled to sell labour-power because they lack the means of production (raw materials, tools) to sell other commodities
  • The worker must be rid of all objects needed for the realization of their labour-power

Source Quotes

The time necessary for sale must be counted as well as the time of production. For the transformation of money into capital, therefore, the owner of money must find the free worker available on the commodity-market; and this worker must be free in the double sense that as a free individual he can dispose of his labour-power as his own commodity, and that, on the other hand, he has no other commodity for sale, i.e. he is rid of them, he is free of all the objects needed for the realization [Verwirklichung] of his labour-power. Why this free worker confronts him in the sphere of circulation is a question which does not interest the owner of money, for he finds the labour-market in existence as a particular branch of the commodity-market.
In this way he manages both to alienate [veräussern] his labour-power and to avoid renouncing his rights of ownership over it. The second essential condition which allows the owner of money to find labour-power in the market as a commodity is this, that the possessor of labour-power, instead of being able to sell commodities in which his labour has been objectified, must rather be compelled to offer for sale as a commodity that very labour-power which exists only in his living body. In order that a man may be able to sell commodities other than his labour-power, he must of course possess means of production, such as raw materials, instruments of labour, etc. No boots can be made without leather.

Key Concepts

  • free in the double sense that as a free individual he can dispose of his labour-power as his own commodity
  • on the other hand, he has no other commodity for sale
  • rid of them, he is free of all the objects needed for the realization [Verwirklichung] of his labour-power
  • compelled to offer for sale as a commodity that very labour-power which exists only in his living body

Context

Describing the necessary social conditions for the existence of a labour market.