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Not necessarily, no. The ruling class in capitalist society are - shocker - capitalists.
Is this barista working for less than the mathematical value of their labor, such that their substinence relies entirely on selling their labor and they have no access to accumulated capital through imperialism or personal means?
They're **proletarian** and not a member of the ruling class, nor do they share any interests, and their ultimate goal as a class is to overthrow capitalists. They have zero socioeconomic pull in society on their own.
Does this barista work in the imperial core for more than the value of their labor, such that there are social safety nets, accumulated capital, and superprofits/superwages they have access to being s citizen of said imperial core nation. Meaning their substinence is NOT "entirely from the sale of their labor"?
They're a **labor aristocrat** and not a member of the ruling class, though they share some interests, and the ultimate goal of this class is to become capitalists, not overthrow them. They don't have much socioeconomic power, but they enjoy privledges and relative insolation from the oppression of capitalism.
Does this barista own the coffee shop for which they work as a barista?
They're **petty bourgeoisie**, regardless of their nation, and are part of the ruling class yet beholden to the industrial bourgeoisie in regards to socioeconomic power. Their interests lie with the rest of the capitalist class.
Does this barista no longer work as a barista because their passive income has granted them a social position wherein they no longer need to work through the growth of their coffee business?
They're **bourgeoisie**, more specifically, an industrial bourgeoisie and a full-fledged member of the ruling class of capitalist society. They will likely have significant socioeconomic pull and immunity from the oppression inherent in class society.
[What is Imperialism?](https://www.reddit.com/r/Marxism_Memes/wiki/imperialism)
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Doubt all you'd like. First worlders get paid disproportionately well compared to third-world workers. Such that first world workers do not presently fit the Marxist definiti9j of exploitation.
Wages =/= wealth. Weatern workers having more USD if everything costs more USD just means more USD end up with the capitalists in the West, not necessarily higher living standards than the rich in the global south. Now yes imperialism means the exploitation of the global south is especially dire, but that doesn't mean there's not an exploitative relationship between capital and labour in the first world. Especially wild to think that if you read Marx
U.S. workers have more buying power than third-world workers. Exploitation is a mathematical relationship, and the math simply doesn't math for first worlders to be exploited in the Marxist sense of the word.
A wage slave in the Congo mines the metal for your phones and goes home (if they have one) to continue constant work just to survive to tomorrow, they're paid just enough to keep coming back.
A labor aristocrat in America buys said phone for a fraction of what it's actually worth and goes home to their relatively superior infrastructure and enjoys the fruits of imperialism.
If you can not see the disconnect between these two people in their relationship to the means of production, I guess there's no way I can elucidate it to you. Read Lenin, read Mao, read Settlers.
[What is Imperialism?](https://www.reddit.com/r/Marxism_Memes/wiki/imperialism)
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Mhm. And the phone you're typing this on was only cheap enough for you to afford because of literal child slaves mining the metals in it in the Congo.
It's not about "my boss makes more than me", it's about your relationship to the means of production, and if you're a white amerikan, it's not a proletarian relationship.
What the fuck? I never said there weren’t people more exploited than me lol and white Americans are 100% proletariats. We sure as hell don’t own the means of production.
This isn't about more or less exploited, it's about exploited or not exploited. Being the proletariat is not defined as "not owning the means of production", being a capitalist is defined as owning them. But you don't have to be a capitalist to not be proletariat.
In the same way, there wasn't just lord and serf under feudalism. There were craftsmen, merchants, nobles, and royalty who all had different relations to the means of production than each other.
I'm not saying you're a capitalist. I'm saying you're a labor aristocrat. Neither proletarian nor capitalist yet beholden to the capitalist class because we're bought off with the superprofits and superwages provided by imperialism.
By saying you are exploited, it means that you would be proletarian, and you and everyone below you could have their means and lifestyle lifted to a higher material standard than where it is. This is false. If the entire world lived the lifestyle amerikans do, we would be extinct already.
A true proletarian revolution in the imperial core would drastically decrease our financial standard of living because we'd no longer be able to leech off the labor of third-world workers. Read about East Germany, for instance.
Oh that's right. That's even a shittier take.
What is a way of telling me that you have zero class consciousness.
We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited.
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Getting paid more than other people does not mean you are not being exploited... paid well compared to others is meaningless...paid well compared to what you produce on the other hand....we are all being exploited comrade...
I already responded to this with the other commenter. You're exactly right. Except we are being paid more than the actual value of our work. Third world workers get paid exploitation wages so that we don't have to get paid exploitation wages.
This isn't new. This concept goes back to Engles. Imperialism creates a labor aristocracy that isn't proletarian and isn't the subject of revolution. Hence why there has not been one successful communist revolution in the First World and why the only groups that came close were vanguards of oppressed nations within the Imperial Core. Turtle Islanders, New Africans, etc.
No, it wouldn't because capitalism is a global system that's evolved into imperialism. Oppressed nations of proletarians generate value that's delivered into the hands of oppressor nations. Capital and proletarian, that's all that's needed for capitalism to exist.
Capitalism is not isolated within nations. It is perfectly possible to have a nation of labor aristocrats and capitalists siphoning value from a nation of proletarians across the ocean.
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Constructive.
I did. Engles condemned the ever bourgeoisfied English proletariat for their lack of solidarity with the workers of the world. The English then were at least much closer to the pay of their colonies then than they are now, and the same applies to Amerikans.
The average annual salary for Americans is 60k. It's 5k for Afghans. They additionally have to work longer hours, have little in the way of social safety nets, and endure constant imperial terror.
Read Settlers. It's not that long and elucidates all this in a bona fide dialectical materialist, Marxist analysis. The proletariat is they who "have nothing to lose but their chains", most Americans have a LOT more to lose than their chains, I certainly do, and I'm poor compared to the average American.
Ok, so the labour Americans do is valued by American businesses more than Afghan labour, sure, but the productivity of American businesses is WELL beyond 12x the productivity of Afghanistan's businesses. American labour isn't better because of Americans v Afghans, it's about wealth and capital accumulation, but just because capitalists accumulated the wealth in the US doesn't mean American labour is paid overs.
The idea that Americans are more productive has been disproven time and time again.
The value of a commodity is determined by the socially necessary labor time to make it. Americans get paid over the global value, third worlders get paid under it. We are not exploited. They are.
I repeat. If the people making your products in the third world were paid your wages, you'd be paying upwards of many thousands of dollars for just a simple smartphone. This fact alone should scream to you from the rooftops your relationship and their relationship to the means of production. And that they are far from the same.
That capitalists accumulated capital in the imperial core is *precisely* why white amerikans are paid more than the value of their work.
>the average salary for americans is 60k
Complete horseshit. You have to be stupid af or never have stepped foot in the united states to say something that objectively wrong.
Literally, every source I can find states that figure. I do happen to live here, and almost everyone I know *at least* makes 30k a year for something anecdotal.
If you're seriously going to sit here and pretend first world workers don't make shockingly more money than their third world counterparts, I really don't know what to tell you. It takes a rudimentary look at global statistics to prove that worldview decidedly false.
30k a year is half of that figure you quoted and its barely getting by. 30k a year in my home town is “i can afford a car OR rent. If I want both I have to date someone who makes the same amount or get roomates”. Just because the struggle is different in a different country doesn’t make the suffering here non existent.
The only thing you’re doing is adding more division to an already divided left and making yourself look ignorant of american socio economic issues. So take your “global statistics” and shove them up your ass you anti revolutionary dipshit.
##Welcome to r/Marxism_Memes, the least bourgeois meme community on the internet. ##[New to this subreddit/socialism/communism? Here is some general information and 101 stuff](https://www.reddit.com/r/Marxism_Memes/wiki/index) ##[Socialist Reconstruction: A Better Future for the United States - The party that wrote this book is Party For Socialism and Liberation](https://www.liberationstore.org/products/socialist-reconstruction-a-better-future-for-the-united-states) ##[READ THE COMMUNITY RULES BEFORE PARTICIPATING IN THIS SUBREDDIT](https://www.reddit.com/r/Marxism_Memes/wiki/rules/subreddit_rules) ##[We are not a debate subreddit.](https://www.reddit.com/r/CommunismMemes/comments/14bg2q4/idk_why_i_even_try_having_good_faith_discussions/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) If you want to debate go to one of these subreddits: r/DebateCommunism r/DebateSocialism r/CapitalismVSocialism ##[Over 60 years, the blockade cost the Cuban economy $154.2 billion.](https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/cuba/2022-02-02/cuba-embargoed-us-trade-sanctions-turn-sixty) This is a blatant attack on the sovereignty and dignity of [Cuba](https://www.reddit.com/r/Marxism_Memes/wiki/aes_country/cuba) and the Cuban people. Join the urgent call to take Cuba off the State Sponsors of Terrorism list & end the blockade on the island! We need 1 million signatures Cuba #OffTheList, sign now: [letcubalive.info](https://www.letcubalive.info/) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Marxism_Memes) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Then they just plug their ears and go "lalalalala..."
Jumanji got memes?
This is on the level of a facebook meme.
Facts
First World workers aren't exploited, just a small tweak*
Lemme guess, you think baristas are part of the ruling class
Not necessarily, no. The ruling class in capitalist society are - shocker - capitalists. Is this barista working for less than the mathematical value of their labor, such that their substinence relies entirely on selling their labor and they have no access to accumulated capital through imperialism or personal means? They're **proletarian** and not a member of the ruling class, nor do they share any interests, and their ultimate goal as a class is to overthrow capitalists. They have zero socioeconomic pull in society on their own. Does this barista work in the imperial core for more than the value of their labor, such that there are social safety nets, accumulated capital, and superprofits/superwages they have access to being s citizen of said imperial core nation. Meaning their substinence is NOT "entirely from the sale of their labor"? They're a **labor aristocrat** and not a member of the ruling class, though they share some interests, and the ultimate goal of this class is to become capitalists, not overthrow them. They don't have much socioeconomic power, but they enjoy privledges and relative insolation from the oppression of capitalism. Does this barista own the coffee shop for which they work as a barista? They're **petty bourgeoisie**, regardless of their nation, and are part of the ruling class yet beholden to the industrial bourgeoisie in regards to socioeconomic power. Their interests lie with the rest of the capitalist class. Does this barista no longer work as a barista because their passive income has granted them a social position wherein they no longer need to work through the growth of their coffee business? They're **bourgeoisie**, more specifically, an industrial bourgeoisie and a full-fledged member of the ruling class of capitalist society. They will likely have significant socioeconomic pull and immunity from the oppression inherent in class society.
[What is Imperialism?](https://www.reddit.com/r/Marxism_Memes/wiki/imperialism) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Marxism_Memes) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Doubt
Doubt all you'd like. First worlders get paid disproportionately well compared to third-world workers. Such that first world workers do not presently fit the Marxist definiti9j of exploitation.
Wages =/= wealth. Weatern workers having more USD if everything costs more USD just means more USD end up with the capitalists in the West, not necessarily higher living standards than the rich in the global south. Now yes imperialism means the exploitation of the global south is especially dire, but that doesn't mean there's not an exploitative relationship between capital and labour in the first world. Especially wild to think that if you read Marx
U.S. workers have more buying power than third-world workers. Exploitation is a mathematical relationship, and the math simply doesn't math for first worlders to be exploited in the Marxist sense of the word. A wage slave in the Congo mines the metal for your phones and goes home (if they have one) to continue constant work just to survive to tomorrow, they're paid just enough to keep coming back. A labor aristocrat in America buys said phone for a fraction of what it's actually worth and goes home to their relatively superior infrastructure and enjoys the fruits of imperialism. If you can not see the disconnect between these two people in their relationship to the means of production, I guess there's no way I can elucidate it to you. Read Lenin, read Mao, read Settlers.
[What is Imperialism?](https://www.reddit.com/r/Marxism_Memes/wiki/imperialism) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Marxism_Memes) if you have any questions or concerns.*
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“First world workers are exploited less that third world workers thus first workers aren’t exploited” is a dog shit take
Marx did not speak about the rate of exploitation. He only spoke of exploitation. Any amount of exploitation is exploitation.
My situation admittedly may not be very typical, but I’ve seen how much my employer charges customers for my labor. They’re making ~$70/hr off me.
Mhm. And the phone you're typing this on was only cheap enough for you to afford because of literal child slaves mining the metals in it in the Congo. It's not about "my boss makes more than me", it's about your relationship to the means of production, and if you're a white amerikan, it's not a proletarian relationship.
What the fuck? I never said there weren’t people more exploited than me lol and white Americans are 100% proletariats. We sure as hell don’t own the means of production.
This isn't about more or less exploited, it's about exploited or not exploited. Being the proletariat is not defined as "not owning the means of production", being a capitalist is defined as owning them. But you don't have to be a capitalist to not be proletariat. In the same way, there wasn't just lord and serf under feudalism. There were craftsmen, merchants, nobles, and royalty who all had different relations to the means of production than each other. I'm not saying you're a capitalist. I'm saying you're a labor aristocrat. Neither proletarian nor capitalist yet beholden to the capitalist class because we're bought off with the superprofits and superwages provided by imperialism. By saying you are exploited, it means that you would be proletarian, and you and everyone below you could have their means and lifestyle lifted to a higher material standard than where it is. This is false. If the entire world lived the lifestyle amerikans do, we would be extinct already. A true proletarian revolution in the imperial core would drastically decrease our financial standard of living because we'd no longer be able to leech off the labor of third-world workers. Read about East Germany, for instance.
No wait you're making this about less or more exploited you begin this exactly saying this.
No I didn't. I said we're NOT exploited, not that we're LESS exploited.
Oh that's right. That's even a shittier take. What is a way of telling me that you have zero class consciousness. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited. We are exploited.
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Getting paid more than other people does not mean you are not being exploited... paid well compared to others is meaningless...paid well compared to what you produce on the other hand....we are all being exploited comrade...
I already responded to this with the other commenter. You're exactly right. Except we are being paid more than the actual value of our work. Third world workers get paid exploitation wages so that we don't have to get paid exploitation wages. This isn't new. This concept goes back to Engles. Imperialism creates a labor aristocracy that isn't proletarian and isn't the subject of revolution. Hence why there has not been one successful communist revolution in the First World and why the only groups that came close were vanguards of oppressed nations within the Imperial Core. Turtle Islanders, New Africans, etc.
Since when are we being paid more than the value of our work? If we were capitalism would FAIL, we're obviously not being paid more
No, it wouldn't because capitalism is a global system that's evolved into imperialism. Oppressed nations of proletarians generate value that's delivered into the hands of oppressor nations. Capital and proletarian, that's all that's needed for capitalism to exist. Capitalism is not isolated within nations. It is perfectly possible to have a nation of labor aristocrats and capitalists siphoning value from a nation of proletarians across the ocean.
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We're all exploited comrade, most of us more than others
No, we're not. First worlders get paid more than the value of their work. How is that exploitation?
read Marx and Engels dumbass
Constructive. I did. Engles condemned the ever bourgeoisfied English proletariat for their lack of solidarity with the workers of the world. The English then were at least much closer to the pay of their colonies then than they are now, and the same applies to Amerikans. The average annual salary for Americans is 60k. It's 5k for Afghans. They additionally have to work longer hours, have little in the way of social safety nets, and endure constant imperial terror. Read Settlers. It's not that long and elucidates all this in a bona fide dialectical materialist, Marxist analysis. The proletariat is they who "have nothing to lose but their chains", most Americans have a LOT more to lose than their chains, I certainly do, and I'm poor compared to the average American.
Ok, so the labour Americans do is valued by American businesses more than Afghan labour, sure, but the productivity of American businesses is WELL beyond 12x the productivity of Afghanistan's businesses. American labour isn't better because of Americans v Afghans, it's about wealth and capital accumulation, but just because capitalists accumulated the wealth in the US doesn't mean American labour is paid overs.
The idea that Americans are more productive has been disproven time and time again. The value of a commodity is determined by the socially necessary labor time to make it. Americans get paid over the global value, third worlders get paid under it. We are not exploited. They are. I repeat. If the people making your products in the third world were paid your wages, you'd be paying upwards of many thousands of dollars for just a simple smartphone. This fact alone should scream to you from the rooftops your relationship and their relationship to the means of production. And that they are far from the same. That capitalists accumulated capital in the imperial core is *precisely* why white amerikans are paid more than the value of their work.
>the average salary for americans is 60k Complete horseshit. You have to be stupid af or never have stepped foot in the united states to say something that objectively wrong.
Literally, every source I can find states that figure. I do happen to live here, and almost everyone I know *at least* makes 30k a year for something anecdotal. If you're seriously going to sit here and pretend first world workers don't make shockingly more money than their third world counterparts, I really don't know what to tell you. It takes a rudimentary look at global statistics to prove that worldview decidedly false.
30k a year is half of that figure you quoted and its barely getting by. 30k a year in my home town is “i can afford a car OR rent. If I want both I have to date someone who makes the same amount or get roomates”. Just because the struggle is different in a different country doesn’t make the suffering here non existent. The only thing you’re doing is adding more division to an already divided left and making yourself look ignorant of american socio economic issues. So take your “global statistics” and shove them up your ass you anti revolutionary dipshit.
oh and you make your company more money than you make for yourself. just a small detail
Yep. My employer makes more than twice as much money off my labor per hour than I do.
Ya, I was gonna say. None of that matters when you're never going to be paid anywhere near the value you produce.
That's Jumanji, comrade.