Estranged Labour

In Marx’s manuscript “Estranged Labor”, he addresses the two classes created within the economic system of private ownership: “property owners and the property-less workers”. He describes the situation of the workers about as dismally as possible. Marx refers to them as aliens, people who become “products of their own labor”. He frames their situation: in this economic situation, workers become more poor with increased individual productivity and his impact and value as that individual also decreases with increased object output. There are four types of alienation: 1.) The estrangement of the worker from the product of his work 2.) The estrangement of the worker from the activity of production 3.) the worker’s alienation from “species-being,” or human identity and finally 4.) The estrangement of man to man.

It’s interesting how Marx describes the human-work relationship. Marx believes that physical labor, the act of transforming raw materials into objects of substance is key to personal identity and worth. He claims that in Capitalistic societies, because of it’s basis on private property, work as a source of identity is severely undermined. Subsequently, those without property hand over their productive capacities (the essence of the worker’s being, to factory owners, namely wealthy capitalists.

What I question about Marx’s manuscript, is how great an extent the average worker blames society for his life. The life of a worker, as described by Marx, is that of a “stupid” man, only getting more incumbent with his increased competency in his production. From the beginning Marx rags on the common laborer, and then he tries to defend them. We all must admit that people find niches in society where they find they work best. Some, are thinkers, some belong as CEOs, and some people find their motion in manual labor. Marx seems to be fighting this inevitability. Maybe I just haven’t understood the concept that Marx is trying to convey here.