ABSTRACT LABOUR AND CONCRETE LABOUR
Abstract labour and concrete labour refer to a distinction made by Karl Marx in his
critique of political economy. It refers to the difference between human labour in general as
economically valuable worktime versus human labour as a particular activity that has a
specific useful effect within the (capitalist) mode of production.
The twofold nature of the production for exchange purposes.
Overview
As economically valuable worktime, human labour is spent to add value to products or assets
(thereby conserving their capital value, and/or transferring value from inputs to outputs). In
this sense, labour is an activity which creates/maintains economic value pure and simple,
which could be realized as a sum of money once labour's product is sold or acquired by a
buyer. The value-creating ability of labour is most clearly visible when all labour is stopped. If
all labour is withdrawn, the value of the capital assets worked with will normally deteriorate,
and in the end, if labour is permanently withdrawn, nothing will be left except a ghost town
situation.
As a useful activity of a particular kind, human labour can have a useful effect in producing
particular tangible products which are used by others, or by the producers themselves. In
this sense, labour is an activity which creates use-values, i.e. tangible products, results or
effects which can be used or consumed. The creation of use-values is highlighted, when
goods and services of poor quality are created, which are not supplied on time and mainly
useless to the consumer. Labour must be applied to produce usable products, regardless of
how much they are sold for, otherwise there are no use-values. If labour produces useless
products or results, it is simply a waste of labour-time.
So, Marx argues that human work is both (1) an activity which, by its useful effect, helps to
create particular kinds of products, and (2) in an economic sense a value-forming activity
that, if it is productively applied, can help create more value than there was before. If an
employer hires labour, the employer thinks both about the value that the labour can add
within his business, and about how useful the labour service will be for his business
operations. That is, the right kind of work not only needs to get done, but it needs to get done
in a way that it helps the employer to make money.
If the labour makes no net addition to new value produced, then the employer makes no
money from it, and the labour will be only an expense to him. If the labour is only a net
expense (overhead), then it is commercially speaking unproductive labour. Yet it may be very
necessary to employ this unproductive labour, if, without its performance, considerable
capital value would be lost from the employer's financial investments, or if business would
fail without it. That is, labour may be very necessary to maintain capital value, even if it does
not actually add value to capital, and does not directly add to net profit. So, the employer also
buys unproductive labour because the employer's costs in this respect are lower than
the loss of value that would occur, if he did not employ unproductive labour
to maintain capital value, and to prevent loss of capital value. For example, cleaning work
, might seem a very menial and low-value activity, but if business equipment fails, customers
stay away, and the staff get sick or hurt, it costs the business a lot of extra money.
However, Marx posited abstract labor, all labor-power, as homogeneous, productive labor due
to the social nature of value. Labor power, whether managerial or otherwise, when exchanged
directly with capital, is included in any calculation of the average socially necessary labor
time for production of a specific commodity, and is still represented by variable capital and
therefore value adding capital.
Origin
In the introduction to his Grundrisse manuscript, Marx argued that the category of abstract
labour "expresses an ancient relation existing in all social formations"; but, he
continued, only in modern bourgeois society (exemplified by the United States) is abstract
labour fully realized in practice. Because only there does a system of price-equations exist
within a universal market, which can practically reduce the value of all forms and quantities
of labour uniformly to sums of money, so that any kind of labour becomes an
interchangeable, tradeable good or "input" with a known price tag – and is also
practically treated as such. In the Grundrisse, Marx also distinguished between "particular
labour" and "general labour", contrasting communal production with production for
exchange.
Marx published about the categories of abstract and concrete labour for the first time in A
Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1859) and they are discussed in more
detail in chapter 1 of Capital, Volume I, where Marx writes:
"On the one hand all labour is, speaking physiologically, an expenditure of human labour
power, and in its character of identical abstract human labour, it creates and forms the value
of commodities. On the other hand, all labour is the expenditure of human labour power in a
special form and with a definite aim, and in this, its character of concrete useful labour, it
produces use values. ... At first sight a commodity presented itself to us as a complex of two
things – use value and exchange value. Later on, we saw also that labour, too, possesses the
same twofold nature; for, so far as it finds expression in value, it does not possess the same
characteristics that belong to it as a creator of use values. I was the first to point out and to
examine critically this twofold nature of the labour contained in commodities. ... this point is
the pivot on which a clear comprehension of political economy turns"
Abstract labour and exchange
Marx himself considered that all economising reduced to the economical use of human
labour-time; "to economise" ultimately meant saving on human energy and effort.
"The less time the society requires to produce wheat, cattle etc., the more time it wins for
other production, material or mental. Just as in the case of an individual, the multiplicity of its
development, its enjoyment and its activity depends on economization of time. Economy of
time, to this all economy ultimately reduces itself. Society likewise has to distribute its time
in a purposeful way, in order to achieve a production adequate to its overall needs; just as the
Abstract labour and concrete labour refer to a distinction made by Karl Marx in his
critique of political economy. It refers to the difference between human labour in general as
economically valuable worktime versus human labour as a particular activity that has a
specific useful effect within the (capitalist) mode of production.
The twofold nature of the production for exchange purposes.
Overview
As economically valuable worktime, human labour is spent to add value to products or assets
(thereby conserving their capital value, and/or transferring value from inputs to outputs). In
this sense, labour is an activity which creates/maintains economic value pure and simple,
which could be realized as a sum of money once labour's product is sold or acquired by a
buyer. The value-creating ability of labour is most clearly visible when all labour is stopped. If
all labour is withdrawn, the value of the capital assets worked with will normally deteriorate,
and in the end, if labour is permanently withdrawn, nothing will be left except a ghost town
situation.
As a useful activity of a particular kind, human labour can have a useful effect in producing
particular tangible products which are used by others, or by the producers themselves. In
this sense, labour is an activity which creates use-values, i.e. tangible products, results or
effects which can be used or consumed. The creation of use-values is highlighted, when
goods and services of poor quality are created, which are not supplied on time and mainly
useless to the consumer. Labour must be applied to produce usable products, regardless of
how much they are sold for, otherwise there are no use-values. If labour produces useless
products or results, it is simply a waste of labour-time.
So, Marx argues that human work is both (1) an activity which, by its useful effect, helps to
create particular kinds of products, and (2) in an economic sense a value-forming activity
that, if it is productively applied, can help create more value than there was before. If an
employer hires labour, the employer thinks both about the value that the labour can add
within his business, and about how useful the labour service will be for his business
operations. That is, the right kind of work not only needs to get done, but it needs to get done
in a way that it helps the employer to make money.
If the labour makes no net addition to new value produced, then the employer makes no
money from it, and the labour will be only an expense to him. If the labour is only a net
expense (overhead), then it is commercially speaking unproductive labour. Yet it may be very
necessary to employ this unproductive labour, if, without its performance, considerable
capital value would be lost from the employer's financial investments, or if business would
fail without it. That is, labour may be very necessary to maintain capital value, even if it does
not actually add value to capital, and does not directly add to net profit. So, the employer also
buys unproductive labour because the employer's costs in this respect are lower than
the loss of value that would occur, if he did not employ unproductive labour
to maintain capital value, and to prevent loss of capital value. For example, cleaning work
, might seem a very menial and low-value activity, but if business equipment fails, customers
stay away, and the staff get sick or hurt, it costs the business a lot of extra money.
However, Marx posited abstract labor, all labor-power, as homogeneous, productive labor due
to the social nature of value. Labor power, whether managerial or otherwise, when exchanged
directly with capital, is included in any calculation of the average socially necessary labor
time for production of a specific commodity, and is still represented by variable capital and
therefore value adding capital.
Origin
In the introduction to his Grundrisse manuscript, Marx argued that the category of abstract
labour "expresses an ancient relation existing in all social formations"; but, he
continued, only in modern bourgeois society (exemplified by the United States) is abstract
labour fully realized in practice. Because only there does a system of price-equations exist
within a universal market, which can practically reduce the value of all forms and quantities
of labour uniformly to sums of money, so that any kind of labour becomes an
interchangeable, tradeable good or "input" with a known price tag – and is also
practically treated as such. In the Grundrisse, Marx also distinguished between "particular
labour" and "general labour", contrasting communal production with production for
exchange.
Marx published about the categories of abstract and concrete labour for the first time in A
Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1859) and they are discussed in more
detail in chapter 1 of Capital, Volume I, where Marx writes:
"On the one hand all labour is, speaking physiologically, an expenditure of human labour
power, and in its character of identical abstract human labour, it creates and forms the value
of commodities. On the other hand, all labour is the expenditure of human labour power in a
special form and with a definite aim, and in this, its character of concrete useful labour, it
produces use values. ... At first sight a commodity presented itself to us as a complex of two
things – use value and exchange value. Later on, we saw also that labour, too, possesses the
same twofold nature; for, so far as it finds expression in value, it does not possess the same
characteristics that belong to it as a creator of use values. I was the first to point out and to
examine critically this twofold nature of the labour contained in commodities. ... this point is
the pivot on which a clear comprehension of political economy turns"
Abstract labour and exchange
Marx himself considered that all economising reduced to the economical use of human
labour-time; "to economise" ultimately meant saving on human energy and effort.
"The less time the society requires to produce wheat, cattle etc., the more time it wins for
other production, material or mental. Just as in the case of an individual, the multiplicity of its
development, its enjoyment and its activity depends on economization of time. Economy of
time, to this all economy ultimately reduces itself. Society likewise has to distribute its time
in a purposeful way, in order to achieve a production adequate to its overall needs; just as the
