---
Title: Wage
Description: Part of total production with which capital buys labor power and which tends to equal the social cost of reproducing it with the necessary skill and knowledge required in production.
Author: School of Marxism
URL: https://dictionary.marxismo.school/Wage
---


> Part of total production with which capital buys labor power and which tends to equal the social cost of reproducing it with the necessary skill and knowledge required in production.

It is a part of capital, the part capital uses to buy [labor power](https://dictionary.marxismo.school/Labor%20power):

> The wage is not the worker's share in the commodity he produces. The wage is the part of already existing commodities with which the capitalist buys a certain amount of productive labor power.
>
> ["Wage Labor and Capital"](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/wage-labour/index.htm), Karl Marx 1849

As the [value](https://dictionary.marxismo.school/Value) of [labor power](https://dictionary.marxismo.school/Labor%20power), the wage represents the social cost of reproducing the commodity consumed by the capitalist in the productive process. This includes not only the cost of keeping the [proletariat](https://dictionary.marxismo.school/Proletariat) alive, but also the cost of maintaining it with the average qualification necessary for its [labor power](https://dictionary.marxismo.school/Labor%20power) to be productively employed for [capital](https://dictionary.marxismo.school/Capital).