Alienated labor is a class phenomenon, not a technical one.

Evidence

When the capitalist buys a lathe he gets just that— a lathe with given and known specifications and production characteristics for a given price. When he “buys” a worker, however, he gets not work itself, but a problem: how to get work out of the worker. The problem is solved through maintaining and reinforcing his power vis-a-vis the worker. Thus capitalist production is at heart a social and not merely a technical process. And alienation is a class and not a technological phenomenon. — Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis, Schooling in Capitalist America, 736

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies the economic distinction between buying labor power versus extracting actual labor from the worker.
• XREF: Ties back to the book’s earlier claim of the enterprise being politically autocratic, and the exploitation masked by formal market equality (ch22-25). — connects to: Alienation accurately describes working-class privation but not general spiritual malaise — Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic…, 241; Economic function, not legal status, defines membership in the working class. — Noel Ignatiev, How the Irish Became White, 156

Broader Connections

• Alienation accurately describes working-class privation but not general spiritual malaise #qualifies (0.80) — Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic…, 241