Capitalist growth fundamentally depends on paying workers less than they produce.

Evidence

The fundamental point is that surplus value is generated by unpaid labor, and this is a characteristic of the system: without it, there would be no profit for the employer. Without profit, there would be no capital accumulation, no economic growth, and fundamentally no capitalism. The capitalist pays for the commodity of labor power, but not for the value workers actually produce. For example, during their eight-hour shift, Kellogg’s factory workers produce cereals and snacks worth thousands of dollars but are paid only 120 a day. A Starbucks employee may be paid 100 a day, but in the same period they may sell $1,000 worth of coffee, generating profits that go directly to the multinational corporation. In both cases, employees keep working long after the value they have generated for the company covers their wages. In other words, capital expands not through equal exchange, as the market perspective suggests, but precisely through its opposite: by not paying workers for a portion of their labor. — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 104

Categorization

• XREF: Directly contradicts the neoclassical claim (loc 100) that wages equal marginal product. The two faces of the ‘invisible order’ are set against each other. — connects to: All capitalist growth rests on a gap between wages and value created — David Harvey, The Condition of Postmodernity: An…, 1137; The profits workers generate form the actual basis of capitalist economic growth. — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 95; Market dependence makes workers hope for capitalist success. — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 368 (+1 more)