This right here! Okay so to consent to something you need to be reasonably informed. There is no such thing as perfect knowledge so the standard is what a reasonable person (the legal definition, not the colloquial one). I’ll bet you that very few people are actually reasonably informed when we take and work out jobs. How much value does your individual labour add to the economy? Not what you’re paid, how much money does your work make total? Do any of us know, or even have an idea? We negotiate away our labour without knowing what that labour is actually worth. Worse than that, the person who does know will never tell you because they also pay you and it’s not in their interests to tell you how much your worth.
Workers do not fully consent to wage labour because we literally can’t. We’re giving concent without being informed, any other aspect of civil society that would be a crime. For employment it’s just the way it goes.
This is one part of it. I also think it’s important to think about how all labor under capitalism is coerced under the implicit threat of starvation and homelessness. Decisions made under duress cannot count as full consent.
This right here! Okay so to consent to something you need to be reasonably informed. There is no such thing as perfect knowledge so the standard is what a reasonable person (the legal definition, not the colloquial one). I’ll bet you that very few people are actually reasonably informed when we take and work out jobs. How much value does your individual labour add to the economy? Not what you’re paid, how much money does your work make total? Do any of us know, or even have an idea? We negotiate away our labour without knowing what that labour is actually worth. Worse than that, the person who does know will never tell you because they also pay you and it’s not in their interests to tell you how much your worth.
Workers do not fully consent to wage labour because we literally can’t. We’re giving concent without being informed, any other aspect of civil society that would be a crime. For employment it’s just the way it goes.
This is one part of it. I also think it’s important to think about how all labor under capitalism is coerced under the implicit threat of starvation and homelessness. Decisions made under duress cannot count as full consent.
ALL labour? I don’t think someone getting their job as CEO in a 4th company is choosing that job to avoid starvation.