Wage Slave Quotes

“Well, I think that what used to be called, centuries ago, "wage slavery" is intolerable. And I don't think people ought to be forced to rent themselves in order to survive. I think that the economic institutions ought to be run democratically, by their participants, by the communities in which they exist, and so on; and I think basically through various kinds of free association.”
― Noam Chomsky

“Slavery may change its form or its name—its essence remains the same. Its essence may be expressed in these words: to be a slave is to he forced to work for someone else, just as to he a master is to live on someone else's work In antiquity, just as in Asia and in Africa today, as well as even in a part of America, slaves were, in all honesty, called slaves. In the Middle Ages, they took the name of serfs: nowadays they are called wage earners. The position of tins latter group has a great deal more dignity attached to it, and it is less hard than that of slaves, but they are nonetheless forced, by hunger as well as by political and social institutions, to maintain other people in complete or relative idleness, through their own exceedingly hard labor. Consequently they arc slaves. And in general, no state, ancient or modern, has ever managed or will ever manage to get along without the forced labor of the masses, either wage earners or slaves, as a principal and absolutely necessary foundation for the leisure, the liberty, and the civilization of the political class—the citizens.”
― Mikhail Bakunin

“There are a lot of things we all know that don't want to face. I hope you already know that. It will save you a lot of grief if you are aware and expect to discover it about yourself.”
― Richard D. Wolff

“The USA is the modern version of slavery.”
― Steven Magee

“I am glad my days of being used and abused by toxic corporations are over!”
― Steven Magee

“Wage workers are unconsciously trading their limited lifetime for abundant pieces of paper that are designed to steal their lifetime”
― Daniella Liberati

“Work as a metaphysical act, the very “act of being” must be distinguished from labor; work as a remunerative economic invention must be distinguished from subsistence.”
― J. Phillip Johnson, The Invention of Work