Question

What is “labor power?” How is it distinguished from "labor?"

Answer 1

In the Marxian theoretical system, labor is not a commodity, whereas labor power is. Labor is always something that human beings have done to produce the goods and services that depend on life. Labor power is something very unique in historical terms, is mostly missing in long stretches of human history and achieves its greatest presence in capitalism. What a worker sells to an employer is labor strength. The employer "consumes" the purchased labor power by placing its owner-the worker-alongside / with tools , equipment, and raw materials to perform the labor activity (to do labour).

The worker shall be paid a salary in exchange for providing the employer with what he / she possesses, namely his / her labor power for a given period of time. The employer's aim in consuming the labor power he / she has purchased is the commodity which emerges at the end of the production process, a commodity whose value (socially necessary labor time) exceeds the combined value of (1) the tools, equipment and raw materials used up, plus (2) the value of the wage paid for the labor power purchased. That surplus-value is a capitalist employer's driving objective