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... enter a class distinction in two ways. First it says that the working class is lazy, incompetent and perhaps resentful. Second, the working class is physically separated by yet another level from their superiors. The classes are literally separated in the workplace.
This, in part, leads to Marx's third argument of capitalism; labor estrangement. I will return to this later in the essay. Returning to class separation, is the actual class structure. Zweig says, the American experience is an experience of intense class difference (Zweig, 9). His beliefs on the class structure in society are very strong and are centered on inequality and separation that the working class faces. Why has the working class disappeared from the public view?
he asks, (Zweig, 39). It seems that the real working people are hidden or disguised. This is a bit extreme, but Marx's original argument is that class inequality exists due to economics. Zweig says that not only does class inequality exist, but our society hides and denies it all together.
We tend to think that we do not live in a class society. We see the poor as a separate group all together, when in fact they are a part of the working class majority. We have the notion of upward mobility, that if we work hard we can move up. Zweig argues that this gives people a false sense of hope. First of all there always needs to be people on the bottom in capitalism. Consequently, for any person fortunate enough to move up, others must move down, and furthermore, no one can move anywhere without education, talent, a lot of effort, and, most importantly, luck.
The upper class is born, luckily for them, into positions that offer better opportunities. This is class inequality. Income and power shape class according to Zweig, and we relate both of these to the upper class. A result of this that truly exemplifies the difference in the classes is wealth distribution. Wealth is distributed even more unequally than income (Zweig, 69). Where income is salary, and wealth, money invested in various assets and savings, the poor do not get a chance to save because of their low income, whereas the rich are getting richer.
In the class struggle that takes place everyday, members of the owning class try to get as much profit as they can by controlling the labor process (Kaufman, 59). Kaufman makes a similar point to both Bowles and Gordon here. She makes the point that people aim to improve their situation in life. What Bowles and Gordon do not examine that Kaufman and Zweig both find, is that the working class itself is divided today. In Kaufman's experience she sees that workers do not necessarily get along. They are often divided because of racial and gender issues.
This divide gives the capitalists more power than if the workers were united. This is just as Marx noted 150 years ago. Zweig also points out how workers segregate themselves in a way that Marx may not have been able to foresee. As we tend to push the poor farther outside of society, we subsequently blame society's problems on them. At the same time, we look to the rich as role-models, because through the media and consumerism, we, too, desire to be rich.
To blame problems on them would be hypocritical. So, we vent on the poor and low level workers. This is self-segregation and in effect it alienates the workplace. This departs strongly from Marx's goal of seeing workers unite. It is the individual mentality of trying to get ahead that, along with class separation and private property, brings us back to Marx's third point. Labor estrangement.
To Marx, man would become alienated to himself through his labor in a capitalist society. Looking at Bowles explanation of labor being extracted by employers, we see that labor does in fact become com modified. Marx saw this as a result of capitalism creating meaningless work and low wages. Capitalism de-skills labor through creative destruction and technological advances that eliminate skillful work. This occurs through the motivation of the capitalist to cut costs and maximize profit. Following Zweig's structure of classes in the workplace and the systems of control that are exerted, the worker is alienated in his setting.
There is little hope for advancement and a sense of inferiority. Man is estranged. Labor is forced and turned un-enjoyable, and workers experience this as a detachment from production. People begin to take on their job as an identity because so much time is spent at it. Work itself then becomes alienating. Alienation creates individualism as Zweig refers to it.
We become individuals at work and production looses all sense of community. When man confronts himself, he also confronts other men. What is true of man's relationship to his labor, to the product of his labor, and to himself, is also true of his relationship to other men, and to the labor and the object of the labor of other men (Marx, Lecture 6, slide 26). Work begins to separate us from those we work with. Marx is argument is further extended in Ehrenreichs story, as co-workers, in some instances, are not even allowed to talk to each other. Workers shouldnt be distanced from their labor, but they are when they are forced to work alone.
It is inevitable that we will care less about our work because any labor that is done and anything that is produced belongs to the capitalist. Bowles explains that it is human nature to be interested in what we are doing, and when we arent we feel estranged. This is central to Marx's argument. Working without interest kills the human spirit. Another extension to what Marx is saying that Bowles poses, is that work is made ambiguous through voluntary contracts. Workers and employers come to an agreement about a specific job, its responsibilities and wages.
What is ambiguous, however, is the amount of control an employer has and the amount of effort an employee must put into the job. And these are what truly define our work experience. In effect, what the contract does is give the employer the power to fire. Laborers work to keep from getting fired rather than to produce. These are the fear tactics mentioned above. This estranges people from work in the fact that we no longer work to produce.
We work to please someone just enough to keep a job, but not much harder because it is unlikely that extra work will be rewarded. People are naturally motivated to work though. Throughout human existence, working has not been viewed as something people dislike. We are naturally motivated to perform work by numerous reasons. We are complex beings and we feel socially responsible for each other on very basic levels. Through Marx's fundamentals, private property leading to ownership and hence a class separation that creates class inequality and estrangement of man from his labor and himself, the majority of us lose most, if not all motivation in the workplace.
We are hired to be productive, but the structure of work discourages independent thought, meaningful work, enjoyment, a sense of fulfillment and that which makes us want to work in the first place. Work becomes negative and production; a paradox.
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