“M-C-M” refers to the process of capital accumulation in capitalism. It stands for “money-commodity-money.” capitalists start with a certain amount of money, use it to purchase commodities then sell it for higher to have income from it, they stay wealthy by reinvesting their profit , wealthy people stay wealthy as a class because they make investments that they can make profit back from 

1.How I understand the protections of labor is things are produced to labor and capitalist make profit off the labor of others production is the effort put into producing the products

Labor is a source of value of the band of this apply makes a valuable in the cost of production. A product value is measured by how much labor it takes to produce under normal circumstances. The difference between labor and power is labor is the physical effort and power is the capacity.

surplus value is the value on top of the value it took to get you there when you make something it goes to your boss, and they make profit increasing their value

1. the distinction is employees live off income and wage and owners live off investments and royalties. The distinction is income, for example owning class if others work for you compared to business owners who are running their own Business themselves .
2. That workers wages don’t actually represent the amounts of labor they put in that it only represents a portion, workers are closely compared to slaves because of the exploitation
3. my thoughts on reading 4.4 is that it is important to understand class dynamics and to see the inequality and exploitation and what stood out to be is the statement “what you have is what you get “
4. “class structures are built around a close form of dependency”? What i understand from this is that some social classes rely on each other like how workers depend on the owners for the wages and etc because that is how they provide for themselves and this is why lower class is looked down upon because they have to depend on the higher ups

1.Article one talks about social class and which class does Americans put themselves and what makes a difference like ages and what doesn’t like ideology. Lower, working ands middle class brings home 20,000 a year but it fluctuates where some would consider themselves working class or middle, education level is also used as a statistic to show social class. The only similarity I feel between the two articles is explaining New York income inequality, the first article is showing what people consider themselves as whereas the second is showing the trains, the subway lines earnings showing Manhattan to be the highest

2. The closest station to me is the F train which mostly shows lower and working class and somewhat going up to middle this doesn’t not surprise me because it shows the highest. In Manhattan whereas Brooklyn and queens is the lowest and allot of these places and neighborhoods are working class and becoming gentrified

3. The general pattern i see is that the highest median income is Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx is more so lower and working class and queens is a mixture

Repressive state apparatus prevents change and enforces listening to authority due force so this is like the police or court, they responsible for punishing and controlling order, it is called repressive because it’s emphasis on force and violence, emphasizing the punishment turn control whereas ideological state apparatus is the opposite and doesn’t contain force but more persuasive such as media showing ideologies through media or it being taught in school the difference between the two is that repressive state apparatus is use of authority and ideological is not authorize but informative. The example I’ve attached shows an example of ideological through media such as a movie showing gender inequality using entertainment to convey this

Ideology is an individuals perceptions of the world based off beliefs and values, for example political, social and economic. What comes to mind first when i think of this is conservatism, which is the tendency to stick to traditional values and promoting law and order also sticking to gender roles, religion etc. As far as the difference between conservative and liberalism is conservative supports limited government and is into traditional values and social structure, whereas liberalism supports equality, and social justice, supporting a more active role in the government to help address issues . In my opinion this topic Is a bit more complex to understand is but how I understand Althusser definition of ideology is that ideology is what shapes everyone’s understanding of the world and this is expressed through religion etc.