1. Understanding the difference between owners (capitalists) and employees (workers) is key to understanding the Marxist definition of class.

Owners are those who possess wealth, or capital. They either own the means of production (i.e. a factory, a restaurant chain) or have enough equity in private property (i.e. owning an apartment building) to live off of the profits. Profit is passive income; income that someone does not have to work for. They make money primarily off the labor of others.

Employees are those who are employed by the capitalists. Their survival depends on selling labor for wages or salary. They do not possess wealth, and therefore if they decided to stop working they would not be able to sustain themselves, even if they have a high salary. Their source of money is their own labor. Examples include construction workers, baristas, and factory workers.

Owners live off of their investments, employees do not.

2. Adam Smith’s quote on page 28 proposes that the real determinant of a commodity’s value is always the labor that went in to producing it. This places an enormous amount of importance on the laborer. However, under capitalism, workers are paid substantially less than the value created by them. This quote is especially ironic considering Adam Smith was a founding father of capitalism.

3. Personally, I agree with the assertion that class is not an identity. While I was a bit confused about the logic of the writer at first, once I re-read and thought about it a little bit more it made sense to me. In the case of gender, racial, or sexual identities, nothing can be withdrawn to challenge the oppressor. A trans person not transitioning does nothing to fight transphobia. However, a worker withholding labor, as well as banding together with other workers to demand fair treatment, does fight class oppression. This is why class should not be viewed as an identity.

4. Reading 4.4 states that class structures “rest on a close form of interdependency.” In a capitalist society, both the workers and the capitalists are wholly necessary and vital to the success of the other. Because capitalists are the producers of goods, as well as the ones who are employing, workers need them to survive. Capitalists need workers because, without them, capitalists would not make money. Capitalists rely on the exploitation of workers to survive. They organize the production of goods, but workers are the ones who actually produce the goods themselves, and give capitalists a way to make profit. This is why strikes and labor unions can be so effective. An example of workers using this interdependency to their advantage is the mass “teacher sickouts” of 2019 in Louisville, KY. To demand better treatment, teachers coordinated to use their sick days at the same time, which shut down several school districts including the two largest in the state.