{"id":12731,"date":"2026-03-01T23:59:00","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T04:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/?p=12731"},"modified":"2026-02-28T00:47:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T05:47:07","slug":"jessica-irie-discussion-board-5-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/2026\/03\/01\/jessica-irie-discussion-board-5-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Jessica Irie- Discussion Board 5.1"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
    \n
  1. The term “means of production” relates to all of the physical equipment, resources, and technologies required to manufacture items, which include factories, machines, land, and raw materials. It includes everything necessary to manufacture goods in the economy. For example, at a car factory, the means of production would be the assembly line machines, the factory structure, and the steel needed to manufacture vehicles. The term “labor” refers to the human work and effort required to create something. It refers to the actual amount of energy, talent, and time that people spend producing goods and services. Assembly line workers put together parts to form a finished car, which is an excellent example of labor.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. The video defines value as the worth of a product based on the effort required to produce it. Something gains value when others put in the time and effort to create it. Value doesn’t come only from goods or money, but also from the human labor required to convert materials into something valuable. In general, the more labor is required to make something, the higher its value.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Labor and value have an unbreakable connection because labor generates value. Workers put in their time and effort to create items, and this work is what gives them economic value. Without labor, raw materials and equipment do not generate products that people can use or sell. So the relationship is that value comes from labor. The work that humans put into creating something is what makes it valuable.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. Labor power means a worker’s ability or capacity to work, as well as the skills, strength, and time that they can offer an employer. Labor pertains to the actual work done when that ability is applied in manufacturing. So, labor power is the potential or resource that a worker brings (their ability to work), and labor is what occurs when that capacity is used to produce goods. For example, a chef possesses labor power (the ability to cook creatively), but when they create meals in a restaurant, that’s their work in action.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  5. Surplus value is the value that workers produce in addition to their salary. In other words, it is the difference between what an employee produces and what their company pays them. This additional value creates profit for the owner. It is critical for understanding social class since surplus value is where capitalist profit originates from, not the owner’s labor, but the labor of workers. This is an essential component of how inequality between classes functions. The owning class profits because workers create more value than they are compensated for. For example, if a worker is paid $100 for a day’s work but produces $300 in goods, the extra $200 is considered surplus value and is profit for the owner. This explains why workers may never fully profit from the value of what they do, as well as why there is a class divide between workers and owners.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":11396,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"portfolio_post_id":0,"portfolio_citation":"","portfolio_annotation":"","openlab_post_visibility":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12731","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-discussion-board-5-1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12731","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11396"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12731"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12731\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12732,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12731\/revisions\/12732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.bmcc.cuny.edu\/pol-100-0505-spring-2026-introduction-to-american-government\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}