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Marx observed that wage labour never produced property for the labourer at all but instead only capital. Unlike
the artisans of previous generations, the proletariat did not own their tools of trade nor their end product. Where in previous
generations exploitation was hidden by politics and religion it had now exposed itself unabashedly as raw exploitation. The
worker had become a mere appendage to a machine and a form of merchandise in the hands of the bourgeoisie. A minimum wage
gives the worker the absolute minimum to survive only in order for him to work more. The end result is that "the labourer
lives merely to increase capital, and is allowed to live only in so far as the ruling class requires it." The worker's
personal worth has become simply his exchange value. Humanity is no longer sacred and even families are solely based on capital
and, therefore, private gain. Marx notes that only capital, not man, achieves freedom and in "bourgeois society capital
is independent and has individuality while the living person is dependent and has no individuality."
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