For Marx, labor is part of what makes humans human: “Man not only effects a change of form in the materials of nature; he also realizes […] his own purpose in those materials” (284). Marx breaks down the labor process into three elements: the actual work; the “object” (287), or end goal of the labor; and the tools used for the work (284). The process of labor results in the labor becoming “objectified” in the final product (287).

With industrialization, labor requires the consumption of a wide variety of commodities and finished products to make other products. Many of these commodities, such as metals or plants, are still provided by nature. However, while workers are the ones to actually make the product out of raw materials and other products, under a capitalist, a “worker works under the control of the capitalist to whom his labour belongs” (291). The products the worker makes therefore belong to the capitalist, not the worker.

Capitalists have two goals when it comes to production: the production of commodities that have use values that can also serve as exchange values and to have those commodities worth more than all the commodities used to make them, giving them “surplus-value” (293).