Page:Karl Marx - Wage Labor and Capital - tr. J. L. Joynes (1900).pdf/38

 in the amount of wage-labor and in the number of wage-laborers; or, in other words, the dominion of capital is spread over a larger number of individuals, And, to assume even the most favorable case, with the increase of productive capital there is an increase in the demand for labor. And thus wages, the price of labor, will rise.

A house may be large or small, but as long as the surrounding houses are equally small, it satisfies all social requirements of a dwelling place. But let a palace arise by the side of this small house, and it shrinks from a house into a hut, The smallness of the house now indicates that its occupant is permitted to have either very few claims or none at all; and however high it may shoot up with the progress of civilization, if the neighboring palace shoots up also in the same or in greater proportion, the occupant of the comparatively small house will always find himself more uncomfortable, more discontented, confined within his four walls.

A notable advance in the amount paid as wages presupposes a rapid increase of productive capital. The rapid increase of productive capital calls forth just as rapid an increase in wealth, luxury, social wants, and social comforts. Therefore, although the comforts of the laborer have risen, the social satisfaction which they give has fallen in comparison with these augmented comforts of the capitalist, which are unattainable for the laborer, and in comparison with the scale of general development society has reached. Our wants and their satisfaction have their origin in