Page:Shop Talks on Economics.djvu/8

 want. Low prices for labor-power is what your employer wants.

Are your interests identical?

What happens when there are ten men competing to sell their labor-power? Who gets the job?

What happens when there are several jobs and only one worker? Will he receive higher or lower wages? Will he get a good price for his labor-power?

When workingmen are scarce and manufacturers are forced to pay a high price for labor-power (high wages) in a certain locality, does the scarcity of workers last long? If not, why not?

When men are hunting jobs toward which cities do they go? Why?

Does supply and demand have anything to do with the price at which you are able to sell your labor-power?

Why is the steel trust putting up a fifty million dollar plant in China? Will they be able to make more profits manufacturing steel there than in America? Why?

Why do Chinese workmen come to America to sell their labor-power?

Karl Marx talks much of commodities—their value and their price, and in order to understand his teachings, we must know first of all that we are sellers of a commodity called labor-power.

In the next lesson we shall take up the question of what determines the value of your labor-power and