Page "Labor theory of value" Paragraph 65

" Socially necessary " labor refers to the quantity required to produce a commodity " in a given state of society, under certain social average conditions or production, with a given social average intensity, and average skill of the labour employed.

" That is, the value of a product is determined more by societal standards than by individual conditions.

This explains why technological breakthroughs lower the price of commodities and put less advanced producers out of business.

Finally, it is not labor per se, which creates value, but labor power sold by free wage workers to capitalists.

Another distinction to be made is that between productive and unproductive labor.

Only wage workers of productive sectors of the economy produce value.