Surplus Quotes

“Take the example of our spinner. We have seen that, to daily reproduce his labouring power, he must daily reproduce a value of three shillings, which he will do by working six hours daily. But this does not disable him from working ten or twelve or more hours a day. But by paying the daily or weekly value of the spinner's labouring power the capitalist has acquired the right of using that labouring power during the whole day or week. He will, therefore, make him work say, daily, twelve hours. Over and above the six hours required to replace his wages, or the value of his labouring power, he will, therefore, have to work six other hours, which I shall call hours of surplus labour, which surplus labour will realize itself in a surplus value and a surplus produce. If our spinner, for example, by his daily labour of six hours, added three shillings' value to the cotton, a value forming an exact equivalent to his wages, he will, in twelce hours, add six shillings' worth to the cotton, and produce a proportional surplus of yarn. As he has sold his labouring power to the capitalist, the whole value of produce created by him belongs to the capitalist, the owner pro tem. of his labouring power. By advancing three shillings, the capitalist will, therefore, realize a value of six shillings, because, advancing a value in which six hours of labour are crystallized. By repeating this same process daily, the capitalist will daily advance three shillings and daily pocket six shillings, one half of which will go to pay wages anew, and the other half of which will form surplus value, for which the capitalist pays no equivalent. It is this sort of exchange between capital and labour upon which capitalistic production, or the wages system, is founded, and which must constantly result in reproducing the working man as a working man, and the capitalist as a capitalist.”

“The danger lies in how your ‘surplus time’ is spent. If the ‘surplus time’ is spent for one’s own Soul, then it is (like) watering your own farm, but when it is used for other things [other than one’s own self], it is wasted water. Therefore, anyone whose ‘surplus time’ is spent on the Self, all his time is considered to have gone towards one’s own Self [The Soul].”

“The surplus of the heart overflows from a smile. (Le surplus du coeur - Déborde d'un sourire)”

“The bread of such a nation (living godly) shall be in constant supply. Talking of abundance, provision, prosperity, surplus etc.”

“I love the Army-Navy surplus store Surplus Value Center. They have really good long underwear and multicolored bandanas, cool camo jackets, and really, really scary-looking knives. If you're into that sort of thing.”

“People above the line of bare subsistence in this age, and in all earlier ages, do not use the surplus which society has given them primarily for useful purposes. They do not seek to expand their lives, to live more wisely, intelligently, understandingly, but to impress other people with the fact that they have a surplus.”

“Institutionalized rejection of difference is an absolute necessity in a profit economy which needs outsiders as surplus people.”

“In a society not characterised by class exploitation, the relationship between the processes of surplus-production and reproduction of labour-power is qualitatively distinct from that characterising societies in which exploitation dominates...surplus-labour is identified by the nature of its contribution to social reproduction, not by the fact that it is provately appropriated.”

“I love you Anna Covey,' he said, his voice barely audible. And slowly, clumsily, he leant forward, and his lips found hers, and Anna felt him kiss her awkwardly, she knew that she wasn't a Surplus any more. And nor was Peter.”