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Present-day society is wholly based on the exploitation of the vast masses of the working class by a tiny minority of the population, the class of the landowners and that of the capitalists. It is a slave society, since the 'free' workers, who all their life work for the capitalists, are 'entitled' only to such means of subsistence as are essential for the maintenance of slaves who produce profit, for the safeguarding and perpetuation of capitalist slavery.

Vladimir Lenin#48

EconomicsClassExploitationSociety

About this quote

What does it mean?
Modern society is a slave system where a tiny elite exploits the masses, who are only allowed enough to survive while producing profit for the owners.
In plain terms
Society is a slave system where a few exploit the many.
What can you take from it?
Economic exploitation underlies contemporary social structures.

Where it applies

  • economic policy
  • labor rights
  • social critique

Putting it to work

  • advocate wealth redistribution
  • strengthen workers’ bargaining power

Questions to consider

  • What measures reduce exploitation without revolution?
  • How does consumer choice affect this dynamic?

Another view

Some argue that modern welfare states mitigate outright slavery.

More from Vladimir Lenin

  1. The bourgeois court, which claimed to maintain order, but which, as a matter of fact, was a blind, subtle instrument for the ruthless suppression of the exploi…

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  2. Discrimination among citizens on account of their religious convictions is wholly intolerable. Even the bare mention of a citizen's religion in official docume…

    Permalink to quote #49
  3. Only by abolishing private property in land and building cheap and hygienic dwellings can the housing problem be solved.

    Permalink to quote #46

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