A fair day's wage for a fair day's work

A fair day's wage for a fair day's work is an objective of the labor movement, trade unions and other workers' groups, to increase pay, and adopt reasonable hours of work.

In 1881 Frederick Engels criticised the slogan in the first issue of The Labour Standard.

He argued that workers exchange their full labour power for a day in return for the subsistence necessary to maintain them for a day: "The workman gives as much, the Capitalist gives as little, as the nature of the bargain will admit."

He ends up calling for the old motto to be buried for ever and replaced by another motto: "Possession of the Means of Work, Raw Material, Factories, Machinery, By the Working People Themselves.

"[1] That critique was taken up by Karl Marx, who in Value, Price and Profit said: This article related to one or more trade or labor unions is a stub.