cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/506167

When say “self-employed” I mean folks like custom-pc builders, carpenters, vulcanizers, with no additional staff.

Which class do they fall under, capitalist or proletariat? Are there some special cases regarding them?

  • 小莱卡
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    121 year ago

    Mostly proletariat, remember they still have to sell their labour-power. These self-employed workers don’t profit off their relation to property but off their skills and expertise. Now the moment they stop selling their own labour and start employing others to do the work is when they turn petite-bourgeois.

    But remember, in the current world petite-bourgeois are always on the edge to become proletariat.

    • JoeMarx 193OP
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      21 year ago

      Alright, I’ll keep note of it

  • @redtea
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    111 year ago

    Depends on the circumstances and the country. There are more than just two classes, too.

    A self employed carpenter seems to be a special case because they are a blue collar worker, but they tend to get paid well when they can get work and they may own their own tools, at least, to be self employed. Three label itself, ‘self employed’, is anti dialectical. There is no such thing as a one-sided relation. So each self employed person needs to be put back into their social context. It can go at least four ways.

    (1) To be truly ‘self employed’ they may also need a workshop and/or a vehicle. That sounds petite bourgeois and labour aristocratic, even without employees. But in many cases, that building and vehicle might be financed, so they don’t really own it until the loan is paid off. That changes the dynamic a little bit.

    (2) A lot of self employed construction workers will inevitably hire an apprentice or a labourer to stay competitive. Then they’re petit bourgeois/labour aristocrat/managerial, depending on the arrangements with the contractors. Sometimes they will partner up with another ‘self employed’ person(s), and claim that they’re not an employer. But this is for legal and tax purposes, and the other person(s) is/are still dependant on the first one.

    (3) Self employed is just a legal term that doesn’t necessarily affect the underlying relations. If they’re self employed but work for the same handful of companies in rotation, being ‘self employed’ just creates a structure for that relationship, but really they’re employed on fractional contracts. They might even get paid more per hour than those companies’ ‘employed’ workers, but that’s to factor in the lack of holiday, parental, and sick pay, etc, which self employed people aren’t entitled to. In that case, they’re the same class as the other workers. Perhaps proletariat/labour aristocrat, depending on the country.

    (4) Being self employed often means being unemployed. A carpenter might have two months of sub-contacted work as an independent ‘self employed’ contractor. But then they’ll spend two months looking for work. In this case, it’s a mix of lumpen-proletariat/proletariat/petit bourgeois/labour aristocrat/managerial, depending on the type of work, the pay, and the level of ‘choice’ in the periods of no work.

    The same logic likely applies to most instances of ‘self employed’. Essentially it’s a legal construct and does very little to the underlying social relations of production.

    But, self employed blue collar workers are likely to be much more open to anti-capitalism or at least anti-government than employed white collar workers on the same pay. This is also true of some, but not all, blue collar, self employees, and hire workers but still work on the tools. It really depends, though, because some ‘self employed’ ‘small business owners’ are the most reactionary potential millionaires.

  • @Munrock
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    91 year ago

    Asking which class self-employed people belong to is like asking which gender German people are.

    Germans don’t all have the same gender, and self-employed people don’t all have the same class.

    “Self employed” is a label born of capitalist/liberal thought patterns, that’s why it doesn’t make sense from a materialist perspective.

    You got this. Next time the answer isn’t obvious, check the terminology and definitions you’re working with for contradictions.

  • @PolandIsAStateOfMind
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    81 year ago

    Technically petty bourgeoisie. Basically have same interests and similar situation as working class, though you might notice historically that they more often than not side with the rest of bourgeoisie against workers. Iirc Marx described that in “The class struggles in France”

    Also that post is more for GenZhou community than here.

    • JoeMarx 193OP
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      21 year ago

      So that means custom PC builders fall under proletariat?