Suppose that the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the entire adult population of Mankiwland can be categorized as follows: 25 million people employed, 3 million people unemployed, 1 million discouraged workers, and 1 million people who are either students, homemakers, retirees, or other people not seeking employment.

In Marxist theory, the work force (or work capacity) is the set of physical and mental abilities, inherent in every human being, capable of being used for the production of a use value.1 It differs from work , which is the implementation of the workforce.

According to Marx's labor-value theory, the value of the labor force, like that of any other commodity, is determined by the socially necessary labor time to produce it. In this case, because it is a special commodity, its value is determined by the time of work socially necessary to produce the means of existence and reproduction of the worker, that is his and his descendants. This is the value of the mass of goods that constitute the average consumption basket of the working class. The value of the workforce includes a social, historical and cultural character. In a given time and society, we can consider that the value of the workforce is known. For Marx, the labor force can transcend according to what one can accumulate, since wealth is the origin of the bourgeois class and this in turn feeds the working class.