Working class

The working class is a social class of people who earn their livelihoods mainly through manual, industrial, service, or other wage labor. Its members generally depend on wages rather than ownership of productive assets for income.

Social class: A social grouping shaped by shared economic position, status, or power. The working class is one class formation within broader systems of social stratification.
Industrial Revolution: A period of major economic and technological change driven by mechanized production. Factory growth expanded wage labor and helped form the modern industrial working class.
Robert Owen: A Welsh industrialist and social reformer who advocated cooperative communities and improved worker conditions. Owen became an early influential advocate for reforming industrial labor and worker welfare.
Trade union: An organization formed by workers to represent their shared interests in employment. Unions give workers a means to bargain collectively over pay and conditions.
Middle class: A broad social class commonly associated with intermediate economic security, education, or occupational status. Its boundary with the working class shifts across societies and classification systems.
Wage labor: Work performed in exchange for payment from an employer. Dependence on wages is a defining feature of the class described here.
Enclosure: The consolidation of common land into privately controlled holdings, especially in Britain. Loss of access to land pushed many people toward wage-dependent work.
E. P. Thompson: A British historian known for studying the formation and experience of the English working class. His history treated class as a relationship formed through shared experiences and struggle.
Collective bargaining: Negotiation between employers and worker representatives over employment terms. It converts workers' shared dependence on wages into negotiated workplace standards.
Bourgeoisie: A class whose economic position rests chiefly on ownership of productive capital. In Marxist analysis, the bourgeoisie stands opposite workers who sell their labor.

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