Työarvo

Työarvo, literally “value of labor” in Finnish, is a term used in economics to refer to the value of a good or service determined by the socially necessary labor time required for its production. The concept originates from classical political economy and is closely associated with labor-based explanations of value.

In classical and Marxist theory, labor value is central: the value of a commodity is tied to the amount of socially necessary labor embodied in it. This framework distinguishes use value, or the practical usefulness of a good, from exchange value, which is the price it can fetch on the market. The notion of labor value thus underpins questions about how value relates to production processes and social time.

In capitalist analysis, wages are often linked to the value of labor power, and surplus value arises when workers produce more value in a given period than they receive as wages. The concept has been used to discuss distributional tensions between workers, capitalists, and society, and to scrutinize how value is generated and appropriated within economic systems.

Modern neoclassical economics critiques labor value, arguing that prices are determined by marginal utility and scarcity rather than embodied labor. Consequently, Työarvo is mainly encountered in historical, philosophical, or critical discussions rather than as a dominant explanatory framework in contemporary mainstream economics.

In Finnish scholarship, Työarvo appears in studies of the history of economic thought, debates about value theory, and analyses of wage formation and productivity. The term remains a reference point for discussions of how labor relates to value and distribution in economic life.