The bourgeoisie have a stake in exalting the power of labor.  They own the property on which labor is exerted.  It turns out that the laborer becomes a slave of the owners of natural property.

The ideal case is one in which some amount, X, of labor in one form is exchanged for an equal amount of labor, Y, in another form.  But does it really work this way?  Some people are superior to others physically or mentally, or both, and they can work longer or harder.  So, "it is, therefore, a right of inequality, in its content, like every right.  Right, by its very nature, can consist only in the application of an equal standard; but unequal individuals (and they would not be different individuals if they were not unequal) are measurableonly by an equal standard in so far as they are brought under an equal point of view, are taken from one definite side only, for instance, in the present case, are regarded only as workers and nothing more is seen in them, everything else being ignored."

Marx comments that in a higher phase of communist society, when labor has become not just a means of subsistence but also and most importantly a prime want or desire of all people, then we will be able to realize "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!"
 

Comments from the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844

The Wages of Labor:
    Capitalists can live longer without workers than workers can live without capitalists.  The worker depends on the capitalist for his livelihood, and of course so does the capitalist depend on the worker.  But the worker is paid less than the value of that which he produces, and so the capitalist lives on capital (stored labor).

    Capitalists pay the lowest possible wage simply so that laborers don't die out.  The capitalists need workers, and of course the workers are people; so the workers themselves become commodities.  There is nothing of the capitalists' benefit or loss that does not affect the worker because the worker loses when the capitalist loses, but he does not gain simply because the capitalist gains.  If his wages increase, the work increases and shortens the life of the worker.  Of course, this is beneficial for the capitalist because now more workers are needed.
    What happens is that now the increase in the number of workers causes competition and lowers the price of their labor.  The worker becomes a machine.  THE WORKER MUST SELL HIMSELF AND HIS HUMAN IDENTITY.

 
Estranged Labor

    The worker becomes a cheaper "commodity" the more commodities he creates.  "The increasing value of the world of things proceeds in direct proportion to the devaluation of the world of men."

    What the worker produces becomes ALIEN to the worker.  =OBJECTIFICATION OF LABOR.  This is the same result for the human being as occurs with religion:  "The more man puts into God, the less he retains in himself."
    Labor is external to the worker.  It is not part of his humanity anymore.  It is forced labor.  Labor is no longer the satisfiaction of a need; it is a means to satisfy needs external to labor itself.  "Labor is now shunned like the plague."  The laborer sells his labor, so the labor belongs to someone else; and since the human being is not separate from his labor, HE, TOO, BELONGS TO SOMEONE ELSE.  This means that the person, the worker, loses his humanity.  HE IS NOW ALIENATED FROM HIMSELF.
    Alienated labor turns man's species being into a being alien to him.  (SPECIES BEING - a free, universal, valuable being)  Workers confront each other as competitors.

Three aspects of alienation:  Of the product; of the labor; of man from man.

Private Property and Labor:
    Communism is the negation of the negation:  Communism is the negation of private property, which negates the human being.

    "The free, perfect, final articulation of humanity is when production is the release and cultivation of human energy, not because production is a means of subsistence."