Karl Marx said the process of value creation is thus: a carpenter goes into a woodshop and bangs on wood for eight hours a day. The raw materials (wood, nails) plus partially used and worn down materials (saw blade etc.) are transformed into tables, which are worth more than the materials used. $2000 worth of material becomes worth $2160 in eight hours. In eight hours $160 of value is created.

The carpenter keeps all the wealth he creates for the first six hours of work - all $160 worth. The last two hours he keeps none of the wealth he creates - it goes to the woodshop owner who rents the woodshop, owns the mechanical saws etc.

This is how business works. It is obvious. Of course there are caveats, which Marx spends thousands of pages covering - only a fool would reply to this saying my summation of thousands of pages in a short HN comment missed one of those caveats.

It is also obvious how in a system like this, the owners are making money while the workers are stagnant or doing worse. And the method owners have of doing this is obvious - either have the worker work more hours for free per day, or try to somehow increase the amount of wealth that is created every hour. Obviously both methods are used.