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/wˈeɪdʒəz/ /wˈeɪdʒɪz/ Listen

noun

Wages n.

1.

(plural in termination, but singular in signification) A compensation given to a hired person for services; price paid for labor; recompense; hire. See Wage, n., 2. "The wages of sin is death."

2.

(Economics) The share of the annual product or national dividend which goes as a reward to labor, as distinct from the remuneration received by capital in its various forms. This economic or technical sense of the word wages is broader than the current sense, and includes not only amounts actually paid to laborers, but the remuneration obtained by those who sell the products of their own work, and the wages of superintendence or management, which are earned by skill in directing the work of others.

Wages fund (Polit. Econ.), the aggregate capital existing at any time in any country, which theoretically is unconditionally destined to be paid out in wages. It was formerly held, by Mill and other political economists, that the average rate of wages in any country at any time depended upon the relation of the wages fund to the number of laborers. This theory has been greatly modified by the discovery of other conditions affecting wages, which it does not take into account.

Synonyms: See under Wage, n.

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Etymology of 'Wages'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Wages" Quotes from Famous Books

... democracy in government, his sympathies were with the toiling masses. His work entitled Past and Present (1843) suggests the organization of labor and introduces such modern expressions as "a fair day's wages for a fair day's work." In Sartor Resartus, he specially honors "the toilworn Craftsman, that with earthmade implement laboriously conquers the Earth and ...

— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck

... requires the master to give his slaves a certain amount of food and clothing. If it can oblige the master to give the slave one thing, it can oblige him to give him another: if food and clothing, then wages, liberty, ...

— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... consequently from maintaining a still greater quantity of productive labour, and affording a still greater revenue to the industrious inhabitants of that country. One great original source of revenue, therefore, the wages of labour, the monopoly must necessarily have rendered, at all times, less abundant than it ...

— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith

... too late for the grapes and the oranges had not yet come in. The lower grounds are divided into small enclosures by stone walls, and subdivided by rows of a tall stout reed (Arundo donax) resembling sugarcane. Although taxes and other burdens are heavy, and wages very low, yet to a mere visitor like myself there appeared none of those occasional signs of destitution which strike one in walking through a town at home, nor did ...

— Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John MacGillivray

... elbows shine And if my overcoat reveals The poverty that's mine, 'Tis not because I squander gold In folly's reckless way; The cost of foodstuffs, be it told, Takes all my weekly pay. 'Tis putting food on empty plates That eats my wages up; And now another mouth awaits, ...

— Just Folks • Edgar A. Guest

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