The newly industrialized city of Manchester, which horrified Friedrich Engels when he worked there in the 1840s, had the highest level of labor productivity the world had ever seen. But the factory workers’ wages were set not by their extraordinary productivity, but by what they would earn if they returned to the potato fields of pre-famine Ireland.
20世纪40年代，当弗雷德里希·恩格斯（ Friedrich Engels）在新兴工业化曼彻斯特工作时，他被前所未见的世界最高水平劳动生产率所震慑。但该工厂工人的工资并不由他们卓越的生产率决定，而由他们若回到闹饥荒之前的爱尔兰的土豆地能赚到多少决定。