reduced to selling their labor-power in order to live

Related phrases: lumpen proletariat lumpen-proletariat
Definitions of PROLETARIAT on the Web:
for a Marxist, the working class of society in conflict and competition with the bourgeoisie. This class must sell their labor to the bourgeoisie in order to produce the goods needed by society.www2.cumberlandcollege.edu/acad/english/litcritweb/glossary.htm
Wage workers. From the Communist Manifesto: "By proletariat [is meant] the class of modern wage laborers, who, having no means of production of their own, are reduced to selling their labor-power in order to live."www.workers.org/marcy/perestroika/glossary.html
The working class, especially those who lack capital and must sell their unskilled labour in order to survive.www.uwic.ac.uk/shss/dom/newweb/General/Glossary.htm
the industrial "propertyless" working class; in Marxism, the exploited class that is destined to subjugate and destroy the bourgeoisie.www.summit.org/resource/dictionary/
Historically, they were the lowest class of Roman Empire. Name means one who serves the State not with property but with offspring. Some academics still hold this view (see Contribution).www.embassy.org.nz/encycl/p9encyc.htm
Term given to the working class people in society.regentsprep.org/Regents/global/vocab/topic_alpha.cfm
Class of working people without access to producing property; typically manufacturing workers, paid laborers in agricultural economy, or urban poor; in Europe, product of economic changes of 16th and 17th centuries. (p. 528)occawlonline.pearsoned.com/bookbind/pubbooks/stearns_awl/medialib/glossary/gloss_P.html
French term describing the workers. In today's terms, they would be the working class.instruction.blackhawk.tec.wi.us/ghoffarth/economicsglossary.htm
The working class, as it is referred to in Karl Marx’ Communist Manifesto. Marx predicts the eventual overtake of the Government by the Proletariat.www.historyteacher.net/EuroProjects/DBQ1998-1999/Glossary22-99.htm
A Marxist term referring to those who sell their labour to the bourgeoisie; the working class.www.comune.venezia.it/atlante/documents/glossary/nelson_glossary.htm
labor: a social class comprising those who do manual labor or work for wages; "there is a shortage of skilled labor in this field" wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
The proletariat (from Latin proles, offspring) is a term used to identify a lower social class; a member of such a class is called a proletarian. Originally it was identified as those people who have no other wealth than their sons; the term was initially used in a derogatory sense, until Karl Marx used it as a positive term to identify what he termed the working class. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proletariat