On the Nuclear Family: Pro; Con

Abstract

As an old Marxist and an old psychoanalyst, I have read with interest Margaret Benston's article, "The Political Economy of Women's Liberation," in the September 1969 issue of Monthly Review. She rightly approaches the problem by first making the distinction between socialized and private labor, i.e., work for the market giving exchange-value and work for direct consumption having only use-value. The product of the work a woman does in her home has use-value, not exchange value. The author then says: "The material basis for the inferior status of women is to be found in just this definition of women.

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