When does a worker become a worker? when does he cease being a worker?

[Blanquist]

the migrant workers in china, there are millions of them, they come from the country-side and get working class jobs. when do they become workers and not just peasants in a factory? When do they become proletarian?


after how many months of unemployment from a factory does a worker cease being a worker?

Trying to understand classes. Thanks.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

when do they become workers and not just peasants in a factory? When do they become proletarian?
If they survive by selling their labor power to the ruling class, then they're a worker.


after how many months of unemployment from a factory does a worker cease being a worker?
An unemployed worker is still a worker.

[A Revolutionary Tool]

"Peasants" in a factory are part of the proletariat by definition. A proletarian is a person whose means of survival is based on her/his relations to the means of production. If you have none and therefore need to sell the only commodity you have, labor-power, to somebody else to gain some form of subsistence you are part of the proletariat.

In this sense you don't have to work in a factory to be part of the proletariat, you can still be involved in agriculture and be part of the proletariat. Migrant farmers for instance aren't really peasants, they're proletarian because the migrant farmer has no connection to the land and instead has to sell their labor-power which the owner of the farm directs to do whatever needs to be done on the farm.

Now when do they gain consciousness of their proletarianization? That is a completely different story which I really don't know about.