wage slave

a person who works for a wage, especially with total and immediate dependency on the income derived from such labor.

Origin of wage slave

First recorded in 1885–90

wage slavery, noun

I was as faithful a wage-slave as ever a capitalist exploited.

The House of Pride |Jack London
The wage-slave lives for the evening's liberty, the business man for his wealth, the preacher for his church.

Over Prairie Trails |Frederick Philip Grove
She sat in another chair, very straight in her lavender dress, and joined with the flapper in her survey of the wage-slave.

Bunker Bean |Harry Leon Wilson
Slave and slave-owner, serf and baron, wage-slave and capitalist—so the classes have struggled.

The Common Sense of Socialism |John Spargo

The wage-slave, when he is out of work, must now starve or go into the workhouse and be made miserable, or commit suicide.

British Socialism |J. Ellis Barker

wage slave

ironic a person dependent on a wage or salary