LABOR AND ITS STRUCTURE: TERMINOLOGICAL EVOLUTION

The subject of the study is the ratio of productive and unproductive labor, affecting labor content as a social phenomenon. The relevance of the paper is due to changes in labor with the introduction of information and communication technologies, artificial intelligence, and the rapid digitalization of social and labor relations, both in public life in general and in the labor process. The purpose of the study is to analyze the content embedded in the classical interpretation of productive and unproductive labor, the productivity of such a division, and the elaboration of an approach to understanding the essence of labor, taking into account the development of information and communication technologies, artificial intelligence, digitalization and robotization of public life. The scientific novelty lies in the approach to defining the term "labor" while recognizing the inexpediency of dividing labor into productive and unproductive in its classical interpretation. The main analytical and historical research methods are used, with conscious extensive quoting of the positions of the classics of political economy and Russian thinkers of the second half of the XIX – early XX centuries. This is due to the desire to pay attention to their authentic approaches to the interpretation of the term “labor”, freed from modern “liberal” layers. At the same time, the content of the terms “productive labor” and “unproductive labor” in their classical interpretation is being revised. Also, a point of view is expressed about the inexpediency of the classical division of labor into productive and unproductive, recognizing that there is necessary and useful labor that ensures the growth of public and personal well-being, sustainable socio-economic development of the economy, and the socio-cultural sphere of the state. The research results: based on the conducted analysis, the following definition of the concept of labor is proposed – “a conscious and purposeful type of activity through which various goods are created and used that satisfy the needs of both specific people and the social community as a whole, ensuring both the development of the social community and the self-development and self-realization of the working individual, with a certain reward for the results, and determined by specific historical and social relations between the natural world, members of the social community, the level of its cultural and moral, scientific and technical, technological and information and communication development, the level of development of human capital, as well as traditional values”.