ABSTRACT
This paper presents a reductio ad absurdum of an imagined complete capitalist market where morals and ethics are disregarded. It begins with two premises: (i) everything is allowed to be transacted under a complete capitalist market, including the claim of one’s time, and (ii) every human being is subject to their own time because every action requires and consumes parts of a finite lifespan. From the two premises above, the paper argues that the selling of one’s remainder of the lifespan would effectively transfer the control over the seller’s future actions, bodily autonomy, and practical volition to another party, which would lead to a condition described as a Corpse Puppet. A state in which a biologically living person loses all autonomous control over their own body, and is considered functionally dead. After establishing the absurd conclusion, the paper continued to price the time through minimum wage, current earnings, potential lifetime earnings, and buyer surplus. The conclusion implied that the Corpse Puppet condition is unacceptable, so the universal tradability premise should be morally limited or restricted. As a result, human time, bodily autonomy, and practical volition must remain protected from complete commodification to prevent the worst-case scenario of a complete capitalist market.
Yang, Antonio Tony, Time Commodification: How Capitalism Justifies Enslavement and Organ Harvesting (July 30, 2026).
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