Wa"ges (?), n. plural in termination, but
singular in signification. [Plural of wage; cf. F.
gages, pl., wages, hire. See Wage, n.]
A compensation given to a hired person for services; price paid for
labor; recompense; hire. See Wage, n.,
2.
The wages of sin is death.
Rom. vi.
23.
Wages fund (Polit. Econ.), the aggregate
capital existing at any time in any country, which theoretically is
unconditionally destined to be paid out in wages. It was formerly held, by
Mill and other political economists, that the average rate of wages in any
country at any time depended upon the relation of the wages fund to the
number of laborers. This theory has been greatly modified by the discovery
of other conditions affecting wages, which it does not take into
account. Encyc. Brit.
Syn. -- See under Wage, n.
Wa"ges (?), n. pl. (Theoretical
Economics) The share of the annual product or national
dividend which goes as a reward to labor, as distinct from the
remuneration received by capital in its various forms. This economic
or technical sense of the word wages is broader than the
current sense, and includes not only amounts actually paid to
laborers, but the remuneration obtained by those who sell the products
of their own work, and the wages of superintendence or
management, which are earned by skill in directing the work of
others.