The monetary value of a unit of labor to producers is thus its DMVP, that is, its effective marginal contribution to the product. The price commanded by labor in the marketplace is known as its wage. In a well-developed free market without uncertainty, the wage tends toward the DMVP. If a producer/employer offers less than the DMVP for a particular kind of labor, then an opportunity is created for other producers to increase their monetary return by offering a higher wage, until the gap is eliminated. On the other hand, a producer will not hire labor for more than the DMVP—at least, if his or her purpose is to produce goods to exchange for money. In a free market, of course, a producer's purposes may extend beyond considerations of monetary return, so that he or she realizes additional psychic utility by offering a wage exceeding the monetary value of the services offered.

Thus market wages (like other prices), are not arbitrarily set, but are determined by a process of natural law, just as are the tides or the orbit of the earth. Individual producers and employees, who see the market from a much narrower perspective, may not be aware of this process. To the extent that producers act to maximize their monetary earnings, however, the prevailing wage will tend toward the Discounted Marginal Value Product. If medical insurance, pensions, or other payroll costs are involved, of course, then the money component of the wage is correspondingly reduced.