"wages" as payment *by* worker

[Doug Harris]

Seems a likely source for the 'wages of sin' term.
dh


>At 11/19/2008 01:19 AM, Joel S. Berson wrote:
>>I have seen 18th-century uses of "wages" to mean payment *by* a
>>worker  -- if a slave was hired out and earned money for labor, he
>>would have to pay his owner an agreed amount that his time was worth
>>to his owner (and generally the slave was able to keep any excess
>>for himself).
>>
>>This seems a reversal of the common sense of  "wages" being paid *to*
>>a worker, and I don't see it in the OED.  Am I missing something, or
>>is it absent?
>>
>>Joel

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