Pay for the Printer is a science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 short story by Philip K. Dick

Philip K. Dick

Philip Kindred Dick was an American novelist, short story writer and essayist whose published work is almost entirely in the science fiction genre. Dick explored sociological, political and metaphysical themes in novels dominated by monopolistic corporations, authoritarian governments and altered...

. First published in Satellite Science Fiction

Satellite Science Fiction

Satellite Science Fiction was a science fiction digest-sized magazine that was published in the United States in the late 1950s.The first edition of Satellite Science Fiction was published in October 1956. It published a total of 18 editions and ceased publication after the May 1959 edition.The...

, October 1956.

Plot

In a war-ravaged future, humanity has come to depend on an alien species known as the Biltongs, possessed of the ability to replicate items identically - although the copies only last for a short time. When the Biltongs become decrepit, the humans are forced to rediscover the skill of building.

Interpretation

Bradley Robert Arthur Congdon makes the case that Pay for the Printer is a critique "of the culture of consumerism and mass production." Congdon connects Dick's story to a left wing analysis of the failings of capitalism, writing that, "it is not much of a stretch to see that a Marxian idea of alienation is at work, where mankind is so alienated from its labour that the possibility of survival is hamstrung."