How did Marx think economic crises would affect industrial workers?

In the context of Marxism, Karl Marx argued that capitalism is an inherently volatile system prone to regular, worsening economic crises, such as recessions and depressions. He believed these crises would have severe consequences for industrial workers, leading to increased unemployment, lower wages, and growing pauperization or misery.12

Marx posited that these conditions would force workers to recognize that their interests as a class were fundamentally opposed to those of the ruling bourgeoisie. This realization, combined with the instability of the capitalist system, would foster revolutionary class consciousness among the proletariat. Ultimately, Marx believed these crises served as preludes to a general collapse of the capitalist system, which would be replaced by a communist society through the actions of the organized working class.213