Your first point is a very old and well-analyzed one amongst Marxists, in the sense of time-as-labor, “time” being the usual approximate metric for the measure of labor. Indeed, depending on how one interprets your question, it may be that you independently stumbled upon one of the key points of Marxian analysis and the concept of surplus-value.
Perhaps with that qualification some Googling may serve as a productive use of your time.
Ach, I had not realized that required classes in college might feel as useless as required classes in high school. But perhaps college classes will be more rigorous and less likely to induce I-Could-Learn-This-On-Wikpedia Syndrome. I can but hope.
Oh god, this is still an issue for people in college? And here I was assuming that after I got out of high school I wouldn’t think along these tempting-yet-ultimately-ruinous lines ever again.
Complex is very far from what I would call Marx’s objective hypotheses. Perhaps you are confusing Marx’s analyses of the capitalist modus specifically, such as he did in Capital, with dialectical materialism in general; the former is naturally very complex, as it is the analysis of a subjective and transitory superstructural expression of dialectical materialism in general, the latter being, if I may take this liberty, akin to Bayes’ Law in being simple in expression yet complex in result.
To put it another way, it is easy to confuse Marx’s subjective analysis of a transitory form, which he did most prominently in Capital, with the broad, historical, sociological, objective principles of the materialist conception of history, dialectical materialism, which he expressed in parts throughout his writing.
Additionally I, for one, would hold that contrary to the common perception of Marx having failed at his predictions that Marx’s writings on capitalism apply more to the current state of affairs than to his own.
Anyway, on reading back over your post, I’m not so sure now exactly what you are trying to do; but reading the literature on surplus labor, etc. can never hurt!