Extermination through labor Extermination through labor ( ) is a principle that guided the operation of the Nazi concentration camp system , defined as the willful or accepted killing of forced laborer s or prisoners through excessive heavy labor , malnutrition and inadequate care . In Nazism . According to Nazi ideology , the " Germanic peoples , " i . e . the Germans , Flemish , Dutch , English , and Scandinavians , were considered " Aryans " and constituted the " master race . " " German blood " and the " Aryans " had to be " kept pure " from the " foreign races . " The Nazis persecuted many individuals because of their race , political affiliation , disability , religion or sexual orientation . While others could possibly redeem themselves in the eyes of the Nazis , there was no room in Hitler ' s world - view for Jews . Because of their size ( approximately 1 % and 0 . 1 % of the population , respectively ) and perceived threat , eliminating world Jewry was the Nazi ' s paramount concern . As such , the Nazi leadership gathered to discuss what had come to be called " the final solution to the Jewish question " at a conference in Wannsee , Germany . The transcript of this gathering on January 20 , 1942 gives historians insight into the thinking of the Nazi Leadership , as they devised the salient details of their future destruction , including using extermination through labor as one component of their so - called " Final Solution " : Other groups marginalized by the majority population included welfare - dependent families with many children , vagrants , and transients , as well as members of perceived problem groups such as alcoholics and prostitutes . While these people were considered " German - blooded , " they were also categorized as " social misfits , " as well as superfluous " ballast - lifes . " They were recorded in lists ( as were homosexuals ) by civil and police authorities and subjected to myriad state restrictions and repressive actions , which included forced sterilization and ultimately imprisonment in concentration camps . Anyone who rebelled openly against the Nazi regime ( such as communists , social democrats , democrats , and conscientious objector s ) was detained in a prison or a camp . Many of the prisoners did not survive the camps . In Nazi camps , " extermination through labor " was principally carried out through a slave - based labor organization , which is why , in contrast with the forced labor of foreign work forces , a term from the Nuremberg Trials is used for " slave work " and " slave workers . " Working conditions were characterized by : Concentration camps . Imprisonment in concentration camps was intended not merely to break , but to destroy inmates . The admission and registration of the new prisoners , the forced labor , the prisoner housing , the roll calls — all aspects of camp life were accompanied by humiliation and harassment . Admission , registration and interrogation of the detainees was accompanied by scornful remarks from SS officials . The prisoners were stepped on and beaten during roll call . Forced labor partly consisted of pointless tasks and heavy labor , which was intended to wear down the prisoners . At many of the concentration camps , forced labor was channeled for the advancement of the German war machine . In these cases , excessive working hours were also seen as a means to maximizing output . Oswald Pohl , the leader of the " SS - Wirtschafts - Verwaltungshauptamt " ( " SS Economy and Administration Main Bureau " , or SS - WVHA ) , who oversaw the employment of slave labor at the concentration camps , ordered on April 30 , 1942 : Up to 25 , 000 of the 35 , 000 prisoners appointed to work for IG Farben in Auschwitz died . The average life expectancy of a Jewish prisoner on a work assignment amounted to less than four months . The emaciated forced laborers died from exhaustion or disease or they were deemed to be incapable of work and killed . About 30 percent of the forced laborers who were assigned to dig tunnels , which were created for weapon factories in the last months of the war , died . In the satellite camps , which were established in the vicinity of mines and industrial firms , death rates were even higher , since accommodations and supplies were often even less adequate there than in the main camps . The phrase " Arbeit macht frei " ( " work shall set you free " ) , which could be found in various places in some Nazi concentration camps , e . g . on the entrance gates , seems particularly cynical in this context ( the Buchenwald concentration camp was the only concentration camp with the motto " Jedem das Seine " ( " To each his own " ) on the entrance gate ) . Victims . Victims of extermination through labor were principally Jews from nearly every state in Europe , gypsies , Slavs , political dissidents , homosexuals and so - called " asocials " . Approximately six million Jews , 80 , 000 sick and handicapped people of German origin , 500 , 000 Sinti , Romanies , and members of other persecuted " gypsy " groups as well as seven million Soviet prisoners of war and civilians in concentration camps were killed altogether . It is impossible to ensure that these numbers are exact , as the Nazis often kept no records of their victims . Background . Nazi Ideology demanded the " purification " of the " Aryan race " and the " German blood " from " foreign - blooded people . " These " foreign - blooded people " were principally Slavs , blacks , Jews , and parts of the gypsy population . Old people , sick people , " work refusers , " so - called " asocials " and disabled people were considered " useless people . " Regime opponents , such as communists , democrats and social democrats , were also persecuted , since they opposed the " decampment " and the " national awakening . " Controversial cases . The Soviet Gulag is sometimes presented as a system of death camps . < ref name = " Joel Kotek / Pierre Rigoulot " Gefangenschaft , Zwangsarbeit , Vernichtung " " > Joel Kotek / Pierre Rigoulot " Gefangenschaft , Zwangsarbeit , Vernichtung " , Propyläen 2001 < / ref > Alexander Solzhenitsyn introduced the expression " camps of extermination by labor " in his non - fiction work " The Gulag Archipelago " . According to him , the system didn ' t exterminate opponents with poison gas , but rather let them work as prisoners on big building sites ( for example the White Sea - Baltic Canal , quarries , railroads , and urban development projects ) under what are said to be inhumane conditions . Roy Medvedev comments : " The penal system in the Kolyma and in the camps in the north was deliberately designed for the extermination of people . " Alexander Nikolaevich Yakovlev expands upon this , claiming that Stalin was the " architect of the gulag system for totally destroying human life . " However , this point of view is contested by some scholars who argue that Gulag was neither as large nor as deadly as it is often presented , and it was not a death camp . According to formerly secret internal Gulag documents , some 1 . 6 million people must have died in the period between 1930 and 1956 in Soviet forced labor camps and colonies ( excluding prisoner of war camps ) , though these figures only include the deaths in the colonies beginning in 1935 . The majority ( about 900 , 000 ) of these deaths therefore fall between 1941 and 1945 , coinciding with the period of German - Soviet War when food supply levels were low in the entire country . These figures are consistent with the archived documents that Russian historian Oleg Khlevniuk presents and analyzes in his study " The History of the Gulag : From Collectivization to the Great Terror " , according to which some 500 , 000 people died in the camps and colonies from 1930 to 1941 . Khlevniuk points out that these figures don ' t take into account any deaths that occurred during transport . Also excluded are those who died shortly after their release due to the harsh treatment in the camps , who , according to both archives and memoirs , were numerous . The historian J . Otto Pohl estimates that some 2 , 749 , 163 prisoners perished in the labor camps , colonies and special settlements , although stresses that this is an incomplete figure . In 2013 it is believed that similar camps are operating in North Korea .