Economist's work I'd ask a pal about — time to get stuck into it (3,7)

'economist's work' is the definition.
(German title of Karl Marx's Capital)

'i'd ask a pal about time to get stuck into it' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
an anagram of 'ask' is 'ska' which is present in the answer.
'a' is within the answer.
'about' could be 'a' (abbreviation in Chambers) and 'a' is located in the answer.
'time' could be 't' and 't' is found within the answer.
This explanation may well be incorrect...