[Fluff time] In the Matrix who were really the slaves and who was really free?

In the Matrix is alludes to those suck in the Matrix are basically slaves because they are not living a real life but some illusion the machines created for them to use them as a ”battery” (as Morpheus said). While those in the matrix human field have lives in their minds, the machines had to labor all of the time to keep the Matrix running to keep their power going less they become extinct. They are de facto slaves to the Matrix and their own existence; it seemed that they had no other function than to tend to the Matrix and the humans providing the power to keep it running. So who truly got the shorter end of the stick? Is being an unconscious slave but having a conscious reality worse than being a conscious machine having to slave daily over a process to stay ”alive”, or the other way around?