Answers to Correspondents. (1930)

Letters to the Editors from the December 1930 issue of the Socialist Standard

W. Jennings (Harringay).

If you or the anonymous member of the Manchester Reform Club will give some evidence (as distinct from a mere unsupported assertion), that the workers “are immeasurably more comfortable than in the most prosperous pre-war times,” we shall be prepared to consider it.

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Taxes and the smallholder.

A correspondent asks if smallholders would be better off if taxes were lowered by the abolition of unemployment pay. Small scale producers in general are at a disadvantage because small-scale production is uneconomic, because they pay heavily for transport, and because they are in competition with big and powerful rivals. If the total amount of taxes were reduced it does not follow that those who control the Government would pass on the benefit to smallholders; and if they did it does not follow that the smallholder would actually benefit. The conditions might very well permit the land owners to put up the rent. Moreover, a lowering or abolition of unemployment pay might well increase the number of those trying to make a living as smallholders and thus make competition among them still keener. In U.S.A. where there is no unemployment pay, millions of small farmers have been squeezed out of business since the war.

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The pay of civil servants.

A correspondent writes to criticise our statement in the September issue that the pay of the various grades of civil servants is no better than the pay of outside workers. To support his point he compares the pay of a policeman with that of a watchman, and the pay of an L.C.C. school teacher with that of a private governess. Our correspondent makes the error of not comparing like with like, and the comparisons therefore have no point. If he imagines that his comparisons are sound will he tell us of any police force recruited from watchmen, and any education authority which appoints unqualified governesses as its teachers?

We did not say that civil servants are paid less than outside workers (although incidentally the higher grades are paid less in many cases than comparable grades outside).

Our correspondent objects to our comparison between the Post Office staff and the London Underground Railway staff, on the ground that the latter “prides itself on the high wages it pays.” The objection is pointless. In the first place the Post Office also prides itself on its high wages, and in the second place every firm of any size and standing makes the same claim.

We would emphasise that although our correspondent challenges our statement he is unable to give a single instance which will support his assertion that civil servants are “an aristocracy among the working class.” The illustrations which he uses break down because he gives untenable comparisons. (In passing it may be mentioned that neither Teachers nor Policemen are civil servants in the proper meaning of the term.)

We do not deny that the ruling class would, if they thought necessary, protect their interests by paying their state servants generously. The facts, however, bear out our view that in practice the ruling class have not in general found that policy necessary. We would in conclusion return to the main point, which is that nationalisation or state capitalism does not solve any problem for the working class.

Editorial Committee.