Monday, December 10, 2018

Wages (1960)

From the December 1960 issue of the Socialist Standard
The wages of work is cash.
The wages of cash is want more cash.
The wages of want more cash is vicious competition.
The wages of vicious competition is—the world we live in. 
The work—cash—want circle is the viciousest circle 
that ever turned men into fiends. 
Earning a wage is a prison occupation 
and a wage-earner is a sort of gaol-bird.
Earning a salary is a prison overseer’s job. 
a gaoler instead of a gaol-bird. 
Living on your income is strolling grandly outside the prison 
in terror lest you have to go in. And since 
the work-prison covers almost every scrap of the living 
earth, you stroll up and down on a narrow beat, about the same as a prisoner taking his exercise. 
This is called universal freedom.
From “Pansies” (1929) by D. H. Lawrence
(Published by Marlin Seeker)

No comments: