Revolution’s Reply to Reform. (Part 4) (1910)

From the March 1910 issue of the Socialist Standard

The answer to “Arms for the Workers: A Defence of the Programme of the Social-Democratic Party.” (E. C. Fairchild, Lon. Organiser, S.D.P.)

(Continued from previous issue)

On a Workingman’s Wages.

Under the above heading Mr. Fairchild tells us that the third objection usually preferred against what he is pleased to call a Socialist programme is that some of its proposals would decrease the cost of living and result in lowering wages to the detriment of the working class. He says that this objection is generally advanced by “those who claim some acquaintance with economic science,” and declares that it “depends upon confusion of the amount of money the employer pays to the workman as wages with the amount or quantity of goods the workman can purchase with that money.” The confusion, however, is with our critic, for when we claim that some of the proposals would cause wages to fall, we do so in the full knowledge of the fact that “The food, clothing, or other things which the workman can obtain for his money” (i.e., wages) “is the real wage paid to him for his labour.” Nevertheless, if the money wage falls and buys less “food, clothing or other things,” the fact remains that “real wages” have fallen, and this notwithstanding that the deficiency is made good by a dole from “the municipal authority or the Government.” An argument which the revolutionary puts forward to show that the workers can be no better off for the so-called palliatives, is met by this bolster of capitalist politics with the retort that they will be no worse off ! What a defence of the palliative programme of the S.D.P. ! What a justification for this modern wandering in the arid Desert of Gobi, that after all the toil and travail of shifting a portion of their cost of maintenance from their employers’ pay-bill to the municipal alms box the workers are no worse off ! Such a defence is a complete surrender to our contention, yet the defence goes no further. An attempt is made, it is true, to exploit the eternal “if,” but the result is ludicrous. “If,” says Mr. Fairchild,

“the money wage paid by the capitalist should fall by 5s. weekly, and the municipal authority or the Government provided the workman with goods or services to the value of 5s. weekly, the workman would not suffer any hardship. If the municipal authority or the Government supplied him with goods or services worth 6s. weekly, the workman would gain, though his wages fall by 5s.”

If, if, if. But if the result of the “palliative” (in this case the “goods or services” supplied by the municipality or Government) is a fall in wages because it cheapens living, it is clear that the effect will be measured by the cause—in other words 6s. worth of “palliation” will be followed by a wage reduction, not of 5s., but, of 6s. There was no logical position for our reformer between absolute denial of the cause and full surrender to the effect, and when, he states that the “third objection” is due to confusion of money wages and “real” wages, and that the loss in money wages is compensated by the dole, he accepts the argument of the cause and effect, confesses that his only defence against the “third objection” is that workers are no worse off, and so doing surrenders, with the worst grace he can, to our contention that they are no better off, and that their efforts have therefore been in vain.

And Englishmen’s Homes.

The burden of this section is the housing problem. The proposal seems to be to provide the employers with homes for their workers at the expense of the landlord class. It is like the horse siding with his master in a demand for a free stable. But as our author says at the end of his previous section : “the source whence the workman draws his maintenance is a matter of no concern at all. The vital thing is that he gets maintenance.” It is a matter of no concern at all to the workers who pays “the cost of the land . . and also the interest payable to the lenders from whom the housing authority borrowed.” Such charges are in the same category as taxes, which even S.D.P. literature proves are not paid by the working class. The maintenance of the workers as a class in a certain average degree of health and strength and efficiency is the first and indispensable charge upon the wealth produced by the workers. It is the vitally necessary condition without which the workers’ power to produce wealth must cease. This degree of efficiency is determined by the degree of development and general conditions of production itself. The housing problem, then, is a problem for the master class. It is an important part of the problem how to provide the necessary maintenance of the workers with smallest possible call upon the latters’ total wealth production. For the rest it becomes a tussle between the industrial capitalists and the landlords for the plunder of the fruits of the workers’ toil. It is for this reason we find certain sections of the master class proceeding with municipal housing schemes and other sections opposing.

“If the money wages of labour were to fall by a sum equal to the reduction in rent—a decrease only possible if municipal housing was of stupendous magnitude . .” next says the S.D.P. oracle. It appears then that we can have too much of a good thing—even of an S.D.P. “palliative”—and that the time may come when we shall find the reform mongers anxious to get elected to undo their own handiwork, to keep wages from falling by preventing municipal housing attaining “stupendous magnitude.”

It would be interesting to know exactly what “stupendous magnitude” means. Where is the line to be drawn beyond which the reform cannot go without affecting money wages and why ? If one municipal house, through its reduced rent, does not affect wages why should ten ? If ten do not why should a hundred ? If a hundred do not why should a thousand, or ten thousand, or a million ? What is there in the last that is not contained in the first ? Nothing. The difference between one reduced rent and a million reduced rents is simply the difference between one and a million—a quantitative not a qualitative, difference—a matter of multiplication. Hence the effect of a million reduced rents can only be the multiplied effect of one reduced rent. This talk of the wage-reducing effect of certain “palliatives” only operating when the proposals become general, or “of stupendous magnitude” is rubbish, and comes fittingly from those who magnify a few municipally reduced rents into an important increase of “the amenities of the workers’ lives,” because they can see those reductions, but cannot understand an exactly equal and equally insignificant wage reduction because, as our author very felicitously puts it, they cannot know the things they cannot see.

One municipal house in every thousand houses in the London area would mean about a thousand municipal houses. We will not ask Mr. Fairchild if such a ratio would be of “stupendous magnitude.” A two-shillings per week reduction of this thousand rents is a visible movement, because it is concentrated. If it resulted in an equivalent reduction in money wages of the actual tenants of these houses, that would be a visible effect. It would be two shillings a week off the earnings of each tenant if there was one tenant to each house. But if this wage reduction, instead of affecting merely the actual participants in the reduced rents, were spread over all the wage earners of the area, it would mean less than three farthings—not per week but—per annum reduction to each. Of how much more “stupendous magnitude” must this become before our “palliator” can see and therefore know it !

Luxuries a Necessity.

The “mixed thinking” of the reformer is shown by our opponents’ remarks under the above heading. First declaring that “the supply and demand for labour regulates the wage that is paid,” he proceeds to flatly contradict himself in the words : “the employing class . . conspires to fix wages at a price sufficient to maintain the physical efficiency required for the production of average profits, . . .” Wages are the price of labour-power, hence to speak of the price of wages is to speak of the price of a price—which is idiotic jibberish. Again, to regulate a thing is to control its movements, therefore that which is regulated is not fixed. Still again, to attribute control of wages on the one hand to competition, in the labour market and on the other hand to conspiracy by the masters is taking idiot’s license, to say the least. Two flat contradictions and a lunacy in three dozen words is not a bad performance.

Of course, by one who holds that wages are fixed by the conspiracy of a to class yield profit, it is an easy transition to the argument that they can, by the conspiracy of another class, be fixed at such a level as to leave no profit at all (that they have ceased to become wages then need not trouble such free-and-easy economists). The first step toward this is for the workers to want more. “On first awakening,” we are told, “workman demands more bread in return for labour” (how much of the “palliators'” confusion arises from ignorance of the fact that the workman does not sell labour, but labour-power ?) “He will inevitably advance from that position into the struggle to acquire education, and refinement.” So it seems that the source of the workers’ troubles is that they haven’t wanted anything. How then, are we to read the next sentence : “The standard of comfort held by the workers is the result of prolonged conflict with the capitalist class.” If they have not wanted anything what have they been fighting for ? Are we to suppose that their share of the “prolonged conflict” has been resistence to a beneficent capitalist class intent on forcing upon them “luxuries” they have not wanted ?

A most fertile source of confusion is this spectre, “Standard of Comfort.” Behind it lurks the idea that it is all to do with the resistence of the workers, and they have only to wish for and strive for a higher “standard of comfort” in order to get it. This is far from the truth. In all their long struggle with the master class the workers have never for a moment forgotten their appalling poverty, have never for a moment been without a desperate and feverish longing for a higher standard of living. If desire could have endowed with “luxury” the working class would be redolent of comforts. As a matter of fact all their powers of resistence are necessary to enable them to realise for their labour-power its plain, naked value, without any reference to the adjustment of that mystery of mysteries, the “standard of comfort.” This resistence is common to all owners of commodities. They all sell as dear as they can, and according as the market is favourable to or against them, they now get a little more, anon a little less, than the value of their goods, but in the long run neither more or less than that value. Yet no one dreams of saying that if commodity-owners desired more for their goods they could get it. The same with the commodity labour-power. The owner’s resistence, his determination not to part with it for less than the most he can get for it, is the presupposed condition which enables its value to find expression. The “standard of comfort,” on the other hand, is one of the conditions of the determination of that value. The value must exist before it can find expression, therefore the conditions determining the magnitude of that value must come before conditions which enable the value to find expression in (in this instance) the wage. To say then, that “When no longer required to devote the same proportion of his wages to the purchase of absolute necessaries, the workman . . . can be trusted to follow the methods of the middle and upper classes, who spend more when they have more to spend,” is to take hold of the wrong end of the stick. The workers can never keep the suggested surplus because they have first satisfied “absolute” needs, but only because they have made “luxuries” equally with the so-called “absolute necessaries” a first charge upon their wages. And this they can only do when their environment has rendered those “luxuries” so necessary that they are prepared to go without food rather than abandon them, and then they have become “absolute necessaries” in the cost of producing labour-power, must therefore be embodied in its value, and eventually in wages.

All this is to say that the “standard of comfort” is merely the level of subsistence determined by the general conditions of production and the social and natural environment. “The gradual lowering of the cost of living,” therefore, must leave the standard of living unchanged. The gradual lowering of the cost of working-class living is a constant factor in capitalist society, and it is accompanied by a steady decrease in the proportion of the product of their toil which goes to the workers.

And if “the gradual lowering of the cost of living” does result in “the growth of new desires,” what are these but new miseries to be endured, new whips to scourge them into submission, new chains to bind them to their benches and desks ? The anxiety of the threatened is in proportion to the loss he is threatened with, and new wants can only add to the horrors of insecurity. Not all, not even the worst, perhaps, of the evil of the working-class position is contained in their actual poverty. Its most awful aspect is the utter insecurity, the growing precariousness of their hold upon the means of subsistence. To talk of “new desires . . . leading them to resist wage reduction” is to ascribe the workers’ present awful plight to the lack of desires. Heaven knows they have desires and needs enough, and are sufficiently conscious of them, to make such insulting mockery quite superfluous. The peculiar position of the working class decrees that necessity must precede means, hence the question of luxury can never arise for them.

A. E. Jacomb

To be Continued.

Correspondence: Wages and Prices (1933)

Letter to the Editors from the October 1933 issue of the Socialist Standard

Wages and Prices

Are wage increases an illusion? 

A correspondent asks the following question : —

Would the workers be better off if they had higher wages? As far as I can see, if there is an appreciable rise in wages, the price of goods must be higher. Am I right or wrong?

Reply.

This question is one of which little has been heard during the past ten years, but during the years 1914 to 1921, when prices were rising, it was in the forefront of every discussion at trade union and political meetings. If prices rise again this old bogey will be trotted out once more. How old it is can be seen from the fact that the question was put to Marx nearly seventy years ago, and was answered by him in the lecture which is republished in the pamphlet, “Value, Price and Profit.” That answer has stood the test of time, and has never been bettered. Our correspondent and others who are interested are strongly advised to read it in order to supplement the brief explanation given below, and the somewhat fuller treatment in our pamphlet, Socialism.

The first thing to notice is that the prices at which articles sell are not fixed at whatever amount the capitalist chooses to select. Competition between capitalists, each trying to realise a profit by selling his goods, prevents the individual capitalist charging a price far above the average market price for that article. The determining factor in all prices is the value of the article, that is, the amount of labour required in its production, including, of course, the amount of labour required in the production of machinery, fuel, buildings, etc., with the aid of which the process of production is carried out. When we say that a bicycle is worth £5, what we are really saying is that the amount of labour required to produce the bicycle is the same as the amount of labour required to produce the weight of gold represented by five £1 notes.

“Labour-power,” which is the commodity sold by the workers to the capitalists, has its value determined in a similar way. The value of labour-power is determined by the amount of labour required for the upkeep of the worker and his family. The price at which the worker sells his labour-power is his wages.

We see, therefore, that prices and wages, under a given set of conditions, are alike determined by factors outside the control of the capitalists.

The next point to realise is that the values of the goods produced by the workers are not determined by the amount of the workers’ wages. The values of the goods are determined by the average amount of labour (number of hours of labour) required in their production.

For example, in a 48-hour week, a worker might produce goods whose value is £5, but the amount of labour required for the upkeep of the worker is only 24 hours, which would mean that his wage is about £2 10s. The capitalist keeps the difference between the worker’s product and the worker’s wages.

If wages fall and the product remains the same, the employer’s profits are increased. If wages rise the employer’s profits are decreased.

Therefore, it is not true that higher wages are of no good to the worker. Nor is it true that higher wages lead to higher prices.

The truth of this can be tested by observation. If the capitalists could raise prices just how they like they would never object to higher wages or to higher taxes. Yet we see in practice that the capitalists will go to enormous trouble and expense to defeat a demand for higher wages or higher taxes. They know very well indeed that higher wages mean smaller profits.

The truth of the position outlined above is easily seen at times when the general level of prices remains unchanged. It is, however, not so clear when prices are rising or falling. Owing to changes in the amount of labour required in the production of articles of all kinds, or in the production of gold (due, for example, to new machinery and new methods), it is possible for all prices to rise or fall. When prices rise it costs more to provide for the upkeep of the worker, and consequently wages rise also, although in practice we generally find wages rising more slowly than the workers’ cost of living.

When prices fall it costs the worker less to provide for himself and family, and wages then come down along with prices. Sometimes, as in Great Britain, during recent years, wages fall rather more slowly than prices.

At times of rising prices, the capitalists and their agents and also many muddleheaded labour leaders, put forward this false theory that wage increases lead to higher prices, and are useless. The capitalists do this because they hope thereby to dissuade the workers from striking for higher wages, and hope to get them to accept permanently a lower standard of living. The workers should resist such attempts and should never miss a real opportunity of struggling for higher wages.

At a superficial view it may look inconsistent to struggle to raise the standard of living if the workers’ wages are based on what it costs to keep him and his family. It is, however, not inconsistent because the workers’ cost of living is not merely the cost of bare necessities. It can, and usually does, include other factors depending on tradition and the needs and customs of the trade in which the worker is employed and of the country in which he lives. If the workers are able at a particular time to resist wage reductions during a period of falling prices, or are able to gain and hold wage increases at a time of stable prices, they can to that extent better their position and improve their standard of living. As, however, this can only be done at the immediate expense of the employers, the latter will always strive to prevent it, and if the employers find it expedient to give way at the time, they will always endeavour to recoup themselves later on by speeding-up the work, introducing “labour-saving” machinery, employing a cheaper type of labour, employing women and juveniles in place of men, etc.

Therefore, while the wage struggle is necessary and it would be disastrous to give it up, it can never solve the real problem which faces the workers. That cannot be done by the day-to-day struggle against the capitalists. It can only be done by gaining control of the machinery of government and abolishing capitalist ownership and control of the land, factories, railways, etc.

Ed. Comm.

Exploitation in South Africa (1976)

From the July 1976 issue of the Socialist Standard

According to The Star (Johannesburg) of 28th April 1976, the recent increase of 18 per cent, in the price of “mealies” (maize cobs) will help erode “the small reservoir of goodwill that remains among more than 20m. Black and Brown South Africans”. Mealie is basic to the cost of living of something like three-quarters of South Africa’s population and “few products of inflation can weigh as heavily on the Black community as an increased mealie price”. This will lead to a worsening in race relations because many blacks cannot afford the increase. The article says that whilst an increase was “inevitable” it should be remembered that “vast numbers of our mealie farmers are relatively unproductive and inefficient”.

The Star says the solution must be two-fold. First, encourage the efficient farmers and discourage the inefficient ones. This presumably means to encourage the use of labour-saving machinery so that eventually, through competition, the “unproductive” farmers will be forced out of business. The second part of the “solution” is to pay the blacks more so that they can “afford to absorb knocks like the increased mealie price”. To make this practicable they must be “better trained and utilised” (our emphasis). Also they must be allowed to form “more effective industrial bargaining machinery” (i.e. Unions).

Black trade unions have no recognition in South Africa but it seems that the South African capitalist class and their agents, through their media like The Star, are beginning to recognize that they have a vast potential industrial proletariat which if it could be put to use profitably could bring them untold surplus-value in the future. The problem is that they need training, and that costs money and takes time. For the capitalists it is better to “adopt” the embryonic unions and have them under their wings than to allow them to develop in direct antagonism to the employers. The benevolence of the South African capitalists is staggering: once they have a black working class which is industrialized, working for a few pennies more, then they can carry on eating mealie and be grateful for it.

Our advice to workers must always be that, necessary as it obviously is for them to struggle against pressure to reduce the little they have, they should be seeking to understand why it is that one class can sell the goods which the workers produce alone and yet which do not belong to them unless they can buy them back. Once they understand this they will know that the time is long overdue for the change to Socialism.

T.K.

We are indebted to a correspondent in Johannesburg for supplying the material used above.

Fifty Years of “Progress”. (1909)

From the July 1909 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Socialist Examination of a Capitalist Statement.

Flights of Fancy.

The Daily Chronicle could scarcely find words to give expression to its admiration of the Blue Book recently published by the Local Government Board, wherein, we are told, the great prosperity of the worker since the introduction of Free Trade, is clearly shown. Wages have risen, prices have fallen, and that great social sore, pauperism, has decreased. In fact, after a perusal of the figures we are almost led to believe that within the next few years all the social evils that now afflict us will have been entirely eliminated, almost, that is, unless we happen to be in possession of further facts and figures.

We are informed by the Daily Chronicle that since 1849 the percentage of paupers to the population has decreased.

Now the total number of persons in receipt of poor relief during the year 1906-7 was 2,076,316. Every day during the year, taking the average, 25.1 per thousand of the population were in receipt of relief. While there has been a decrease since 1850 in the number of outdoor paupers, the number of indoor paupers has almost doubled. When referring to this question the Press were very careful to avoid giving an explanation of the decrease of outdoor pauperism. The cause was fully explained by “F. C. W.” in the issue of March ’06 Socialist Standard, wherein he says

“The Poor Law was further strengthened by the Amendment Act of 1844, but it was not (says the “Encyclopedia Britannica”) until 1867 that the local administration bodies took the matter up with much enthusiasm. The Pauper Inmate Act of 1871, and the Casual Poor Act of 1882, made conditions of relief more onerous by increasing the compulsory stay of vagrants and by other means. Ashcroft and Preston Thomas say in their work ‘The English Poor Law System’ p. 285, ‘The marked increase of indoor paupers (accompanied of course by a still more marked decrease of outdoor paupers until recently) is due to the movement beginning about 1865 in favour of the workhouse principle. It is clear that in the case of this class of paupers (able-bodied adults) it was mainly by the rigid enforcement of the workhouse test that this improvement was secured.’ ”

The Return to Naked Fact.

There are now many other ways by which the workhouses are being relieved, such as, for instance, the Church Army and Salvation Army Homes, and Dr. Barnado’s Homes (which boast of having 8,000 children always under its care) and the rest of the 1,800 charitable institutions dispensing funds to the amount of ten million pounds per annum.

When the Pauper Inmate Act and the Casual Poor Act had been in operation some time, there was another large increase in pauperism. The “Twelfth Abstract of Labour Statistics” issued by the Board of Trade states that

“on every day throughout the year 1892 the average number of persons in receipt of poor relief was 953,719, this number rising steadily each year with but very slight fluctuation to 1,103,724 in 1906, being an increase not only in the number but also relatively to the increase of population.”

If the Majority Report of the Poor Law Commission is adopted and the suggested alterations in the Poor Law are enacted, then we shall again be told that pauperism is decreasing, while as a matter of fact the relief of the poor will have been transferred from public institutions to private charity, which we are told can be so developed and organised that out-door relief will become unnecessary.

Turning from the question of pauperism our attention is diverted to “the record of rising wages under Free Trade,” as the Daily Chronicle has it.

Two sides to the story.

Now it is true that there has been an increase in the rate of money wages, but that is no criterion of an actual rise in wages or of an increase in the purchasing power of the wages received. Turning again to the “Twelfth Abstract of Labour Statistics” we find that since 1895 (the first year for which comparative tables are given) the increase in the retail prices of the necessaries of life, apart from the increase of house rent, which is by far the most important factor in the expenditure of the workers, has kept pace with the increase in the rate of wages, which is in many cases based upon the price paid per hour. But the same publication informs us that the number of hours worked per week have been greatly reduced, to say nothing of the increase of unemployment. So when we take all the facts into consideration we find instead of an increase in wages we have an absolute decrease.

The Daily News makes a very poor attempt to minimise the extent of the unemployed problem by attributing the great increase during 1908 to the engineering and ship-building disputes, and this in spite of the fact that the Board of Trade and Labour Gazette tells us in every issue, that persons on strike or locked out, sick or superannuated, are excluded from the figures.

The health of the workers is the next subject that confronts us. We are reminded that the number of cases arising from such diseases as enteric fever, diptheria, small-pox, etc., have been greatly reduced, in fact some of them have actually been stamped out. If, then, there has been such a large decrease in this class of disease, we must ask the reason for the alarm of the friendly societies at the “enormous increase in the number of applicants for sick pay.”

Unemployment brings Sickness–

The Evening News of June 3rd asks “Are modern conditions of life undermining the general health of the working people of this country ? Mere warnings of medical men,” it continues, “unsupported by statistics, do not count as evidence, but the testimony of the great friendly societies which are in close and constant touch with the workers is a more weighty matter.”

On this question Mr. J. Luther Green, president of the Hearts of Oak Benefit Society, says,

“The matter is most serious and is causing the greatest concern to all friendly societies. . . . The causes of the alarming increase in sickness liabilities are probably to be found in the changed industrial conditions, the constancy of the evil of unemployment, the operation of the Compensation Act, and the increased pace and pressure of life. . . Distress arising from unemployment has been especially noticeable during the past year. Cases have come under the notice of the committee where the sickness has been solely the result of unemployment. Distress is followed by privation and health must of necessity be impaired.”

It appears that while the membership of the above society has increased, since 1903, 12½ per cent., the number of claims for sick pay has increased 24 per cent., and the amount paid in sick benefit by over 33 per cent., in spite of the adoption of more stringent methods to eliminate the fraudulent “invalids.”

But the Hearts of Oak is only one of the many benefit societies, so we must take a broader view of the subject. Reviewing the returns of the 14 leading benefit societies we find an almost corresponding increase in sickness, and we agree with the president of the H.O.O. that the great increase is due to insufficient nourishment and the increased pace and pressure on the life of the worker. Every worker knows that the pace and pressure in the factories, workshops and offices is far greater to-day than it was even a few years ago, while the age at which he is thrown upon the industrial scrap-heap, when his vitality and energy have degenerated, is earlier; and so witnesses the record, in the Blue Book, of the great decrease in the number of persons employed over the age of 65.

Employment Wounds and Death.

With the speeding up of machinery and increasing pressure upon the worker grows the the increase of sickness, insanity and the “accidents” upon the industrial field, the number of the latter in 1907 reaching the enormous total of 160,731, being almost double the figure for 1898. The number of fatal “accidents” rose from 3,810 in 1898 to 4,453 in 1907, and the number of non-fatal accidents increased from 79,633 in the former year to 156,278 in the latter ! a total far in excess of the combined British and Boer casualties in the late South African war.

The increasing development of capitalism renders it far more difficult for the worker to raise himself from the ranks of the wage-slaves until now it has become almost an impossibility even in individual cases.

The increase in unemployment and the longer period the worker is in the labour market, makes life ever more insecure. While in employment he is compelled, where possible, to deprive himself and family of many of the necessaries of life in order to accumulate a little to tide over the ever-expected period of “out-o’-work,” an attempt that more often than not ends in failure. 

In conclusion, then, and taking into consideration all the facts attending the position of the workers, we can safely say that instead of enjoying greater prosperity, their position in society continues on the downward grade, Liberal and Tory reformers notwithstanding. And so their only hope is in the complete change, the Revolution, i.e., Socialism.

H. A. Young

Chapter Four: Taxation— Dilemma & Deception (1984)

From Samuel Leight's book, The Futility of Reformism

Taxation is a dominating, reformist activity generating an inferred assumption that it possesses similar economic consequences for both the capitalist and working classes, varying only in degree. The socialist attitude contradicts this inference and asserts that the real burden of taxation is borne by the capitalist class, that the whole question has become a misleading, dangerous red herring diverting the working class away from their true interests. Our proposition may startle the uninitiated; however, we are dealing with a complex system of society, notorious for its deceptions, which invariably favor the rulers and not the ruled.

In order to properly evaluate the taxation process two essential factors must be properly understood: first, the value of labor power and how it is determined; second, the purpose of taxation and the related function of the state machine.

Wages represent the price of labor power and are determined by the cost of production of the worker. Members of the working class receive a sufficiency in the means of subsistence in order that mental and physical energies may be utilized during the working day. In addition, children must be raised, who will eventually become workers replacing those who have either died or gone into retirement, forced or otherwise. Wages attempt to cover the costs of food, clothing, shelter and the various amenities and necessities of life that are needed to maintain the worker and his family. The wages paid to the working class as a whole always approximate to a minimal amount related to their survival costs, adjusted on a continuous basis, through perpetual struggle, to a supposed cost of living figure. Labor power is therefore a commodity containing a use and exchange value, priced in the form of wages. Gross wages are subject to various deductions that result in a “take home pay.” This sum, however, does not indicate the true worth of the remuneration until the worker ventures into the market place to make purchases. “Real wages” are equal to the total sum of the various commodities that the worker is able to purchase with the net amount of money received. 

Under the taxation facade gross figures are stated from which tax deductions are made. The actual sum deducted as taxes also represents a portion of the gross wages—wages that in actuality the worker never receives except solely as a book-keeping item. This of course he “can’t eat,” but the euphoria created by the magical appearance of the figure and its swift demise is tantamount to a colossal deception and a cruel hoax. In reality, and most certainly over the longer term, it does not matter whether taxes are “high,” “low,” or even non-existent. The worker will eventually still only receive an amount equal to what is required for himself and his family’s maintenance. Laws, for example, could be enacted which at various times might eliminate taxes altogether; convey free rent, free transportation, and health and welfare subsidies. All these “benefits,” in the final show-down, would then be reflected in wages adjusted downwards in order to offset the illusory gains. This would not, of course, take place automatically, or immediately upon these measures being passed. The struggle over wages between the workers and their employers, through trade union action and by workers without organized representation, is a continuous one. Wage adjustments take into consideration allowances previously granted by an employing class well protected by efficient accountants and sophisticated managers. It should also be realized that any subsidies or services paid by governments out of taxes make the capitalist class a prime beneficiary, because without them the cost of living of the workers would increase and wages would consequently rise.

And so the paraphernalia of regular income tax deductions takes place together with an annual “settlement sheet” in the form of a Tax Return. The average worker gripes about “all the taxes” he has paid and fantasizes about how much better off he would be if he paid less taxes or if,perchance, he paid none at all. At this juncture, workers would do well to review past history where, for example, prior to World War II in the U.S., less than 5 million people paid federal income taxes. Similarly, large numbers of workers in England paid no taxes until after the war. All the multi-millions of these tax-free workers in by-gone eras endured a relentless poverty that was completely impervious to the tax-exempt status of the majority of the population. Poverty, both past and present, is basically unaffected by the taxation “levied” on the workers through a devious, intricate accounting system. The working class are not poverty- stricken because of taxation and their plight cannot be cured by tax adjustments. They are poor because they are property-less in the means of production and distribution—that is the crux of the problem!

The working class are led to believe that they are in fact making real, valid tax contributions which are going either directly or indirectly towards the support of “their country” and “their affairs” — a necessary evil, so to speak. The deception, instigated with superficial deductions and paper-work, has been impressively initiated, reality cunningly disguised. It matters little as to whether the ruling class and their representatives, either individually or collectively, are properly aware of the illusion created — this is beside the point. Obviously the majority of the capitalist class, like their dependent wage-slaves, are completely oblivious to the true nature of the system’s economics; possibly just a small minority are fully cognizant of all the ramifications of the tax scam.

From the aspect that all values produced in capitalist society are the result of the efforts of the working class alone, in this sense only workers produce all the wealth from which taxes are paid. Further, inasmuch as the tax forms legally designate the individual worker as the payer superficially, the workers nominally are paying taxes. But this is a graphic example of the deception of appearances. Taxes are payments which the capitalist class are forced to relinquish from the surplus values produced by the working class over and above the wages they receive, in order to pay for the various expenses needed to preserve the system’s survival and its administration. This is a necessary burden borne by the capitalist class and camouflaged by fancy form-filing and adroit misrepresentation.

Let us suppose that a worker earning a gross wage of $400.00 per week had taxes of $100.00 deducted, leaving him with a net take-home sum of $300.00 (for the purpose of this illustration, we are disregarding all other standard deductions). The capitalist is parting with $400.00 in an actual payment out of which $100.00 goes towards taxes under the name of the employee. Assume, hypothetically, that laws were changed so that the worker no longer was obligated to pay taxes but this item was shifted to the employer. Further, that at this particular time the total amount of taxes required by the Government in its effort to defray expenses remained the same and wage levels were unchanged. Both the monetary position of the capitalist and the worker would remain unaltered. The capitalist would still be paying out, over the long term, the $400.00 out of which a $100.00 would be allocated towards taxes at some future date; and the worker, you can rest assured, would still wind up receiving his $300.00. The only difference would be a transfer of the taxes credited to the employer’s name. Although wage levels and taxes do not operate with the rigidity that the foregoing example would imply, nevertheless the theory is sound based upon the determination of the value of wages and the formulation of surplus values produced by the working class over and above wages paid. From this surplus value the capitalist class derive their livelihood and are obligated to sacrifice a percentage, in the form of taxes, in order to protect their holdings.

The present arrangement is a clever camouflage, far superior to the example just given, that conveys an impression of higher wages being paid, with workers erroneously assuming that they are actively participating in affairs of state through their tax contributions. Incidentally, as an alternative to reducing wages it is far more subtle to “increase taxes.”

The working class are under the mistaken impression that they are joining with their employers on a somewhat comparable footing when they add their names and payments to the tax forms and - subsequently learn how the total national tax proceeds are allocated. Taxation is used for the upkeep of the state which covers a vast conglomeration of institutions, functions and services that exist to preserve and protect the capitalist system of society and the interests of the capitalist class—not those of the workers! The armed forces, police, judiciary, tax revenue departments, bureaucracies, welfare and social agencies, armaments, (euphemistically termed “defense”) are all part of the intricate state mechanism which is operating at all times for the protection of the status quo. The working class have had bestowed upon them, under the guise of taxation, the dubious honor of associating with their masters, on a superficial basis only, in the upkeep of a modern-day gargantuan monster—an instrument of economic oppression and an acknowledged legalized killer, with a potential for worldwide destruction.

For the capitalist class taxation is a never-ending dilemma, an irremovable thorn in their side, that demands national contributions of astronomical proportions to cover the overheads of the system. Although the burden is large, it nevertheless does not infringe upon their ownership rights, still allowing them to live in riches as compared to the poverty of the majority. The capitalist class, through their representatives, wage a constant battle amongst themselves as to which sections of their class should bear the various burdens of direct and indirect taxation. The merchants, real estate operators, manufacturers, bankers, for example, are lobbying continuously over tax matters, attempting to keep their own contributions as low as possible, and caring little should the costs fall upon their class compatriots. Truly a case of legalized robbers squabbling over the costs of the robbery! Much of the time and energies devoted by the main political parties revolve around tax issues; how collections should be accomplished, to what degree, in which areas, and a determination of expenditures.

Government spending receives its income via taxation or through the inflation of currency, which in its turn creates a general rise in prices. Governmental tax planners and reformists agonize over the theory that tax increases, which are obviously needed to defray budget deficits, will have a negative effect on business activity; that conversely a cut in taxes might act as a stimulant. The so-called policy, absurdly entitled Reaganomics, ironically put forward this approach which was previously espoused by their supposed political opposites,the Democratic Party during the late President Johnson’s administration. The U.S. national debt reached the mathematically incomprehensible figure of $1 Trillion in October, 1981 coupled with an ongoing Budget seemingly impossible to balance. Such facts are presented to the working class as if the problem was theirs and not their masters. Workers who spend the whole of their lives scrimping, saving, and as perennial debtors, who in most instances are unable to keep within their own paltry budget, are apparently expected to become concerned in the problems of the ruling class under the false premise that their interests are involved.

The national debt, significantly reported to be about 34 per cent of the Gross National Product, (i.e., the value of goods and services produced by American workers every year) is“underwritten” by the working class. Their physical and mental energies are the tangible resources that represents a labor force which makes feasible all the profits on the one hand while offering future “collateral” for the state’s indebtedness on the other.

The ramifications of taxation are so manifold that they provide a livelihood to armies of bureaucrats, accountants and tax attorneys. Each year new publications are printed which attempt to unravel and explain a veritable morass of tax laws. In fact, in order to strive for more simplification a U.S. Flat-Rate-Tax is now under consideration which, if adopted, would apply across the board the same percentage rate regardless of the amount of taxable income. The taxing of capital gains, short and long term, and estate taxes, are always being scrutinized and adjusted. The complexities are mind-boggling. The rich and super-rich establish protective trusts, use charities, plus a multitude of devices which, together with the nature — of the system itself, substantially protects their holdings both for themselves and their heirs. The tax payments never make the rich poor, nor the poor rich.

Members of the working class who own homes make property tax payments that go towards the upkeep of local governments, services and allied costs. However, a large proportion of this real estate is heavily mortgaged, with the consequence that in reality the Banks, Savings and Loan Associations and Insurance Companies own far greater equities in the properties than the actual tax payers. In effect, therefore, the workers’ payments in this instance is related to a creditor’s holding that is larger than their own. The funds are being used, just as they are with the Federal Government, to help maintain a system that exploits them. In any event, similar to the sales taxes that are added to commodity prices, in the overall picture these items are factors that are incorporated within the cost of production of the worker and the amount of wages received. This does not imply that wages can be expected at all times to satisfactorily and automatically cover all costs paid by the workers for their survival— far from it.We are dealing here with general economic positions that are subject to the effectiveness of the class struggle, from the working class standpoint, at any given period. Should taxes increase, or the cost of living goes up, without an immediate wage adjustment, then the worker’s situation is temporarily worsened. However, assuming that the workers continue their struggle to maintain and increase wages as conditions warrant and allow, it is the longer term outcome that becomes operative. Wages are adjusted on a continuing basis, related to the cost of living, the militancy of the workers, and the existing state of the capitalist economy.

The reformists will never cease in their efforts with tax matters. Taxation, however, is not a working class issue. Energies should be devoted to maintaining and increasing the net wages paid as general circumstances allow, with the understanding that this is in line with working class interests, while campaigning over taxation isa futile waste of time—a mythical non-issue. There is, in fact, only one issue—the establishment of socialism.

The Working Class since 1904 (1974)

From the June 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

Why have seventy years of struggling against poverty, unemployment, insecurity and bad housing been a colossal waste of time as far as the working class is concerned? It is because such struggles have been directed along the lines of social reform and trade unionism. The elephant of social reform has given birth to the mouse of organized poverty. The trade unions are more conservative and muddled than ever. They have now become integrated with the capitalist system, with their investments in stocks and shares, and loans to local authorities. Their central body, the TUC, is nothing less than an extension of the Labour Party.

The mistakes made by the movement could not have come about through a shortage of political parties and movements claiming to represent their interests. In 1904 we had the Fabian Society; the ILP, the SDF, the Democratic Labour League (William Morris and Belford Bax), and the Labour Representation Committee, in addition to the SPGB. The Fabian Society, the oldest political organization in this country, really laid the basis in 1885 for the reform policies subsequently pursued by the Labour Party and its satellites. The principle of gradualism preached by Sidney Webb, H. G. Wells and others was based on the theory that whilst on the continent of Europe political struggles became violent affairs sometimes leading to bloody revolutions, the Britisher, whose temperament was different, could legislate his problems away piecemeal. The ostensible reasonableness of this proposition perhaps had an appeal but events have subsequently shown that capitalism creates problems faster than legislative measures introduced to combat them.

One of the proposals in the present Labour Government’s programme, the nationalization of land, was advocated in 1880 by sections of the Liberal Party. The experiment of nationalization, with the dazzling prospects presented by the Fabian Society in the 1880s, has turned sour. Nationalization of the coal and steel industries, the railways, road transport, gas & electrical undertakings, has merely altered the form of capitalist administration, but has done and could do. nothing to abate the class struggle in those industries. Strikes are on a bigger scale within those industries than ever before.

There is a tendency to believe that social reforms gained over the years in various fields (for example in housing, health, education and pensions) once having been granted are so much water under the bridge, and the reform movement can look for fresh fields to conquer. We would say in general that once a certain standard of living has been attained historically the workers will take this as their natural right and fight to keep or improve it. But this applies only to the wages struggle. The reforms introduced by the capitalists over the years can be taken away, or alternatively can be charged to the worker, and are in fact gradually being charged. For example, the government subsidies which were a basic part of local authority housing during the last fifty years are being removed under the Housing Finance Act, with the result that rents will rise to compensate for the loss of the subsidies. This is reform in reverse. The Labour Party’s concept of non-contributory pensions has also moved in reverse. All pensions are now contributory, and are becoming more so. The much vaunted “free” National Health Service is introducing charges over a whole range of its services. Government expenditure on universities is being cut back, and there are signs that eventually only those who are able to pay for a university education will receive one, as was the case in 1904. Should the capitalist class decide to turn students’ grants, meagre as they are, into repayable loans, there is nothing militant student action can do about it.

The struggle for reforms of any description is not part of the class struggle. Conversely, any struggle to prevent reformist legislation being repealed is not part of the class struggle. You cannot defeat the capitalist class by creating a mass of non-Socialist reform-hungry workers.

The problem of unemployment has persisted, apart from the two periods during 1914-18 (World War I) and 1939-47 (World War II and after). The percentage of unemployed has ranged between 2.5 per cent, in 1900; 7.8 per cent, in 1908; 10 per cent, in 1929-30 (3 million), the highest recorded figure. The figure for 1904— i.e. 6.0 per cent — represented 1,131,000 unemployed (London & Cambridge Economic Service estimate 1904). The number of workers (employed and unemployed) in 1904 was between 15-16 million, including 5,300,000 women nearly 2 million of whom were domestic servants (London & Cambridge Economic Service estimate 1904) The number of unemployed (registered) in March 1974 was approx. 600,000 out of a total labour force of 23,581,000, of whom 14,500,000 are male and 9 million female. A figure of 1 million has been forecast for 1974 (Sunday Times 21/4/74. London Business School estimate).

The problem has not gone away, and it has come as a nasty shock to numbers of young workers, and some not so young, who suddenly found themselves redundant at all levels of employment. This is capitalism. and unemployment is an organic part of its operation. When we consider the unemployed demonstrations and hunger marches of the thirties, the agitation for full employment by all political parties except the SPGB, we are entitled to say they have led nowhere.

Perhaps a more live issue in the shape of housing is occupying workers’ minds at the moment. There was no housing shortage in 1904, even of working class houses — the problem was rent. In 1974 approx. 8 million people own their own houses and no longer have to pay rent but mortgage interest. Given the choice, many workers would prefer to rent rather than have the constant worry of paying off the mortgage, which incontestably is considerably higher than average rents. The accolade of the property-owning democracy has descended upon them, and consequently their worries have increased. This is not social progress. The Shelter organization estimates that approx, three million people live in slums and substandard accommodation, in addition to the thousands who are homeless. We are told there is a housing shortage — and there is. High rents, high mortgage rates. The standard of housing has risen since 1904 — all we need are the houses to go with it.

On the industrial front the workers have gained a little more — statistically. It is not always possible to make accurate comparisons over a period of seventy years because there are so many changing factors. The luxuries of 1904 have become the necessities of today. The motor car and the telephone, to give two examples, are indispensable to the livelihood of hundreds of thousands of workers. Many regard them as liabilities. Entertainment no longer entertains, and it is now a social custom for workers to expect to be literally saturated by TV on every possible subject in which they have little interest. Social habits have changed considerably, and not always for the better.

The trade unions (mainly skilled workers) in the early stages of the working-class movement were withdrawn from politics except when legislation affecting their interests was proposed. Then they lobbied individual members of Parliament, mainly Liberals. Then, as now, the trade unions were only concerned in the interest of their members, although they paid lip-service to the idea of international working class solidarity. Marx deprecated their “conservatism”. The formation of the Labour Representation Committee (later the Labour Party) in 1900, was to bring the Trade Unions into politics. Up to 1918 it was a condition of membership of the Labour Party that you held a TU card.

In 1904 there was a total of 1,211 Unions with a total membership of 1,901,674 (HMSO Abstract of Labour Statistics, p.193). Of these, 212 unions were affiliated to the TUC with a total membership of 1,422,518 (TUC Report 1971, p.698) out of a labour force of 15-16 million. At the moment there are about 11 million trade unionists; about 10 million in the TUC out of a total labour force of 23½ million. The great majority of the smaller unions are not, nor ever have been, affiliated to the TUC. This means that there are three times the number of workers in trade unions today compared with 1904. Wages varied over a wide range, as today, and it is not possible to give a true average. Skilled building workers (carpenters, bricklayers, masons) received 10½d. per hour (1904) in London (Abstract of Labour Statistics 1912, p.7l) for a working week of 50 hours. The basic wage today of a skilled building worker is £25 for a 40-hour week, plus a bonus of £2 (approx. 11 times that of 1904). These are the official figures, but skilled building workers’ earnings are about £40 per week.

The price-level estimate allowing for inflation in 1974 is given as 10 times that of 1904 (London & Cambridge Economic Service). On this basis, building workers' wages have moved ahead of prices. The same is true of engineering workers (fitters, London 1904 — £2 per week of 54 hours; 1974 basic £25 per week of 40 hours. Same source). Skilled fitters earn much more than this with bonus, piecework, overtime, etc. (AEU). Agricultural workers were the lowest paid of any section of the working class. Average wage in 1907 was 17s.6d. per week, excluding perquisites (How the Labourer lives — Rowntree). Today the basic wage is £21.80 plus housing at low rent or nil rent (National Union of Agricultural Workers). Railwaymen in 1904 (excluding clerical grades, etc.) earned 25s.7d. per week (London & Cambridge Economic Service). Basic wage today for the lowest grade is £21.80 per week of 41 hours. Railwaymen (National Union of Railwaymen) obviously earn much more than this.

The same story could be repeated throughout industry, and it is not part of the Socialist case to show that worsening conditions will produce the spur to social revolution. The struggle to maintain living standards has to be waged constantly, and unfortunately has come to be regarded as an end in itself. Relating one era to a former era in order to show progress is an old trick of capitalism. They cannot logically defend the system, but try to show that it works statistically. Half a loaf is better than none, or for that matter, than one slice of bread. But one loaf is better still, and so we go on with these trite and nonsensical equations so dearly beloved of reformers and their tame economists. The point is that we shall not be too interested in the statistics of poverty and wealth, but rather in changing the social basis of private ownership upon which these statistics are based.

As an agent of revolution, the trade union movement has played no part, neither has it any part to play. Its function cannot be developed to include a revolutionary Socialist policy because the unions are open to everybody, Socialist and non-Socialist alike. Socialism cannot be established by non-Socialists. Trade unions, however militant on the wages front, are born of capitalism. It is inevitable that as creatures of capitalism they follow the fashion; they become respectable, that is they actually participate in helping the capitalist class to run industry. Co-operation does not end there. They subsidize the pro-capitalist Labour Party, paying the very people whose job it is to maintain the basis of working-class exploitation. If the SPGB could have relied on the same degree of help from them over the years as that given to our class enemies, there is no doubt that the Socialist movement would be stronger in influence and membership today. We welcome any assistance from trade unions, but on our terms.

To summarize these few aspects of working-class history, we would say that so much time has been wasted. So many permutations of failed policies — not new lamps for old but old lamps refurbished. Lord Shinwell. a very muddled counsellor in his day, summed up the success of his own Party — “It seemed to be that nothing we have done in politics had brought about any fundamental change. Thousands of people still live on the poverty line. Although some of the poor are more affluent there has been no fundamental change. The disparity between the rich and the poor remains. This is in spite of all our pronouncements and all our resolutions at conferences. They have not made any difference at all”. (The Times 19th June 1973 — “Why things never get any better”). Lord Shinwell has certainly come late to realization, if he has come at all. We condemned their policies at the time, and we are not speaking with the benefit of hindsight.

In 1904 we were told that 90 per cent, of the wealth was owned by 10 per cent, of the population. The SPGB’s case does not depend on the degree of wealth ownership. We propose to abolish the rich not tax them — we propose to abolish the poor not subsidize them. We propose a classless society. The working-class movement can thank the SPGB that Socialism is still an issue; that the body of thought represented in Socialist ideas has not been shown to be wrong or inapplicable to the present situations. The basic cause of poverty in 1904 was due to the fact that the means of production themselves were not owned or controlled by those in society who operated them. That condition still obtains. The problem is the same, the remedy is the same — Socialism. Only when the working class in the majority understand and implement the policies of the SPGB will they be able to say politics is not a waste of time after all.

Jim D'Arcy

Cooking the Books: A false dilemma exposed (2025)

The Cooking the Books Column from the February 2025 issue of the Socialist Standard

Some people say that, to save the planet, humanity is faced with a terrible dilemma: as the world cannot support 8 billion humans and more all with the same living standard as in the West, either a quarter of the world’s population is going to have to remain living in dire poverty or those in the West are going to have to have their living standard cut drastically.

This is to assume that the standard of living that a lot of people in the West have can only be met in a capitalist way, that is, as a byproduct of the accumulation of more and more capital out of profits, or ‘growth’ as it is often called. But this is not the only way in which such a standard of living could be sustained, as Jason Hickel and Dylan Sullivan explain in an article ‘How much growth is required to achieve good lives for all? Insights from needs-based analysis’ published last September.

They start from what a ‘decent living standard’ might be:

‘Recent empirical studies have established the minimum set of specific goods and services that are necessary for people to achieve decent-living standards (DLS), including nutritious food, modern housing, healthcare, education, electricity, clean-cooking stoves, sanitation systems, clothing, washing machines, refrigeration, heating/cooling, computers, mobile phones, internet, transit, etc’.

Then they work out how much resources would be required if production were to be geared to meeting these needs of everyone on the planet, and conclude:

‘Provisioning decent-living standards (DLS) for 8.5 billion people would require only 30% of current global resource and energy use, leaving a substantial surplus for additional consumption, public luxury, scientific advancement, and other social investments’.

What they are calling for is the redirection of the aim of production from seeking profits to be accumulated as more capital towards meeting people’s needs. They are aware that this goes against the logic of capitalism:

‘This is challenging within a capitalist market economy, however, because capital generally requires increasing aggregate output (GDP) to stabilize accumulation and because in capitalist economies any reduction of aggregate output triggers social crises characterized by mass layoffs and unemployment. Furthermore, under capitalism, decisions about production are made by wealthy investors with the primary goal of maximizing private profits, rather than meeting social and ecological goals. Necessary goods and services that are not profitable are often underproduced’.

However, although they talk in terms of ‘post-capitalist’ approaches, they still envisage production aimed at giving people a decent living standard being introduced while retaining finance (even though ‘public’) and money income (even if at or above a guaranteed minimum). To be fair, they do envisage many of the services and amenities being provided free of charge.

This is to be achieved through the state intervening in the capitalist economy and overcoming its economic laws. This in effect is global economy reformism. But, experience of the many reformist governments at national level in many different countries has shown that governments cannot overcome the economic laws of capitalism and that, if they go too far in trying to do this, this ‘triggers social crises characterized by mass layoffs and unemployment’. Which leads either to the government doing a U-turn or to it being voted out of office.

The plain fact is that production under capitalism cannot be redirected from profit-seeking to meeting people’s needs. That can only be done after capitalism has been abolished and society reorganised on the basis of the common ownership and democratic control of the world’s natural and industrial resources.

Despite not realising this, Hickel and Sullivan are to be commended for having shown that the world can support all its current population (and more) without exacerbating ecological breakdown.

News in Review: By-elections (1962)

The News in Review column from the December 1962 issue of the Socialist Standard

By-elections

As we go to press it is too early to comment in detail upon the results of the November spate of by-elections.

At the moment only a few facts are clear. Lord Sandwich is causing a stir in Dorset South by beating his own track through the Tory undergrowth there— something which is becoming a habit with this rich aristocrat. This has pained Tory candidate Angus Maude, who was once on the Sandwich (when he was Hinchingbrooke) coat-tails over Suez and perhaps looked for better reward than this.

We know that a number of servicemen are testifying to the delights of being part of capitalism’s military machine by working a legal fiddle to get out of the forces by having themselves nominated as candidates in the by-elections.

But most of all we know that for Socialists all over the world one of these contests is especially notable. For the first time—in Woodside, in Glasgow—a Socialist candidate has been nominated to fight in a Scottish Parliamentary constituency.

This news will hit no headlines in the capitalist press. We do not expect our candidate to receive many votes. But, as usual, we shall strive to make sure that whatever votes are cast for him come from people who want to get rid of capitalism and replace it with a world of peace and plenty which will be worth living in.

In contrast the Labour Party Deputy-Leader, George Brown, has promised that his party will make their campaign “as exciting and lighthearted as possible . . . in an attempt to stimulate the interest of young people.” He added (as he had to) that this would be “short of gimmicks.”

This is typical of the hard-headed vote-catching of the parties of capitalism. Yet it will be uphill work to persuade anyone to be lighthearted over Cuba, say, or the current figures of London homeless and Scottish unemployed. And hasn’t capitalism got enough excitement already? Nothing gets us more het up than a narrow escape from nuclear war.

Mr. Brown will have his gaiety and his excitement and he will get his votes as well. The Socialist in Woodside will get none of these, but for all that his is the only significant and worthwhile campaign among them all. 

More unemployed

Obstinately, the unemployed figures creep upwards. The October total of over half a million was the highest since April, 1959, and represented 2.2 per cent, of the total working population. Scotland is the hardest hit and after that the North West is the worst sufferer.

At the same time the number of available and vacant jobs has decreased, and at a faster rate than is usual at this time of the year.

The immediate reasons for this situation are simple enough. Firms all over the country are finding it harder than ever to sell their goods, at home and abroad. Profit margins are under strong pressure because, at the same time as selling is getting more difficult many costs of production are going up. Competition in some markets is keen to the point of cut-throat.

Many industries are in considerable uncertainty. Others, like the mines and the railways, have an air of doom as the efficiency experts and the accountants move in and redundancy spreads.

Yet uncertainty was one of the things which capitalism’s experts are supposed to have banished for ever. Are not they all dedicated Keynesians, who can revitalise an economy by the simple process of manufacturing bootstraps for it to lift itself up by?

Have they not assured us, many times in recent years, that they had at last solved the problem of boom and slump and unemployment? Was it not all something to do with planning the economy?

Countries abroad, like Canada and Italy, have already shown up the fallacy of the experts’ claims for themselves. Now our own lengthening dole queues mock the helpless experts and the promises which they have made.

None of this, of course, will prevent them making similar promises in the future. Neither will it prevent the working class falling for the facile assurance from the expert. But some, at any rate, of the workers will get the point

However much capitalism is meddled with, and whatever promises are made for it, it cannot help but remain the same uncontrollable mess it has always been.

China and India

As India has emerged into the family of capitalist nations it has often suited her government to pose as an honest broker in the disputes between both sides in the Cold War.

This has gone home with a lot of workers, who now imagine India as a perpetual peacemaker, always willing to send her men into the Congo or Suez to sort out the mess left by the more ambitious disputants of international capitalism.

Even more confusingly, the government in Delhi is expected to behave like the pacifist which Gandhi is mistakenly thought to have been.

In fact, Ghandi was simply an exponent of the technique of passive resistance to the presence of British rule in India. Had he lived to lead a government, he would soon have had to discard the surface idealism so necessary to any aspiring leader's days of struggle.

So there was nothing inconsistent in the Indian adventures in Kashmir and the annexation of Portuguese Goa. The Indian ruling class has shown that, when its interests demand it, it can be as belligerent and as ruthless as any of the old colonial powers.

Now that India herself is under attack, her government has run true to form. Passive resistance? Not likely. Mr. Nehru has called for the “Dunkirk spirit” and those of us who can remember what that meant for the British working class can shiver for our Indian brothers.

The Chinese in India have suffered in the way of all such people in an enemy country in wartime. If they own shops, these have been attacked by mobs. By government decree, they have been stripped of their Indian citizenship—a move obviously designed to play up to popular nationalist sentiment.

This is particularly dirty work. The harshness of British rule, boosted as it was by racial theories which went against the Indian, should have taught the Indian worker that such theories are pernicious and inhuman. But he has shown himself as ignorant, as ready to be deceived by his leaders and as .proudly nationalist as any Empire builder of the old days.

Just another job

Boy, are you looking for a job?

Listen, stop worrying. I’ve found one.

It’s great. Nothing to do with good works or anything like that. It’s so easy.

Listen, there’s this female and she's at Oxford, at the University, I mean, and she’s a research worker.

Sounds good, you say.

Now she’s been finding out something about how people live. Nothing to do with how well we could live. It’s all about how little we could live on.

And has she come up with the goods. Listen.

She says that a family with a mother and a father and three kids can live spending less than four pounds a week on food.

If they want to, that is. But, of course, they don’t, and this research worker, she sounds a bit cross about it.

She says—in high tone, of course, because after all she is at Oxford—that when a family’s wage goes down they sometimes cut out essential foods instead of buckling to and making the most of the cheaper stuff.

She thinks that we should teach kids in school to cook so that when the wage drops they’ll know just how to get food that a research worker approves of.

Now I wonder whether she worked all that out with those statistics things or whether she’s lived on low wages herself and eaten poor food with them.

Because k says nothing for the modern world that it has to present ordinary, useful human beings with problems of living which make subjects for nice lady research workers at Oxford to look into, does it?

And it isn’t so surprising that, when subsistence is a problem, these useful humans don’t act like the humming, foolproof computers that the lady might use in her researches for all I know, but like—well, like human beings.

Now you don’t need to be a university research worker to think that one out. I’m sure I could do that girl’s job for a lot less than she’s getting.

Think I’ll apply. Wonder how little she could live on?

Breaking Apart (2024)

Book Review from the June 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

Shattered Nation: Inequality and the Geography of a Failing State. By Danny Dorling. Verso £14.99.

It was recently reported (BBC online 21 March) that the UK now has twelve million people living in absolute poverty, after the biggest rise in thirty years. And in December the Centre for Social Justice (centreforsocialjustice.org.uk) published Two Nations, a report which concluded that for those who are not getting by, ‘their lives are marked by generations of family breakdown, their communities are torn apart by addictions and crime, they live in poor quality, expensive, and insecure housing, and they are sick.’ Here Danny Dorling, who has written on similar issues in the past, surveys many of the ways in which the lives of British workers are indeed being shattered.

One theme is that in most of the world, human lives are improving, but not so much in the UK. For instance, infant mortality is falling faster elsewhere than in the UK, and economic inequality is falling. The UK is probably the most unequal country in Europe in terms of income inequality. In the late 1960s and early 70s, Britain was more equal than it is now, and where you grew up was less important than it is today.

The second part of the book echoes the Five Giants identified in the 1942 Beveridge Report. They are presented as hunger, precarity (insecurity related to housing as well as employment), waste (with far more people now working in finance and accounting), exploitation (such as high university fees), and fear (physical and mental health having declined since the 70s). Research in 2022 showed that one UK household in six was in serious financial difficulty. Austerity has led to a slowdown in growth in life expectancy in Britain, and people in the poorest fifth of households saw their earnings fall between February and May 2020. Death rates from Covid were higher in the poorest areas, and long Covid is most commonly found there too. Many facts and statistics such as these make much of the book an informative but rather depressing read. There is one refreshing observation, though: ‘We should measure the value of a job by the amount of happiness it brings to others, not by the profit that can be made by the person employing the worker.’

And what is the author’s proposed solution? This is not a book where the last chapter offers a raft of reformist measures intended to do away with the problems discussed earlier. Rather, the proposals are spread throughout its pages, including minimising VAT, raising wages faster than food price increases, making school lunches universally available, making tenancy agreements more secure, and restricting second-home ownership. It is ironic that the Labour Party is criticised for proposing ‘only more tinkering’, when the ideas set out here are little more than that.

What we said in the April 2015 Socialist Standard is just as valid as it was then: Danny Dorling should be a socialist and not simply fight for reforms.

Paul Bennett

What makes you happy? (2024)

From the June 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

The World Happiness Report ranks countries and cities in terms of how happy their inhabitants are (see Socialist Standard, December 2020). Being comfortably off naturally tends to make people happier, but it is much more than just a matter of wealth, with countries such as the US, Japan and South Korea being fairly well down the rankings. At the bottom, though, are countries where people are impoverished and often live in fear. Destitution prevents people being satisfied with their lives, but being better off does not necessarily make you more satisfied.

These issues were discussed in an article ‘High life satisfaction reported among small-scale societies with low incomes’, by Eric Galbraith and a lengthy list of co-authors, published earlier this year in the online open-access US journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, volume 121, no 7.

The researchers studied nearly three thousand people in nineteen societies, consisting of Indigenous peoples and local communities, in Central and South America, Africa, Asia and Oceania. This included, for instance, Tuareg in Algeria, Mongolians in the Ordos desert and farmers in Guatemala. Participants completed a survey on their life satisfaction, but because ‘only 64% of the households surveyed received any cash at all during the study period, we use the market value of persistent commercial assets as a proxy to estimate monetary income per person.’ In most cases, the estimated annual income was less than $1,000 per person. It is not stated what is meant by ‘persistent commercial assets’, but it is clear that the people studied were not well-off in monetary terms.

Higher household income generally correlated with more life satisfaction, at the level of both villages and individuals. But on the whole, the more positive aspects of a village, the happier its people were. Unfortunately, it is not explained properly what is meant by more positive aspects, except that it is not related to monetary income. And overall, at a given level of wealth, people in the small-scale societies were much happier than those studied in the larger World Happiness surveys. Some societies, though, were oppressed and marginalised, and their inhabitants were far less happy with their lot. Yet all in all, ‘remarkably high measures of subjective well-being are widespread among the 19 small-scale societies studied’.

So ‘reported life satisfaction in very low-income communities can meet and even exceed that reported at the highest average levels of material wealth provided by industrial ways of life’.

As research such as that for The Spirit Level by Wilkinson and Pickett has shown, in addition to the World Happiness Report, feelings of trust and equal treatment can be more important than actual income. Living in a society where people feel secure and help each other can be far more satisfying than having a supposedly high material standard of living. A socialist world will provide for people’s needs and wants, without being any kind of consumer paradise.

Paul Bennett

Notes by the Way: £3 10s. 5½d. a week (1958)

The Notes by the Way Column from the April 1958 issue of the Socialist Standard

£3 10s. 5½d. a week

Miss Schulz, of the Oxford Institute of Statistics, worked out that it would be possible to feed a family of five on £3 10s. 5½d. a week on a diet corresponding to the pre-war “Rowntree” diet which in 1936 cost 21s. 7d. Readers of newspapers who heard about it were for the most part very indignant and blamed Miss Schulz.

Miss Schulz, like the late Seebohn Rowntree, was dealing with the cost of a “minimum" diet for a “working class” family.

The angry critics should be aiming at a larger target. They should be asking themselves what justification there is for a system of society which accepts the double standard of "working class" as distinct from human beings, and which concerns itself with calculating a minimum diet at a time when half the world is slipping into depression because it cannot sell its excess supplies of foodstuffs. They should ask why there should be people who can afford only £3 10s. 5½d. (or less) while other people can toss this away on a little dinner party for two or three.

Donald's Good Man Goes Wrong

From time to time the long-suffering workers have to put up with a special brand of confusion spreaders, the "progressive" clergy. One of them is the Reverend Donald Soper, idol of non-conformity, supporter of the Labour Party, regular contributor to the Tribune, self-styled Socialist and professed pacifist. His idea of Socialism is State capitalism. Hence, for example, his declared objective of “the preservation and extension of the Welfare State, so that those who are unavoidably out of work, will still belong to the community and will not be left to rot in the 'freedom and flexibility' of idleness" (Tribune, 7th March, 1958).

He spends much of his time criticising the aims and activities of his own party and clearly sees no inconsistency in supporting the war-making, capitalism supporting Labour Party while preaching pacifism and, in words, denouncing capitalism and supporting Socialism.

In line with his professional preoccupation with "sin" one of his contributions to confusion is to see the different capitalist national groups in terms of good and bad men. He evidently sees the “older and fatter" bandits of capitalism as “bad” and the up and coming, but as yet leaner bandits as “good.” It was inevitable therefore that his heart should go out to dictator Nasser and the other representatives of the exploiting class in Egypt. When the British and French governments started war over Suez he addressed a protest meeting at Caxton Hall (14th August 1956). He claimed to speak as a Socialist and pacifist and progressive Christian. But instead of putting the Socialist case against capitalism as the cause of war and as an exploiting system, all he could do was to condemn the aggressor capitalist groups and praise the defending capitalist group. Instead of calling on the workers to oppose capitalism (and its wars) he called for encouragement of the Egyptian capitalist figure-head, Nasser.

“I wanted to say in the name of Christianity that this Nasser ought to be encouraged and not be repressed, because I believe the root of the matter in him is good, and because it is good it is our business to evoke it by corresponding good and not to repress it by threats of violence."

But those who take sides between “good” and "bad” representatives of capitalism are asking for trouble. Just lately the good Colonel has been putting the imperialist squeeze on Sudan. Here was a chance for Soper to make an indignant protest. But we looked in Tribune in vain. Instead of loud protests there was a deafening silence.

Tribune had been rallying round Bourguiba of Tunisia, another “good" man, under attack from the “bad” French. Now Bourguiba threatens to break off diplomatic relations with Nasser, because, so he alleges, Nasser’s government has been conniving at a plot to assassinate him (Manchester Guardian, 7th March, 1958).

Apart from praying, what is Soper going to do about it?

Blood is not as thick as oil

While we are on the subject of assassination plots we should not overlook the fact that Nasser is said to be on the receiving end as well as being an instigator, for the Syrian partners in the newly united Egypt-Syria claim to have evidence that Saudi Arabia’s ruler paid £2 million to have Nasser bumped off (or was it only £1 million?). This should be a lesson to those who, rejecting the Socialist explanation of international groupings and rivalries, interpreted the evolution of Middle-East capitalism in terms of the blood bond and Moslem faith of Arab peoples. We now have Egypt and Syria facing Iraq and Jordan, with Saudi Arabia maintaining hostile aloofness. Oil and pipe-lines are the key to the situation, not race and religion or a supposed common hostility to imperialism.

The centre of interest is now moving westwards along the North African coast owing to the first developments of reportedly enormous quantities of oil under the French Sahara; with the Algerian armed rebels standing across the outlets to the Mediterranean. That is what keeps a French army of hundreds of thousands desperately trying to make the oil safe for French capitalism and for the British and other oil interests that have a hand in it.

Attitudes to the H-Bomb

As the gradations of opposition, half-opposition, half support and full support to the H bomb come to expression in the multiplicity of new organisations and declarations, it becomes a major task to know where they all stand. At one end there are the ”rely on the H bomb” lunatics; then the make but don't use or test, the make but don't test, the test, but don't use, the have but not in American planes, the keep but suspend work on, the do this now and the do it after Summit talks, the rely on good old conventional weapons, etc., etc.

The arguments between them are particularly sterile because of the tacit acceptance by all the contestants of the capitalist system of society. They can all knock the other man’s case to pieces, but none of them put up a Socialist alternative. Mr. J. B. Priestley is a case in point. In an article “H-Bomb Hotchpotch ” in the Daily Herald (5th March, 1958) he makes mincemeat of his opponents, but comes down to this in the end:—

“If this country walked out of the nuclear arms race and declared that it would defend itself if necessary with anything a man could lay his hands on, from shot-guns to bombs made out of corned beef tins, it would be a safer place than it is to-day; and certainly safer than Mr. Sandys and friends—who are gambling everything on the belief that nothing can happen . —can make it to-morrow."

Brave words, but it is a safe bet that if it happened, Mr. Priestley would be calling on us to die gloriously with our shot-guns against all the modern armoury of weapons (and probably denouncing the government of the day for not having provided better armaments) with never a thought that war because of capitalism is just as senseless whatever the arms and whichever capitalist group came out victorious.

If Priestley were a Socialist, adding his voice to the international Socialist stand against capitalism everywhere, in opposition to every capitalist government and party, he would be doing something really useful on behalf of humanity.

Labour Government and Strikes

Workers who support the Labour Party and have expectations that the next Labour Government will be different from the last should take note of the speech by Mr. Alfred Robens, who is tipped off to be their Minister of Labour. The following report appeared in the Daily Herald (21st February, 1958):—

"Originally, when private ownership of industry was widespread, a strike was intended to damage the profitability of a company and the private pocket of the owner.

“But times have changed.” Mr. Robens told a London meeting of the Industrial Co-partnership Association.

“We have moved into a managerial society in which shareholders are quite remote from actual management.

“Therefore the strike today does not affect the individuals who are managing in the way which it may have affected those individuals 50 years ago. The managing director’s salary goes on as before.”

"But it did hold up orders and caused people to be chary of investing in an industry with a black record of stoppages.

“The result is that the strike has a long-term boomerang effect of holding up investment in an industry, and so not enabling it to become more modern and reducing its profitability,” added Mr. Robens.

“It. disturbs the confidence of the customer, and it can have nothing but a harmful effect not only on the company, but on all those employed by it.”

Capitalist Culture comes to Florida

In the Manchester Guardian (1st March, 1958) Mr. Alistair Cooke told the sad story of American “progress.” 

"Until the great prosperity came along many of the smaller keys were ravishing; quiet tropical refuges of hardwood and limes and wild flowers and herons, brief reminders of the natural luxury that limestone and warm winds can breed in the middle of an aquamarine ocean. But the "developers” have been here as everywhere, and here, too—on the once lovely Marathon Key, for example—suburban Los Angeles seems to set the universal pattern : trailer camps, hot-dog stands, Joe’s Miracle Bargains in second-hand cars flaunting their strings of bulbs against the indigo night sky.

The harbour at Key West is much the same, and a town that once looked like the perfect setting for a romance by Tennessee Williams or a small domestic tragedy by William March is now the garish frowzy camp of souvenir pedlars and chrome motels and neon-lit saloons. Sometimes the sky darkens over and God pours out a deluge of punishing rain. The streets swirl and the sewers gurgle for a while in running floods. Then, after lunch, the sky is cloudless again. It is 80 degrees, and either by sea or sky the horizon is the gate of Paradise. But the aeroplane coach service and the real estate men together have converted one of the last and beautiful relics of the Spanish Empire into a Coney Island. There is no hiding place down here.”

Edgar Hardcastle