Cooking the Books: Who does capitalism work for? (2026)

The Cooking The Books column from the May 2026 issue of the Socialist Standard

‘AI risks widening inequality, warns Fink’ was the headline in the Times (24 March) reporting on the annual letter from billionaire Larry Fink to the shareholders of his asset management company BlackRock. The caption under a photo of Fink read:

‘Larry Fink said that most people who work for an income would be left behind by those enjoying returns on investment.’

These weren’t Fink’s exact words but they expressed his meaning. They also point to the two classes of capitalist society — the working class (those who work for an income) and the capitalist class (those who enjoy returns on investment).

More accurately, the working class is composed of all those who have to work for an income to survive, and the capitalist class of those who have sufficient returns on investment to survive without having to work.

What Fink wrote was that over recent decades:

‘… the vast majority of wealth has flowed to people who owned assets, not to people who earned most of their money by working. Since 1989, a dollar in the U.S. stock market has grown more than 15 times the value of a dollar tied to median wages. Now AI threatens to repeat that pattern at an even larger scale—concentrating wealth among the companies and investors positioned to capture it. This is where much of today’s economic anxiety comes from: a deeper feeling that capitalism is working—just not for enough people.’

He may be exaggerating — he himself later pointed out that when there is some technological innovation the companies producing and adopting it benefit and that this is ‘not unusual’ nor ‘inherently problematic’ — but he has an axe to grind. He argues that widening inequality could be avoided if more people owned stocks and shares; if they owned shares in these companies they would benefit from the rise in their stock market capitalisation. And of course BlackRock will be there to manage their share portfolio, for a fee.

It’s the old fraud of a ‘people’s capitalism’ that the Tories and the Liberals over here used to propose — making capitalism work for more people by giving them a share in profits.

Quite a few workers do own shares, though not enough to bring them an income to allow them to live without having to work, like capitalists. Fink quoted figures showing that in the US more than half of households own shares and that this is ‘a distinctive feature of American capitalism’ compared with Europe where only a third of households do.

This doesn’t mean that workers in the US are better off than those in Europe. It simply means that more workers there hold their savings as shares compared to Europe where more hold theirs as savings in a bank. The source of both the dividends on shares and the interest on savings accounts is profits made in capitalist industry, only in the case of interest on bank savings in a roundabout way.

Banks and assets management companies are in competition for the savings that workers might have. In Britain the asset management companies are currently running an aggressive advertising campaign to persuade workers to entrust their savings to them. Workers can make up their own minds on this. Savings in a bank are secure but, as they say, shares can go down as well as up.

One thing, however, is clear: workers will never have enough savings, whether in shares or in a bank, to allow them to live without having to work for wages. After all, if they did, who would produce the profits? Or the wealth society needs to continue to exist?

Editorial: Russia also juggles with finance (1948)

Editorial from the January 1948 issue of the Socialist Standard

The more the Communists proclaim how different everything is in Russia the more events disclose how much that country resembles the other Capitalist States. The latest example is the decision of the Russian Government to issue a new currency in place of the old, thus doing what Belgium did in 1944 and what rumour says the British Government has been contemplating for some time past.

The Russian Government’s scheme, though rather complicated in detail, is simple enough in its broad intention. Wherever there is rationing and the sale of rationed goods at controlled prices a “black market” is bound to arise as those with enough money try to supplement their rations and get scarce high-priced luxuries. Russia was no exception though the “free” market in that country was officially recognised and anyone rich enough could buy what was offered at the enormous prices ruling there. The government’s scheme is to abolish rationing, reduce the prices of a few foodstuffs while raising the prices of other goods so that the new price level as a whole is raised to a point somewhere between the present low “rationed” prices and the present very high “free”market prices. At the same time they aim at a drastic reduction of the amount of money available to be spent, by the simple device of giving fewer new rouble notes in exchange for the old ones. If you have 100 roubles in cash in your pocket or at home you get only 10 in exchange. If you have 10,000 roubles deposited in a savings bank you get the full rate for the first 3,000 and two-thirds for the remaining 7,000 roubles. We can illustrate the effect by putting 10,000 roubles into pounds at the rate of exchange (32 to the pound) allowed to foreign diplomats in Russia. It means that a. man with £312 in a savings bank will find it reduced to £240. If his £312 was invested in a State Loan (except the most recent loan in 1947) he will have it cut to one-third of its value, £104. Wages are not being reduced but the workers, in addition to losing some of their cash and savings will be hit by the higher prices.

Of course the Daily Worker had to rush in and say what a fine thing it all is—”a step forward,” “a triumph for the Socialist economic system,” but the article (published on December 16th) indicated a certain amount of uneasiness. The writer, Mr. Andrew Rothstein, had to admit that “everyone will inevitably be affected to some extent because the new prices must lie somewhere between the ‘rationed’ and ‘off-rationed’ prices.”

Some other interesting points are thrown up by the new policy and by the Daily Worker comment on it. Just as Sir Stafford Cripps, at a time when prices are rising, tells the workers it will soon be all right because harder work will increase supplies and bring down prices, so the Daily Worker says “the existence of ample supplies . . . will soon more than compensate for the temporary difficulties.” This is printed in the “Worker” alongside the reproduction of a Russian “plenty to eat” poster which tells how much meat, fats, sugar, etc., etc. will be produced “in the five-year plan to be completed in 1950.”

During the war when news came out of Russia about the rouble-millionaires the Communists hastened to explain that this was a good thing and natural to a “socialist” country, and that we should note that it was all earned money and there were no speculators able to accumulate fortunes by speculation and black market operations as in Britain and U.S.A. Now we learn that the new policy is designed to hit “speculators, who amassed considerable sums ” and were, able to “buy up stocks, create artificial shortages and lower the purchasing power of the rouble.” (Daily Worker, 16/12/47).

It should be observed incidentally that the new policy, while reducing the big fortunes, does not by any means wipe them out. The speculator or other wealthy person with 1,000,000 roubles in State loans will still possess 333,000 roubles of investments and will, of course, gain to the extent that he can now buy goods at much lower prices than he formerly had to pay in the “free” market, prices which ranged up to ten and fifteen times pre-war prices. (Manchester Guardian, 15/12/47).

One wonders, too, how the Communists are going to wriggle out of their claim that the Russian Government, unlike other governments, does not descend to slick tricks in its dealings with workers’ savings. It is going to be very difficult to square what has just been done, with the claim made in 1946 that “money put into the State loan is, of course, absolutely secure” and that holders of bonds “can redeem them at their nominal value at any time within the 20-year period.” (Article by S. Grigoryev in Soviet News, published by the Soviet Embassy in London, 16/5/46.)

Readers of the Daily Worker (15/12/47) who read that “the new rouble of full value will be much stronger that the old,” will perhaps recall how the Communists jeered at the late Lord Snowden when he defended the economy cuts of 1931 on the ground that they would enable the pound to be strengthened and “look the world in the face.”

Doubtless one of the reasons for the new policy in Russia is to back up the campaign to capture the support of the European workers by pointing out that the West European governments, notwithstanding loans from U.S.A., are behind Russia in abolishing rationing. If the British Communists try to push the same policy over here they will be in the same position as those Conservatives who press for the abolition of controls and who argue that it would be better for the workers in the long run even though it would mean higher prices immediately. The truth is that for the workers it would be merely a choice of evils and so far, judging by results of by-elections, the majority of workers prefer the evil of rationing that they have got used to and are not enamoured of the Conservative alternative.

Socialists, of course, are not in favour of Capitalism anyway, whether with or without controls.

Workers as shareholders (1986)

From the December 1986 issue of the Socialist Standard

In preparation for the next general election the Tory Party is popularising the idea of worker-shareholders as part of that party's long-held vote-catching conception of a "property-owning democracy". From the earliest days of capitalism the rich and governments have always urged the workers to work hard, be loyal to their employers, live prudently, save money and never get into debt. The advice also included warning them to put the money in a safe place such as the Trustee Savings Banks or. in 1861. in the newly established Post Office Savings Bank. The one thing they were advised not to do was to enter the risky field of company shares.

But times change and the advice also. Every inducement is now given to getting into debt by buying on credit. Working hard and being loyal to the employer remain, but nowadays this calls for more sophisticated methods. At all times the motives behind the advice have been the same. Workers who followed the advice would, it was thought, be better profit-producers for their employers, would be less likely to fall into destitution and become a burden on the rates.

In the middle of the nineteenth century few workers were able to save anything. British capitalism was booming but the wages of most workers were at bare subsistence level. Only skilled workers could put anything by. But it was only out of their own resources that any workers could make provision for sickness, unemployment and old age, or the cost of funerals. What provision some workers could make was through membership of the Friendly Societies and trade unions. (This and other information will be found in Paul Johnson's Savings and Spending: The Working Class Economy in Britain 1870-1939).

As Paul Johnson says, few workers even troubled about what they would live on in old age because they did not expect to live long enough Only the trade unions had provision for unemployment but as late as 1911 Lloyd George reckoned that not even ten per cent of the working class were covered for it. As the trade unions grew in membership and effectiveness, in the second half of the century. wages steadily increased and savings also. Between 1870 and 1914 the number of depositors in the Post Office Savings Bank and Trustee Savings Banks grew from 2,500,000 to 11,000,000. Yet in 1911 it was reckoned that the total assets of adult workers were only £11.10p a head — just enough to cover two months' unemployment or sickness.

Since 1945 conditions have altered in various ways. The purchasing power of workers' take home pay (after deductions of PAYE and NI contributions) has continued to increase and is now well above the level of 1938. Workers' savings have grown but the ownership of accumulated wealth of all kinds remains highly unequal. The Royal Commission on the Distribution of Wealth and Income, in its report in 1975, found that the top twenty per cent of adult population owned seventy-eight per cent of the wealth and the bottom eighty per cent of the population only twenty-two per cent of the wealth. One new factor has been the payment of £10,000 million redundancy pay to workers who have lost their jobs, producing the somewhat novel feature of unemployed workers having, for a time, cash at their disposal. It is against this background that the Tory Government launched its programme for a property-owning democracy. This included a change in the law enabling council house tenants to buy their houses at prices below the market rate. The Tory Election Manifesto 1983 said. "There are a million more owner-occupiers today than four years ago".

Other items in the Tory programme have been encouragement to companies to introduce "profit sharing" to their workers and schemes to increase the buying of shares by workers. In the "privatisation" of British Telecom and other nationalised industries shares have been issued at prices below market rates, with preference to employees to buy shares. The result has been that those who acquired shares saw an immediate big rise in their stock-exchange price. According to the British Market Research Bureau the proportion of individual shareholders among the adult population has more than doubled in the past two years, to about 16 per cent. The British Telecom share issue is reported to have attracted about a million investors who had never owned shares before, including a large proportion of the firm's employees.

The latest government scheme (still in its discussion stage) aims to encourage companies to make agreements with their workers to have part of their wages related to the ups and downs of profits. Instead of an agreed wage of. say, £10,000 a year (£192 a week) there might be a basic rate of £8,000 (£154) plus a share in profit. In an average year the profit share would be £38 which, with the basic £154. would give £192 as before. If profits rose, the total would be above £192 but in a bad year the worker would receive only the basic £154. The inducement to the worker would be that some part (half has been suggested) of the profit element of pay would be exempt from PAYE deduction, worth about £5 a week to a worker on average pay.

The advantage to the employer would be that the workers would have an interest in co-operating to produce maximum profits and avoid strikes, and would make it easier for the employer to adjust costs in times of bad trade. Instead of having to try to reduce wages, the fall in total payments to the workers would be automatic, in the terms of the agreement. However the supposed effect of the scheme to which the government attaches most importance is that it would, in the governments view, encourage employers to take on more workers and thus reduce unemployment, instead of having to pay £192 a week to additional workers the employers' commitment would be only the basic rate. £154. Only if profits again increased would the employer have to pay more than that.

The scheme has received a very mixed reception. The Confederation of British Industry is lukewarm about it and the largest employers' organisation, the Engineering Employers' Federation, is hostile. The Federation doubts whether it would change the workers' attitude towards their employers and whether it would have any effect in reducing unemployment. Among the objections raised to the scheme by employers is that the unions would counter any fall in the profit-related part of wages simply by claiming an increase of the basic rate and that the workers would resist the employment of additional workers because it would mean sharing the profits among a larger number, reducing the amount going to each worker. In spite of the objections, present indications are that the government will go on with the scheme.

The TUC is sceptical and the attitude of the Labour Party is not yet known. But about worker shareholders the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party. Roy Hattersley, has come out in favour. "The extension of employee shareholding . . .  is wholly consistent with the aims of socialism. It is also in the interests of the economic success and social cohesion of the country" (Observer 16 March 1986). Whether or not the government really believes that their various schemes for a property owning democracy will make any difference to the way capitalism operates, it is certain that they will feature prominently at the next general election, in confrontation with the Labour Party's attempts to revive the lagging popularity of nationalisation by giving it the new name "Social Ownership"

The Labour Party will claim that, in selling the nationalised industries to raise revenue and to make possible a reduction of income tax, the Tories have been guilty of a profligate misuse of "public property". The Tories will retort that a Labour government, with its plans for a vast increase of government expenditure, will have to raise income tax drastically and that employee share ownership “is the truest public ownership of all" (Tory Election Programme 1983).

The Tories will make the most of the Labour Party's declared intention of government action about the shareholders in British Telecom. At present the holders of shares in British Telecom and other privatised industries are seeing a big increase in the stock exchange price of their shares. A Labour government will offer to these shareholders the option of selling the shares to the corporation only at the lower price paid for them, or of having Consumer Bonds which will not carry voting rights.

Of course, by the time the election comes round the stock exchange price of British Telecom and British Gas shares (under the impact of increased competition) may have fallen below the present price. But if the stock exchange prices keep up to the present high level, the Tories will represent the Labour Party's taking over of the shares as an act of "robbery of the workers' savings".

The Tories will not have forgotten what happened at the general election in 1931. The Labour government had collapsed, with the Labour Prime Minister. J. R. MacDonald and his Chancellor of the Exchequer. Philip Snowden, joining a National government with the Tories and Liberals. The Labour Party lost heavily in votes and seats and political commentators said that a major factor in their defeat was a broadcast by Snowden asserting that if a Labour government were elected it intended to "rob the Post Office Savings Bank" in which the workers had their savings.

Edgar Hardcastle

Independence for All. (1916)

From the October 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

In the report of an interview with a Mr. R. M. Kindersley, which appeared in the “Daily Chronicle” of July 13th under the title of “The New Habit,” is about as much piffle as it is possible to get into two columns of that paper. The writer, Mr. Arnold Bennett, praises the subject of the interview for the part he is playing in getting other people to economise and save during the war, by the use of the bait of, not 9d. for 4d. this time, but £1 for 15s. 6d.— we are dealing with “high finance,” don’tcher-know.

Now, you 223,000 railway workers who, according to your “leaders” (“Daily Telegraph,” 21.8.16.) are getting less than 25s. a week, and you other workers who are getting less than a pound, have you read the scheme ? It shows you how to get rich without work ! Buy War Loan certificates. You will see you are on a good thing if I quote from the article. Mr. Kindersley is speaking.

“The proposition is the £1 for 15s. 6d. War Savings certificate. It means an unsurpassed security, the security of the British nation, and principle paid back at the end of a short term, together with compound interest at the rate of £5 4s, 7d. per cent. And no income tax ! And you can cash it at any time on three days notice. This form of saving presents every advantage.

There is simply nothing else to touch it anywhere on earth. Most people, old and young, have a foundation of common sense, and they only need to understand the advantages of the 15s. 6d. certificate in order to buy it.”

Stick a pin there—nothing to pay for the tip. This statement, of course, is wrong. You need more than to understand in order to buy a certificate : you need money. But still they have made it easy to quote again.

“Members need not wait until they have the 15s. 6d. in hand. They can begin to save at once with as small a sum as 6d. . . There is no limit except that no single human being can buy more than 500 certificates.”

This scheme is easy ; indeed there is nothing like it ; it gives everybody a chance. Mr. Kindersley has said so and he ought to know, as this article will show later. Let us see where the chance comes in for a person getting 25s. a week with a wife and four children to keep. He will probably have to pay out for

After providing for these items he has 11s. per week for food for six persons.

In order that at least one of the six can produce a profit for a boss he must be more or less fit and unfortunately (for the boss) he must eat a little. Consequently we will allow him, with things at present prices, 1s. a day, to be allotted as follows :

Now, Mr. Kindersley, after allotting the man a diet the cost of which would starve you, there are still five persons to feed on the princely sum of 4s. a week. How is it done? Do you feed one of your children at that cost ? Not much ! It is quite clear that there is nothing to spare for beer and tobacco, or holidays, or motor-car tours, or for governesses, toys, or pets for the kids. There is nothing for luxuries of any kind, or even to meet the expenses of illness.

Now, Mr. Kindersley, show us where it is easier to effect a saving—but I forgot, you are not doing that ; this side is left to the wives and maiden ladies of your class.

To turn to the interview again, Mr. Arnold Bennett asked, “And what are you persuading the women to do?” To this Mr. Kindersley replied: “We are persuading them to undertake house-to-house propaganda among women and to serve as honorary secretaries of associations, and to arrange for war economy exhibitions, competitions, cookery demonstrations, and all that sort of thing.” “But,” said Arnold Bennett, “this means heavy work for them.” “It does,” agreed Mr. Kindersley. “But the women will do it. They are doing it. They know, as a sex, the value of economy.”

Is it possible for impudence to go further ? For women who have as much in one week to keep a house on as the worker’s wife has in a whole year, to go and preach economy to these same workers’ wives is extreme irony. I should like to hear how they are received when they suggest cutting down the bill of fare in order to buy War Loan certificates.

“Don’t you want to hear about our advertising department ?” asked Mr. Kindersley. “Don’t you want to hear about, our travelling speakers ? And about our film ‘For the Empire’ ?” One of these talking machines or so-called speakers, has been found out by a section of the workers. He was billed to speak twice at an aircraft factory during dinner hours, bat his reception was such, and the heckling and questions were so much to the point, that only one meeting was held, and that of but 15 minutes duration.

Let me quote Mr. Kindersley again :

“But the most important reason is that we are showing members of the Association how to help the country, and this is what they want above all to do. They like to feel they have a stake in the country, and are helping it as well as saving. This combination is a new and delicious sensation to many of them.”

Until they wake up, when they discover it was only sensation.

The workers of this country, like the workers of other countries, have no stake in the country they happen to be born in. Out of the hundreds of thousands of members of the working class that have been killed in the present bloody war, how many have left wealth sufficient to have to pay death duty on, although the amount is only £100 ? Read the list of wills and you will see how seldom the working-class soldier has anything to bequeath. The butchered wage-slave has given all he had—life. And even that was not his. All there is in and on this country belongs to the capitalist class. Not only have the workers no stake in the country, they have no right in the country except at the bidding of the master class. This class has set up its tribunals to decide whether you shall work, where you shall work, and what work you shall do—or whether their interests would be better served by making a fighting unit of you, to go and murder other workers who are cajoled and coerced by masters in the same way that you are.

What rights have you ? For all the boasted “freedom” of the British race you have the right of slaves—the right to obey your masters. Anything you do in your own interests which is against the interests of your masters, as it must be since the interests of masters and slaves are opposite, is met with imprisonment, banishment, the ignominy of being strapped to a gun wheel, of even death by shooting or hanging.

Don’t blame the master class for what they are doing. Every class acts in its own interests as it understands them. Therefore as this country is owned by the capitalists who live in it it is to their interest to see that it is not endangered by the capitalists of another land, hence their present actions.

Just another quotation from the report in question ; it is a warning of what is likely to happen to all who don’t save. Says Mr. Kindersley :

“My belief is that these Associations are doing more than help the war—they are changing the nation. I foresee the day when the man, woman, or child who does not possess savings in the shape of a national security will be a marked man, women, or child.”

There’s a timely warning. Take heed, otherwise you will be marked “Cain” because you weren’t “Abel,” and the crime will not be on Mr. Kindersley’s shoulders.

Has it ever dawned on you why these people want you to save ? Some of the least astute of the capitalist class have partly told us, though we knew previously. Lord Clarendon, presiding over a War Savings committee meeting at Watford a few weeks ago said : “This saving scheme will not only help us now, but it will help to tide over the industrial depression which must follow the war.” There you are, fellow-workers, though these be lean years there are leaner ones to follow, and if you can be kidded to take up your belt another hole now and live on a bit less you will either be used to it or dead by the time the leaner years come. In either case you will not want poor relief. Should you fail to save in these times of “plenty” and dare to seek relief in the lean period, look out, for Mr. Kindersley has said you will be “a marked man, woman, or child.”

Perhaps the workers who exist in the small village in Herts where Mr. Kindersley’s large residence is situated will wonder what is going to happen to them seeing that their wages are well below 25s. per week. This apostle of working-class economy had the damned cheek to lecture these opulent villagers on the interesting subject of economy a few weeks before he took his family for a month’s holiday to Bangor. A staff of servants, averaging more than two to each member of the family, was sent on by rail, whilst the family followed by road in a Rolls Royce motor car and a cheap £750 knockabout Wolsely car (purchased to run one of the kids to and from school at Eton).

That is economy as practiced by a director of the Bank of England and a governor of the Hudson Bay Company. It is typical of the capitalist class as a whole. In peace time they rob you, the workers, of two-thirds of the wealth that you produce, and now when it is harder to live than any living person can remember, they tell you to save while they themselves spend more on their private billiard room than the average worker gets in wages all his life.

How do they manage it ? They are few compared with the working class, yet they control the lives of the latter. It happens this way.

The capitalists own the country and all on it. The business of the country is carried on through a political machine called Parliament. Control of this machine gives control over the Army, Navy, Police, magistrates, and all the judicial machinery of the country. All laws that matter are passed by and in the interest of those in control of Parliament, and are forced upon the people by the Army, Navy, Police, etc., who act according to instructions from Parliament. Any worker or body of workers who attempt to do anything against the interests of the capitalist class, who at present control Parliament, can at any time be punished or brought back to capitalist law and order by the coercive forces. How do the capitalists get control of Parliament and keep it ? It is quite simple. Every few years an election takes place, whereat there usually come before the people two persons, one calling himself a Liberal and the other a Conservative. Sometimes a Judas from the working class is allowed to take the place of the Liberal, but in the main it is Liberal v. Conservative. Now you know how they call each other names in order to get you to vote for them. Both are representatives of the class who own the country, and in the fight for the seat whichever gets elected makes no difference to the workers.

Millions of pounds of the masters’ money are spent on elections, and it pays because it gives them political control. They dangle before your eyes on posters big loaves and little loaves. “The foreigner has got your job !” they tell you on other posters. “Vote for Have’em and work for all,” they implore; “Vote for Kidem and cheap food,” they wail.

All this goes on because the working class have the power in their hands to give or withhold control of Parliament. That is, they possess the majority of votes. Consequently they have the power to take the control of Parliament from the capitalist class and use it in their own interests. But while they continue to vote for the representatives of the capitalist class, thereby giving them power, they must expect that power to be used in the interest of the class who, for the time being, possess it.

The way out of the trouble is to organise for the capture of the political machine. Organise on the basis of your class interests ; that is, organise as a class who produce all the wealth and own none of it, but who has for its object the social control and ownership of all the means and instruments for producing wealth, and the wealth when produced.

In this way and in no other will you prevent an idle class robbing you of 13s. in the £, and be able yourselves to live a free and full life.

SNOOKEY

Jottings. (1915)

The Jottings Column from the August 1915 issue of the Socialist Standard

The “Silver Ballets” leaflet issued by the Parliamentary War Savings Committee provides some very interesting reading.

We are told that if our 45 million people each saved on an average half-a-crown a week, we should save nearly £300,000,000 a year. Now this 45,000,000 people comprises nearly the whole population of the United Kingdom, and half-a-crown a week from each person in an. average family of five persons—man, wife, and three children—would mean twelve shillings and sixpence per week to save. Ye gods, this from a population estimated in 1903 by Sir H. C. Bannerman to include over 12,000,000 “living in the grip of perpetual poverty” !— A population of whom Mr. D. Lloyd George (when booming his insurance scheme) said: “You have got, side by side with the most extravagant wealth, multitudes of people who cannot consider even a bare subsistence as assured to them. . . . The wolves of hunger prowl constantly round millions of doors in the land.”

Similar remarks coming from persons now “kidding” workers to save, what time the workers are receiving in some cases war bonus to meet the increased cost of living—run up by patriots—only show how their maintenance of political supremacy depends upon a lack of memory and want of understanding, among the working class, of their class status within the society of to-day. The work of the Socialist Party of Great Britain is to refresh workers’ memories on such points, and, primarily to put facts before them which, given intelligence to understand, they will proceed to act upon.

We wonder what one member of the Government (Mr. J. M. Robertson) thinks of his “Fallacy of Saving” in the light of the Parliamentary War Savings Committee’s appeal ?

* * *

Mr. Lloyd George in his speech at Manchester said in reference to being prepared for this war:

“When we appear at the great judgment seat of history as a nation and as a people, and this war with its terrors, with its tortures, with its suffering, is brought up against us, we can say, the proof that we are innocent of this crime is that at any rate we did not prepare, we at any rate did not organise for that war. We had not organised great forces for the purpose of conquering Germany or Austria, or trampling upon the liberties of any other nation.”

But that was only the “swank” as showing how it could be organised, now he had taken over the organising of munitions for war.

Listen, however, to “Winnie” of the ineffable smile justifying his work at the Admiralty. At Dundee on June 5th he said :

“I was sent to the Admiralty in 1911, after the Agadir crisis had nearly brought us into war, and I was sent with the express duty laid upon me by the Prime Minister to put the fleet in a state of instant and constant readiness for war in case we were attacked by Germany.”— “Reynolds,” 6.6.15.

J. B.

The Birkbeck collapse. (1911)

From the July 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are always being told about “the savings of the working classes” and the vested interest they have in the banks and allied institutions in this country. But when the Birkbeck Building Society’s Bank closed its doors, another story was told by our good capitalist Press.

We then heard of the hundreds of pounds being lost by this investor and that one, and day by day the story was continued of 10s. in the £ amounting to one, two and three hundred pounds, being carried away.

Much was written about the struggle of this shopkeeper and that professional man, etc., to save up his little hoard.

Once for all, then, the anti-Socialists give the lie to their own cry. that it is the savings of the workers invested in these institutions. They themselves amply prove that the banks are filled with the money of others than members of the working class

Even the small savings of the working class are at the mercy of the capitalist financiers. The workers do not control the money, which comes into the hands of the capitalists, who use it to exploit the toilers.

The sequel to the bankruptcy supplied backing to the Socialist contention that the control over capital concentrates into relatively fewer hands as this system develops.

The business of the Birkbeck was acquired by the London County and Westminster Bank, one of the premier banks, with a capital of 14 millions. That is the usual way—the small concern dies the large one grows greater at its expense.

Adolph Kohn

Jottings. (1909)

The Jottings Column from the July 1909 issue of the Socialist Standard

Mr. A. D. Steel-Maitland and Miss Rose Squire were appointed to investigate the relationship of industrial and sanitary conditions to pauperism. Their report to the Poor Law Commission is issued as a Blue Book. Their summing up gives the following conditions as being contributory to pauperism in the order given.

1. Casual and Irregular Employment.

2. Bad Housing Conditions.

3. Seasonal Fluctuations in Trade.

4. Unhealthy Trades and Insanitary Conditions of Work Places.

5. Earnings Habitually Below what are required for Healthy Subsistence.

6. Dangerous Trades.

7. Excessive Hours of Work.

Regarding cause 2 the investigators say ”These contribute to pauperism through disease and demoralisation. They are important causes of Pauperism, but less so than the first.”

The Socialist is well aware that the bad housing conditions are consequent upon (or effects of) the irregular employment under existing conditions. Shortness of wages compels the wage worker to accept a slum dwelling.

Some of the slums are the result of “improvements,” it is pointed out.

“Improvements in towns, accompanying the increase of wealth, by the demolition of badly built quarters, the erection of palaces for banks, warehouses, etc., the widening of streets for business traffic, for the carriages of luxury, and for the introduction of tramways, etc., drive the poor into worse and more crowded hiding places.”—” Capital,” Vol. I, p. 674.

This shows clearly that the palliative of better housing does not palliate the real evil of the present system at all, but this by the way.

* * *

With reference to No. 7, “Excessive Hours of Work,” the comment of the investigators is “We have been unable to trace any connection between long hours of work and pauperism.”

Whilst, however, they cannot trace “any connection between long hours of work and pauperism,” they tell us that drink is one of the principal causes of pauperism, but for the most part it is the effect of causes such as dangerous and unhealthy conditions of work, excessive hours, low wages and bad housing. So showing drink to be a cause of pauperism and excessive hours to be a cause of drinking habits, these blind tools of capitalist hypocrits cannot (?) trace any connection between long hours and pauperism.

* * *

The June issue of the Pioneer, the organ of the “Labour and Socialist” movement in Burnley and edited from the S.D.P. club in that town, contains an article on the Budget by Robinson Graham.

The sixpenny super-tax is hailed gladly by the writer of the article. He goes on to say “we Socialists (!) are determined that the working class shall be reminded that this Liberal tax is a tax which has been advocated by Socialists on the platform and in the Press since the inception of the Socialist movement.” Again, “the Government has merely embodied the public wish formed by the Socialist agitator.” Quite unconsciously Mr. Graham belittles the “Socialist” effort alluded to above and points out that “ten Budgets like this one would make little or no difference to the lives of the working classes.”

As the item advocated since the inception of the “Socialist” movement is contained in the Budget, those “Socialists” who advocated it stand condemned, on their own admission, for side-tracking the workers, in so far as time has been wasted on a useless measure.

There is some sound advice in the concluding paragraph of Mr. Graham’s article, which the workers of Burnley and elsewhere (and Mr. Graham himself) should take to heart. They are urged to “direct their attention to ways and means of overthrowing the capitalist system which makes poverty the common experience of the great majority of our people,” and since it is admitted that the Liberal Government have brought in this Budget with a view “to restoring the confidence of the British workmen” in themselves, it should be a lesson to the workers to fight shy of even S.D.P. agitation for super-taxes and the like, which can be used for the restoration of confidence in a capitalist Government.r

Socialism is the only remedy, and that alone, for our social evils. Super-taxes will not make any alteration whatever in the basis of society, in fact, they presuppose exploitation in order that the taxes may be levied and realised.

Those who, claiming to be working-class leaders, direct working-class political activity against anything except the capitalist system must be swept away.

* * *

We are informed by the Baker’s Record, that the S.D.P. have convened a meeting to consider the food supply of the nation, at which they propose to put forward a resolution urging the Government to purchase large reserve stores of corn with money invested in the Post Office Savings Bank. This all very fine as an example of revolutionary daring, but it isn’t to be supposed that the capitalist class are going to put up for ever with the revolutionary (!) plots that are hatched at Mooney’s bar. One of these fine days the S.D.P. will find itself suppressed, unless some particularly funny turn so excites the hilarity of the police as to prevent them executing their duty. Moreover, they are in for a “rough-and-tumble” with the I.L.P., for I hear that the latter have long ago ear-marked “the money in the Post Office Savings Bank” for the capitalists to buy themselves out with.

JAYBEE.

A Look Round. (1907)

From the October 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

The fact that Victor Grayson fought Colne Valley without the sanction of the Labour Party has upset several members of that “sensible, respectable, and adaptable” collection of odds and ends. Writing in the A.S.E. Journal for August, Mr. G. N. Barnes says that “each section should endeavour to fall in line with due regard to the general situation. Otherwise there may be more or less irregular candidatures leading to friction and a breaking up of the solidarity which has so far characterised the Labour Party. If Socialists, for instance, are going to run candidates ‘on their own’ without regard to the feelings of the Trade Unionist section, and, as in this case, without consulting the party as a whole, then Trade Unionists may be disposed to return the compliment.”

***

Mr. Barnes’ reference to “solidarity” is amusing. Even the Daily News for September 3rd wrote concerning it: “Its members are but loosely joined together : in its small aggregation it comprehends the extremes of opinion. Today they are often seen walking into different lobbies in Parliament.”

***

The following report appeared in the Times of August 27th:—

” The ‘Survivors of the all-night sittings’ of August 19 and 20 dined together at the House of Commons last night, among those present being Mr. Whitely, Mr. J. A. Pease, Mr. Herbert Lewis, the Master of Elibank, Mr. Fuller, Captain Norton, and Mr. Whitley (Liberal Whips), Mr. H. W. Forster and Mr. Pike Pease (Unionist Whips), and Messrs. Burns, Cavendish, Hobhouse, T. W. Russell, Ainsworth, G. Baring, W. Benn, Bowerman, Carr-Gomm, Clough, C. H. Corbett, Courthope, C. Duncan, Dunn, Fenwick, Gill, Goddard, C. L. Harmsworth, Haworth, A. Henderson, Henry, Higham, Illingworth, MacVeagh, Manfield, Markham, Nicholls, John O’Connor, Pearce, C. E. Price, Rainey, T. F. Richards, Silcock, A. Stanley, Whitehead, and W. T. Wilson. The menu for the occasion was something in the nature of a novelty, among the dishes being ‘Consommé Tortue à la Banbury,’ ‘Harengs aux Baleines Ecossais. Sauce Wason,’ ‘Gelée Lloyd-George,’ ‘Harcourts Verts petite culture,’ ‘Grouse de Hampstead Heath (Tué par M. Whiteley et Sir Hood),” ‘Pèches Anglaises sucrées, sans impôot (Garanties par M. Jean Burns),’ ‘Moelles pain dore du Sud Afrique à la Chinois,’ ‘Dessert de 45 héros,’ and ‘Gâteau (Gagne par M. Jeremie McVeagh).’ The wines were described as ‘Moselle Piesporter Cuvée Caisse Fermée Minisère de Finance. Ad Hoc.” ‘Champagne Cuvée Dorsdors’ and ‘ Porte ! Porte ! Dow’s 1878.’ The concluding line on the menu was ‘Prorogation—Le Roi le veult.'”

***

Subject to correction, the “Survivors” named Bowerman, Duncan, Gill, Henderson, and T. F. Richards are “Labour” members. Who paid ?

***

Lord William Cecil is recording, in the columns of the Times, the impressions of his recent visit to China, where he went with the object of seeing the Christian missions at work in that portion of the Far East. What he has to say is far from reassuring says the Church Times. He found only too convincing proof of the tendency among European residents in China to sink to the lower moral standard of the Orientals. Foreseeing a time when China, like Japan, will enter into close relation and intercourse with the West, he dreads a Yellow Peril no less serious than the peril of aggression, which he believes to be imaginary. The Yellow Peril he fears is that of moral contamination for Europe, through the adoption of Chinese morals and ideas.

To meet this Lord William thinks that every effort should be made to make known the religion of Christ to the Chinese ! But a knowledge of this religion has not prevented the Europeans from falling !

***

The correspondence in the Church Times on Socialism was brought to a close on September 15th with a letter from Mr. Harry Phillips, writing from the Church House, Westminster, He “was once a member of the I.L.P., but is not now,” as he “can no longer support Labour when it declares for secular education !”

***

In the course of his letter Mr. Phillips says : “Under the rule of a strong Socialist majority on the West Ham Town Council, there was more poverty, more suffering, and greater want of employment, than at any other period during the history of West Ham, and had it not been for the generous subscriptions of strong individualists and capitalists like Mr. Dewar, and others, the suffering would have been a great deal worse ; it was exactly the same at Poplar. I am not now alluding to the bribery and corruption of a few men, none of whom were Labour men, nor am I in any sense attacking any Socialist members of the Town Council, but the administration during the Socialist regime instead of reducing poverty, intensified it. Rates and rent went up enormously, and unemployment and suffering increased.”

***

Now, even a Christian Socialist might try to tell the truth sometimes ! There never has been a Socialist majority on the West Ham Town Council, and far from rates and rent going up enormously, it is a well-known fact that in West Ham and in districts further East rents have fallen considerably, although rates have risen. As we have repeatedly shown, a rise in rates is not always followed by a rise in rents, but, on the other hand, rents often fall concurrently with rising rates. The landlords always secure the full amount that competition for house accommodation will permit them to exact, irrespective of rates. And very often high rates mean low assessments, and low rates high assessments.

***

In their efforts to capture the working class for Christ the parsons are ably assisted by some of the Labour Misleaders. Mr. G. J. Wardle, M.P., speaking at Brixham Congregational Church on Aug. 25 delivered himself as follows:

“There were thousands of men who had to work hard from week to week, and yet at the end there was nothing for them but the workhouse and a pauper’s grave. Every working-man who was discontented with the present conditions was so because he knew that life to him was not what it ought to be and what it might be. Under a system of industry in, which they could see the Divine hand, he knew that there would not only be security of tenure, but no unreasonably long hours and small wages, whilst he would have those comforts which health demanded.”

***

Mr. Wardle, apparently, has no conception of a time when the working man shall cease to be such, as distinguished from the non-working section of the community. No, all that is wanted is “fixity of tenure” (which apparently means that the workman’s nose is to be fixed to the grindstone) and not unreasonably long hours or unreasonably small wages. These of course are very vague terms, suitable to the occasion. And what reason has Mr. Wardle for suggesting that the Divine hand (whatever that may be) is not to be seen in the present system of industry ?

***

At the annual demonstration of the Blaina district of the South Wales Miners’ Federation on August 26th dissatisfaction was expressed at the action of Mr. T. Richards, Labour M.P. for West Monmouth, in supporting Liberal candidates. Mr. Richards, in reply, said that he went to support the Liberal candidate at Bristol at the request of a Labour Leader (whom he did not name) and he was not sorry that he had helped to return Mr. Robinson, the Liberal member for Breconshire. Loud cheers greeted his speech, after which Mr. W. Crooks, M.P., addressed the meeting, no doubt on the “solidarity” of the Labour Party.

***

At a Primrose League demonstration Lord Londonderry spoke of the great and growing danger of Socialism to the State. He said :

“There is £152,000,000 in the Post Office Savings Bank, the savings of ten million persons, for the Socialists to take. A million and three-quarter persons have put nearly £53,000,000 in trustee savings banks. Some £68,000,000 has been placed by workmen in building societies, and there is some £50,000,000 invested in industrial and provident societies, co-operative and friendly societies, and trade union benefit funds, while small holders hold some £20,000,000 worth of Government stock.

“All these are workmen’s savings, and they are all to be confiscated by the Socialists, all to be shared by the thriftless, all to be looted by the ‘have nots’ at the expense of those who have something.”

***

These figures make a total of £343,000,000, and as we showed last month, there is only about £100,000,000 of money in the Kingdom, so that even under Capitalism these “workmen” would be in a bad way if they wanted to withdraw their savings in a hurry. It is unfortunate that his Lordship did not give the numbers of all these various kinds of thrifty workmen. But according to him the depositors in the P.O. and Trustee savings banks number 11,750,000 “workmen.” The Industrial and Provident Societies have about 2,250,000 members and the Trade Unionists number about 2,000,000. Exclusive, then, of the Building Societies, at least 16,000,000 ‘workmen’ have deposited all these savings. But the workers only number about 13,000,000, or, with their dependents, 33,000,000. And of these, according to Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, 13,000,000 are always on the verge of hunger !

***

The sums mentioned by his Lordship do not represent the savings of the working class. Take the P.O. for example. The commercial and trading class know, what the working class, as a rule, do not, viz., that deposits are unattachable, that is, that in event of a bankruptcy, deed of composition, or any other circumstance, the creditors of a depositor in the P.O. Savings Bank cannot touch his or her deposit. Hence many of these wide-awake folk deposit up to the limit (£200) as a sort of provision against a “rainy day.”

***

The working class (S.D.F. resolutions notwithstanding) have nothing to lose but their chains. This also applies to many members of the “respectable classes,” the clerks and shop assistants, and many of their chains are “duds,” as watch snatchers have sometimes found, to their chagrin.

***

The S.D.F. is continually passing resolutions, and sending them to various representatives of the master class and the latest is a “stunner.”

***

Thus saith the S.D.F. Executive : “That this meeting of the Executive Committee of the S.D.F. enters its emphatic protest against the invitation given by King Edward VII on behalf of the British nation to the German Kaiser, and declares its intention to make this protest publicly effective upon his visit in London if necessary, seeing that the presence of a reactionary militarist such as the Kaiser is in no wise welcome among a free and self-respecting people.”

***

The issue of Justice which contained this resolution contained also “A Practical Suggestion for Socialist Unity” by E. R. Hartley, from which it was apparent that E.R.H. desires “Socialist” Unity in order to send to Parliament “someone who shall speak with confidence and authority.” This “someone” is “H. M. Hyndman.” E.R.H. waxes enthusiastic. “Hyndman, the economist, the educated gentleman, the polished and scholarly traveller, . . . Hyndman, with his sublime capacity for magnificent indiscretions” and so on. Evidently the resolution quoted above is one of Hyndman’s “magnificent indiscretions.”

***

Consider the position. In its literature and on its platforms, the S.D.F. declare that the people of this country are slaves. Mr. Hyndman has gone further and has denounced all those who are not class-conscious Socialists as “slaves and curs indeed.” Now, slaves and curs cannot be “free and self-respecting.” The S.D.F. Executive have allowed their jingoism to get the better of their Socialism, and in pursuit of their policy of currying favour with the jingo and “patriotic” section of the master class, of which the advocacy of compulsory military training forms a part, have thrown their Socialism overboard again, and declared what they know is a lie, viz., that the people of this country are “free and self respecting.”

J. Kay.

A Look Round. (1907)

From the July 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Trades Dispute Act, passed by a Government “having something of a Labour Party force behind it” as one jubilant Trade Unionist has expressed it, legalised peaceful picketing. That is to say it made it quite lawful for “one or more persons acting on their own behalf or on behalf of a Trade Union or of an individual employer or firm in contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute to attend at or near a house or place where a person resides or works or carries on business or happens to be if they so attend merely for the purpose of peacefully obtaining or communicating information or of peacefully persuading any person to work or abstain from working.”

* * *

But the question of what is peaceful picketing is of course one for the Magistrates and the Judges. In the course of a strike or lock-out, it is hardly to be expected that strikers or locked-out workers will be able to control their feelings altogether when they see their places being taken by others. The moment they get excited they can be charged under the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act, 1875, as was the case at the Old Street Police Court on June 6th, when two men were each fined £10 and ordered to pay six guineas costs between them.

* * *

Another Act of the present Government, the Workmen’s Compensation Act, 1906, comes into force on July 1st. If a workman, after that date, meet with a fatal accident, and his relatives can afford to employ lawyers, or make a bargain with them on the “no win, no pay” system, they may get a verdict of £300 against the employer. And if the latter has not insured and cannot pay, he can make himself a bankrupt, and clear himself of all obligations. No wonder the Act has been described as one for the benefit of insurance companies and lawyers more than for workmen.

* * *

Probably many of the smaller employers will regard a fatal accident to one of their workmen as a blessing in disguise if it enables them, by means of the Bankruptcy Court, to disentangle themselves from the difficult position in which they have been forced under this competitive system.

* * *

The Stringertype is the name of a new matrix composing and casting machine recently invented by Mr. H. J. S. Culbert-Stringer. After a close inspection by a number of experts, the machine has been found to thoroughly justify the many important advantages claimed for it by the inventor.

* * *

Another factor in the problem of men v. machinery !

* * *

The chairman of Barclay, Perkins & Company, Ltd., is much afraid that “after legislation has finished with the Breweries,” the “Socialists” would turn their attention to other so-called monopolies, and the property of the Church itself will be in danger ! This twaddle about the wicked Socialists who would destroy property is part of the game played by the capitalist class. But Barclay, Perkins’ “property,” like that of other sections of the master class, may be depreciated and even destroyed in the ordinary course of capitalist development, without any “Socialist” agitation or action.

* * *

Thus at the meeting of William Cory & Son, Ltd., held on June 11th, Sir Francis Cory-Wright said they ought to put large sums to depreciation and reserve, because they could not say what in the future might take the place of coal, and render much of their assets valueless.

* * *

He went on to refer to the new invention “Coalite,” to exploit which a new company was being formed. Mr. Parker, of Wolverhampton, claimed that it was absolutely smokeless, and that its use would put an end to thick fogs, which were solely due to the smoke emitted from domestic and factory chimneys. There were good grounds for this claim, and if “Coalite” proved successful it would have a great future.

* * *

As I understand it, “Coalite” is obtained by treating ordinary coal in a particular manner. But surely it is within the region of possibility that a fuel may one day be discovered superior to coal in every respect, which would at once depreciate the value of coal mines and allied industries. Then the coal mine owners would agitate for the nationalisation of coal mines and some alleged Socialists would be jubilant at the rate of progress of their ideas.

* * *

On June 12th Mr. Bicknell presided at the meeting of J. C. & J. Field, Ltd., Soap and Candle Manufacturers. He said the year had been a disappointing one. For some years the profits had been steadily growing less, owing to heavy taxation, the increased price of raw materials, in addition to excessive competition.

* * *

When the Soap Trust was operating here, Field's was one of the firms which remained outside. And when the retailers talked of forming a co-operative concern to manufacture soap against the Trust, Field’s advised them not to erect a factory or to put down new plant, but, if they would subscribe £50,000 Capital, Field’s plant could be utilised, etc. All this, of course, was disinterested. Field’s sole desire, as everybody knew, was to help the people fight the awful Trust.

* * *

It is stated that the cause of the trouble at Vickers, Sons & Maxim’s Engineering Works at Erith, was primarily the introduction of a premium bonus system, similar in many respects to the “Rowan” system. In this connection the following extract from The Engineer-in-Charge and Works Manager for May will be interesting to readers.

* * *

Piecework.—Each engineer must decide for himself as to whether any of the work undertaken in his department can be more cheaply turned out on a piecework basis. Many engineers have to manufacture spare parts in considerable quantities, and in these cases the work can often be done more cheaply by the piece; the workman possibly earns more money, but the total cost will be less when establishment charges have been added.

The chief objection to piecework is the difficulty of fixing a fair rate ; if too high, the workman earns very large wages and the rate has to be cut down, with the result that next time a man is given a job at a high rate he takes care not to work too quickly. To avoid this system the premium system has been introduced, which has the effect of giving part of the additional earnings to the employer and part to the workmen. The method introduced by the late Mr. James Rowan has been more used than perhaps any other : by this system a man is allowed, say eight hours in which to do a certain job, and his rate is 8d. per hour ; if he does the work in six hours he will be paid his ordinary rate plus 2-8ths—2d.; therefore, in this case he will get 10d. per hour. It is obviously impossible, with this method, for a man to be paid double his ordinary rate, and the effect is to increase the man’s bonus for small savings in time and to decrease it for large, that is compared with ordinary piecework ; hence, it is unnecessary ever to cut the rate after it has once been fixed, and this system is undoubtedly useful for work for which the rate is difficult to compute.

* * *

There are no flies on the employers who adopt this system !

* * *

In the current issue of The Contemporary Review, Mr. L. G. Chiozza Money, M.P., deals with the Investments of the Masses. He estimates the total wealth of the United Kingdom at £11,500,000,000, of which £10,900,000,00 is owned by 5,000,000 people, and £600,000,000 by 39,000,000 of the population. Thus about 95 per cent. of the entire wealth of the United Kingdom is owned by about one-ninth of its population. It could easily be shown, he added, that of the 5,000,000 of people above the income tax line a small proportion, about one-fifth or say, 1,000,000 people (about 200,000 or 250,000 families) own nearly the whole of the accumulated wealth of the Kingdom, and that this small group exercise the effective government of the nation by its control of the means of production. “THOSE RULE WHO OWN.”

* * *

Those rule who own. That is the position. Whatever political reforms may be secured will be useless so long as the means of wealth production are private property. Therefore the efforts of the workers for political supremacy must be directed with the object of using the power thus obtained to effect the social revolution. Private ownership of the means of wealth production must give place to social ownership.

* * *

Some societies of working men have been led into supporting the Workers’ Educational Association, which exists for the purpose of encouraging boys and girls to continue their education (of a kind agreeable to their masters) by attendance at evening schools after they have commenced to work. Last month a Conference took place between the Association and employers of labour at Birmingham, at which a committee, with the Lord Mayor as chairman, was appointed to carry out the work. The true inwardness of the movement may be gathered from the Press reports of this meeting, which conclude thus : “It was stated that the decay of the apprenticeship system had caused employers to lose that control of young people which they formerly possessed.” And, of course, by the help of Mr. Albert Mansbridge and his W.E.A., they hope to get it back.

* * *

An instance of the fallacy that only unskilled workers need lack employment in this happy land arose at the City Coroner’s Court on June 6th, when an inquest was held concerning the death of Harry G. Burrell, aged 59, a brass finisher, who dropped dead the previous Sunday evening in Whitecross-st. It was stated that the deceased was a capital workman, but had been unable to find regular employment for the past five years. One witness stated that he had known deceased since January and frequently during the bitter nights of February and March they would lie sodden with rain on one of the seats of the Embankment, only to be moved on and made to walk by the first constable who came across them. Between two and three thousand homeless “heirs to glory” went to the Embankment at night.

* * *

Of course, the jury, being “practical” men, passed the usual verdict: “Death from natural causes.” It is quite recognised by the capitalist class that it is perfectly “natural” for men, able and willing to work, to die of starvation in the midst of plenty.

J. Kay.

A Look Round. (1907)

From the January 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

On January 1st all orthodox persons are supposed to make resolutions—which they devote the remaining days of the year to breaking. Reformers of all shades are amongst the orthodox, regarding the members of the S.P.G.B. as unorthodox, “visionary,” “outside the political pale,” etc. I would suggest that these folk take a resolution to ignore the things that do not matter, and to devote their energies to the only thing that does, viz., the class ownership of the means of wealth production, and the consequent enslavement and poverty of the wealth producers,

o o o

If the reformers could show any effective “reforms” as the result of their efforts ; if they could prove that any “reforms” they may have been instrumental in securing have made any real difference to the condition of the working class, one would be inclined to bear with them, but when there is abundant testimony to the failure of their efforts, to the waste of all the money they have spent, the time and energy they have devoted to the particular phases of the social problem which find favour in their eyes, one gets a little impatient. However, I will be calm and will only bid them take to heart the truth, as expounded in the following paragraph, extracted from the columns of that, most respectable organ, The Times, of Christmas Day, in its comments upon the reports by medical inspectors of the Local Government Boards.

o o o

“The stories told, it says, are monotonous, and, in most instances, the particulars are disgusting. . . Houses unfit for human habitation, rooms destitute of light and ventilation, overcrowding in rural cottages, contaminated water supplies, accumulations of every description of filth and refuse, a total absence of drainage, a reign of unbelievable dirt in milk-shops and slaughter-houses, and an inadequate supervision by officials who are frequently incompetent; such, in a general way, is the picture that is commonly presented.”

o o o

Reading an article from the pen of Mr. E. Belfort Bax in Wilshire’s Magazine, written from the National Liberal Club, England, a correspondent in America asks how the S.D.F. can square its assertion that the Liberal Party must be smashed with the fact that it allows its prominent members to belong to Liberal Clubs. We know it is usual to ask riddles at the festive season, but, owing to the ravages of the prevailing epidemic, we regret we are not up to finding the solution.

o o o

According to the Reader, one of the most prized possessions of Lord Tweedmouth is a half-crown. It is set in a frame, and underneath are the words, “Honestly earned.” We congratulate his Lordship upon being so candid as to admit that out of his large income he has only “honestly earned” one solitary half-crown in his life, and that was by accident.

o o o

Mr. Ben Cooper (Liberal) and Mr. Harry Quelch (S.D.F., and supporter of Liberal candidates) will represent the London Trades Council at the Labour Party Conference at Belfast this month.

o o o

Mr. Bell, M.P., addressing a meeting of the Derby Trades Council recently, said that he certainly had said “For God’s sake let us keep politics out of our unions,” and he was still of the same opinion. Later he declared that they had had more advantages for Labour during the past year from the Liberals than they had ever had or were likely to have from any Conservative government. His position was and always had been one of strict neutrality, but he invited them to give the Liberal Government credit.

o o o

If Mr. Bell believes in keeping politics out of the unions, why does he so continuously use union meetings to boom the Liberals and—Richard Bell, M.P. ?

o o o

In these days when wealthy and titled personages are entering the “Labour” movement, and, because of their wealth and their titles, being pushed to the front by the middle-class dominators of that movement; when “Labour ” “copy” is “good copy” in capitalist journals and magazines, the working class will need all their wits to prevent side-tracking. There is something to ponder over in the words put into the mouth of an Anarchist plotter in a story in the December Harper’s.

o o o

“Don’t you know yet that an idle and selfish class loves to see mischief being made, even if it is made at its own expense ? Its own life being all a matter of vestment and gesture, it is unable to realise the power and danger of real ache and of words that have no sham meaning. It is all fun and sentiment. It is sufficient, for instance, to point out the attitude of the old French aristocracy towards the philosophers whose words were preparing the Great Revolution. Even in England, where you have some common sense, a demagogue has only to shout loud enough and long enough to find some backing in the very class he is shouting at. You too like to see mischief being made. The demagogue gets the amateurs of emotion with him. Amateurism in this, that and the other thing is a delightfully easy way of killing time, and of feeding one’s own vanity—the silly vanity of being abreast with the ideas of the day after tomorrow. Just as good and otherwise harmless people will join you in ecstacies over your collection of old china, without having the slightest notion in what its marvellousness really consists.”

o o o

With the advent of these “aristocratic” and “millionaire” Socialists in increasing numbers, more strenuous efforts are made by their “fellow conspirators” to make Socialism appeal ever so respectable. “Hide the Red Flag” says one section; “Don’t hold meetings on Sundays,” says another; “Deny the Class War,” and so on. And here is Gaylord Wilshire, one of America’s “millionaire Socialists,” repeating the old twaddle that “The phrase ‘capital versus labour’ continually gives rise to the popular misconception that labour is against capital, or rather that the Socialist is against capital. Not at all. The Socialist is against the private ownership of capital, but certainly not against capital itself.”

o o o

The Socialist who understands the position is out for the abolition of capital. This was dealt with in our issues of April and August last.

o o o

“There are many Socialists who assert that ‘the armed nation,’ so called, should supplant the standing armies of capitalism, but the experience of Switzerland doesn’t bear out the theory. A recent meeting of Socialists in the Canton of Zurich was held to protest against the employment of troops in suppressing strikes. They claimed that in no country in Europe, Russia not excepted, were troops so constantly used to put down strikes and suppress picketing, and stated that ‘military outrages against peaceful strikers are becoming matters of daily occurrence.’ Switzerland’s military establishment is based on the ‘armed nation’ principle.” 

Wilshire’s Magazine.

o o o

In the Report of Mr. D. Cummings and his Executive of the Boiler Makers’ Union, on the failure of the Clyde Strike, and the defeat of the men, occur these words : “On account of our railway shares not being saleable without great loss, and the difficulty of disposing of the Preference shares of Armstrong, Whitworth, and Co., we were momentarily in financial difficulty, but our bankers advanced us temporarily a large sum of money at the current interest, and were prepared to advance us still more had the strike gone on.”

o o o

The capitalist Press are continually booming the “thrift” of the working class, as evidenced by their savings in trade unions, friendly societies, building societies and the like. But in a time of need, such as the strike under review, these savings are useless unless “at call.” As they are invariably invested in capitalist enterprises they are, not available when needed, except under the disadvantageous circumstances referred to in the Report. A combination of financiers could at any time, paralyze the trade unions, by dealing with their investments on the Stock Exchange in such a manner as to render them useless.

o o o

The capitalist cat has at least the proverbial number of lives, and is not going to be killed by a little Trade Dispute Act, despite the junketing of S.D.F., I.L.P., and Liberal-Labour men, who forgot their differences and ate, drank, and were merry together at the Shackleton Banquet last month.

J. Kay

Blogger's Note:

"There is something to ponder over in the words put into the mouth of an Anarchist plotter in a story in the December Harper’s . . . " 

The passage quoted from Harper's magazine is from Joseph Conrad's short story, 'The Informer'. I'm guessing this short story was one of Conrad's dry runs for his more famous work, The Secret Agent.

So They Say: Same the Whole World Over (1974)

The So They Say Column from the February 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

Same the Whole World Over

The Paris paper Le Monde on 27th December published tables of French workers’ earnings in 1973. The information comes from employers’ official returns, and covers a working population of 13 millions.

The headline tells the story: 60% of earnings are less than 1750 francs a month. 1750 francs is in fact the approximate upper limit of the largest group of wage earners, 34.2 per cent., who receive between 1165f. and 1745f. On 27th December the exchange rate was 10.85f. to the £, giving an English equivalent for this group of about £27.10 to about £40.60 a week.

13.9 per cent. of French workers receive between 935f. a month, or £21.35 a week, and 1165f., and 14.2 per cent. less than 935f. When these figures are seen in relation to substantially higher costs for food and clothing, the position in France is the same as that of workers in Britain and other countries. To round off the similarity, a lucky 1.5 per cent, receive above 7000f. a month. Work it out for yourself.

An Incomes Policy at Last? 

A country where working-class living standards are lower than elsewhere is Russia. A report by Edmund Stevens in The Times on 2nd January described the satisfaction of the Russian press at “comparing the conditions in the Soviet Union with the turmoil and violence in much of the world”, and went on:

Nor is there a threat of petrol shortage, or an energy crisis, or runaway inflation.

However, the article went on to say that petrol prices are expected shortly to go up by 60 per cent., and that many prices have risen recently: sturgeon and other choice fish by nearly 300 per cent., while the cost of caviar doubled in December. How then does the Soviet government avoid monetary and petrol troubles? The answer is supplied:

None of this affected the vast majority of people, who have no need for petrol and could not afford such delicacies as caviar and sturgeon at previous prices, which were raised repeatedly during the past decade.

What a good way of avoiding problems — simply by not letting people have enough money to buy things ! Heath must be envious. But it should be noted that only “runaway” inflation is absent from Russia. The report tells us:

A kind of selective creeping inflation has been going on ever since 1961, when the old roubles were converted to new ones at a 10-1 rate.

So they seem to have problems after all.

Gold Mine Turns Out to be Mirage

A favourite argument of those who tell us the capitalist system is different now is to point to the number of small investors who allegedly represent the working class getting a stake in the ownership of the means of production. Under the heading “Relying on a little help from friends” a Guardian investment writer on 5th January gave a different picture (and, incidentally, showed the futility of much of the advice given by investment writers). He said:

The small investor must beware of tips in newspapers, because when he reads of them a few hundred thousand others will have read them also . . . Stockbrokers don’t want the small man. Indeed anyone with funds of less than £10,000, unless he has investment knowledge, should, if he wants equities, buy investment trusts or unit trusts.

Realistic words. They mean the capitalist class do not mind letting you have interest on small savings, but will not encourage big ideas of sharing with them. And which of us has not got “funds of less than £10,000”?

Trouble in Blue Heaven

The Socialist Party has always opposed every form of censorship. We often meet well-meaning advocates of it who say they agree generally, but believe there is some special evil to which its application will be justified. Part of the answer to them is that once censorship is instituted its use is not limited, and becomes an additional instrument for the suppression of opinion.

An interesting demonstration was given in two letters to The Guardian on 10th January. Both were concerned with the Cinematograph and Indecent Displays Bill now going through Parliament; one was from the chairman of a group of Greater London Young Conservatives, the other from the secretary of an Arts Co-operative. The first fears that the Bill will allow pornography still to be sold under the counter while restricting the availability of Men Only, Mayfair and Penthouse. The second fears that it will be used to suppress Picasso nudes.

Their juxtaposition makes our point, handsomely.

Oiling the Works

Commentators have been getting good mileage out of North Sea oil. Not only will it, in a few years, be replenishing the petrol-pumps and generators of Britain. It will bring “prosperity”. The suggestion is of a good time coming, when the working class will be more than compensated for the hardships of the three-day week and wage restraint.

Whoever believes this should read the financial pages. The good time is being had already — but not by the workers. On 4th January the Guardian's “City Comment” reported the “windfall” which has come to the merchant bank group Edward Bates.

The principal part of the $12 millions deals announced by Bates for the acquisition of working interests and royalties, was negotiated when oil was selling at $4.20 a barrel in the U.S. It is currently being sold at $8.30. As a result, the Bates projection of oil and gas income for 1974 jumps from $2.6 millions to $4.8 millions, not to mention the substantial capital gains which will result in property values.

The next day the Technology Correspondent told of the prosperity resulting from the latest North Sea find: “£180 millions added to the values of BP and Burmah Oil”. The Guardian writer calls the Bates acquisition “an example of the pickings to be had in the American market” over North Sea oil. Incorrect. The "pickings” are had out of the exploitation of the workers — for whom windfalls from capitalism remain elusive.

Where We Came In

Can you place this quotation?

You can’t conceive what existence is like without trains or tubes . . . and probably no electric light tomorrow. We in Richmond can still get to Waterloo; but Hampstead is entirely cut off . . . Then the experts say that the working classes have behaved with such incredible stupidity that the Government will beat them; and this strike is only the beginning of others far worse to follow. They say we are in for such a year as has never been known.

It comes in fact from a letter written by Virginia Woolf in 1919, quoted in her biography. What should be noted, apart from its contemporary ring, is that Mrs. Woolf was associated with groups who were going to end the inefficiency and inequity of capitalism. And fifty-five years later it is still the same.

Robert Barltrop