[lbo-talk] Cuba to abandon salary equality

Mike Ballard swillsqueal at yahoo.com.au
Sat Jun 14 16:40:36 PDT 2008


You could use Marx's suggestion from the "Critique of the Gotha" programme or elsewhere, as opposed to Proudhon's "equality of wages" concept. People could draw from the social store of goods and services on the basis of how many socially necessary hours they put into the production of goods and services, minus the amount necessary to maintain and expand the means of production. After all, it was SUPPOSED to be a communist revolution.

Mike B)

The carbon atoms in your body were forged inside a star somewhere, billions of years ago. http://www.myspace.com/ballardoso

--- On Sat, 14/6/08, Chris Doss <lookoverhere1 at yahoo.com> wrote:


> From: Chris Doss <lookoverhere1 at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Cuba to abandon salary equality
> To: swillsqueal at yahoo.com.au
> Received: Saturday, 14 June, 2008, 11:57 PM
> How was the USSR supposed to pay people? You go to the store
> and get annthing you want?
>
> --- On Sat, 6/14/08, Mike Ballard
> <swillsqueal at yahoo.com.au> wrote:
>
> > From: Mike Ballard <swillsqueal at yahoo.com.au>
> > Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Cuba to abandon salary
> equality
> > To: "lbo lbo" <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org>
> > Date: Saturday, June 14, 2008, 8:31 AM
> > Chris writes:
> >
> > > I know nothing about Cuba, but the whole
> "salary
> > ceiling" system was very
> > > unpopular in the USSR.
> > ============================
> > Lots of discussion about this on Lou Proyect's
> list. Be
> > interested to hear
> > more on the unpopularity of the system in the USSR. My
> > take: Cuba is being
> > forced to follow the path taken by the Soviets,
> Chinese,
> > and others who
> > abolished and then restored capitalism:
> >
> > http://www.marxmail.org/msg42977.html
> >
> > http://www.marxmail.org/msg42945.html
> > ************
> >
> > As Marx pointed out, where there is wage labour, there
> is
> > capital. It's no wonder to me why the trasition
> to
> > communism beccame a transition to full blown
> industrial
> > capitalism.
> >
> > Mike B)
> > **************
> >
> > The very development of modern industry must
> progressively
> > turn the scale in favour of the capitalist against the
> > working man, and that consequently the general
> tendency of
> > capitalistic production is not to raise, but to sink
> the
> > average standard of wages, or to push the value of
> labour
> > more or less to its minimum limit. Such being the
> tendency
> > of things in this system, is this saying that the
> working
> > class ought to renounce their resistance against the
> > encroachments of capital, and abandon their attempts
> at
> > making the best of the occasional chances for their
> > temporary improvement? If they did, they would be
> degraded
> > to one level mass of broken wretches past
> salvation.... By
> > cowardly giving way in their everyday conflict with
> > capital, they would certainly disqualify themselves
> for the
> > initiating of any larger movement.
> >
> > At the same time, and quite apart from the general
> > servitude involved in the wages system, the working
> class
> > ought not to exaggerate to themselves the ultimate
> working
> > of these everyday struggles. They ought not to forget
> that
> > they are fighting with effects, but not with the
> causes of
> > those effects; that they are retarding the downward
> > movement, but not changing its direction; that they
> are
> > applying palliatives, not curing the malady. They
> ought,
> > therefore, not to be exclusively absorbed in these
> > unavoidable guerilla fights incessantly springing up
> from
> > the never-ceasing encroachments of capital or changes
> of
> > the market. They ought to understand that, with all
> the
> > miseries it imposes upon them, the present system
> > simultaneously engenders the material conditions and
> the
> > social forms necessary for an economical
> reconstruction of
> > society. Instead of the conservative motto, A fair
> > day's wage for a fair day's work! they ought
> to
> > inscribe on their banner the
> > revolutionary watchword, Abolition of the wages
> system!
> >
> > Marx, 'Value, Price and Profit'
> >
> > The carbon atoms in your body were forged inside a
> star
> > somewhere, billions of years ago.
> > http://www.myspace.com/ballardoso
> >
> >
> > Get the name you always wanted with the new
> y7mail
> > email address.
> > www.yahoo7.com.au/mail
> >
> > ___________________________________
> > http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk

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