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Letters
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Dear Editors,
I would be interested in your answers to the following points:
(1) Massive social improvements have been achieved since WW2 by
modifying
capitalism. This is a proven strategy for improving the lives of
working people.
Abolishing capitalism is unproven and so ambitious and unlikely that
most
people can't even imagine it. Better to play the percentage game and
stick with a
socially modified form of capitalism along Scandinavian lines.
(2) I work for a company owned by capitalists so why don't I feel
oppressed?
I make as much money as I want doing a job I enjoy without being an
owner or shareholder.
(3) People need a contrast between work and leisure in order to
appreciate and
enjoy their leisure time. This would be lost if paid work was
abolished.
(4) Are NHS workers also wage slaves? If so, why? Since they work for
the good of
the whole of society not a capitalist's profit.
N. B., Maccesfield.
Reply:
(1) It is true that, compared with their equivalents in 1945, most
people in Britain
today are better off in terms of what they consume. But this hasn't
been the result
of Scandinavian-type "social modification" of capitalism since it has
also happened
in other countries, such as the US, which have not adopted such a
policy.
It will have been the result partly of workers working more
intensively than they did
in 1945 and so needing to consume more to regenerate their mental and
physical
energies and partly also of their increased productiveness allowing the
capitalists
under trade union pressure to pay higher wages while still
extracting more
profit.
Even so, most people do probably see things like you do, which
will be one
of the reasons why they have not been interested in socialist ideas.
But they still
have money problems and they are also affected by wider social problems
wars
and the threat of war, pollution, crime which can only be solved
in the context
of a socialist society. On the world scale of course it's a different
story with record
numbers living in absolute poverty.
As to Socialism being ambitious what worthwhile goal isn't? 99
percent of the
socialist revolution consists of imbuing our class with the confidence
and ambition to
succeed, and a revulsion of living as wage slaves whether pampered or
ill-fed: once we
have this our numbers will carry the day.
(2) Just because you don't feel oppressed doesn't mean you are not
being
exploited. Why do you think your capitalist company employs you if not
because it is
getting more money from what you do than what it pays you? It's
certainly not doing
this just to give you money to live on. Wait and see what will happen
if the company
ever runs into financial difficulties or is taken over.
(3) All that those socialists who have speculated about the
disappearance of the
distinction between work and leisure in socialism mean is that work,
like leisure
activities today, could become something people like doing not an
impossibility
since even under capitalism today you yourself say you like the job
you're doing.
Of course, there will still be a distinction in socialism between
organised work to be
done during set hours, even if enjoyable, and recreational activities
carried out at
the individual's discretion.
(4) Yes, NHS workers are wage-slaves in the sense that, not having any
large
unearned income from owning property, to get the money to buy the
things they
need to live, they have to sell themselves or more accurately,
their working abilities
on the labour market for a wage. They may be employed by a
governmental body
and be doing a useful job (at least some of them, not those working in
accounts)
rather than for a profit-seeking capitalist firm, but they are still
exploited in the
sense of working for a longer time than the value of the working skills
they sell and
are paid for.
Editors
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Socialist
Party
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London
Central
London branch*
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6.30pm. The Shakespeare's Head, 64-68
Kingsway, Holborn. (Nearest tube:
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and Haringey branch*
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Tel: 0117 9511199
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Tel: 01692 582533.
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Tel: 07890343044
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028 90852062
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. 3rd Wednesday of
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Tel: 01328 541643
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EH5 6UW.
Tel: 01506 462359
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Tel: 01792 643624
Cardiff
and District
. John James, 67
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Barry CF62 6RR.
Tel: 01446 405636 |
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Bankura, 722122
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18, 8270 Højbjerg.
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Companion Parties overseas
World
Socialist Party of Australia.
P. O. Box 1266 North Richmond
3121, Victoria, Australia.. Email:
commonownership@yahoo.com.au
Socialist
Party of Canada/Parti
Socialiste du
Canada
. Box 4280,
Victoria B.C. V8X 3X8 Canada. E-mail:
SPC@iname.com
World
Socialist Party (New Zealand)
P.O. Box 1929, Auckland, NI, New Zealand.
World
Socialist Party of the United States
P.O. Box 440247,
Boston, MA 02144 USA.
E-mail: wspboston@covad.net
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