TheOldGreyWhistle wrote:For

February 23, 2012 at 2:23 pm #87789

Anonymous

Inactive

TheOldGreyWhistle wrote:

For your candidate to claim that your first and only aim is the abolition of the wages system is misleading. I understand that one of the implications of the working class taking control of the state and dispossessing the capitalist class will be the abolition of capital and wages but we cannot abolish the wages system until then.

One of our candidates replied to a similar point made recently (February 15th) on the Party’s election blog:-http://spgb.blogspot.com/”I consider myself, almost, taken to task. Given, though, that the wages system is the essence of capitalism, you cannot abolish it within capitalism. Yes, it’s conceivable that it could be abolished to be replaced by some other class society: a restored serfdom; a return to chattel slavery; or something new altogether. As our commenter notes, however, we’re calling on the working class to do this for themselves.Indeed, I would agree with the prescription that political action to achieve common ownership is a prerequisite for abolishing the wages system; and the only way in which I think it could realistically be done. That said, we start from the conscious knowledge that we are people who live by selling our labour power, and our struggle to free ourselves must include ending that condition.”

TheOld GreyWhistle wrote:

Abolition of the wages system is not mentioned in your Aims and Declaration of Principles nor does it imply common ownership and democratic control. Many societies in the past did not have a wages system but they could hardly have been described as socialist.

You have the cart before the horse The Object of the Party clearly states:-The establishment of a system of society based upon the common ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth by and in the interest of the whole communityIn a classless society where wealth is held in common the medium of exchange ceases to exist as it would serve no purpose, and all the associated paraphernalia, including the wages system, is consigned to the dustbin of history.