Remember the Real Robbery

The sad fact is that workers -- those who vote and those who don't -- still buy into the notion that capitalism can somehow solve the problems and miseries it creates and confronts them with. This misunderstanding is no accident. That misconception is nurtured deliberately by capitalism's politicians, and by assorted capitalist agencies of disinformation and misinformation -- the media, the schools, the universities, the churches, the pro-capitalist union leaders, the ever-present reformers and more -- all of which are dominated by pro-capitalist interests. Those interests and their political lackeys are primarily concerned with the preservation of their system -- the source of their wealth and their positions of privilege -- at the continued expense of the useful producers of the nation. They will not and do not hesitate to mouth any promise or resort to any act they think will serve their purpose, no matter how hypocritical or ruthless. They all camouflage and disguise the reality that there can be no hope for a sane and decent society within the confines of the capitalist system. Capitalism cannot be reformed, regardless of how righteous reformers may be. Capitalism is beyond that. Its very nature militates against such efforts. It is the task of the World Socialist Movement to arouse the working class to its historic mission to abolish capitalism and replace it with socialism.

It is true that the capitalist class appears to be winning the class struggle. That, however, is because the capitalists are united in their battle against the workers, despite differences regarding strategy and tactics. They have their goal clearly in mind -- the pursuit of ever-greater profits through the continued and ever-intensified exploitation of the workers. The capitalist system prevails by default. It exists because the working class is weak. The working class is weak because it is disorganised. It is disorganised because it lacks a fundamental understanding of the class nature of capitalism and its own class interest. The workers must at come to understand that the hope and future of this planet rest in their hands. They must focus their concerns and political perspectives on themselves, on their collective interests as a class, on their latent economic and political power and its potential for changing society in a manner that will assure economic security and social welfare for all.

It is not possible to exaggerate the importance of the law of value and the theory of surplus value. Upon an understanding of this economic law and its corollary rests the fate of the working class. Recessions, unemployment, working-class insecurity -- all these flow from the working out of the law of value and surplus value. Through an understanding of Marxian economics, we learn how the capitalist class robs the working class on a colossal scale. We learn what causes strikes -- and how the union leaders betray the workers in the settlements they negotiate. The Socialist Party accepts the Marxian law of value as true and works for a society in which the workers -- the useful producers, or everyone in a society without parasites -- will collectively own their collective products. The products will go to the producers. Any other arrangement in which the workers receive back but a part of their product and the capitalists keep the rest, amounts to robbery. This would be true, too, in a phony socialist society in which politicians and bureaucrats, removed from production and therefore not needed for production, received incomes in return for being parasites, and for usurping the power that belongs to the useful producers of society. The Socialist Party does not compromise on this issue, for to do so would be to concede that the parasites -- capitalists or politicians and bureaucrats -- are entitled to the wealth they steal from the workers. The parties falsely calling themselves socialist, that failed to base themselves on the factual correctness of the law of value have disappeared or nullified themselves by being satisfied with reforms. The Socialist Party cannot be so satisfied, for its knows that the collective capitalists steal from the collective workers so that they can keep on stealing into perpetuity, and that both the present and the future welfare of the useful producers of society can be met only by stopping the thievery and assuring the product to the producers.

The law of value leads therefore to two vital conclusions:

1. The wealth in the hands of the capitalist class is plunder - wealth created by labor and stolen (albeit legally) from labor.

2. The capitalists play a completely useless role. Were their class status and privileges eliminated through the outlawing of private ownership of the means of social production, the workers of brain and brawn could produce all the good things of life for the benefit of the producers. The logic of the law of value is that those who produce the wealth should have it. Production for use and production democratically administered is socialism.

It is very easy for workers to become fixated with the tax deductions on their paychecks, believing that the amounts listed show the wealth that is stolen from them. The real and far greater robbery, however, lies in the huge surplus values that they create with their labour but never see or enjoy. The truth of the matter is that taxes, directly or indirectly, are paid out of surplus value-the share of the value, contained in the products that the working class creates, that is taken by the employing, capitalist class. That is why taxes are not an issue for the working class. They are a distraction from the real issue that should concern them: the exploitation of the working class by the capitalist class.

The key to understanding how the working class is robbed is to recognise that wages do not reflect the value of the workers' product. Wages are the price of workers' labor power, or ability to work. Under capitalism, workers, in order to make a living, must sell their labor power, as a commodity, on a labor market, in which the capitalists are the buyers. Under capitalism, there are certain economic laws -- principally, the law of value -- that govern the price of commodities. Like other commodities, labor power has a definite exchange value, around which the price (wages) will tend to gravitate, despite the fluctuations of supply and demand. Basically, the economic laws of capitalism operate such that workers, on average, receive a "living wage." There are variations for different kinds of labour power, of course -- an engineer will tend to command a higher wage than a farmworker. But on the whole, workers, when employed, receive just enough to support themselves and raise a new generation of workers. However, the value of workers' labour power and the value of workers' product are two different things. Under capitalism, workers create much more value than they receive in the form of wages.

Typically, in an 8-hour workday, the value of the products that workers create in about the first 1-1/2 to 2 hours of work will equal their wages. For the other 6 to 6-1/2 hours, workers are creating surplus value -- value, in the form of real wealth, which goes to the capitalist class, not for working, but for "owning." That is what socialists mean when they say that the capitalist class exploits the working class. It is out of this surplus value that the capitalists make their profits, after they pay off any other capitalists owed rent, interest, advertising fees, etc., and pay the taxes needed to support the government. Exploitation is not something that exists only in theory. The robbery of the working class can be measured.

Workers should continue to battle deteriorating living standards on the economic front, by uniting with their fellow workers at the workplace and not by becoming involved in capitalist tax debates. However, for a real solution to exploitation, workers must educate themselves as to the real nature of capitalism, and then build the appropriate organisations to bring about the necessary social change. They should become aware of several concepts: that they, as a class, produce all social wealth; that they are exploited by the capitalist class at the point of production; that their condition can only deteriorate as long as capitalism continues, and that their long-term goal must be social ownership and workers' control of the means of production and distribution.

Remember: The real battle facing the working class has nothing to do with taxes. The real battle is to put an end to the robbery of the working class by the capitalist class.