The Grey River Argus TUESDAY, June 1, 1948. THE FINAL ANALYSIS

Grey River Argus, 1 June 1948, Page 4

The Grey River Argus TUESDAY, June 1, 1948. THE FINAL ANALYSIS

MONOTONOUS is the only * word to describe the way in which the pro-r-apitalist press of this country ignores the most fundamental fact of the economic situation to-day. ' Whether it be Australia’s price control referendum, our own import regulations, or the hours and wages of labour, the situation is invariably termed, an abnormal one. Every plan of the Labour Movement which recognises, not merely the accidental or temporary circumstances of the social organisation, but also the essential and lasting realities is scoffed at as socialistic-. Marxism. The truth, however, is that there is much more in common between the Marxian and the capitalistic objective that there is between the Labour Movement and either of them. It is to hide this fact that our Nationalistic Partyv. scribes are as anxious to confuse Communism and Labour, as they are to exclude any comparison between Communism and Capitalism. They aver instead that the Labour Governments here, in Australia and in Britain are insincere when they • disavow Communist theory, and combat Communistic activity in practice. Now it Avoidd be equally dishonest to deny that there is one fundamental feature of -capitalistic society recognised both in theory and in practice by all three, but the, capitalist class, is as remarked, constrained in the dialectical sense to protend this basic feature is one of no consequence at all. The Nationalist press denies indeed that society is so capitalistic as it was, while asserting that it were better to go back to what it used to be than to remain as it is is, or to b'e further modified along the lines which are alleged to be socialistic in the sense of Communistic. The question then is what actually is that fundamental feature of present industrial capitalism which all perceive, some admit, and others try to modify or to alter. The fact is that' the great majority of the people are not capitalists at all. That is one obvious reason why the Australian Government has sought to unify price control, why our Government has regulated in some degree the se-

cond fundamental characteristic of capitalism —namely competition by means of import control —-,and why Britain has put most of her eggs in the basket of industrial exportation. The true description of our system is that of a proletarian society. In other words it is one to which all are politically free, not simply to ■ make a mark on. a Parliamentary ballot paper, but to make a contract binJding upon the one party as equally as upon the other. An exception, might be mentioned. If a proletarian, that is a wage-earner is incapacitated by accident at work, there is a liability oh the capitalist employer to compensate. The reason of this modification of freedom is simply that the average wage-earner from the very nature of capitilistic society cannot be expected to have the means of tiding over a period of incapacity, however temporary, much less permanently. To control prices so that workers may not hunger should be consistent with the . existing law for insurance against industrial casualty, but the capitalists, whose urge is competitive, do not try in any degree to regulate prices and quality otherwise than so as to rake in profit at the maximum. It is therefore a joke when some capitalistic press apologist says such schemes of pure stabilisation as none have contested are due only to these being time# that are abnormal, and that when cut-throat competition, over-production, unemployment, and rampant poverty return, we shall have really and truly got back again to bed-rock normality. In their philosophy,, to give a free field for the exploitation, hot only of the natural means of wealth, but of labour, and of markets, is the sole requisite for normality. They are ready to sanction no little subsidisation of prices when it suits the capitalist, but if it suits the wage-worker the question is raised that it comes from taxation. In Australia, for instance, the Federal Government is expected to subsidise prices to the extent of forty millions yearly, and at the same to forgo the exercise of control as to what the recipients shall charge on the goods subsidised. The object is that anything calculated to render capitalism—or, correctly stated, proletarianism—workable is normal. The simple meaning of that attitude is that it is to be reckoned natural for the very few to own all the means of production, and natural for the very many to bo beholden to this few for a job, a wage—an existence. Is it natural that the great majority should regard this as inevitable? Is it evil if the idea that ownership of means of production should be shared by the majority should blossom in the minds of the majority? The strain to the social system is undoubtedly this one —the comparative few who own can dictate; and the great majority, deprived of ownership, though in theory or politically free, compelled to labour for the owners. Stabilisation may, like compensation, ease this strain from' time to time, but it remains. Every school of thought admits its existence. One school in this country is out to perpetuate and consolidate it, but the attempt is going against the tide. Either the majority of men must be restored to economic as well as political freedom, or the minority risks the loss of it.