First Published: The Call, Vol. 6, No. 16, April 25, 1977.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
Copyright: This work is in the Public Domain under the Creative Commons Common Deed. You can freely copy, distribute and display this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line as your source, include the url to this work, and note any of the transcribers, editors & proofreaders above.
The recently published Draft Program of the Communist Party (M-L) exposes the real character of the present economic crisis. It refutes the myth that the U.S. working class today is enjoying a higher standard of living than any time in history.
The Program shows that, in fact, imperialism is a system of continual crisis which is driving the working class into impoverishment. There are no “solutions” which can save imperialism from its crisis.
As the Draft Program states, “Crisis is inherent in imperialism. The general crisis reflects the overall decline and decay of the imperialist system: full recovery for imperialism is impossible.” Today, cyclical crises of overproduction, which are inevitable under capitalism, are becoming more frequent and devastating. This is because they are occurring within the framework of the general crisis of world capitalism.
In the earlier part of the century, periods of crisis and depression were followed by extended periods of boom and recovery. Today, U.S. imperialism is moving from one crisis to the next without full recovery in between. We are now in the midst of the sixth and most severe and protracted crisis since World War II.
These crises are, in turn, sharpening all the contradictions of capitalism. Unemployment is skyrocketing, prices are rising, and products are produced which can’t be sold.
How do these crises occur? Why do all these unsold products sit in warehouses while millions live in, poverty? Why are U.S. factories running at only 73% capacity while millions are out of work?
The Draft Program points out that these cyclical crises of overproduction arise out of the basic contradiction of capitalist society – the contradiction between the social character of production and the private appropriation of wealth.
On the one hand, the working class has been concentrated and drawn together, socialized by the very process, of capitalist production itself. But, on the other hand, socialization of production does not serve the interests of society as a whole, but only of a small group of capitalists who “increasingly concentrate the ownership of the means of production into their own hands.” In the U.S. today, for example, less than 5,000 capitalists control the 500 corporations which account for 78% of all profits.
The Draft Program shows that this contradiction between private appropriation and social production results in totally anarchistic and unplanned production. In the race for profits, every capitalist or grouping of capitalists tries to expand their enterprises and increase their volume of production in fierce competition with one another. They do this without knowing how much demand there is for their product.
A good example is the overproduction that occurred in 1974 in the highly monopolized auto industry, when the Big Three auto makers suddenly found themselves with two million unsold cars. These cars sat unsold, not because workers don’t need new cars, but because the workers and oppressed people in this country cannot afford to buy the very commodities they produce. As the Draft Program states, “Capitalism reduces the ability of the people to consume these goods by continually driving down their living standards and increasing their impoverishment.”
The working class is growing poorer in a country where wealth abounds. The wages of the workers are being eaten-up by inflation as the cost of living surpasses wage increases. Overall, the “real“ wages or actual buying power of the workers has declined by 0.4% since 1967. These figures do not take into account the “income” of millions of unemployed workers.
The standard of living of the working class is affected, not only by their “real” wages, but also by the intensity of labor and working conditions. The imperialists try to hold back and inhibit many technical innovations which might threaten their profits. But at the same time, they do introduce some technical improvements which will reduce their costs.
Through these limited technical improvements, combined with speedups and job combination, the capitalists are able to extract more surplus value from the workers. This means that for the same wage, each worker has to expend more energy and, overall, fewer workers are needed for the same amount of production. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, production of “output per man hour” more than doubled in less than 30 years between 1949 and 1975.
Thus, under capitalism, the great technical achievements of science are used exclusively to secure higher profits for the capitalists, and every technical improvement is turned into an instrument for the greater exploitation of the working class.
This increasing exploitation is reflected today in the growing reserve of unemployed and in the murderous speedups of workers on the job. In earlier parts of this century, the industrial reserve army dwindled in times of prosperity. Today it has become a permanent and growing part of U.S. society. Unemployment has remained above 7% since 1974 and is many times higher for youth and national minorities. Millions of U.S. workers have been condemned to a state of more or less permanent joblessness.
In addition to drastically lowering the standard of living of those without jobs, unemployment also strengthens the capitalists’ ability to drive the wages and working conditions of employed workers even further down. Thus, unemployment increases the impoverishment of the whole working class.
All of these signs of decline in the standard of living of the working class show the truth of Marx’s statement that, under capitalism, the tendency towards impoverishment of the working class is “absolute.” In other words, the workers are actually growing poorer than before.
The percentage of U.S. people living below the poverty line increased more sharply in 1975 than at any time in the previous 20 years. The working class is plagued by urban blight and deteriorating housing. Crime is at an all-time high.
In addition to tending towards “absolute” impoverishment, the working class in this country is facing greater “relative” impoverishment. This means that the workers’ share of the national income is growing smaller as the capitalists’ share grows larger. On the one hand, sales of $284,000 power cruisers to the bourgeoisie are booming. On the other hand, workers are literally freezing to death because they cannot afford to pay their gas bills.
In addition to the growing economic impoverishment of the working class, the political effects of the crisis on the masses are devastating. Police repression and threats of war and fascism are growing. As the Program points out, “The weight of the crisis is falling especially heavily on the oppressed nationalities, youth and women, who suffer intensely under these conditions.”
The Draft Program targets and exposes the reformists and revisionists, who push the view that capitalism can be saved from its crises through increased government spending or reordering of Priorities. The revisionist CPUSA promotes liberal reforms like the Humphrey-Hawkins bill which does not provide a single job, as a “solution” to the crisis and unemployment. The revisionists say the Soviet Union will create jobs for U.S. workers. They also say the crisis can be solved if the imperialists “reorder priorities” by cutting arms spending and devoting more money to public welfare programs.
But, as Lenin pointed out,“ As long as capitalism remains what it is, surplus capital will be utilized not for the purpose of raising the standard of the masses in a given country, for this would mean a decline in profits ... ”
The revisionists’ strategy cannot lead the working class out of the crisis because it leaves the imperialist system intact. As the Draft Program states: “The crisis is revealing even more clearly to millions of people the totally reactionary character of U.S. imperialism as a system of exploitation, oppression, war and crisis ... The deepening of the crisis creates the conditions for revolution as working and oppressed peoples rise up against the capitalist system ... ”
Our new Party will lead a massive revolutionary fightback against these daily attacks on the living standards of the working class and oppressed people. It will show the need for the working class to seize the means of production from the handful of imperialists. Only under socialism can the productive forces of modern society and the abundant social wealth be used for the benefit of all toiling people.