Bring on the socialist revolution!

(Written 26/07/2011, in response to the question below, asking how a "peoples revolution" against banker's and politician's greed could happen.)

 

> To me, the only question is how to bring that about without causing yet more chaos.

> Thoughts?

Bear in mind I'm in the Marxist corner as you read this, inasmuch as I agree with Marx's analysis of society, while accepting that he got the rise of the middle-class completely wrong.

It would be difficult to rebalance things without some chaos - if, by "chaos" you include lawbreaking and other forms of civil action. All the power that the Left has won has always come from some kind of struggle, and taking back that power from the forces of Capitalism will take action of some kind.

Here's where we are with Capitalism. I remember an interview with billionaire Theo Paphitis where he explained that the acquisition of further wealth wasn't really about being greedy. After a certain point, money doesn't make him feel any richer - "It's just a handy way of keeping score." That summed it up for me, Capitalism in a sentence. All them bloated plutocrats, they're not doing it to get richer, they're doing it to increase their scores.

Therefore, anything that reduces profits, like sharing the wealth, implementing shorter hours, offering salaries that are higher than what's necessary to attract just as many people as you need - well, that's just reducing the score, so it won't happen.

I find that attitude completely incomprehensible, but then I'm a Marxist. The power-holders and the money owners clearly are not, and I doubt we'd share many values. So, short-term, those people have to be bound by laws passed by a Government that, for want of a better word, would have to be Socialist (ic). Long-term, it has to be education of the masses so that the wealth accumulators are seen as being the same as a 6 year old at his/her birthday party who, when the cake is handed round, throws a tantrum and screams "No! S'my cake. MY cake! All of it!!!"

The only examples I can give are from my own thoughts and hopes of being well-off. Assume, if you will, that my company was super-successful. The first thing that would happen is that a lot of employees would get a pay rise, because from day one of (my company name omitted) I have had a rule that nobody is allowed to earn less than 10% of my pay packet plus any dividend I pay myself. (OK, I only employ 1 person, but she gets a minimum of 10% of the profits plus a weekend ticket to Fairport Convention's Cropredy Festival whenever she can get there.)

I think the next idea I'd explore would be a four day week. We'd still operate five or more days a week, just with more staff. A decent pension scheme would be important, too, with the company chucking in double what any employee contributed up to, say, 8%, and with a minimum mandatory contribution of 4%. Oh, and one percent of profits, maybe more, goes to charity, the charities being voted on by the staff. Any employee raising money for charity can expect the company to double what they raise. That'll do to start with.

I'd feel pretty good if I could run a company like that, providing employment, spreading the wealth around to both employees and charity - and I could probably rub along on a few hundred thousand a year. Of course I'd have the Villa Piaf Mort near Grasse, but at 9m euros, I couldn't afford to buy it with a dividend, because according to the !0% rule, that means I'd have to pay all my staff a minimum of 900,000 euros. So the company would buy it, and there would be ten weeks spread across the year where employees could use it, and the cars in the garage. Half the places would be allocated by ballot, the other half being awarded by a series of incentive schemes.

See? You don't need to bring the means of production under state control to achieve a fair deal for the workers, you just need an employer/entrepreneur who likes being both well-off and making his/her workers lives better in equal measure.

What, though, of the customers of my company? Well, unless there's some kind of radical change in thinking, such a company couldn't exist in Britain because most Brits hate successful people with a passion and cling to a deep suspicion of education of any kind. They'll condemn the lack of manufacturing jobs as they buy Chinese toasters, and point out that all the jobs go to people from other nationalities, anyway. They put their savings into bank accounts paying 0.1% interest, rather than buying investment bonds in a basket of British industries, or buying Govt debt at a guaranteed 6%, or buying Premium Bonds which, if held for five years with a minimum investment of £5000, will return around 4% in most cases. It seems that the idea that the last three options actually puts money into the economy is too difficult for them. Then they grumble when the bank they've trusted their savings to, the one that rewards them with 0.1% interest, hands out millions of pounds in bonuses to traders who look on those cheques as their score for the year.

When the breathalyser was first introduced, it was accompanied by a massive campaign designed to change attitudes. Drinking and driving went from being something that people boasted about, to being something that people were ashamed of, in around ten years or less. We need the same kind of social campaign that condemns greed at the expense of bringing benefits to the community, and an education programme that explains to the slowest of thinker that when you buy a Chinese toaster, you're - please concentrate here - giving pounds to a Chinese company that doesn't employ any British workers, doesn't advertise vacancies at your local JobCentre, and would make you go and live in China if you secured a job with them. For some people, it has to be explained at a really basic level.

As does socialism, and please note the lower case "s". There's no harm in being rich, but riches need to come with some responsibilites, like looking after the people who make the money for you, putting a bit back in so that the people who fall through the welfare state net can be helped, and making the community around you a better place just because it's nicer that way. How many people think like that, though?

Once you get to a point where you regard the accumulation of wealth as being some kind of score, though, there's no hope. Capitalism has won, and the only real chance is some kind of People's Revolution - which invariably leads to chaos.

So see you on the barricades, comrades, and when we liberate Buckingham Palace for the proletariat, remember that I've got dibs on the bedroom farthest away from that sodding bagpiper.