Re: [Marxism] The Road Forward - I get happy thiking about communism

[Waistline2@xxxxxxx]

In a message dated 12/26/03 12:28:10 PM Pacific Standard Time,
clyder@xxxxxxxxxx writes:
Marx's formulation, following Owen, was that in the first phase
of communism labour time would still regulate distribution - the
famous system of labour vouchers he spoke of in Critique of the
Gotha Programme.

Waistline has repeatedly said that we are reaching the end of
the period of value production, this is a provocative and original
insight, but I think he overstates the case.

Comment

Under our present state of development of the productive forces, distribution
networks and communications infrastructure, does one need a labor voucher to
ensure access to water? To transportation? To education? To medical services?
To basic food stuffs? To attain access to an Internet Cafe? To ensure access
to energy in their home?

Or is a system of registration of that which is consumed and in constant need
of reproduction needed? That portion of the population on Welfare use what is
called Bridge Cards for access to food stuff and this is not a labor voucher.

The basic proposition is not a society completely run by robots or advance
robotics. The proposition is that the technological regime undermines and
unravel the value form or the commodity form of the social products.

Section 3 of Capital is called "The Form of Value or Exchange-Value."

It is probably true that I tend to overstate this juncture of the evolution
of the commodity form of the social products and why the current technological
regime undermines and unravels the exchange value relationship or economy
based on the purchase and sell of labor power. We are at the beginning of a new
juncture and perhaps by 2014 - ten years from now, more will become clear. By
2024 it will be fairly obvious that the emergent communist class is no
theoretical fiction.

Today the world auto production could be reconfigured to eliminate perhaps
eighty percent of the manual labor force. The technical know how has been in
existence for decades. However the bourgeoisie is the involuntary promoter of
technological innovation.

A universal system of labor vouchers makes sense under conditions of
industrial production but not under today's conditions and our technological 
regime.
Our current reproduction process is not simply bourgeois production - which it
is, but reproduces a mass of commodities that are destructive to human life
and nature.

I hate to be petty but I vote that we eliminate  80% of all the energy and
labor that goes into the production of candy bars. I vote that we eliminate  80%
of all the energy and labor that goes into the production of raw material for
automobile production. And I am not against individual transportation. I vote
that we close down McDonald's and the Burger King as destructive to human
life and nature. I vote we close down at least half of all the Kentucky fried
Chicken Joints and 100% of all Popeye Chicken. :-)

I vote that Coca Cola be compelled to use 80% of its organization and
infrastructure for world water purification and for every bottle of soda 
produced it
must produce two bottles of fresh water. I vote that we consolidate and
through popular vote determine the basic brand of Liquor and beer to be on the
market.

I even vote with Lou P. against fishing blue fish. There is not human
biological imperative for blue fish or whale meat or a massive milk industry. We
waste our productive forces on nonsense and the reproduction of capital. We are 
at
another level - juncture of possibility.

I vote to immediately stop deploying labor and energy for the production of
music CD's and implement a new system of music access. We simply do not need a
system of labor vouchers to access the things outlined above. We are beyond
Marx description of the first phase of communism as it emerges from the world in
which Marx lived and labored.

We do not need the state to be the owner of property as was the case in the
Soviet Union. Why? We do not need a massive state organization to govern us.
What is the state going to do . . . make people go to the movies and school?
State planing is needed to reorganized our urban life on a new basis. But people
on a local basis can ascertain their needs.

I vote that the state has no right to issue marriage license or determine who
can and cannot marry. How is this the business of the state!

It seems to me that our mighty forces of production have fundamentally
defeated the need for exchange - distribution of products, based on "labor
equivalents" or a certificate that authenticates ones labor contribution. A 
certificate
that authenticates ones labor contribution is the definition of a labor
voucher.

Value as you state is a form of the laboring process and it is this form as
it is expressed as exchange value that is under assault from the mighty
productive forces. The bourgeoisie is horrified and have opened Pandora's box.

There I go overstating the issue again.

Sorry. But I get passionate about communism. The end of work is in sight -
not the end of contributing to the development of human society, but the end of
work.  As the young boys say, "a job ain't nothing but a bunch of work."

No one needs a labor voucher to eat and anyone in the Welfare system is very
clear about this. Let's eliminate car insurance. Why I got to pay a damn water
bill. Something's are against God, nature and man.

I get happy thinking about communism.

I am not an advocate of industrial socialism. The labor voucher is basically
not need in American society. A simply credit card can register into the
national infrastructure what has been consumed and needs to be reproduced.

Why we got to pay for baby diapers? Why women have to pay for sanitary
napkins? This never made any sense to me.

Melvin P.

.
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