Re: [Marxism] Cuba legalizes private titles to govt. homes (longer)

["Ruthless Critic of All that Exists" <ok.president+marxml@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, Apr 11, 2008 at 7:37 PM, Eli Stephens
<elishastephens@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>  URL:
>   http://www.miamiherald.com/581/story/492678.html
>
>  Cuba will let some have title to state-owned homes
>  Posted on Fri, Apr. 11, 2008
>
>  By WILL WEISSERT
>  Associated Press Writer

>
>  Economic commentator
>  Ariel Terrero said a resolution approved in February but not yet published 
> will
>  remove the salary caps designed to promote social and economic equality.
>
'> 'For the first time,
> it  is clearly and precisely stated that a salary does not
>  have a limit, that the roof of a salary depends on productivity,'' said 
> Terrero.
>  He added that he doesn't see this as a violation of Cuban socialism, but 
> rather
>  support for the mantra of ``from each according to his work, to each 
> according
>  to his ability.''

Here is the passage from Marx (Critique of the Gotha Program)  that he
is referring to:

"What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has
developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it
emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect,
economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the
birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges. Accordingly,
the individual producer receives back from society -- after the
deductions have been made -- exactly what he gives to it. What he has
given to it is his individual quantum of labor. For example, the
social working day consists of the sum of the individual hours of
work; the individual labor time of the individual producer is the part
of the social working day contributed by him, his share in it. He
receives a certificate from society that he has furnished
such-and-such an amount of labor (after deducting his labor for the
common funds); and with this certificate, he draws from the social
stock of means of consumption as much as the same amount of labor
cost. The same amount of labor which he has given to society in one
form, he receives back in another."

The question is, why did it take the Cubans so long to do this? Why
didn't Fidel do this earlier?

Marx had written (a couple of paragraphs later):

"In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving
subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and
therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has
vanished; after labor has become not only a means of life but life's
prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the
all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of
co-operative wealth flow more abundantly -- only then then can the
narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and
society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability,
to each according to his needs!"

So it seems that the Cubans were trying (unsuccessfully, so far) what
Marx had advocated doing only in a *higher* phase of communist
society, namely "each according to his ability, to each according to
his needs"  -- and only *now*, 50 years after the revolution,  are the
Cubans going back to what Marx had advocated doing at the *initial*
stages after the revolution, namely "from each according to his work,
to each according to his ability"

Can someone explain this anomaly?

Any thoughts?

Walter? Others?

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