Labour Price

Past Labour Value

The new socialist system envisages competition of workers through higher productivity for every publicly owned job. Labour competition will achieve higher productivity than capitalism in the open labour market. Socialism needs socially owned enterprises to accomplish this goal. In this regard, socialism needs to find an acceptable method of transforming private capital into social. Owners of private capital will voluntarily surrender their private property to society if society values and redeems their wealth fairly. Such capital will create a new value in socialism, which will generate higher incomes for those who sell their property to society. Thus, the owners of capital may be encouraged to sell their worth to the community.

Socialism has accepted a labour theory of value which bounds the value of commodities to the labour time needed to produce them. However, each product contains a considerable number of hours of work spent on discovering and developing the production process that every product uses, from the discovery of fire and wheels to the present day. Therefore, it is impossible to summarize the total amount of past work of all generations that created the material and cognitive values that society possesses today.

Therefore, socialist systems valued the past work of workers formally through years of service. A longer length of service would generate a slightly higher income. However, such a measure of the value of labour did not objectively represent individual contributions to productivity and was therefore not productively stimulating. A significant shortcoming also lies in the fact that socialism did not consider the value of the past work of ancestors who contributed to the creation of all that society possesses.

The capitalist system determines the values of past labour more efficiently because it displays it using the value of produced capital. Marxists complain that a part of the value of owned capital arose from the exploitation of workers, which is true. Still, there is no method to determine which part of their property was created by exploitation. Private property is accepted globally, so socialism should accept it as well because there is no other suitable solution. Socialism needs to reform the distribution system in production to increase justice and improve society.

It should be accepted that a more valuable capital reflects the greater value of past labour. A higher value of past work should generate higher income, motivating private capital owners to cede their capital to society. Let us call the unit value of past labour the point of past labour. The value of past labour points can replace the private property in real estate, securities, and money in the commune. All values expressed in money can also be shown in points of past work. Private owners of material goods will receive as many points of past labour as their property has value. A person with more valuable past work will get more past work points and earn a higher income.

People who do not have private property will realize the value of past work to the extent that, together with their ancestors, they contributed to the creation of value in the joint ownership of the commune’s inhabitants. Each commune possesses material values owned by the society, such as enterprises, land, facilities, infrastructure, natural resources, and other resources. Therefore, it will be necessary to estimate the total value of the common property of the commune inhabitants and determine its equivalent in points of past labour.

The total value of common material wealth expressed in points of past work should be determined by arbitration and then distributed to members of the community according to jointly agreed and accepted criteria that will valorize all contributions to building today’s society. Such a criterion should be formed by an expert commission and approved by the commune assembly. In the end, the people will accept such regulation in a referendum by a large majority. Such regulation of past work values will not be easy to establish, but people could succeed after optimally acceptable corrections. The solution that will be obtained, no matter how relatively inconvenient it may seem to an individual or a group, will be a big step forward for each individual and society.

Let a certain amount of points of past work be achieved at birth. The work that individual does by creating themselves brings the greatest perfection that people can make and brings the most significant value that people can create for themselves and other people. In addition, socialism can regulate the birth rate of society through past labour points. For example, in a fall in the birth rate, parents with more children may be awarded more past labour points, stimulating an increase in the birth rate and vice versa.

Furthermore, the values of past work can increase linearly with years of service, education and all the criteria that permanently improve individuals, society and nature. The distribution of past work points will be formed so that it stimulates the realization of social needs. This measure primarily refers to production where productivity-enhancing work would be rewarded.

The total amount of past labour points of all commune residents can be adjusted to the numerical value of the commune’s revenue. The increase in production increases the commune’s revenue. As the revenue increases, the number of past labour points earmarked for distribution among the commune’s population increases. Workers who improve productivity would be automatically awarded a certain number of points of past work, depending on the rise in productivity and their responsibilities. This will promote the productivity of the companies, which will bring social prosperity.

On the other hand, socially owned production has not found a satisfactory solution to the issue of workers’ responsibility in the production process, which significantly reduces their efficiency. Besides this, work can also permanently damage the productivity of companies. Accountability in the social form of production can be taken through past labour points. The difference between offered and achieved productivity has its value. This value can be determined and then deducted from the value of the past work of responsible workers by a mutually agreed procedure. The application of such a mode of accountability can solve the fundamental problems in socialist production and non-profit organizations. Taking responsibility by the points of past work will be highly effective because people will be responsible with their past work and their current and future income. The principles of responsibility in production are presented in more detail in the chapter “Development of the Economy.”

A certain amount of past work points can be distributed to independent creators as a sign of recognition for scientific, cultural, sports, or other achievements that would stimulate non-economic activities that contribute to society’s development. Such a distribution would be made by juries and arbitration commissions based on the valorization of accomplishments and the benefits that society derives from them.

Every society has a judicial system that protects people from the criminal activities of free individuals. Today’s system solves the problem of crime mainly by taking people’s freedom by imprisonment. It is cruel and inefficient. Socialism can achieve an acceptable and effective form of sanctions for offences committed by deducting the statutory amount of past labour points. It should not be a problem for the courts to convert prison sentences into points of past work. Taking responsibility through past labour points is more acceptable than inhumane imprisonment because people retain their freedom and productive power in society. If people commit significant crimes, they may lose all points of past work and even fall into negative value. The proposed system can make the negative value of past work points psychologically, sociologically and economically more painful than prison. People who fall into the negative amount of past work points will be able to earn only a minimal income no matter what job they do until they escape from the negative value of past work. For the few that commit particularly disgraceful crimes and are considered a threat to society, they will be rehabilitated in mental health institutions.

Furthermore, people who fall into the negative value of past work points may be forced to wear unique clothing that will tell everyone that they are bad people. As a result, people will shy away from crime and misdemeanours more than they do today. Suppose people enter the negative value of past work. In that case, they will try hard to get out of it, and this will be possible only with the help of highly productive work and exemplary behaviour over a long period.

In the same way, the judiciary can take over the function of rewarding people who bring significant benefits to society, stimulating the development of productive orientation in the community. However, courts have significant shortcomings because their forming of justice in society is authoritative, which means that it is alienated from society. As humanity strives for the growth of democracy, each member should be given equal power to sanction and reward other people for creating benefits and troubles in society. With such a right, every person will receive direct and equal executive power in the community, which would anarchically stimulate favourable social actions at all levels of complex social relations. Such power of judging people is called democratic anarchy.

The negative evaluation people receive should take a small part of the points of past work. By introducing such a measure, each person will try not to create disadvantages for another person or create them as little as possible at all levels of complex social relations. In other words, every person should know what does not suit well to another person and will avoid doing it. Moreover, suppose people do not know that they create difficulties for other community members. In that case, the negative evaluations they receive and the penalties that come with it will make them contemplate and realize what is wrong with them.

Over a longer period, such an assessment method can replace judicial bodies, laws, and regulations, rendering them unnecessary. People will form unwritten codes of justice based on natural knowledge about realizing benefits in society. On the other hand, every community member should be entitled in the same way to reward people who have contributed to creating benefits for themselves and society. Democratic anarchy can form the most significant benefits in society

The number of past work points will be a form of humanistic shares because it will provide income based on the value of past work. More past work points will indicate more valuable past work and generate higher salaries. It will present the productive power of people and become a great value in society. The commune should also be able to exchange past labour points for money to increase confidence in this form of value. This value will continue to be alienated from human nature but will effectively build a good society.

Points of past work will be the inviolable property of people that will be inherited through generations. It will thus become a measure of the values of the work through generations. Therefore, the points of past work will require responsible behaviour, bringing social stability through generations. Such a system would be acceptably repressive because it would not deprive people of their freedom but would prevent members of society from using their freedom to create problems in society.

Current Labour Price

The price of current labour depends on the direct value of labour itself. The direct value of labour shows the relation between conveniences and inconveniences arising from work itself, independently of the value of the produced results of work.

The conveniences connected with the work as such stem from the meeting of the individual’s immediate work needs, from the necessary exchange of energy with nature, the realization of both physical and spiritual needs, the need for developing the individual’s essential powers, from the status value of the working position, from the presentation of the productive potency in the society, from helping others, as well as in work contributions to the development of society. The conveniences arising from work as such bring pleasure.

On the other hand, the work also brings inconveniences, which cannot be accepted as a value. The inconveniences in work occur due to forced work where the individual is a means to realize needs alienated to them, or from forced labour necessary to ensure existential needs. Such work is not free and, therefore, cannot realize the individual’s productive forces, so it cannot bring direct conveniences to the individual.

A greater value will present the job that suits the individual’s nature more, their individual characteristics, which realizes more conveniences in its duration. Let it be accepted that average work has a magnitude equal to 1 (one) as direct current value labour. If the interval between the extreme inconvenience and the extreme convenience of work were from 0.1 to 10, then the convenient work would, in mathematical terms, be a hundred times more valuable than the inconvenient.

Each worker can most efficiently establish the direct value of current labour because they know best how convenient or inconvenient the work they perform is. Therefore, each individual needs to assess the relationship of the magnitudes of everyday work burden and relaxation with all their psychophysical factors and compare them with other work obligations. The result of such assessment will be a magnitude between 0.1 and 10 that will indicate the relationship between work conveniences and inconveniences on a specific work post against average work.

A lower value of current labour represents greater inconveniences during the duration of work and therefore needs to realize a larger share in income distribution to compensate for the work-related inconveniences. Conversely, a higher value of current labour advocates greater conveniences in the work duration in relation to average work and needs from that point of view to realize a smaller share in income distribution and will thus realize smaller conveniences in the work results.

The price of current labour determines the share in the distribution of work results. The current labour price is inversely proportionate to the direct current labour value. The current labour price will also have a value scale from 0.1 to 10. A more favourable work will realize an immediate current labour value higher than 1 (one) so that the price of present labour will be smaller than 1 (one), and the income thus realized will be smaller than the average. For example, very unfavourable work getting a direct current labour value equal to 0.2 will be five times less favourable than average work and will realize the current labour price equal to 5, thus an income five times higher than the one on average work.    

In a system of protected work posts, each worker could, by their subjective consciousness, evaluate their work as markedly inconvenient and would require a substantially larger share in the distribution of the performance of collective work than the one they would objectively deserve. Socialism will ensure an objective valuation of work with the help of work competition in the work market. This means that in the circumstances of equal productivity, the right to work will be exercised by the worker to whom current labour brings greater direct exchange value or the worker who will demand a lower current labour price and a lower income.

In that way, a new trend in society may be achieved in which the direct exchange value of the work would rise to the point where it would become more important than the operating result. Such a trend may form a turning point in the development of society. This is possible to achieve by automation of the production, by the redistribution of inappropriate forms of labour and by the increased possibility of selecting the types of work where the individual may find the sources of realization of their productive, essential forces. The work as a form of realization of the power of being may cause the individual to find non-exhaustive inspiration and necessity, convenience and value. Such work has its usable value. The prosperity of the society lies in the approach where the work in its duration becomes a value. It can bring conveniences greater or equal to those realized beyond the work.

The result of such an approach to the valuation of current labour is the number that shows the price of current labour of each worker employed in enterprises, where workers directly realize income by their work. However, each socially beneficial activity would need to be proclaimed as valuable, irrespective of whether it participates directly in the production. An unemployed individual contributes in some form to society daily. The individual is a value to the individual, and society must accept this standpoint for such a value to develop.   

This measure refers to all unemployed people: pre-school children, pupils, persons of advanced age who are no longer able to work, invalids and those not wishing to work. Accepting the values of everyone’s current labour means to ensure to each individual an income-based compensation to the level of the recognized price of present labour. The current labour price of the unemployed population needs to be determined by the commune’s leadership based on the commune’s needs and possibilities and adopted by the commune’s assembly. Such values may be changeable according to the economic opportunities and needs of the social community. For example, if workers were not sufficiently interested in work, the price of current labour would, with the unemployed portion of the population, fall depending on the category of the unemployed, which would reduce their income and increase, in terms of revenue, the interest in work.

On the other hand, if workers were more interested in work than necessary or, more precisely said, if direct work becomes a value, the current labour price of the unemployed portion of the population will rise and increase their share in the distribution of the result of work, which would reduce the income-based share of the interest in work. Therefore, such income regulation between employed and unemployed portions of the population will contribute to the balance in the work demand and supply, contributing to the balance within complex social relations.

Such an approach to work valuation will ensure economic and existential independence and freedom for everyone, which is an essential prerequisite for social freedom, stability, and prosperity. It is necessary to provide basic needs for everyone because an individual’s endangered survival leads to the endangered survival of society. This measure is nothing else but a universal substitution for social, pension and disability insurance, solidarity-based payments to the unemployed, child allowances, or tax facilities in the case of multi-member families. Instead, it means a simpler, more just and more efficient redistribution that is at the same time more natural and wiser when social determinations are concerned.

Each work contains elements of current and past labour. Past labour without the current one that maintains it has no value, while present labour cannot exist without the past one. As current and past labour are mutually linked, and as the production develops by geometric progression, the price of each work may be shown by the product of past labour value expressed in points of past labour and the price of current labour.