{"id":227,"date":"2019-08-27T07:51:47","date_gmt":"2019-08-27T05:51:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/marxistworkersparty.org.za\/?page_id=227"},"modified":"2021-01-11T10:58:21","modified_gmt":"2021-01-11T08:58:21","slug":"2-capitalism-the-trade-unions","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/?page_id=227","title":{"rendered":"Capitalism and the Trade Unions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

We live in a\ncapitalist society where the banks, the mines, the farms, the big factories and\nthe big businesses \u2013 like Absa Bank, Anglo American, Rainbow Chicken, SCAW\nMetals, Vodacom, and Shoprite \u2013 are privately<\/em><\/strong> owned<\/em><\/strong>. This splits\nsociety into two main groups of people \u2013 the minority capitalist class (the\nbosses) that own the economy, and a majority working class who work for them.\nThe working class includes workers\u2019 dependents, e.g. pensioners, the\nunemployed, children etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Monopoly<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The development\nof capitalism across the world over the past 200+ years has concentrated ownership\nof the economy in fewer and fewer hands. Today we live under monopoly<\/em><\/strong>\ncapitalism<\/em><\/strong>.\nThis is where just a handful of privately owned companies dominate the economy.\nFor example, Shoprite Holdings Ltd. not only owns Shoprite, but also Checkers,\nUsave, OK Furniture, Liquor Shop, MediRite Pharmacies, House & Home,\nTranspharm and Computicket. The scandal hit Steinhoff group owns 32 different\nretailers, including Ackermans, PEP, HiFi Corp, Shoe City and Sleepmasters.\nFamous Brands owns the franchises of 27 different food outlets including Wimpy,\nSteers, Debonairs and Fishaways. If you go into a mall, most of the shops and\nrestaurants are owned by the same capitalists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These\nmega-companies are in turn usually owned by a handful of financial institutions\nand banks \u2013 e.g. Absa, Nedbank, FNB and Standard Bank. Further, capitalism has\ndeveloped a world market<\/em><\/strong> dominated by a handful of imperialist countries. The\nmajor stakes in the South African banks are often owned by even bigger banks in\nthe imperialist centres of the USA and Europe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Inequality<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

With private\nownership comes narrow self-interest and monstrous inequality. Capitalism is a\nsystem where production is organised for private profit and not for social\nneed. The monopolies are not run for the \u2018greater good\u2019 of society but to make\nmoney for their owners. The so-called \u2018market\u2019 allocates resources to those who\ncan pay not to those in need. In South Africa 14 million people go to bed\nhungry every night. But 10 million tonnes of food are wasted every year \u2013 that\nis one third of all the food in the country. The capitalist economy is\nincapable of something as basic as feeding the population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worldwide, just\n42 dollar billionaires \u2013 who together would fit in three mini-bus taxis with\nspace left over \u2013 have as much wealth as the poorest 3.7 billion people. And\nmost of these 3.7 billion people, who together are more than half of the\nworld\u2019s entire population, live in poverty. As a result 22,000 children die\nevery year simply because they were born poor. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In South Africa\nitself, 1% of the population owns 71% of all wealth. Out of a population of 57\nmillion, just the richest three billionaires have as much wealth as the poorest\n28 million. Because the poor majority are not a profitable investment the big\nmonopolies hoard their wealth. The top 50 companies listed on the Johannesburg\nStock Exchange are together sitting on R1.4 trillion. This is nearly 150% of\nthe government\u2019s annual spending on everything \u2013 schools, hospitals, clinics,\nhouses, roads, wages etc. But this wealth just lies unused in bank accounts\nawaiting a profitable \u2018investment opportunity\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Super-wealth for\na tiny minority means poverty for the majority. There are 30.4 million people,\nmore than half of South Africa\u2019s entire population, living in poverty. Many of\nthem are the so-called \u2018working poor\u2019. There are 6.6 million workers earning\nless than R3,500 per month. But on this foundation of poverty-wages the bosses\nare enjoying life. The average income of a CEO is R24 million per year. And\nthis is just the average. In 2017-18, the CEO of Naspers, Bob van Dijk,\nreceived a bonus worth a total of R1.5 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africa\u2019s\nracist history of colonialism and apartheid means class inequality goes\nhand-in-hand with racial inequality. Over 64% of black people live in poverty,\ncompared to just 1% of white people; 74% of black children will grow up in\npoverty but less than 1.5% of white children will.  The class inequality of capitalism maintains\nracism by branding black skin as poor and inferior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Competition<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The pursuit of\nprofit leads to wasteful competition. Rather than develop society, the\ncapitalist economy is a \u2018winner takes all\u2019 casino game. This means chaos for\nworkers. Jobs come and go and livelihoods are built and then destroyed over\nwhether people should shop at Pic N Pay or Shoprite, buy Sunlight or Omo, drive\nVolkswagens or Toyotas, or eat Sasko or Albany. In 2016 R45 billion was spent\non advertising to try and convince the working class that somehow this capitalist\ncompetition matters to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Capitalist\ncompetition compels every company to squeeze its workers as much as possible to\ngain any \u2018competitive edge\u2019 over their rivals. But in doing so they actually\ndestroy the very market they are frantically producing for \u2013 low pay and mass\nunemployment means that the working class cannot buy back all of the goods they\nproduce. This leads to recession and economic crises. But these are not \u2018natural\ndisasters\u2019 as the capitalist class would have us believe. They are the normal\noutcome of production for profit and capitalist competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On a world scale\ncapitalist competition can lead to the destruction of entire industries. For\nexample, cheap clothing imports have seen the South African textile industry\nvirtually disappear. The industry went from an employer of 200,000 workers to\nan employer of barely 19,000. The local capitalists were outcompeted by their overseas\ncounter-parts. The competition between rival capitalists in different countries\ncan lead to trade wars, like the one unfolding between the US and China today.\nIt leads to real wars when the capitalist class use their state to defend their\ninterests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Unemployment<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the madness\nof capitalism does not end there. It is often more profitable for the bosses to\nmake their existing employees work long hours instead of creating new jobs.\nThis means that in South Africa long hours exist side-by-side with mass\nunemployment. One in ten workers works for more than 60 hours every week. This\nis despite laws setting 45 hours as the maximum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But workers know\nthis \u2018working day\u2019 is just the tip of the iceberg. Long journeys to and from\nwork every day, unpaid lunchbreaks and unpaid overtime must also be added.\nThere is little time for workers to relax, spend time with family and friends,\nor develop and educate themselves. At the same time, more than nine million\npeople sit with nothing to do \u2013 South Africa\u2019s vast army of unemployed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is\ncapitalism. It is a system of permanent crisis. This is the system that pushed\nworkers to organise trade unions.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Exploitation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So how are the\nbosses able to get away with this? To begin to understand this we need to look\nat exactly<\/em><\/strong>\nhow<\/em><\/strong>\nthe bosses exploit workers under capitalism. The starting point is the private\nownership of the economy we have already mentioned \u2013 ownership of the land, the\nbuildings on it, the equipment and machinery in those buildings, packaged with\na nice company logo. This allows the bosses to say to workers:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cYou need money to live? I can give you a job\nand pay you a wage. But let us be clear that this is my<\/em><\/strong> business and you will\nbe working in my<\/em><\/strong> building on my<\/em><\/strong> land using my<\/em><\/strong> equipment. Therefore all\nthe wealth you create will also<\/em><\/strong> belong to me<\/em><\/strong> and it is up\nto me what I do with it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Workers have no\nchoice but to accept this \u2013 the other choice is to starve. But this \u2018normal\u2019\nboss-worker relationship \u2013 exchanging labour for wages \u2013 hides the big con-trick\nat the heart of capitalism. Every time workers perform a day\u2019s work they create\nnew wealth (or \u2018value\u2019 as Karl Marx called it). In doing so, workers create more<\/em><\/strong>\nthan is needed to cover their own wages and the bosses\u2019 other fixed costs, e.g.\nbuying materials, replacing equipment, paying electricity bills, etc. Something\nis left over which Marx called surplus-value<\/em><\/strong>. When the capitalists\ntake this surplus for themselves it is called profit<\/em><\/strong>. But profit\nis simply the unpaid labour of workers<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Understanding that\nit is only workers\u2019 hard-work day-in and day-out that creates the bosses\u2019\nprofits is very important. Without the products workers make, the services they\nprovide, and the buildings they clean and guard, the bosses have nothing. But\nthey try and hide this. Backed up by the media they sell the false idea that\nthey are rich because they have \u2018worked hard\u2019. They tell workers to stop\ncomplaining and do the same. But this is comparing apples and oranges. A worker\ncan exhaust him or herself through overtime, working every hour possible. But\nthey will never be able to achieve wealth even close to that of the bosses because\nthey are selling their own labour, not exploiting the labour of many others.\nThis is the \u2018legal\u2019 mechanism by which the capitalist minority enriches\nthemselves with the wealth created by the working class majority. In 2017 82%\nof the world\u2019s new wealth was taken by the richest 1%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Any struggle for\nhigher wages is a struggle over surplus-value. The same is true of demands for\nmore jobs to be created, for more spending on health and safety, to modernise\nequipment, for longer breaks and leave-days, for more money to be placed in\neducation, pension and other funds, or demanding that government raise taxes on\nprofits to fund hospitals and schools. The division of surplus-value between\nthe capitalist class and the working class is the engine of the class\nstruggle<\/em><\/strong>. Trade unions are on the front-line in the class struggle\nbecause they organise workers where wealth is created \u2013 in the workplace. This\narms workers with their most basic weapon: the withdrawal of labour, i.e. a\nstrike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Control<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But there is\nanother side to the class struggle. Workers also want to be treated as human\nbeings when in the workplace. Many workers were pushed to join a trade union\nbecause of the petty dictators in the workplace \u2013 the supervisors, HRs and various\nmanagers. We have all felt outrage that one or two people are allowed to push-around\ntens, hundreds, even thousands of people day-in and day-out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Workers are\nemployed in huge numbers. For example, Absa Bank employs 40,000 workers, Anglo\nAmerican 135,000, Rainbow Chicken 20,000, SCAW Metals 7,000+, Vodacom 7,000+ and\nShoprite 130,000. Together, the 25 biggest companies listed on the Johannesburg\nStock Exchange employ a staggering 1.3 million workers. These figures do not even\ninclude all the contractors, outsourced and labour broker workers, or the\nworkers in the small and medium-sized businesses that depend on these giants\nfor their existence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the bosses\nhave the final say on everything. The CEOs and company boards, mere handfuls of\nindividuals, have unchallenged authority over the lives of workers, and because\nof their dominance of the economy, all of society.  If a worker is brave enough to raise an issue they\nmay be accused of \u2018insubordination\u2019. Maybe they will be identified as a\n\u2018trouble maker\u2019 and even dismissed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such control by the bosses over the workplace is absolutely necessary for capitalism. The majority of workers cannot be allowed a real say because they would never voluntarily agree to run the workplace solely to maximise the profits of the bosses. The capitalist class justifies this because the workplace is their private property. But a trade union is a direct challenge to the bosses\u2019 control as workers demand a greater say in how the workplace is run.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Continue to How the Bosses Control and Co-opt the Workers Movement<\/a><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We live in a capitalist society where the banks, the mines, the farms, the big factories and the big businesses \u2013 like Absa Bank, Anglo […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":222,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-227","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"acf":[],"_hostinger_reach_plugin_has_subscription_block":false,"_hostinger_reach_plugin_is_elementor":false,"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=227"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2422,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/227\/revisions\/2422"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/222"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}