Vol. 74/No. 33      August 30, 2010

Reader Alan Grady asks, since every cash remuneration by the bosses is essentially blood money to stave off struggles by the workers, is the Militant implying that those workers who don’t donate are not so class conscious?

When the Militant writes about blood money we are describing a particular kind of bribe used by the bosses or their government against workers. We are not talking about the wages workers receive as compensation for the value of our labor power. Most of the wealth workers produce is stolen by the boss, so we are constantly fighting to recover as much of it as we can through higher wages.

Workers often have contracts imposed on us that include signing bonuses in lieu of wage increases. This means the next contract begins at the same pay level, not a higher pay rate that will be built upon from year to year. This type of bonus, which is made to appear good for the worker, enables the bosses to steal more surplus value from every hour we sell our labor power to them.

Similarly, bosses often dole out production or safety bonus checks. These so-called rewards are for accepting brutal increases in the pace of production or not reporting injuries.

What makes bosses’ bonuses, “gifts,” and back-wage “settlements” blood money is that they are aimed at tying the workers to the company, and away from any perspective of struggle to end the wages system. Workers are supposed to think there is no ongoing, permanent class struggle. Instead, what exists is a “personal” and “human” relationship.

It is these types of cash remunerations that members of the Socialist Workers Party and other class-conscious workers have proudly turned over to the communist movement. It is a way of saying to the boss class, “we don’t accept your bribe, instead we’ll take it and put it to work against you and your system.” It is a good example that can be emulated.
 
 
Related articles:
Letters  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home