From each according to his need, to each according to his work?

[The Man]

Do you think that people should only gets their needs as long as they also produce something for the community?

If you vote No, How would we avoid people who get their needs, even though they don't work?

[Victus Mortuum]

What would that do to quadriplegics who aren't capable of working?

[Ocean Seal]

Do you think that people should only gets their needs as long as they also produce something for the community?

If you vote No, How would we avoid people who get their needs, even though they don't work?
I believe that the question you're asking would be best represented as from each according to their work, to each according to their work right?
In any case I believe that while at first we should use the labor voucher system where people don't all earn equally under socialism we should move to create an equal pay system when the social value of labor has increased to eclipse individualistic tendencies.

[Magón]

What would that do to quadriplegics who aren't capable of working?

They're capable of working from home, aren't they?


Just sayin'.

[psgchisolm]

They're capable of working from home, aren't they?


Just sayin'.
tell that to people who have no arms or can't move their arms.

[Ism]

Society is rich enough and our technology is already so advanced that we can cut down our working hours dramatically while still creating abundance. When a robot can do what a cashier does, why does the cashier have to work his ass off doing perhaps the world's most boring and repetitive job? (I'm only eighteen and in high school, cashier is the only job I've ever had, so that's all I can tell from personal experience).

Think of all the useless jobs in existence. There would be no insurance people, no overseers at the factories, no police officers (or at least very few of them) and so on. The fact is that we don't have to employ everybody in society.

Therefore, I think it's perfectly fair that people slack - to a certain degree of course. Like in capitalism, you would be forced (in lack of a better word) to do at least some work. In capitalism, you'll have to work to death or you will starve to death unless you are one of the few rich people in this world who can live off of your money without ever working. In socialism/communism, everybody would be equal and have equal "slacking rights". If you were not to work at all, you'd perhaps need a special medical report for example if you've lost a leg, are depressed, schizophreniac and so on. But if your job's interesting enough and you don't have to work your ass to pieces sixty hours a week, why would you stay at home? That'd be boring as hell in the long run and I hope everybody would agree with me on that.

Of course, we'll only want perfectly healthy people to do their jobs at free will. Our end goal is communism, after all.

[TheGeekySocialist]

people dont work for any number of reasons, I see no reason to deny them there needs because of that.

[Aurora]

'From each according to their ability, to each according to their work' is the basis of distribution in the lower phase of socialism, while society isn't yet capable of allowing each member to take according to need (higher phase of socialism, post-scarcity)there must be a fair method by which products that are in short supply can be acquired.

What would that do to quadriplegics who aren't capable of working?
There will be a deduction taken from those who work to provide for those who can't and of course to build things like hospitals, schools etc

[Victus Mortuum]

So the maxim isn't quite accurate

[syndicat]

what does "from each according to need" mean?

the requirement of work in order to share in the product is meant, by its advocates, to apply only to able-bodied adults, and is about a willingness to work. it is also the responsibility of the community to ensure that work is available.

cases where people should be provided consumption without regard to their work effort:

1. everyone is provided certain public or social goods simply because they are human, such as health care, education. the extent of this is likely to vary from one region to another due to differences in culture and politics. the aim of socialism is development of each person's potential. this is an aspect of "positive freedom." this includes the right to participate in social decision-making, and things that sustain and develop one's abilities, such as health care and education.

2. children. chiildren's prospects and needs should not be dependent on the earnings of their parents.

3. people are between jobs at various times. say a plant's product is no longer in demand and it is disbanded to move the resources elsewhere. the people who worked there still need to receive consumption entitlement.

4. in old age. there is a tradition of allowing people to no longer be responsible for providing socially required labor once they reach a certain age.

5. people who are infirm or disabled. for example people in hospitals.

[PoliticalNightmare]

There are some silly arguments made here against pay for work. Obviously those genuinely unable to work would be provided for. Free healthcare, medicine, education and access to certain public utilities (e.g. parks) should also be allocated freely. But that is where the line is drawn.

[Magón]

tell that to people who have no arms or can't move their arms.

What about replacements? We have those nowadays, and the likelihood of them getting better in technology in the future, would only improve those who can't move their arms, or have no arms.

[Luisrah]

The thing is, everyone is different, and so they must work different, and recieve different, in order to be equal.

Taking it to the extreme, if I work exactly the same as my co-worker, one of us deserves more for what we've done. Why? Because we're different. I may have more difficulties in the work we did, and that means I made more effort, and should be better compensated. That's the extreme, of course and it doesn't make sense alone.

But if someone perfectly normal works as hard as they can, and someone that has health issues, or is raising a baby, or mental problems, works as hard as they can, even if the absolute work isn't the same (the first will most probably be able to produce more), they both deserve the same compensation. (this is if we do not take into account any other factor)

But lets think about two people, that both work the same. One could be recieving more compensation than the other, but that doesn't happen here, they are both identical, except that one has a strange disease that doesn't affect him in any way, but if he doesn't take a pill every 6 hours, he dies.
That person didn't choose to have that condition, so it is not only fair but also logical that he should recieve more compensation that the other guy, because his needs are higher, he needs to buy those pills.

That is why we think fair is ''From each according to his ability...'' (meaning, each will work what they can, because everyone has limitations, some more than others due to what I've said already) and ''...to each according to his need'' (each will recieve what is necessary to satisfy their needs, basic or not, depending on the production of society)

[Dóchas]

What would that do to quadriplegics who aren't capable of working?


tell that to people who have no arms or can't move their arms.

I'm sure the community would be willing to sacrifice some of their earnings to help out those in need. This is not capitalism where each person is trying to get one up on the other, the whole point of socialism/communism is to support each other and helping those in need. If that means that a person who cant work in any way receives aid then so be it. It should not be an issue where someone is forced to work just so things can be "fair", it doesnt seem fair to force them to work in order to justify them receiving an income. That being said, I'm sure they would have certain skills that they could contribute to society, I dunno, a teacher? Stephen Hawking managed alright enough.

[ckaihatsu]

Society is rich enough and our technology is already so advanced that we can cut down our working hours dramatically while still creating abundance.


I'll expand on this to say that we should take care not to fall into "spoon-feeding" and "zero-sum" habits of thinking -- while not exactly moralistic, these kinds of arguments *flirt* with moralism by focusing on how *individuals* may or may not be productive, instead of concentrating on how *society* and *machinery* is productive.

If we keep our *ends* in mind, foremost, then we can think in terms of what it would take to *feed* and *house* everyone, no matter how many or how few laborers that would take to do it. (Likewise for all similar ends, like a worldwide revolutionary workers' control of the means of mass production.)

And, the problem with moralism in the context of politics is that it is right next to a quick and slippery slope into opportunism.

[revolution inaction]

There are some silly arguments made here against pay for work. Obviously those genuinely unable to work would be provided for. Free healthcare, medicine, education and access to certain public utilities (e.g. parks) should also be allocated freely. But that is where the line is drawn.

why? i see no reason why we would need to charge for anything if everything was owned, controlled and run directly by the workers, and i've never see any one come up wiht a sensible reason why we should.

[Black Sheep]

thread title

From each according to his ability, to each according to his work?
poll title

From each according to his need, to each according to his work?

[ʇsıɥɔɹɐuɐ ıɯɐbıɹo]

I like to think that you know, even if I don't do everything to the best of my ability I might get what I need to survive. I mean, EVERYONE needs a holiday now and then and if I don't work but still get food and water and shelter, that's me, lazing around, while others work, but I will work while others laze around if they give me the same courtesy. Perhaps I am drawing lines in the sand too close to the beach (and the whole vacation thing is part of the 'needs' for a human), but I still think that when I don't work I should have my needs met because I'd try to do the same for you to a reasonable extent.

[William Howe]

I agree with this.

If someone is disabled or incapable of work, they should be supported. But if it's someone fully capable of doing work, but they don't want to get off their lazy arse to do said work, they should not be supported. They are relaxing away while living off the backs of the workers, and are being capitalistically exploitive.

There is NO justification for procrastination like that.

[ʇsıɥɔɹɐuɐ ıɯɐbıɹo]

I agree with this.

If someone is disabled or incapable of work, they should be supported. But if it's someone fully capable of doing work, but they don't want to get off their lazy arse to do said work, they should not be supported. They are relaxing away while living off the backs of the workers, and are being capitalistically exploitive.

There is NO justification for procrastination like that.

So that's a no to my request for paternity leave boss?

[PoliticalNightmare]

why? i see no reason why we would need to charge for anything if everything was owned, controlled and run directly by the workers, and i've never see any one come up wiht a sensible reason why we should.

There are two reasons, one of them is rational economic decision making. Namely, to calculate the efficiency of the mode of production, the labourers require a method of calculation; higher order goods can be calculated according to the socially necessary labour time. This gives them an idea of how to produce in a way that is as efficient as possible. It also considers extraneities in the production process such as pollution, increasing the costs of such high order goods and penalising the labourer by reducing their salary.

The second reason is, to minimise wasteful production. People must first contribute to society before they are to take and they may take only according to their input. This will force them (a) to contribute and (b) to be careful about withdrawing goods unnecessarily and increasing the demand for productivity. For example, we can reward people with labour vouchers when they return items that can be recycled.

The gift economy without labour vouchers does not allow people to take whatever they want unnecessarily but it makes it hard for the distributors to distribute goods in a rational manner and preserve the supply of goods.

I'd like to hear more about how a gift economy could function without some form of calculation and reward allocated according to the socially necessary labour time.

[ckaihatsu]

I'd like to hear more about how a gift economy could function without some form of calculation and reward allocated according to the socially necessary labour time.


There's a thread on that topic, and I was soliciting feedback on one point there regarding varying distribution methods for varying degrees of abundance (ease of production) for various goods and services....








It's about distribution systems. Communism (socialism with communal distribution) is usually conceived as a gift economy, but I think a democratic-community model of distribution is a much more accurate depiction of what the intent is. Hypothetically you could have various cities democratically deciding to have different distribution models for different product groups. That seems the most workable model to me.

- Market
- Labor vouchers
- Communal-Democratic
- Gift





This is an excellent point, one I'm surprised we haven't seen earlier. You're placing these various, differentiated methods of distribution on a sliding scale according to the relative *abundance* of the component goods and services produced within.

Perhaps, then, one of the major tasks of a mass collectivized political economy administrating all of this would be to simply categorize *all* goods and services according to their abundant availability, on this sliding scale -- I picture it as a circular bulls-eye centralized point of (all) production, radiating its production outward, with gift distribution closest to the center (indicating abundance), then a bulk-pooled communal-democratic method outside of that, followed by a ratio-based labor voucher system outside of that, with a market-type system (of floating exchange rates) on the outlying peripheral area for least-common and more-specialized items.

[Bardo]

I think there should be a basic standard of living for all citizens reguardless of contribution. By basic standard of living I mean shelter, food, water, healthcare, education ect should be available to everyone, no person should be denied the right to live because they can't afford it and the opportunity to succeed should always be available. If someone chooses not to go to work and contribute then they will be stuck living in a densely populated, publicly funded housing environment with minimal supplies. I assume most people won't be content with such living conditions and would choose to contribute to society in order to live a more comfortable life.

[ckaihatsu]

I think there should be a basic standard of living for all citizens reguardless of contribution. By basic standard of living I mean shelter, food, water, healthcare, education ect should be available to everyone, no person should be denied the right to live because they can't afford it and the opportunity to succeed should always be available. If someone chooses not to go to work and contribute then they will be stuck living in a densely populated, publicly funded housing environment with minimal supplies. I assume most people won't be content with such living conditions and would choose to contribute to society in order to live a more comfortable life.


...And they'll have to use email instead of Facebook or MySpace -- !


= D


Seriously, though, here's a recent response of mine to this question:





I'm not a moralist. As long as the means are available to produce enough food and housing (etc.) for everyone, and there are enough (liberated) laborers who will make such a "surplus" available to all, regardless of work status, then that's "all" it takes for that to happen.

I happen to think that the principle of liberation and self-determination for a socialist society means that no one can be *coerced* to do things like labor that they don't want to do -- that would contradict the principle that was used to overthrow capitalist rule.

Also:




[T]here could very well be a "core" of hobbyist-like liberated laborers who wind up plotting society's technical and artistic trajectory from their own interests and inclinations, as long as they have a sufficient political base by which to do so, for using society's collectivized implements. These would be the liberated scientists and artists of a post-capitalist society, free to pursue their large-scale-enabled visions as long as there were no legitimate political grounds for denying them their proportionate access to collectivized implements.

- A second would be that there *could* be a "division of labor" in a post-commodity economic context, by which *mass demands* could be fulfilled by *mass liberated labor*, and *not* dependent on a perpetual avant garde sector of society for forward progress. In this way liberated labor would *not* be tied into being one and the same as those who politically *support* a project, and, likewise, those who *are* political and provide proposed plans for the use of society's collectivized machinery would not be constrained to their own ranks for the subsequent *implementation* of those (mass-approved) plans, as with their own liberated labor alone.


communist supply & demand -- Model of Material Factors

http://postimage.org/image/35sw8csv8/

[revolution inaction]

There are two reasons, one of them is rational economic decision making. Namely, to calculate the efficiency of the mode of production, the labourers require a method of calculation; higher order goods can be calculated according to the socially necessary labour time. This gives them an idea of how to produce in a way that is as efficient as possible. It also considers extraneities in the production process such as pollution, increasing the costs of such high order goods and penalising the labourer by reducing their salary.

I seen no reason why people couldn't or wouldn't keep track of how much resources used, including labour, without labour vouches, and vouchers don't consider extraneities, your just surgesting a way to use them for that, which i doubt would work vary well, it would certainly encourage workers to be over optimistic about how much they are polluting, if not outright dishonest.




The second reason is, to minimise wasteful production. People must first contribute to society before they are to take and they may take only according to their input. This will force them (a) to contribute and (b) to be careful about withdrawing goods unnecessarily and increasing the demand for productivity. For example, we can reward people with labour vouchers when they return items that can be recycled.

The gift economy without labour vouchers does not allow people to take whatever they want unnecessarily but it makes it hard for the distributors to distribute goods in a rational manner and preserve the supply of goods.

I'd like to hear more about how a gift economy could function without some form of calculation and reward allocated according to the socially necessary labour time.


if enough people don't contribute to be a problem in a communist society then we could always limit them to basic rations, or even refuse to give them any thing or throw them out of our community.
As for people taking to much, we can limit production and put a limit on how much any one can take.

People would take things like bottles to be recycled if that was the standard way they where dealt with, just like people take out there rubbish now. Infect lots of people recycle things now, without receiving any reward at all.

[PoliticalNightmare]

I seen no reason why people couldn't or wouldn't keep track of how much resources used, including labour, without labour vouches, and vouchers don't consider extraneities, your just surgesting a way to use them for that, which i doubt would work vary well, it would certainly encourage workers to be over optimistic about how much they are polluting, if not outright dishonest.

Special bodies of delegates commission qualified research teams to calculate the socially necessary labour time, not the producers themselves. There is no reason why certain roles such as administration cannot be circulated around the community to avoid corruption, though.

Higher order goods are those used in the mode of production. The producers and society in general need to be able to calculate the efficiency of different modes of production to be able to produce goods as high a quality as possible. That's what the economic calculation debate (Mises) is all about - but he does not fully address the labour theory of value which addresses those concerns.

What I'm saying, is that if value is attached to goods according to the labour time embodied in them, we might as well require the labourer to produce goods worth x amount of hours (on average) to be able to take goods worth x amount of hours (on average).


if enough people don't contribute to be a problem in a communist society then we could always limit them to basic rations, or even refuse to give them any thing or throw them out of our community.

Yes but how are you going to find an effective way of who contributes what and how much without resorting to bias (subjective judgements of who is "lazy" and who is "not lazy"). Also, you assume that there is a black and white distinction between lazy and not lazy rather than acknowledge the grey areas. You can't just say, well they're lazy, let's chuck 'em out and they're not lazy so let's just give them whatever they "need" (again another circumstance which requires objectivity to measure, e.g. a measure of labour time).


As for people taking to much, we can limit production and put a limit on how much any one can take.

Then that takes away the incentive of hard working labourers to achieve more productivity.


People would take things like bottles to be recycled if that was the standard way they where dealt with, just like people take out there rubbish now. Infect lots of people recycle things now, without receiving any reward at all.

Yeah, I was using that as a sort of inverse example to explain how labour vouchers would maximise productivity. To have a system without labour vouchers, you would need a small isolated community with only simple making decision criteria to consider and where everyone knows each other very well. That's why during the Spanish revolution, it was only in such village type communities that money was actually abolished. No doubt had it existed longer, money would have been replaced with labour vouchers in cities but I doubt they would have been able to move beyond labour vouchers.

When you consider the difficulties of economic decision making and subjective evaluation of labour by the community and also the level of trust that is required to establish a "pure" gift economy it is difficult to consider such a system.

[ckaihatsu]

When you consider the difficulties of economic decision making and subjective evaluation of labour by the community and also the level of trust that is required to establish a "pure" gift economy it is difficult to consider such a system.


Sorry, PN, but I maintain that the *ease of production* for certain goods and services -- especially by using implements of industrial production -- creates such a surplus and potential availability that it would be *reactionary* to *not* use a gift economy method of distribution in those instances. Some examples might be clean water, fertilizers, writing paper, machine-harvested produce, bricks, etc.

There *is* a dynamic called 'increasing returns' wherein a certain amount of action put forth in the right place at the right time will yield sustaining, possibly growing, payoffs due to beneficial conditions around it -- planting a seed would be one example, and that plastic bird toy repeatedly dunking its beak in a glass of water ("perpetual motion") would be another.

That's why I caution against losing sight of the forest for the trees (post #15) and also considering that abundance (ease of production) will *vary* across a full range of possible goods and services (post #22).

[PoliticalNightmare]

Sorry, PN, but I maintain that the *ease of production* for certain goods and services -- especially by using implements of industrial production -- creates such a surplus and potential availability that it would be *reactionary* to *not* use a gift economy method of distribution in those instances. Some examples might be clean water, fertilizers, writing paper, machine-harvested produce, bricks, etc.

I think I see what you mean here (correct me if I am wrong) - you mean that certain goods and services are easily produced and in vast quantities and therefore should not be paid for (or perhaps funded by a slight deduction from labour vouchers - i.e. taxation on a voluntary basis, since the labourer is not obliged to deposit his goods and services). I think I might agree with you on this one but I maintain that for certain goods and services, a system for measuring labour time is necessary, especially where the mode of production is concerned.


There *is* a dynamic called 'increasing returns' wherein a certain amount of action put forth in the right place at the right time will yield sustaining, possibly growing, payoffs due to beneficial conditions around it -- planting a seed would be one example, and that plastic bird toy repeatedly dunking its beak in a glass of water ("perpetual motion") would be another.

Yes, this is production by nature; as Marx explains, this should not be considered as part of the human labour process:


A thing can be a use value, without having value. This is the case whenever its utility to man is not due to labour. Such are air, virgin soil, natural meadows, &c. A thing can be useful, and the product of human labour, without being a commodity.

In this case, the article can be considered as having a labour time of zero since no input from the labourer was required; it can be taken freely, though it is important that the natural environment be respected. (I have not figured out yet how this can be achieved scientifically and objectively). However, consider that a degree of labour is still required growing, picking and transporting even goods produced purely by nature such as apples. In this case, value should be assigned according to the socially necessary labour time required to achieve this. However, I agree with you in so far as no input that is independent from that of the labourer should be counted in the evaluation of the article.

[ckaihatsu]

I think I see what you mean here (correct me if I am wrong) - you mean that certain goods and services are easily produced and in vast quantities


Yes, my argument is meant to ease the anxieties that people may have when considering the revolutionary process and an exit from the capitalist system of pricing -- many items that are now commodities will simply be freely available once the boot is off our necks, with negligible labor effort required, as for plucking fruit off a tree.





and therefore should not be paid for (or perhaps funded by a slight deduction from labour vouchers - i.e. taxation on a voluntary basis,


I don't recommend or support retaining *any* system of material pricing for post-capitalist goods and services -- it would be too problematic / difficult to arrive at an objective, fundamental basis of value for any given one unit of its abstract "pricing":





I for one have a position that it is not a good idea to juxtapose labor hours against the provision of material goods and services. This only invites the obvious calculations in people's heads and the entire set of politics (and economics) to provide some kind of matching-up from the former component to the latter.

I advocate an approach that is premised on mass human-needs demand being fulfilled with whatever liberated mass collectivized society is able and willing to produce, with liberated labor having "veto power" over the mass demand while also self-organizing its own ranks.

Nonetheless what I advocate is not just a hazy one-big-potluck dream -- there's a model that spells out structural specifics with a mind towards material-based tracking and balancing:


communist supply & demand -- Model of Material Factors

http://postimage.org/image/35sw8csv8/





since the labourer is not obliged to deposit his goods and services). I think I might agree with you on this one but I maintain that for certain goods and services, a system for measuring labour time is necessary, especially where the mode of production is concerned.


Agreed. Labor time is the *only* rational basis of [formal] value for a post-capitalist political economy.





Yes, this is production by nature; as Marx explains, this should not be considered as part of the human labour process:








In this case, the article can be considered as having a labour time of zero since no input from the labourer was required; it can be taken freely, though it is important that the natural environment be respected. (I have not figured out yet how this can be achieved scientifically and objectively).


Offhand I'd say that most of the despoiling of the environment has been for the purpose of obtaining energy reserves, and, arguably, mineral resources -- freed from the stultification of commodification such civilizational necessities could be procured using alternative methods, ones that are far less intrusive and imposing on the existing (default) state of nature.





However, consider that a degree of labour is still required growing, picking and transporting even goods produced purely by nature such as apples.


How about using hydroponics as an alternative, fully automated method for the growing and harvesting of foodstuffs -- ?





In this case, value should be assigned according to the socially necessary labour time required to achieve this. However, I agree with you in so far as no input that is independent from that of the labourer should be counted in the evaluation of the article.


Certainly labor time would doubtlessly apply in *some* degree, however slight, to *every* procurement process -- we *are* the only conscious, enabled, and socialized species on the planet for this, after all.... But the main point should be to *free* such massively leveraged material productive powers out of the compartmentalization of capitalism and commodity production so that they can be rationally co-administrated on a mass scale, and accessible to all.

[sologdin]

33 USC s. 908 provides the rule for permanent total disability under the US longshore & harbor workers' compensation act:



Loss of both hands, or both arms, or both feet, or both legs, or both eyes, or of any two thereof shall, in the absence of conclusive proof to the contrary, constitute permanent total disability. In all other cases permanent total disability shall be determined in accordance with the facts.


the social security act defines disability thus:



the inability to engage in any substantial gainful activity (SGA) by reason of any medically determinable physical or mental impairment(s) which can be expected to result in death or which has lasted or can be expected to last for a continuous period of not less than 12 months


where "substantial gainful activity" is defined as a monthly maximum income cap, currently set at approximately $1,000.00.

LSA-R.S. 23: 1221 gives us the state of louisiana's permanent total disability rule:



compensation for permanent total disability shall not be awarded if the employee is engaged in any employment or self-employment regardless of the nature or character of the employment or self-employment including but not limited to any and all odd-lot employment, sheltered employment, or employment while working in any pain.

[...]

Loss of both hands, or both arms, or both feet, or both legs, or both eyes, or one hand and one foot, or any of two thereof, or paraplegia, or quadriplegia shall, in the absence of conclusive proof of a substantial earning capacity, constitute permanent total disability.


physical therapists have developed a process of "functional capacity evaluation" to determine what impairments an injured person might have, and then "vocational rehabilitation specialists" can take the impairment ratings and try to fit them into various positions.

these statutes and the rehab process now accrues mostly to the benefit of the owners, and especially their insurance carriers--but i see no reason that the core of the system can't be adopted to handle disability adjudications in a socialist society, and, thereby, allow a reasonable means to distinguish disabled persons from those who are able to work in some capacity.

it would, on the other hand, be completely barbaric to wheel a quadruple amputee into a cubicle, pop a headset on his head, and tell him to start cold-calling. (and just why in the hell is he doing telemarketing in a socialist society, anyway?)