People are separated and united by many conditions and realities. The capitalists themselves recognize the existence of socioeconomic classes that's why they organize and form unions. Yes, the rich have "unions". You didn't know that? It's called the "Chamber of Commerce", it's called the "Ft Lauderdale Business Association"and the "American Manufacturers Association"..etc. It's the industry's super-PACs, it's the think tanks, it's the NGOs, it's the army of lobbyists representing a certain industry or group of billionaires, in the halls of government legally bribing our politicians. It's even the country clubs. Believe me, the rich elites, know they're part of a unique socioeconomic class with its own financial interests.
What is the so-called "working-class"? In the simplest terms, the working-class is the socioeconomic class that needs to sell its labor power to a capitalist employer. To a member of the capitalist, owner-class. The capitalists own the facilities and equipment of production. The working-class are the people who need to sell their lives to another human being for eight hours, twelve hours, perhaps even sixteen hours a day, in order to eat, have a roof over their heads. When you sell your labor-power, you're selling yourself. You see, if you sell your computer, that's not you. I can buy your computer and you don't have to stand by it like a statue, forever. I can throw the computer away, in the dumpster after I purchase it from you, because it's no longer yours, it's mine. I can do whatever I want with it. It's just an object, a product that I purchased from you. You're not tied to that product that you sold me.
When you sell me your labor-power, for eight hours, twelve hours..etc, I'm buying you and you become part of the machinery of production. Your labor power is your life ("life-force"), your effort, your sweat, your presence, your time, your pain and suffering, your health, your attention, your mind..etc. I own you for the time I bought you and I take most of what you produce and make a profit from it. Why do you think most employers treat their workers like....poop? Human beings are treated like cogs in a machine, they're part of the machinery of production. Objects of production. When you walk into that workplace, you've walked into an absolute dictatorship. You have to be an employee for an employer-lord, that's not a choice for the vast majority of people.
How do communists "fix" the problem of people being bought and sold in a labor market as objects of production? We begin the reform by democratizing the workplace. We organize labor unions and assist workers to start their own worker cooperatives, with their fellow workers. A worker cooperative is run similar to a privately owned business enterprise, but it is owned collectively by the workers. The workers become "worker-owners" together, and they run the business democratically. Does that imply that there aren't any managers or CEOs? No. There are still "chiefs and Indians", but unlike in a privately owned business enterprise, the worker-owners elect their leaders (managers, CEOs). There is a level of accountability between management and their subordinates that doesn't exist in a privately owned business. A worker owner isn't an "employeeeeee", but rather a vital part of the business, hence worker-owners attend at least one class weekly to learn about the business, the products, how to run the business..etc.
Worker cooperatives are very competitive and often dominate the market. Capitalists hate them, and that's why American banks tend not to give loans to cooperatives. It's not easy under our current capitalist system for workers to unite and form cooperatives. As communists we're working to change that. We want to empower workers, the American people, to no longer be under the heel of a capitalist. We want democracy in the workplace, not just in government.
In the near future, capitalism is facing a very serious crisis. You know what that is? Technology. Production becomes so efficient and automated, that there is no longer a need for that employer - employee relationship. Human labor is significantly or completely replaced with automated systems, robots, artificial intelligence, self-driving vehicles, powerful computers..etc. The billionaires see the writing on the wall, so they begin to talk to the public, to the working-class, about receiving a "Universal Basic Income". A UBI. A check every month from the government. Why are the billionaires talking about handing "free money" to consumers? Because they know that if wage-labor is significantly reduced or eliminated, there aren't going to be any paying consumers. Paying consumers need wages, in order to consume. Replace enough of wage-labor with technology and you get massive unemployment and eventually the pitchforks come out.
So the billionaires see this coming in the not to distant future, so they're prepping everyone up for what is coming by offering every a free check from the government. That's capitalism on life-support. Communists don't want or need free checks from the government. We don't want that. We can very easily organize production, without capitalism or capitalists. We don't need them. We began as communists tens of thousands of years ago:
In the future we will end with High-Communism (Hightech Communism):
From our current capitalist mode of production to the highest form of communist production, there are several stages. In the end of this process of technological development, in the area of production, consumers will be able to produce whatever they want using atomic precision manufacturing machines. This type of technology:
It will take us about 100 - 150 years to get to "Star Trek" replicators (APMMs Atomic Precision Manufacturing Machines). In the meantime, we begin socializing/democratizing production and gradually moving towards high communism (where consumers privately have complete control over production, right in their homes). Everyone will have a very high standard of living thanks to technology. We will eliminate scarcity, and everyone will have everything they need and want. That's the world communists will create but the capitalists, want to maintain their power. So they do everything they can to brainwash the working class and demonize socialism (they have the working-class voting against their own class interests).
They want to keep everyone, including production, under their heel. We want to empower the consumer, they want to unnecessarily maintain an obsolete system of production they can profit from and maintain their unique social status and power, at everyone else's expense. At the expense of human progress and our health. In the end, the people will win and democracy will be established.
I will also post something on the issue of the aristocracy of labor. That should be discussed as well. Here in America, we were and to a certain extent we still are, the aristocracy of labor. What does that mean? It denotes that we are the main consumer that the capitalist imperialists depend upon the most to purchase their products and services. We are the cultivated, protected "crop" of the American and Western European capitalist elites. The consumer with the most purchasing power, is needed by the capitalists to make their profits. In Latin America and other parts of the world, what we find is heavily consumed and exploited labor. They're consumed and we consume. We are the citizens of the empire, hence our working-class has it good compared to the working-class in the nations we consume and exploit. This was true mostly in the past, between 1948 and 1981, we were the high elite of labor, the citizens of the empire. Now we are becoming exploited and consumed, just like everyone else. The gutting out of the American working class began in the 1980s, with supply-side economics or "Reaganomics". Everything was deregulated, unions were busted, and our manufacturing base was wiped out.
We've been de-industrialized in many ways. We're now completely dependent upon China and other nations for our production. Only in the area of weapons, do we still have a robust manufacturing base. Weapons, not consumer goods and everything else we use and need.
