LABOR SCENE

BY BRUCE MAGNUSON

Inflation and taxes cut
buying power of wages

The mass media never fails to
blame rising costs on the work-
ers and their trade unions. This
is applied with particular bias
directed against the workers in
the construction industry. Let
us therefore take a look at what
happens to the hourly take
home pay of an electrical work-
er in, let us say, the City of
Hamilton, who has a wife and
two dependents.

1971 1972
Gross weekly
wage .............. $253.80 $293.32
Less Income
Tax. 5. 5502 99-05 74.10
Weekly take

home pay ...$194.75 $218.22
Hourly take
home pay ..... 5.41 6.06

(+65¢)
In April 1971 the Consumer
Price Index (CPI) was 132.2,
which by February 1973 had
risen to 145.3, or an advance of
13 points in 22 months.
Increase Lost
According to the Ontario
Federation of Labor’s Research

‘Department each point rise in

the CPI in this particular case
would call for a 5¢ per hour in-
crease in pay. Multiply 13 points
by 5¢ and we arrive at the 65¢
figure which indicates clearly
that the CPI index proves that

‘the above worker lost all of his

increase in take home pay
through price increases.

It must be borne in mind that
the CPI covers only a part of
increased living costs. But even
at that, and with a continued
rise in the Consumer Price
Index March and April, it is
clear that the worker in ques-
tion is moving backward in-
stead of forward with respect

to the buying power of his .

wi

This means that in this 1973
negotiations, this construction
worker must improve his after
tax hourly earnings by at least
$1.50 per hour in order to break
even with the anticipated rise in
the CPI over the next two years,
in other words, to stay still. Any
seasonal layoff, or reduced

weekly hours without a corres-
ponding pay increase, would
mean a drastic cut in income.

* * %

To paraphrase Alan Brown,
writing in the British Labor
Monthly, April, 1973, the all-
pervading grip of monopoly ex-
tracts its vast wealth from those
earning not just $100 a week
but $200, $300, $400 or more. It
hires them, it uses them, it
fires them as deemed necessary
in the interest of maximum pro-
fit. (There are no more cradle-
to-grave jobs; insecurity is the
lot of all workers, even includ-
ing high executive positions).
The monopolists do create, in
traditional grave-digging style,
the ever-widening class which
will destroy them. As Marx com-
mented:

A rise in the price of labor,
as a consequence of accumu-

lation of capital, only means,
in fact, that the length and
weight of the golden chain the
wage-worker has already forg-
ed for himself, allow of a re-
laxation of the tension of it.
(Capital, Vol. 1, Chapter XXV,
Section 1.)

But the chain remains. And
capitalism can scarcely now af-
ford to let it get longer or light-
er. The essential feature today is
that monopoly crushes_ the
whole society outside of itself.
And the working people are
learning.

Many Forms

Financial parasitism, which
has accompanied the growth of
monopoly has many forms. High
interest on hire purchase, moft-
gages and all forms of direct
borrowing, bite at first hand;
countless millions more have
been and are being made
through land speculation which
increases the cost of housing,
raises rents. and rockets the
price of land needed for schools,
hospitals and other public
works (paid for through rates and
taxes); it has moved into the
retail trade through the monopo-
ly chains with their ability to ex-
clude the smaller concerns by
paying fantastic sums for shops

Most Britons face
real housing crisis

The consequences of the pres-
ent crisis of British capitalism
and the Tory efforts (through
entry to the Common Market)
to unload all its burdens on the
working people; are seen in the
crisis for working people in such
things as prices, housing, trans-
port, social services, pensioners
and poverty.

The richest 7% own 84% of
thé. gation’s wealth and the gap
will widen further, according to
the Daily Mirror. The paper
goes on to say: “Nobody is
starving, but there are millions
of, people eking out desperately
meagre and _ underpriveleged
lives.”

Housing is one of the issues
felt most severely. To rent a
house. is almost impossible.
Waiting lists. for Municipal
Council Housing (projects in
USA) are thousands long and
you can grow old waiting. Peo-
ple, especially young married
couples, are told to buy their
homes, but a. house that cost
£4,350 six months ago, today
costs £5,700. (£1=approx. $2.50).

In London, no house can be
bought for less than £8000, even
in the poorest areas. In the last
two years, house prices have
increased by from 65% to 85%.
It is simply impossible for a
young couple, both working, to
qualify for a mortgage. Average
mortgage repayments in a
working class area range from
£45to £60 a month ($112=$150).

Of the 2,652,000 _ resident
households in London, 1,070,860
are owner-occupiers, 659,340 are
in Council-owned houses, 625,-
000 are in unfurnished flats
privately owned and 279,145 in
privately owned furnished flats.
For some of those, scandalous
conditions exist even in a city
like London. The 1971 census
reveals that 644,000 houses lack
the basic amenities—hot water,
bath and inside toilet.

The average American or
Canadian visitor to London sees
only the central area with its
tourist attractions and historic
buildings, but few see the real
London that the average Lon-
doner lives and works in.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, MAY 4, 1973—PAGE 8

and premises and passing the
cost on in their prices (some
even léasing shops from their
own property companies, thus
gaining as monopoly retailer and
property owner). At every turn,
purchasing . power is sucked
from the people's pockets. They
call the result ‘inflation’ — and
blame it on the trade unions.
But facts belie them. And the
people are learning.

In Britain a Special Trades
Union Congress has called upon
the General Council to organ-
ize and lead co-ordinated action
in support of affiliated unions in
dispute and who require sup-
port. It has also called for a de-
termined campaign, inviting af-
filiated unions to join in a day
of national protest and stop-

- page against the wage control

policy and rise in food prices.
Serious Situation

While no official wage control
policy as yet exists as such in
direct legal form in Canada, we
are teetering on the brink, with
voices continually demanding
that such controls be introduced
by Parliament.

There is therefore a need to
mobilize every ounce of work-
ing class strength, to gather all

the forces of support for those *

in the front line of the battle
against monopoly, on both the
economic and political fronts.

There is no room for illusions
as to the seriousness of the situ-
ation. Unity in action is needed
to win the demands and push
back the attack on workers’
standards of living in new con-
tract negotations of 1973. The
Canadian Labor Congress can
play a much more active role
than it is presently doing in co-
ordinating action in support of
affiliated unions in negotiations
and to win public support be-
hind: organized labor by expos-
ing monopoly and its aims.

The rapid growth

in Siberian oil

It took some seven years to
produce the first 100,000,000
tons of oil in Western Siberia.
Eighteen months. later, on
March 28, 1973 the Glavtyumen-
neftegaz control centre register-
ed the 200,000,000th ton of oil
extracted in Siberia since the
development of cis-Ob deposits
began.

There is a whole series of con-
ditions facilitating the high de-
velopment rates of the USSR’s
youngest and most promising
oil- and- gas-bearing region.
These rates will be kept up for
a long time, primarily because
a wealth of oil has been discov-
ered there. Calculations show
that in the near future it will be
possible to extract up to 600-700
million tons oil a year in the
cis-Ob area. ;

Among the deposits being
commissioned are the biggest
ones, whose development allows
rapidly increasing the volume of
oil output: the Samotlor, Agans-
koye, Mamontovskoye and Fyo-
dorovskoye deposits. The oilmen
are confident that in the con-
cluding year of the Ninth Five-
Year Plan Siberia’s oil-fields
will produce 10-15 million tons
more than envisaged in the Dir-
ectives of the 24th CPSU Con-
gress.

“To hell with the neighbours!”

( World ’s students demanaa

end to terror, arrests

PRAGUE—Student organizations from 13 countries have
addressed appeals to the rulers of Jordan and Morocco
protesting the imprisonment and terror launched against
thousands of democrats and liberation fighters in poth
countries. The appeals, addressed to Morocco’s King Hassan,
and Jordan’s King Hussein, are as follows:

His Majesty King Hassan II, d
We the undersigned, the associations of Arab ani

_ foreign students in Czechoslovakia, appeal to you in the

name of thousands of students to free all progressive
political prisoners in Morocco and halt the campaign °
persecution and terror against Moroccan citizens. ‘

We further appeal to you to refrain from persecuting our
colleagues, the Moroccan students, respect the autonomy
of the university, free all detained students and teachers,
and tirelessly work in the service of the common Arab
cause.

* * *
His Majesty King Hussein,

During these critical days, through which the Arab n@ ~
tions in general, and the Jordanian people in particular, are
passing, and which require the unity of all forces struggling
against the occupation and the imperialist-backed Israeli
aggression against our country, we find that our country,
Jordan, is witnessing events that are diametrically oppose
to this objective. Since the days of Black September 197
the- Palestinian resistance has been liquidated in Jordan,
and thousands of progressives and democrats have bee?
jailed. Today we are again witnessing a fresh campaig®
of arrests, accompanied by terror and persecution, whic
many citizens are being subjected to. 4 A

Speaking for all student associations of the Arab a”
other countries in the Socialist Republic of Czechoslovakia,
we strongly appeal to you in the name of humanity an
the necessity of mobilizing all the forces fighting agains
the imperialist-backed Israeli aggression, to immediately
free all political prisoners and detainees in Jordan 4?
put a complete end to the campaign of terror and persecl”
tion to which the sons of the heroic Jordanian people a
being subjected.

“Sian Fant
as ron!

érosrawh
+ deskasi oven

The two appeals are signed by student associations from
Palestine, Syria (2), Iraq (2), Cyprus, Jordan, Sierra Leone;

Lebznon, Sudan, Yemen, Tego, Ethiopia, Nigeria a
\ Kurdish students. :