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Let it not be forgotten that in defiance of its | pre-election pledges, the NSW Government has been | guilty of a distinct breach of its alleged non-party | programme. That breach consists in the attempt to | radically vary the established system in the railway | workshops.

Setting out to increase | production,- to reduce costs, | - the system now being contested aims | at enlarging the difference between what the worker | produces and what is given him in the form of wages. | Stripped to its skin that is what the card-system | seeks to accomplish. Man is to be a producing | animal. His value in the factory is to be expressed | in terms of horse-power.

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Taylor, the principal delineator of the system, | starts out with the proposition that the "best" kind | of staff is that where the intelligent men are in | superintendence over the stupid men - | the bullocks. He further confesses his | system is an insidious one. It may only be worked | in by craft, delicately and with a due regard to the | selection of the employees chosen for further | exploitation. Sociologists and believers in the | brotherhood of man must be eliminated.

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Dealing with a bicycle factory, "the largest in | the States", where 35 girls ultimately performed the | work of 120, Taylor says: |

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Bluntly, when the proposition that there should | be schemes detrimental to unionism was introduced, | those who believed there is a community of interest | between the exploiter and the exploited were | selected; the remainder, who would have fought | against the persistent displacement of other workers | (even though offered the bribe of increased wages), | were sacrificed on the altar of Greed.

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By an industrial conspiracy between the | management and the 35 girls, 85 girls in the case of | one small department in this factory had been | deprived of their livelihood.

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It was nothing to Taylor what became of them. | The system of "scientific management" deals only | with production at its cheapest basis.

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That the trouble is going on is due, no doubt, to | the incapacity of those who wished to establish | Taylorism upon us. Taylor himself says it takes | from three to five years to adopt his system, and | those places which have tried to work a sudden | change have merely developed a strike.

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He postulates an entire divorcement between the | worker and the ownership of his job. The employee | is to regard himself as a mere cog in the wheel. | Here is his statement:~~ |

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Pilkington or R T Robinson, in common with Sir Wm | Irvine, will put that argument up any day. The | worker has no right to share in the profits. | Immediately a loss sets in the worker is sacked. | Profits are sought under Taylorism with a deadly | disregard to what the community may think. The | higher they are, the more efficient is the | scientific management.

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But Taylor stands on the pre-emptive right of the | plutocratic ownership of industry. He makes no | attempt to re-organise the source of profit. He | sticks to speeding-up the workers. The great army | of dividend-mongers, commercial travellers, | sub-foremen and other parasitic burdens on production | are not referred to.

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And his system is a dead loss to the workers as a | class and a substantial gain to the profiteers as a | class. Take the case of the girls in the cycle | factory - his own example. Taylor says | they averaged from 80 to 100 per cent higher wages | than they formerly received. That looks all right. | But they averaged no such thing. This applies to 35 | of them, specially selected; the average of the | remaining 85 was reduced to nothing - | they were dumped on to the street.

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Let us suppose that the original 120 were paid | four dollars a week. That amounted to 480 dollars | weekly. If the final 35 were given 100 per cent | increase, the total is but 280 dollars | weekly - a clear loss to the indigent | masses of 200 dollars weekly on a standard amount of | labor.

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He repudiates the whole claim of unionism for a | collective bargain. Piece work is in all cases | substituted for wages. Certain workers are thrust | in advantageous positions over their fellows. The | working-class ceases to be a community, it develops | into a welter of economic cannibalism.

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If the aim of the world at large is to capitalise | humanity, then Taylorism must be a fine institution. | But if the objective of humanity is to spread | sunshine as widely as possible among the peoples of | the earth, then Taylorism may only be regarded as | hellish.

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It is a gross mis-statement to assert production | is short of requirements because the workers do not | do a fair thing. Every example of the | failure - the alleged failure to be | correct - of State and other collective | activities is due to reasons outside the delinquency | of the toilers. Every State enterprise we know of | has been burdened by the overweight of | superintendence.

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The NSW Government knows this. It pays huge | salaries to a crowd of favored appointees who strut | the workshops dressed in the clothes of authority, | draw their screw, and contribute nothing to the | output. Taylor now finds them an occupation. They | are policemen of time enforcing the decrees of the | profit-graspers.

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Every man on the face of the globe has a right to | earn a living for himself and his dependants. Any | man who prevents this being accomplished is an enemy | to the masses.

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So long as there is unemployment, so long as | mercenaries will starve the people to satisfy a | craving for wealth, the battle against such | conditions must go on.

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Under the capitalist system there is but one cure | for unemployment. That cure is to see that the | production of each is one man's proportion. He who | produces more than one man's proportion is doing | another a direct injury, and himself no good.

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There is an incentive to quick labor | - reduce hours; when we say reduced | hours, we mean hours so reduced that if Smith be starving | because of unemployment, Smyth shall get so little | profit out of Brown's toil that he will be glad to | duplicate that profit by employing Smith.

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These propositions are but makeshifts. They | enable the workers fight the capitalist state. For | ourselves we would have every man engaged in useful | service. The lust for gain would have no means of | satisfying its beastly appetite. Man would work in | helpful co-operation with his fellows. The whip of | dismissal would never smash across a human back. |

But that postulates Socialism. It | necessitates the realisation of working-class | supremacy in industry. For that day to dawn | Capitalism must be fought and defeated.

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