The Theory and Policy of Labour Protection

by A. Schäffle; etc. statutes Germany. Laws

The normal time day is not however sufficient to establish a just balance between performance of work and payment; for in an hour of the same industrial time value, one individual will work less, another more, one better, another worse. The combined interests of the whole community and the equitable wage relations of the different workers to each other, demand therefore the fixing of the normal performance of labour within a defined working time, in short the fixing of a unit of normal work. Having normalised industry on a time basis, we must now normalise it on a work basis. And this is how Rodbertus proposes to do it: According as the normal time labour-day has been fixed in any trade at 6, 8, 10, or 12 hours (in proportion to the arduousness of the work, etc.), the normal amount of work of such a day must also be fixed for that trade, i.e. the amount of work must be determined which an average workman, with average skill and industry, would be able to accomplish in his trade during such a normal time labour-day. This amount of work shall represent in any trade the normal amount of work of a normal time labour-day, and therewith shall constitute in any trade the normal work labour-day, which would be equal to what any workman must accomplish within the normal time labour-day of his trade, before he can be credited with and paid for a full day, that is, a normal work labour-day. Hence if a workman had accomplished in a full normal time labour-day, either one and a half times the amount, or only half the amount of normal work, he would e.g. in the six hours mining day, for six hours work, be credited with a day and a half, or half a day respectively of normal work time; whilst in spinning and weaving, on the other hand, he would in the same way, for 12 hours work, be credited with one and a half or a half-day respectively of normal work time.

In this way Rodbertus claims to be able to establish a fair measure and standard of comparison for labour times, not merely between the various kinds of trades and departments of industry, but also between the various degrees of individual efficiency. Each wage labourer would be able to participate proportionately in that portion of the national product which should be assigned to wage-labour as a whole. If therefore this portion were to be increased in a manner to which we shall presently refer, there would also be a rise in the share of the individual workers, in proportion to the rise in the nett result of national production. This scheme would form the groundwork of an individually just social wage system, a system by which the better workman would also be better paid, which would therefore balance the rights and interests of the workers among themselves, which moreover would ensure the productivity of national labour by variously rewarding the good and bad workers, thus recognising the rights and interests of the whole community, and lastly, which would continuously raise the labour-wage in proportion to the increase in national productivity (and also to the increasing returns of capital, whether fixed or moveable, applied to production).

I may here point out, however, that with all this we should not have arrived at an absolutely just system of remuneration of wage labour, unless we introduced a more complete social valuation of products in the form of normal labour pay instead of metal coinage.

But Rodbertus wishes to see his “normal work labour-day”—equal to 10 normal work hours—established as a universal measure of product value as well as of the value of labour: “Beyond and above what we have yet laid down the most important point of all remains to be established; the normal work labour-day must be taken as the unit of work time or normal time, and according to such work time or normal time (according to labour so computed) we must not only normalise the value of the product in each industry, but must also determine the wages in each kind of work.”

He claims that the one is as practicable as the other. First, with regard to regulating the value of product according to work time or normal work. In order to do this the “normal work labour-day”—which in any trade equals one day (in the various trades it may consist of a varying number of normal time hours), and which represents a quantity of product equal to a normal day’s work—this normal work day must be looked upon as the unit of work time or normal work, and in all trades it must be divided into an equal number (10) of work hours. The product in all trades will then be measured according to such work time. A quantity of product which should equal a full normal day’s work, whether it be the product of half a normal time labour-day, or of two normal time labour-days, would represent or be worth one work day (10 work hours); a quantity of product which should equal half a normal day’s work, whether it be the product of a normal work time or not, would represent or be worth half a day’s work or five work hours.

The product of a work hour in any trade would therefore, according to this measure, equal the product of a work hour in all other trades; or generally expressed: Products of equal work times are equal in value. Such is approximately the scheme of Rodbertus.

A really normal labour-day—normal time and normal work labour-day—would be necessary in any regulated social system that sought on the one hand, in the matter of distribution of wages, to balance equally “the rights and interests of the workers amongst themselves”; and on the other hand, in the matter of productivity, to balance equally the “rights and interests of the workers with those of the whole community,” by means of State intervention. It would therefore be necessary not merely in a State regulated capitalist society, with private property in the means of production, as Rodbertus proposed to carry it out under a strongly monarchical system, but also and specially would it be necessary under a democratic Socialism, if, true to its principles as opposed to Communism, it aimed at rewarding each man proportionately to his performance, instead of allowing each man to work no more than he likes, and enjoy as much as he can, which is the communistic method.

The only difference would be this: that any socialistic system must divide the nett result of production—after deducting what is required for the public purposes of the whole community—in proportion to the amount of normal time contributed, and must make the distribution in products valued according to the cost of their production computed in normal time; whilst Rodbertus, who wishes to preserve private property, finds it necessary to add one more point to those mentioned: the periodical normalisation of wage conditions in all trades. He is very clear upon this point. “The State must require the rate of wage for the normal working-day in any trade to be regulated and agreed upon by the employers and employed among themselves, and must also ensure the periodical readjustment of these regulations and the increase in the rate of wages in proportion to the increase in the productivity of work.”

But Rodbertus clearly perceived the difference between a normalised capitalist system and a normalised socialism, neither communistic nor anarchist. Were the workers alone, he continues, entitled to a share in the national product value, every worker would have to be credited with and paid for the whole normal time during which he had worked, and the whole national product value would be divided amongst the workers alone. For instance, if a workman had accomplished one and a half normal day’s work in his normal time working-day, he would be credited with 15 work hours, and paid accordingly; if he had only accomplished half a normal day’s work in the whole of his normal time working-day, he would be credited with only five work hours. The whole national profit, which would be worth x normal work, would then go in labour wage, which would amount to x normal work. But such a state of things, which may exist in the imaginations of many leaders of labour is, according to Rodbertus, the purest chimera: “In no condition of society can the worker receive the whole product of his normal work, he can never be credited in his wage with the whole amount of normal work accomplished by him; under all circumstances there must be deducted from it what now appears as ground rent and interest on capital.” Ground rent and interest on capital are, according to Rodbertus, remuneration for “indirect work” for the industrial function of directing or superintending production. “If therefore the worker has accomplished, in his normal time working-day, 10 hours of normal work, in his wages he will perhaps be only credited with three work hours, in other words the product value of three work hours will be assigned to him”; for the product value of one work hour would represent perhaps his contribution to the necessities of the State (taxes), and three work hours would have to go towards what is now called ground rent, and another three to interest on capital.

It is impossible here to enter upon a complete critical discussion of the practicability of the capitalist normal working-day, as conceived by Rodbertus; but I may be allowed in passing to indicate one or two points of criticism.