France: pensions, unemployment, inflation... For the resumption of the class struggle against all capitalist attacks!

The pension “reform” is part of the general and constant intensification of capitalist attacks against the proletarians. Pensions are not a “right” or a gift from the state, but part of the “indirect wage” – the part of the “real wage” that is not paid directly to workers, but is redistributed in the form of social benefits – also called “social contributions”. Governments, both left and right, have for years sought to reduce these “levies” in response to the wishes of capitalists, thereby reducing “real wages” and increasing profits, and consequently reducing social benefits. Capitalism’s difficulties in the face of the growing crisis have forced it to increase the pressure on wages and the exploitation of the proletarians. We can see this in the unemployment insurance reform, which aims to reduce benefits; we can see it in the planned pension reform, which will often result in retirement with a reduced pension because of the extension of the length of time needed for contributions: no wonder these reforms have been approved by the employers’ organisations!

To this must be added inflation, which is high, especially for basic products, and which is eroding wages and constituting a real “transfer of wealth” in favour of the capitalists at the expense of the proletarians.

THE STRUGGLE AGAINST THE ATTACKS AGAINST THE PROLETARIAT REQUIRES A RETURN TO THE REAL CLASS STRUGGLE!

In the face of these attacks, the trade union organizations representatives boast that they took part in “consultative” meetings with the government, at which they put forward “other financing solutions” to the system which, they lament, had not been “seriously studied”; in fact, everyone knew that these meetings had no other aim than to give the government, which was determined to push through its project, an alibi image of dialogue: the class adversary must not be consulted, but fought! This is precisely what the trade union leaders, unwaveringly clinging to their role as “social partner” and to the class collaboration that this role entails, do not want. That’s why, after participating in these masquerades, they have resurrected their disastrous tactic of repeated “days of action” and their intention to inscribe “mobilisation” (let’s not talk about struggle!) “in a long-term perspective” (press release of 1 October): there is no better way to exhaust the proletarian combativity, as illustrated by the defeats of the great movements in 2003, 2010, 2013 and 2020.

However, workers are not always doomed to defeat, as the strike of SNCF (national railway company) inspectors over the Christmas holidays showed: organized autonomously, they went on strike independently of the unions, which were too busy with social dialogue with management, and they forced management to give in and  concede if not a pay raise, at least a signifant bonus. This episode, beyond its inevitable limits, points the way: for the struggle to have a chance of success, it is necessary to break with the tendencies and practices of class collaboration imposed by the union leaders and take the struggle into our own hands.

For the return to class methods and means of struggle, for independent class organisation and struggle!

For the resumption of the general struggle against capitalism!

January, 17th 2023

Il comunista - le prolétaire - el proletario - proletarian - programme communiste - el programa comunista - Communist Program

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