The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-05-26

mocrats, Socialists, and labor bu-
reaucrats have a common platform.
That platform is Red-baiting, anti
Communist.
In its 1923 election campaign the
Workers (Communist) Party offers
the following program against trusti-
fled capital and in the interests of
the working class, working farmers,
and oppressed Negro race:
The Curse of Unemployment.
There is heavy economic depres-
sion over the country with a very
heavy unemployment in it's wake.
Bread-lines are long. Hypocritical
charity" is in it's flower. Even con-
sentative Senators estimate the num-
Der of unemployed at four million.
The curse of unemployment is the
most terrible plight of the working
class. The cyclical crises of capital
ist industry bring with them time and
again the untold sufferings of mass
unemployment. But there is unem-
ployment not only at times of crises;
it is here at all times. Unemploy-
ment on mass scale is a normal"
phenomenon of this glorious capital
list society.
The very technical progress-the
development of new machinery, the
increased productivity of labor-be-
comes under capitalist conditions a
source of growing unemployment.
The introduction of new machines has
decreased the number of workers.
The opening up of new markets can
not keep pace with the speedy de-
velopment of technique. The intro
duction of machinery makes the skill
of the workers superfluous. Large
masses of unsI5illed workers can take
the place of the skilled. The time
of apprenticeship is being greatly
shortened. Young workers and even
children can take the place of adults.
A growing number of women are
entering into industry.
The introduction of machinery Gre
ates the basis for mass production.
Mass production with its murderous
competition ruins the lower middle
class and drives its members as
workers into the industries. Mono
poly capitalism ruins the farmers and
forces them to sell their labor power
as industrial workers in the cities.
Mass production opens up hitherto
backward agrarian regions industri-
ally. A large-scale industriaJization
Of the South is taking place, and has
driven hundreds of thousands of
Negroes into the industries. Despite
all prohibition of immigration there
is an annual influx of hundreds Of
thousands of workers from other
countries.
Under present capitalist conditions,
it is inevitable that there be a con-
slant industrial reserve army of
iobless. Even in the best periods of
prosperity, the number of jobless is
estimated at one and half million
In 1927, the factories produced 26
rer cent more than in 1919. Dur
ing this same period, the number of
wage-earners employed in manufac-
turing decreased by not less than
$4,000. Eleven per cent fewer
wage-earners than in 1919 produced
in manufacturing in 1927, 26 per cent
more products. In other words, each
worker produced AZ per cent more
The same tendency manifests itself
everywhere The railways had in
1927 almost 100000 less workers than
in 1919 The number of "superflu-
Gus" miners is near to a quarter of
million. In manufacturing, min
ing and railroading, there were al
most one and a half million fewer
workers employed by the end of 1927
than in 1919. During the last few
years, there has been a continuous
movement of population from the
farms to the cities In 1925, 1884,
coo, in 1925, 100000, in 1927, 6O4,-
900 more persons left the farms for
cities than the cities for the
farms. A large proportion of these
bankrupt and ruined farmers became
industrial workers or rather tried to
become industrial workers. Even
Secretary of Labor Davis has been
forced to raise the question:
SIS automatic machinery driven
by relentless power going to leave
en- our hands state of chronic and
increasing unemployment? Is the
machinery that turns out our wealth
also to create poverty? Is it giving
US permanent jobless class?"
A capitalist writer characterizes
the present unemployment as "tech-
biological unemployment, not cyclical
AN unemployment developing
gradually, almost unawares, like
creeping paralysis, in the midst of
unprecedented prosperity, the by
product of improved chronological eff
ficiency."
Unemployment is indeed the "creep-
ing paralysis" of capitalist society.
1t represents the most vicious con-
tradiction of the present economic
ordpr Tho moro machinery tha