What the workingmen of the country are profoundly interested in is the private ownership of the means of production and distribution, the enslaving and degrading wage-system in which they toil for a pittance at the pleasure of their masters and are bludgeoned, jailed or shot when they protest - this is the central, controlling, vital issue of the hour, and neither of the old party platforms has a word or even a hint about it. As a rule, large capitalists are Republicans and small capitalists are Democrats, but workingmen must remember that they are all capitalists, and that the many small ones, like the fewer large ones, are all politically supporting their class interests, and this is always and everywhere the capitalist class.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Workers care about ownership of production and fair wages, but major parties ignore this core issue.
- In plain terms
- Politicians ignore the real problem: who owns businesses and how workers are paid.
- What can you take from it?
- Party politics often ignores fundamental economic inequalities.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- How do political platforms serve workers?
- What issues get ignored in elections?
Another view
It oversimplifies party platforms which may address labor issues indirectly.
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