SOVIET EFFICIENCY.

Grey River Argus, 25 January 1943, Page 6

SOVIET EFFICIENCY.

(To the Editor).

Sir. —it is now 22 or 23 years since Lenin instituted the system of payment by results throughout Russia What this imnlies is not mentioned, I gather by the supporters of Communism among cex’tain of our Workers’ Groups;—there is a cherished illusion amongst some of those that a. different and Utopian economic system prevails in the Soviet Union. Well there is the method by which social discipline m Russia is enforced, and economic 'efficiency, therefore assured: An order issued by the Commissar of the Food Industry of the Soviet Union on 27th October, 1940, provided that employees in some sugar refineries were to be penalised for their failure to fulfil production quotas prescribed by the Government during the current seasons. The penalty was in the form of a reduction in wages of all administrative and technical workers, effective November 1940. The refineries were to he transferred in classification to a lower wage category, thus decreasing the wages of all workers of the refineries in question. Wages were to be restored to their former level as soon as plant production is up to planned requirements. This order was published in “Food Industry” the organ of the Food Commissariat, Moscow, 26th October, 1940. The Soviet wage policv. which requires a minimum output from each worker, already provides that if his output is lower than that prescribed, he not only gets lower wages, but he may also be punished for repeated failure by transfer to a lower pa ; d job. This seems to be a highly effective system of keeping uo production, and in preventing strikes. Nevertheless I don’t think it could ever be very popular amongst West Coast workers. I am, etc., “THAT’LL BE THE DAY.”