Essay:On the question of incentives to work in a Communist Society

What are some incentives to work?

To answer this we must first look at work, what is the point of it? Why does anyone work? For starters, work, is not only going to your job for 8 hours, instead, it is the physical activity of a person which has a useful goal behind it. If I were to punch a wall with the goal of causing trouble then this is not work, this is just damaging the wall. (if not just hurting my own hand) But if I were to iron a shirt I have the goal of removing wrinkles, which, allows me to look better. There you can see a physical activity with a goal in mind and has a useful outcome behind it.

With the specifics out of the way, what are some incentives to work?

In Primitive society, our ancestors chipped away at stones to form blades which we could then use to cut, this labour was useful because it gave us something with use value. The sharp rock could be used as an arrowhead, a spearhead, a knife, etc. Or what about striking hot metal with a hammer to flatten or bend it, this labour, although of a different kind, is also useful. Both these examples of labour were done with a specific goal in mind: to sharpen a stone and forge metal respectively, although both these examples were done in different times, the stone was sharpened in, as already said, primitive times, for use in survival, while the metal example was done under systems which used forms of payment, in money or in-kind (Slave society, Feudalism and Capitalism)

However, labour is not only a useful process but also a creative process, such as an artist painting a picture or a game developer. These are examples of labour, both having a specific goal in mind, however, they also have that creative aspect.

Payment is not required to perform these actions, all that is needed is wanting to do them, (these reasons are called “incentives”) the Capitalist defender might say that:

“For someone to work, they need a monetary incentive!”

What they mean is that for someone to go to their job and work they need money in exchange. Of course, from what we have seen previously labour is not confined to the workplace and no one would dare to say that to make a bowl of cereal in the morning it requires me to be paid for it.

Of course, making a bowl of cereal is different from working 8 hours a day and of course, in Capitalism the main incentive is money, but as we can see from this cereal example, you don’t need money to work, you can work because you’re hungry and need to eat. And so we see that the biological need for food, and therefore also the need to acquire this food, is an incentive to work.

(This is also an incentive under Capitalism as working gets you money which you then spend on food)

Let’s return back to that stone example, many stones would have been sharpened and shared around the group, ensuring their survival by working together. This cooperation was key to the survival of the group because 1 person cannot kill a mammoth, but many people working together can, however, this group cannot work together if resources are not also shared. It is this circle that ensures that the group works together, it is in their best interests to work together to survive.

And so we see that cooperation is an incentive to work, however, there are others that we can cover. Another incentive is an obvious one, if you don’t work and are able to, then how would you acquire products, that is, how would you get things?

The Capitalist defender interrupts “Ah ha! Communism forces people to work!” First of all, Socialism* (we will discuss the incentives to work under Communism later) Secondly, does the need for food to survive force someone to go to the store and buy some?

If this is true then the Capitalist defenders can surely see that Capitalism would also force people to work. The reason why you wouldn’t get anything if you are able to work but don’t is because who would provide for you? No one other than yourself is going to the workplace, working and bringing home your food. (that is, unless you are unable to work due to disability, age, ect.) If you are able to work then you provide for yourself, if you are unable to work due to a disability, etc. you will still be given what you need to survive.

All people need to eat, all people need water and housing.

As said by Marx in ‘Critique of the Gotha Programme’:

“To understand what is implied in this connection by the phrase "fair distribution", we must take the first paragraph and this one together. The latter presupposes a society wherein the instruments of labor are common property and the total labor is co-operatively regulated, and from the first paragraph we learn that "the proceeds of labor belong undiminished with equal right to all members of society."

"To all members of society"? To those who do not work as well? What remains then of the

"undiminished" proceeds of labor? Only to those members of society who work? What remains then of the "equal right" of all members of society?

But "all members of society" and "equal right" are obviously mere phrases. The kernel consists in this, that in this communist society every worker must receive the "undiminished" Lassallean "proceeds of labor".

Let us take, first of all, the words "proceeds of labor" in the sense of the product of labor; then the co-operative proceeds of labor are the total social product. From this must now be deducted: First, cover for replacement of the means of production used up. Second, additional portion for expansion of production. Third, reserve or insurance funds to provide

against accidents, dislocations caused by natural calamities, etc.

These deductions from the "undiminished" proceeds of labor are an economic necessity, and their magnitude is to be determined according to available means and forces, and partly by computation of probabilities, but they are in no way calculable by equity.

There remains the other part of the total product, intended to serve as means of consumption.

Before this is divided among the individuals, there has to be deducted again, from it: First, the general costs of administration not belonging to production. This part will, from the outset, be very considerably restricted in comparison with present-day society, and it diminishes in proportion as the new society develops. Second, that which is intended for the common satisfaction of needs, such as schools, health services, etc. From the outset, this part grows considerably in comparison with present-day society, and it grows in proportion as the new society develops. Third, funds for those unable to work, etc., in short, for what is included under so-called official poor relief today.”

-Marx on the “undemenished proceeds of labour”, Chapter 1, pages 8-9

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/Marx_Critque_of_the_Gotha_Programme.pdf

Marx’s position was that in production the workers cannot get 100% of what they make, this is in response to the assertions of Lassalle and his followers. In production, there would always need to be part taken out to replace the machinery or as unnecessary surplus, which, would be used to provide for those who cannot work, as shown in the above quote they will all be given what they need (i.e, food, water, housing, care, etc.)

Let’s return to the creative example, we can also say that life would be boring and unfulfilling if those who can work don’t work, what would they do all day? (not to say that life for those who can’t work would have less or no meaning at all) If you aren’t going out, working for a couple of hours to acquire for yourself what you need to pursue this or that task then what can you do all day?

Labour is a source of enjoyment, sewing a shirt, gardening, painting, etc.

These are hobbies which people have because they are fun to do!

Socialism (and Communism) liberates the workers from oppression and exploitation, the long work hours of Capitalism are not due to necessity, they are due to profit. There can not be profit without workers working for longer than they need to to sustain themselves, the factory, etc. Now they work to sustain themselves and hundreds of other people, in order to do this they have to work long hours, from these long hours the Capitalists extract surplus value from the workers. by making the workers work longer than is required to produce their wage it produces extra value, this value, however, is not given to the worker, the worker already made their wage, this extra value is taken as profit;

As explained in by Marx in his book ‘Das Kapital’:

“(surplus value) is the difference between the value of the product and the value of the elements consumed in the formation of that product, in other words, of the means of production and the labour-power.”

- Marx on surplus value, Chapter 8 page 146

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/pdf/Capital-Volume-I.pdf

This means that if we have a product that costs $590 with $410 being the means of production and $90 being the wage then putting these values into the equation 590 - (410 + 90) = 90.

Thus, the surplus is $90, this value is the value of the wage recreated, however, this value is not paid to the worker, and this extra value goes to the Capitalists as profit. Without this extended work time the workers will work for as long as is necessary to produce what is needed by society as well as what is needed to maintain their workplace, that is, the machinery, etc. that is needed to produce, as well as extra that isn’t given to the workers but used to maintain the other aforementioned institutions. We may also say that work becomes far more bearable in a Socialist society, with the work hours reduced, no more exploitation, and more free time, why wouldn’t you go to work to maintain this state of affairs? “Yes but people aren’t machines, human error is inevitable!” The Capitalist defenders speak up, forgetting that Adam Smith’s theories are based on humans being perfectly rational. Marxism is not Utopian, we don’t expect to transition from Capitalism to Socialism to Communism overnight. In order to overthrow Capitalism to get to Communism, the Proletariat must develop class consciousness, this recognition of their social class, and their interests in that social class, is the key to this problem. One goal of Communist parties is to educate the people, to give them the information which is required for them to develop this class consciousness,(which is suppressed by the Bourgeoisie through scapegoating and other methods), class consciousness, which Capitalist defenders seem to forget about, is again another incentive to work. You’d know full well that working is beneficial for you, not only in giving you what you need to survive but also because it maintains this system which benefits you and all other people. After Communism is established what then is the incentive to work? We can say that repetition and following social norms plays the largest part in working in a Communist society.

After the revolution is done and Socialism is established after half a century, maybe even a century, everyone who lived under Capitalism would have died, and everyone alive at that time would have lived under Socialism, knowing only Socialism. They witness day to day life and they go about their day observing the norms of society. It is normal to go to work for X amount of hours and collect what is needed.

With this in mind, we can see then that the argument of “it is human nature to be greedy” falls apart right before your eyes, “human nature” is not a static thing, it changes with the conditions and with this change in social conditions over a century so changes human nature.

This following of the social norms of society is illustrated by Lenin in his book, ‘State and Revolution’:

“Only in communist society, when the resistance of the capitalists have disappeared, when there are no classes (i.e., when there is no distinction between the members of society as regards their relation to the social means of production), only then "the state... ceases to exist", and "it becomes possible to speak of freedom". Only then will a truly complete democracy become possible and be realized, a democracy without any exceptions whatever. And only then will democracy begin to wither away, owing to the simple fact that, freed from capitalist slavery, from the untold horrors, savagery, absurdities, and infamies of capitalist exploitation, people will gradually become accustomed to observing the elementary rules of social intercourse that have been known for centuries and repeated for thousands of years in all copy-book maxims.

They will become accustomed to observing them without force, without coercion, without subordination, without the special apparatus for coercion called the state. The expression "the state withers away" is very well-chosen, for it indicates both the gradual and the spontaneous nature of the process. Only habit can, and undoubtedly will, have such an effect; for we see around us on millions of occassions how readily people become accustomed to observing the necessary rules of social intercourse when there is no exploitation, when there is nothing that arouses indignation, evokes protest and revolt, and creates the need for suppression. And so in capitalist society we have a democracy that is curtailed, wretched, false, a democracy only for the rich, for the minority.

The dictatorship of the proletariat, the period of transition to communism, will for the first time create democracy for the people, for the majority, along with the necessary suppression of the exploiters, of the minority. Communism alone is capable of providing really complete democracy, and the more complete it is, the sooner it will become unnecessary and wither away of its own accord.”

- Lenin on Communism and observing social norms, page 62

https://www.marxists.org/ebooks/lenin/state-and-revolution.pdf

In the Communist society, free from Capitalists, the people who for decades have know only Socialism and Communism, who would recognise their class interests and who would not have greed as a motivation (nor do they have the means to acquire more than they need) would willingly participate in Society.

“But what about human nature? It’s human nature to be greedy how can the workers work in a society that doesn’t fulfill this greed?”

A very common argument, which has been more or less destroyed previously, but which we will discuss now in more detail anyway.

“Human Nature”

One of the Capitalist defenders’ favourite arguments against Communism is the idea that “humans are greedy by nature”, this is untrue, as shown before, there is no singular, constant human nature, human nature changes depending mostly on their conditions, that is, the society they live in and the beliefs of that society, in Capitalism greed is a necessary part of the system, the endless collection of profit requires endless greed and hunger for profit, however in Primitive society and a majority of the animal kingdom, greed is an unhelpful trait, it is better to work together in a group than it is to monopolise material.

The primitive society also did not have the means for an individual to monopolise material, it was only upon the development of slave societies when our ancestors were no longer in danger of attack from predators that individuals were finally able to appropriate and exploit the labour of others when private ownership of material became economically and practically possible. There was a clear change in the mode of production and exchange as well as beliefs and with this change arose changes in “human nature”, no longer was it human nature to live in fear of predators, it was now human nature to work in a field, if you were a slave nor a member of the elite, that is.

Slave societies then developed into Feudal societies, the emergence of nobility and royalty, with lords who owned lands and serfs who worked the lands, religions like Christianity played a part in creating a new outlook on life, with this new economic base based on serf labour, one would not be wrong to claim it was human nature to work for a lord! Or that it was human nature to be ruled by a King appointed by God!

With technological advancements, the development of the old merchant middle class into the Bourgeoisie and technological development in the Industrial Revolution Capitalism emerged, once again a new economic base developed with new conditions, the old farmers, who had worked on the same farm for generations, suddenly found themselves with the opportunity to move to the disease infested, over-crowded cities, which offered higher pay than they had on the farm. A migration took place, a migration from town and farm to city and factory, more and more people worked in factories and the Bourgeoisie gained more and more profits.

After witnessing this summary of the development of society on economic grounds and changes in ideas, can one honestly say that it is human nature to be greedy?

If my summary was not enough to convince you, we should delve into the science of sociology and see what the experts on the topic have to say.

First of all, I shall point to a founding father of Sociology, Émile Durkheim!

Durkheim believed that human nature can not be analysed in isolation, you must take into account the society in which the person lives.

This is shown when he says this in his work, ‘The Rules of Sociological Method’:

“Yet our thought would be singularly misinterpreted if the conclusion was drawn from the previous remarks that sociology, in our view, should not even take into account man and his faculties.

On the contrary, it is clear that the general characteristics of human nature play their part in the work of elaboration from which social life results. But it is not these which produce it or give Rules For the Explanation of Social Facts it its special form. they only make it possible. Collective representations, emotions and tendencies have not as their causes certain states of consciousness in individuals, but the conditions under which the body social as a whole exists.

Doubtless these can be realised only if individual natures are not opposed to them. But these are simply the indeterminate matter which the social factor fashions and transforms. Their contribution is made up exclusively of very general states, vague and thus malleable predispositions which of themselves could not assume the definite and complex forms which characterise social phenomena, if other agents did not intervene.

What a gulf, for example, between the feelings that man experiences when confronted with forces superior to his own and the institution of religion with its beliefs and practices, so multifarious and complicated, and its material and moral organisation! What an abyss between · the psychical conditions of sympathy which two people of the same blood feel for each other, and that hotchpotch of legal and moral rules which determine the structure of the family, personal relationships, and the relationship of things to persons, etc.! We have seen that even when society is reduced to an unorganised crowd, the collective sentiments which arise within it can not only be totally unlike, but even opposed to, the average sentiments of the individuals in it.

How much greater still must be the gap when the pressure exerted upon the individual comes from a normal society, where, to, the influence exerted by his contemporaries, is added that of previous generations and of tradition! A purely psychological explanation of social facts cannot therefore fail to miss completely all that is specific, i.e. social, about them.

What has blinkered the vision of many sociologists to the insufficiency of this method is the fact that, taking the effect for the cause, they have very often highlighted as causal conditions for social phenomena certain psychical states, relatively well defined and specific, but which in reality are the consequence of the phenomena. Thus it has been held that a certain religiosity is innate in man; as is .a.certain minimum of sexual jealousy, filial piety or fatherly affection, etc. , and it is in these that explanations have been sought for religion, marriage and the family. But history shows that these inclinations, far from being inherent in human nature, are either completely absent under certain social conditions or vary so much from one society to another that the residue left after eliminating all these differences, and which alone can be considered of psychological origin, is reduced to something vague and schematic, infinitely removed from the facts which have to be explained. Thus these sentiments result from the collective organisation and are far from being at the basis of it.

It has not even been proved at all that the tendency to sociability was originally a congenital instinct of the human race. It is much more natural to see in it a product of social life which has slowly become organised in us, because it is an observable fact that animals are sociable or otherwise, depending on whether their environmental conditions force them to live in common or cause them to shun such a life. And even then we must add that a considerable gap remains between these well determined tendencies and social reality”

- Durkheim on human nature, pages 130-132

https://monoskop.org/images/1/1e/Durkheim_Emile_The_Rules_of_Sociological_Method_1982.pdf

What Durkheim has shown here is that human nature is determined by the conditions in which a person lives, specific ideas such as religion, family, and marriage appear in 1 form in 1 culture but not in the same form in another, it is clear to say that the system in which they live plays a part in their behaviour and development of social behaviours. Let us not forget that Marx was also a founding father of sociology, Marx for example says in his thesis on Feuerbach:

“Feuerbach resolves the religious essence into the human essence. But the human essence is no abstraction inherent in each single individual.

In its reality it is the ensemble of the social relations…”

- Marx on human nature

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/theses.htm

The Marxist conception of historical development sheds the most light on the idea of human nature and that human nature is not constant but changes with changing social and economic conditions of society and its development. It would be ridiculous to assume that the first Homo Sapiens, from 300,000 years ago, had the same nature as humans now, if one really must give humans a nature, then it would best be described as “change”.

Now that we have outlined the incentives to work in a Communist society and that humans can adapt to these new incentives we must now ask, how are they created? Where do they come from?

How are these incentives created? Where do they come from?

Class interests and cooperation, and following social norms are all well and good but how is this done? How are these incentives created and where do they come from?

The Capitalist system, wherever it is implemented, creates conditions of poverty, pollution, and oppression. The Industrial Revolution, which was the beginning of modern Capitalism, created the Proletariat class, the class of those who depend on wages for survival, who sell themselves daily and hourly, the modern slave. It is this class and its inherent antagonism with the Bourgeoisie, which profits from the exploitation of the Proletariat and wishes to keep the current state of affairs, that will give birth to the revolution that will overthrow Capitalism.

“Overthrowing Capitalism is all well and good but societies aren’t created overnight” the once-defender of Capitalism says.

An astute observation! You’re absolutely correct!

A transition period is needed, this transition period has already been mentioned, Socialism(and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat!). It is in this period during which the political and economic changes take place, that the Proletariat has overthrown the Bourgeoisie and smashed the Bourgeois state, replacing it with the Dictatorship of the Proletariat

“what’s that?”

A good question!

The Dictatorship of the Proletariat (DOTP) refers to when the Proletariat has control over the state, it is a society with the Proletariat as the dominant class, this is a change in the superstructure of society and Socialism is a change in the base, a change in the mode of production. It is a goal of this transition to educate the people, to develop class consciousness. The Proletariat have complete control of the state, they are able to pursue the interests of their class under the protection of the semi-state which they control and it is with this class consciousness that again incentive to work appears. As Engels says in his book ‘Anti-Dühring’:

“The proletariat seizes political power and turns the means of production in the first instance into state property. But, in doing this, it abolishes itself as proletariat, abolishes all class distinctions and class antagonisms, abolishes also the state as state. Society thus far, based upon class antagonisms, had need of the state, that is, of an organisation of the particular class, which was pro tempore the exploiting class, for the maintenance of its external conditions of production, and, therefore, especially, for the purpose of forcibly keeping the exploited classes in the condition of oppression corresponding with the given mode of production (slavery, serfdom, wage-labour).

The state was the official representative of society as a whole; the gathering of it together into a visible embodiment. But it was this only in so far as it was the state of that class which itself represented, for the time being, society as a whole: in ancient times, the state of slave-owning citizens; in the Middle Ages, the feudal lords; in our own time, the bourgeoisie. When at last it becomes the real representative of the whole of society, it renders itself unnecessary.

As soon as there is no longer any social class to be held in subjection; as soon as class rule, and the individual struggle for existence based upon our present anarchy in production, with the collisions and excesses arising from these, are removed, nothing more remains to be repressed, and a special repressive force, a state, is no longer necessary. The first act by virtue of which the state really constitutes itself the representative of the whole of society – the taking possession of the means of production in the name of society – this is, at the same time, its last independent act as a state. State interference in social relations becomes, in one domain after another, superfluous, and then dies out of itself; the government of persons is replaced by the administration of things, and by the conduct of processes of production.

The state is not “abolished”. It dies out. This gives the measure of the value of the phrase “a free people's state”, both as to its justifiable use at times by agitators, and as to its ultimate scientific insufficiency; and also of the demands of the so-called anarchists for the abolition of the state out of hand.”

- Engels on the seizing of the state by the Proletariat, page 177

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/pdf/anti_duhring.pdf

The state seizes the means of production, and with their mastery over the state, the Proletariat therefore abolishes classes, with all people having the same relation to the means of production, class distinctions disappear. Now that everyone is working towards a common goal with this collective, helpful effort between all people the state will become unnecessary, dying out and replacing Socialism with Communism, the incentive of societal cooperation remains but in a new form, now it shifts to become not one of consciously wanting to cooperate but rather the observation of societal norms (which will be discussed later on as well in a bit more detail). This basic concept of observation of the social norms of society is where the main incentive to work originates in a Communist society

(Engels also masterfully points out the failure of Anarchist theory, without a state or transition period, changing a whole mode of production and the political superstructure built on top becomes far more difficult.) The transition period between Capitalism and Communism plays a key role in the construction and development of incentives, this idea has been touched upon at times during this piece, however, we may now develop this idea further.

The Socialist transition period and the construction of the aforementioned incentives

The transition period between Capitalism and Communism, Socialism as well as the DOTP, is both a transition of economic bases and a transition of political systems, the DOTP is the political change, this refers to the organisation of the state, the Bourgeois state has been smashed and the new semi-state has been created, this semi-state is not a permanent state. After the smashing of the Bourgeois state and the overthrow of the Bourgeoisie as the ruling class,

During this transition period, after Socialism has “just emerged after prolonged birth pangs from capitalist society.” we can not go straight into the formula of “from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs”, the old incentive of greed would still exist, however, this greed may be satisfied by the fact that money still exists under socialism, inequalities of wealth are therefore, inevitable under socialism, as well as those who would all too happily take more than what they need for fun.

What is then to be done under the transition period is to keep control of the distribution of resources, that is, to give to the worker what the worker gives to society.

When the worker, after completing the day's work and collecting their “certificate”  (money earned from their labour) from society to prove they have worked for the necessary time, can then take the number of products equal to the time they put in.

As explained by Marx in Critique of the Gotha Programme’:

“What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect,

economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges. Accordingly, the individual producer receives back from society -- after the deductions have been made -- exactly what he gives to it. What he has given to it is his individual quantum of labor.

For example, the social working day consists of the sum of the individual hours of work; the individual labor time of the individual producer is the part of the social working day contributed by him, his share in it. He receives a certificate from society that he has furnished such-and-such an amount of labor (after deducting his labor for the common funds); and with this certificate, he draws from the social stock of means of consumption as much as the same amount of labor cost. The same amount of labor which he has given to society in one form, he receives back in another.”

- Marx on distribution of resources under Socialism (called the “lower phase of communism” by Marx), Chapter 1, page 9

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/Marx_Critque_of_the_Gotha_Programme.pdf

This system ensures that the previous norm of greed, and stealing are stopped and that the economic and social transition to Communism is possible.

It must be said that the hoarding of wealth is still possible because everyone has different abilities, those who can work harder and produce more would therefore be paid more as they gave more to society, and because they then have more than required to acquire what they need they can then amass wealth to some extent.

This idea is shown by Marx later in ‘Critique of the Gotha Programme’:

“But one man is superior to another physically, or mentally, and supplies more labor in the same time, or can labor for a longer time; and labor, to serve as a measure, must be defined by its duration or intensity, otherwise it ceases to be a standard of measurement. This equal right is an unequal right for unequal labor. It recognizes no class differences, because everyone is only a worker like everyone else; but it tacitly recognizes unequal individual endowment, and thus productive capacity, as a natural privilege. It is, therefore, a right of inequality, in its content, like every right. Right, by its very nature, can consist only in the application of an equal standard; but unequal individuals (and they would not be different individuals if they were not unequal) are measurable only by an equal standard insofar as they are brought under an equal point of view, are taken from one definite side only -- for instance, in the present case, are regarded only as workers and nothing more is seen in them, everything else being ignored. Further, one worker is married, another is not; one has more children than another, and so on and so forth. Thus, with an equal performance of labor, and hence an equal in the social consumption fund, one will in fact receive more than another, one will be richer than another, and so on. To avoid all these defects, right, instead of being equal, would have to be unequal. But these defects are inevitable in the first phase of communist society as it is when it has just emerged after prolonged birth pangs from capitalist society…”

- Marx on the “inequality” (differences) of people and their skills, Chapter 1, page 10

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/Marx_Critque_of_the_Gotha_Programme.pdf

Although, this collection of wealth would be nothing but a source of pride for the one amassing it and would not lead to a restoration of Capitalism as the means of production are owned by society and in order for anyone to take them for themselves they would have to get past the workers, who now own the means of production collectively and are armed. (the workers must be armed to defend against the Capitalists who will try to overthrow Socialism)

Later the Proletariat now has control over the state and with this control, the conditions for Communism are developed: with the seizing of the means of production by the Proletariat social classes are abolished as well as the state in the normal sense, with the dominant class no longer being an elite minority but the majority of people, and now the state withers away.

The previously discussed gaining of money will also disappear under Communism, because money becomes redundant as Communist society operates under, as previously said, the principle of “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need.”

Resources are distributed based on needs, thus money becomes redundant.

Returning to the observance of social norms, at this stage, this would become the main incentive to work, people would work because it is a social norm, because, as said before, after some time, maybe a century, everyone born under Socialism would know only Socialism and not Capitalism and so upon the withering of the state and the emergence of Communism, they would see everyone working and see it as normal, along with wanting to preserve the system.

This is how this important incentive emerges, out of a desire to cooperate forming into a social norm, observed by all born into the system becoming sort of a “second nature” as work has become the primary want in life, and not just work in the factories, etc. but hobbies and creating things!

As Marx says, once again, in ‘Critique of the Gotha Programme’:

“In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished; after labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly -- only then then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!”

- Marx on the Higher Phase of Communism and “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs”, Chapter 1, page 10

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/Marx_Critque_of_the_Gotha_Programme.pdf

Conclusion

From this piece we have seen that in a Socialist society, there are multiple incentives to work, such as cooperation, biological necessity (and for some collecting wealth). The incentive of cooperation emerges from the desire, at a base level, to help your family for example. Socialism is also based upon cooperation between everyone in society, with the country providing food to the towns and the towns providing industrial products to the country. Biological necessity is simply the biological need for food and to keep yourself alive, and so you’d work to acquire food, etc. Finally Because Socialism still retains money and everyone is paid based on work, amassing wealth (as meaningless as it really is) serves as to satisfy the original want for money and wealth. We then turn to Communism, under Communism there is 1 main incentive, observing social norms. After some time the incentive of cooperation morphs into a social norm, since the system is based upon society cooperating with eachother it becomes practically a habit and everyone born under Communism would see this in action and think it is normal to go to work for a bit each day, work becomes a habit as well and as normal as a blue sky and green grass!

We can also say that the desire to maintain this system is also an incentive, although not as strong as observing social norms.

Thus we have now seen how incentives work under Socialism and Communism, how they emerge and how the conditions of Socialism create the incentives for Communism.