Cuban Officials Say Equal Pay May Not Work, Dropping Wage Limits Could Help
ASTUTE BLOGGERS
By Pastorius
Cuba is beginning the Long March To Joining The Rest Of The Western World. It seems, they are finding that, perhaps, Communism doesn't work after all:
HAVANA — The egalitarian wage system Fidel Castro spent decades
building in Cuba is no longer viable, plagued by low pay, corruption and waste
that can be eased by paying workers more for better work, a top labor official
said in an interview published Wednesday.
Carlos Mateu, a vice minister of labor and social security, said many government
companies have already eliminated caps on salaries for productive workers and
the rest must do so by August.
The article in the Communist Party daily Granma contained few direct
quotes from Mateu, a practice common in official Cuban media. But it said Mateu
"underscored that there has been a tendency for everyone to get the same, and
that egalitarianism is not convenient."
"That is something we have to resolve," Granma said, adding that the
traditional Cuban pay system saps employees' incentives to excel since everyone
earns the same regardless of performance.
That is "unfair because if it's harmful to give a worker less than he
deserves, it's also harmful to give him what he doesn't deserve," the article
said.
Mateu said the new compensation system fits with the mantra of
"socialist distribution" often mentioned by new President Raul Castro: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his
work." |
