• On our blog, we have published a review addressing the current state of the planning debate. The occasion was Prokla issue #215 on planned economy: “Democratic Planned Economy and Labour-Time Calculation.”
  
• The RAV (Republican Lawyers’ Association) invited us for an interview for the “Utopia” issue of their newsletter. You can read it here: “With an App into a World without Exploitation.”
  
• The Platypus Review was also interested in labour-time calculation and conducted an interview with us: “Democratic Labour-Time Calculation in and for the 21st Century.”
• After the recent reissue of the first edition of the Basic Principles (1930) in Spanish, the second edition (1935) is now also available in Spanish, with a foreword by the Spanish group “cibcom.” The book should soon be available as a PDF here: https://doscuadrados.es/
• In the coming days, the December issue of express – Newspaper for Socialist Workplace and Trade Union Work will be published. It will include an article by us, in which we argue why labour-time calculation should also be relevant for trade unions. (*)
• On our blog, we maintain a bibliography of publications on labour-time calculation. In recent weeks, there have been several new additions, including:
  • Behrens, Fritz: “Economy of Time – in the end, all economy dissolves into it.” Remarks on measuring the utility effect of social labour (1960)
    
  • Mélis, Jean Baptiste (alias Mitchell): Los problemas del periodo de transición (1936)

  • Rogers, Nick: Reflections on the Economics of Socialism (2023)

  • Bruhn, Joachim: Avant-Garde and Ideology. Afterword on Council Communism (2003)

• In November, we had a memorable weekend in London, where we had the chance to meet some comrades from the Indep network. A report on the Historical Materialism Conference, and especially the panel we participated in, can be found in the Auxiliary Statements podcast (in English, starting at minute 28).
• Our social media empire continues to grow: we are now also on Bluesky.
  
  

2024 is drawing to a close, and we bid farewell with our last newsletter of the year – and with a quote from Ralf Hoffrogge:

“If the Left wants to play a role in the polarization between right-wing populism and progressive neoliberalism, it needs its own ideas – also in economic policy. The demands for socialization, as raised by the housing movement, climate movement, and social movements in the healthcare sector, could be first steps. However, they have only been fully articulated for parts of the economy, they are not anchored in the trade unions, and only the housing movement has tested means of exerting pressure for implementation with its referendums. The debate on socialization has so far not produced a fully developed transformation strategy – but it is a start.” (source)

Looking ahead to 2025, we look forward to advancing labour-time calculation further, in order to bring the socialization movement and debates on democratic economic planning together in a productive way.

In any case, you’ll still have us on your back next year. 

(*) The text will appear in the January issue.