One issue that has been sidelined during this general election has been the scandal of low pay in Britain. For decades, pay has stagnated whilst profits have soared. Britain needs a pay rise! Britain needs a revolution!

Once more, the world economy is dangling on the edge of a precipice. The crisis in Greece has again hit the headlines and threatens to drag Europe down with it. The days when capitalism could simply sail by without a care in the world have gone forever. As in the interwar period, the crisis of capitalism remains deep-seated and protracted.

In the second part of his article on the “organic crisis of capitalism”, originally published in the In Defence of Marxism magazine, Rob Sewell examines how capitalism has become an enormous barrier to the development of the productive forces, offering nothing but “secular stagnation” and permanent austerity.