TO N. I. BUKHARIN (April 1921)

Written in March–April 1921 · First published in 1925 in Lenin Miscellany IV. Printed from the original. · page 539

The question is of theoretical interest too:

the proletarian state power holds
a material base {{factories railways foreign trade.

Consequence: in its hands is a commodity stock and its wholesale (railway) transport.

What is the proletarian state power doing with this stock?
Selling it:
(α) to the workers by hand and brain for money,
or for their labour without money;
(β) to the peasants for grain.

How does it sell? Through whom?

Through a commission agent (=a trader) for his percentage on commission.

It gives preference to the co-operatives (trying to organise the entire population in them).

Why is this impossible? Yet this is capitalism+socialism.