It is not news that the recent recession has forced governments world wide to take on in some cases trillions of dollars of debt in order to bail out the financial system that created crisis in the first place. What is becoming more obvious everyday is that should economic growth and recovery happen it will take place on the backs of working people. No doubt there was fear and panic as debates over tax cuts and stimulus spending began to take centre stage. But worldwide as they opened the public coffers to the banks and financial institutions,a silver lining for the ruling class soon became visible. They could not have set the stage more effectively to undermine decades of economic and social gains of working people! Facing deficits in the billions and trillions of dollars , where better to begin to get this money back than from ordinary working people.
After over 30 years of gradual attacks on workers wages, benefits and working conditions, as well as strategically planned attacks on our public services through underfunding, undermining and privatizations, here was an opportunity to escalate these attacks dramatically -to intensify austerity measures and put in place plans for what may be called "permanent austerity." This means nothing more or less than taking back not only the actual wages and benefits , won through collective bargaining, strikes and struggles of the trade unions and the consequent raising of demands for the working class generally but to literally take away every aspect of the social wage won by the working class.
What began as a potential catastrophe for global capitalism has now revealed a potential silver lining and possibly even a golden egg for the exploiting class if we do not organize a fight back in our trade unions and in our communities.
Every day we are confronted with starker examples of their determination to roll back the hard won gains of the working class. With globalization and shifting of capital and labour to poor countries where labour is cheap and regulation barely exists , great new opportunities emerged for the profit seekers. Cheap investment opportunities, cheap labour, virtually non-existent labour and safety regulation. The loss of jobs in the manufacturing sector and the downward pressure on wages, benefits, working conditions and pensions,soon turned into even more elaborate schemes and strategies to escalate existing attacks on public services and public sector workers.
In the absence of any willingness on the part of the labour leadership to throw resources into the building of a strategic well organized fightback, to build political alternatives to the existing bourgeois parties, in fact using the union dues to throw millions of members' dollars into Obama's campaign, working people are left confused, disoriented and without direction and leadership. None of this is news to working people. Nor is it news that in the absence of a trade union or political leadership working people and the poor do not see alternatives in which to put their anger, energies and capacities
It is startling really the degree of danger we are facing. It is as one blogger said " like Alice in Wonderland." The reality is so obvious and everyday working people must feel an increasing sense of disbelief and almost the kind of powerlessness that one feels in a dream.
Today as it is everyday, the most striking news for me throws out another insult to our class, to the point where it is hard to keep up, what stands out are the tensions and debates going on in the US re raising the ceiling on US debt. Already 13 trillion dollars in debt and with a ceiling of 14.3 trillion Obama is struggling to win a vote to raise the debt ceiling. He has no political choice and is maneuvered by his opposition to force further deep cuts to public services and entitlements -to win support. What lousy dirty games these criminals play.
With full awareness that the higher the debt the more that must be stolen from the pockets of working and poor people, Social Security is moving more to the forefront as a purse to dig into, maybe even to steal entirely from the American working class. Of course every theft is linked to another theft -these criminals are organized and strategic. Social Security, as limited as it is, ensures that working people can retire with at the very least some income- not enough certainly if not augmented by work pensions and private savings -but enough to keep them out of deep and dire poverty. This entitlement is especially necessary for retired workers in the absence of a publicly funded health care. First they wanted to raise the retirement age, then a means test was proposed - not only to claw back universal entitlements and to " save tax payers money" but strategically designed to split the "middle class" from poorer workers, as if the divide between working and poor people is not huge enough. Well planned to undermine support for Social Security generally and in the long term get rid of it entirely. If nothing else these crooks are clever.
After over 30 years of gradual attacks on workers wages, benefits and working conditions, as well as strategically planned attacks on our public services through underfunding, undermining and privatizations, here was an opportunity to escalate these attacks dramatically -to intensify austerity measures and put in place plans for what may be called "permanent austerity." This means nothing more or less than taking back not only the actual wages and benefits , won through collective bargaining, strikes and struggles of the trade unions and the consequent raising of demands for the working class generally but to literally take away every aspect of the social wage won by the working class.
What began as a potential catastrophe for global capitalism has now revealed a potential silver lining and possibly even a golden egg for the exploiting class if we do not organize a fight back in our trade unions and in our communities.
Every day we are confronted with starker examples of their determination to roll back the hard won gains of the working class. With globalization and shifting of capital and labour to poor countries where labour is cheap and regulation barely exists , great new opportunities emerged for the profit seekers. Cheap investment opportunities, cheap labour, virtually non-existent labour and safety regulation. The loss of jobs in the manufacturing sector and the downward pressure on wages, benefits, working conditions and pensions,soon turned into even more elaborate schemes and strategies to escalate existing attacks on public services and public sector workers.
In the absence of any willingness on the part of the labour leadership to throw resources into the building of a strategic well organized fightback, to build political alternatives to the existing bourgeois parties, in fact using the union dues to throw millions of members' dollars into Obama's campaign, working people are left confused, disoriented and without direction and leadership. None of this is news to working people. Nor is it news that in the absence of a trade union or political leadership working people and the poor do not see alternatives in which to put their anger, energies and capacities
It is startling really the degree of danger we are facing. It is as one blogger said " like Alice in Wonderland." The reality is so obvious and everyday working people must feel an increasing sense of disbelief and almost the kind of powerlessness that one feels in a dream.
Today as it is everyday, the most striking news for me throws out another insult to our class, to the point where it is hard to keep up, what stands out are the tensions and debates going on in the US re raising the ceiling on US debt. Already 13 trillion dollars in debt and with a ceiling of 14.3 trillion Obama is struggling to win a vote to raise the debt ceiling. He has no political choice and is maneuvered by his opposition to force further deep cuts to public services and entitlements -to win support. What lousy dirty games these criminals play.
With full awareness that the higher the debt the more that must be stolen from the pockets of working and poor people, Social Security is moving more to the forefront as a purse to dig into, maybe even to steal entirely from the American working class. Of course every theft is linked to another theft -these criminals are organized and strategic. Social Security, as limited as it is, ensures that working people can retire with at the very least some income- not enough certainly if not augmented by work pensions and private savings -but enough to keep them out of deep and dire poverty. This entitlement is especially necessary for retired workers in the absence of a publicly funded health care. First they wanted to raise the retirement age, then a means test was proposed - not only to claw back universal entitlements and to " save tax payers money" but strategically designed to split the "middle class" from poorer workers, as if the divide between working and poor people is not huge enough. Well planned to undermine support for Social Security generally and in the long term get rid of it entirely. If nothing else these crooks are clever.
The silver lining has the potential to turn into a real golden egg for the ruling class.
On the Real News Network Republican Senator Lindsay Graham, one silver tongued devil among many, talks about how he will refuse to vote for an increased debt ceiling unless Social Security is on the table. He and others like him have a long term plan. Using the government deficit/debt crisis as a spring board, he poses what is nothing less than an attack on the US working class at the deepest level as an opportunity for the government to "change it's spending ways " and look at "long term debt obligations." Looks to me like the potential silver lining for the profiteers as the cloud of the economic crisis is rapidly turning into a potential golden egg and the stage is set more elaborately for the permanent austerity -meaning nothing less than complete victory over the working class and the poor in the US, a brutal destruction of decades of hard won gains for working people.
In concrete terms this means that millions of retired working people will have no safety net whatsoever and after 40 years or more of working for the bosses and paying taxes they can look forward to dire poverty, pain and suffering at a time in their lives when they are weakest and most vulnerable. And perhaps when the retired working class in America becomes a potential "burden" on the rotten state that stole in many cases their only means of existence/subsistence, they just get rid of us all in the end because we will become part of those dreaded "long-term debt obligations."
More and more like Alice in Wonderland for sure.
1 comment:
It is intense and stressful thinking about the future. I am left thinking about the place I work. The recession gave them a huge excuse to fire a lot of people. I am
Left to wonder about where all these people are now. Are they now unemployed. Do they have kids that they have to care for and educate. These are huge important factors. Thanks for a great article.
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