France: Prime Minister declares war on workers’ living standards

 Republished from the UK Socialist website Left Horizons

20 July 2025

From La Riposte

On July 15, during his speech soberly called “the moment of truth“, François Bayrou, French Prime Minister, presented his plan to restore public finances. It is nothing less than a set of measures, each more reactionary than the last: a blank year in 2026, i.e. a freeze on social benefits, pensions, unemployment benefits, a freeze on civil servants’ salaries, the elimination of two public holidays, one in three retirements not replaced in the civil service with the aim of eliminating 3000 jobs, reduction in funding for local authorities and reduction in the coverage of drugs for long-term illnesses. Bayrou hopes to save nearly €44bn through these budget cuts.

The first effect of these measures will be to considerably degrade public services. Working conditions for hospital staff will be even worse, with fewer and fewer staff and, consequently, a decrease in the quality of care. The same will be true in schools.

The vast majority of these measures are a frontal attack on the workers and youth who benefit from these public services. To give the illusion that “the effort is shared”, Bayrou will ask for a “solidarity contribution” from the “wealthiest” households. He also mentioned savings to be made on high incomes, tax evaders, tax loopholes for billionaires and tax optimisation for the wealthy, but all this without announcing anything concrete, whereas for the rest of the plan, the measures are well detailed and quantified. These last words are only a consolation prize that masks emptiness.

Bayrou responds to the imperative of capitalism

And for good reason: Bayrou responds to an imperative, that of capitalist interests. In his speech, he placed a strong priority on the competitiveness of French companies. French capitalism has been in decline for many years, outpaced and overtaken by its economic competitors in Europe and the world.

The objective of making French companies more competitive is a vital necessity in order to, on the one hand, avoid being crushed by the competition and, on the other hand, so that billionaires such as Bernard Arnaud and his ilk continue to amass ever more profits.

If Bayrou wanted to make savings, he could very well have done so in terms of government aid to companies, which amounts to €210bn a year, whereas shortly before Bayrou’s speech, INSEE (the French National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies) published a report that shows in detail an increase in the number of people living below the poverty line. This is a demonstration that Bayrou is only a lackey of capital, a servant of the capitalist class.

In his speech, Bayrou devoted long minutes to raising the spectre of debt: “For 50 years, all governments combined, the budget has been in deficit“, “there is more expenditure than revenue”, etc. In lecturing, he presented himself as the one who manages his budget as a good father.

It is true that the debt has never stopped growing and now stands at €345.8bn, or 114% of GDP. The argument often put forward is that if the state does not control its finances and lets its debt slide, interest rates could soar and consequently considerably increase the cost of borrowing.

This is what happened at the end of 2024 with political instability and the downgrading of France’s rating by the rating agency Moody’s (see our article on the subject here). However, it should be noted that France’s borrowing is done on the financial markets and is subject to speculation (up and down). In other words, the borrowing rate of the debt is suspended by the law of the market and the actions of speculators who brandish the threat of soaring rates, or even the refusal to lend.

Tsipras in Greece was forced by international capital to retreat

On this point, we can only agree with Bayrou, when he re-explains how, in Greece, Alexis Tsipras “had to” capitulate only a few days after his election in the face of the threat of the troika (ECB, European Commission and IMF) and the heads of government of the time, François Hollande of France and Angela Merkel of Germany in the first place, as well as the speculative capitalists brandishing the same threat.

Tsipras’s social reform programme turned into a draconian austerity plan: a 15% cut in civil servants’ salaries, a 30% cut in retirement pensions, to name but a few examples (see our article here). Such are the mechanics of the capitalist system, which obeys its own laws.

This is an important lesson that we must keep in mind. The capitalist class will put up a fierce resistance against any attempt at reforms of social progress. As long as it retains economic and political power, it will have the means to defeat reformist governments. It is no coincidence that Bayrou cited this example. It should be taken as a warning.

Of these cuts and restrictions of Bayrou, only the military budget is increased. From the outset, he announced an increase of €3.5bn in 2026 and 2027, which is in addition to the military programming law. To justify this increase, Bayrou brandished the threat of war that weighs on France. With these words, “we will not sell out our security imperative“, he is trying to instil fear and prepare us for war against an unknown enemy.

If France wages a war, it will be above all with the aim of defending French capitalist interests. By this means, political leaders worked to strengthen power and economic dominance for the benefit of French capitalists against their rivals. The appeal to patriotism and national unity by evoking a foreign enemy is a classic of the representatives of the capitalist class. They will try by all means to put the workers behind the banner of capitalist interests while at the same time they will suffer austerity and deprivation and thereby to make austerity accepted as a necessary evil.

The arms industry is rubbing its hands together because the increase in military budgets will result in additional orders. Shareholders will see dividends and stock yields increase when they are already at record levels. We will have to endure austerity, the degradation of our public services with fewer resources for hospitals and schools so that a handful of capitalists will enrich themselves and take us to the horrors of war.

Two obstacles are likely to stand in the way of the austerity “program” of the capitalist class. Barely unveiled by Bayrou, it is already unpopular. It is possible that, in the face of hostile public opinion, the 2026 budget will not be adopted. Bayrou would then be forced to resort to the constitutionarl clause 49.3, which would offer the possibility for deputies to bring down this government by a motion of censure in the National Assembly.

Most opposition parties would support a censure motion

The whole of the left and the Rassemblement Nationale (RN), the party of far right Marine Le Pen, would support such a motion, as was the case in 2024. Although it is easy to predict the position of the French Communist Party (PCF), and the left party, La France Insourmise (LFI) which will probably take the initiative, it is less clear predicting the stand of the Socialist Party, (PS).

The latter let themselves be fooled, consciously or unconsciously, by Bayrou during the last motion of censure in the Assembly, in exchange for restarting the pension reform, which ended in total failure. Bayrou will try the same maneuvre by opening discussions and reaching out to the PS, among others.

The second possible obstacle, and perhaps the most decisive, is the reaction of workers and youth. Thse social counter-reforms, considered as such in the eyes of all, despite all the sleight of hand to make people swallow the pill (threat of war, debt crisis), could be the starting point of a massive mobilization.

But this will depend on the attitude of the union leaderships, first and foremost the General Confederation of Labour (CGT), which will have the task of preparing the unions and the workers by giving concrete objectives and directives for the struggle.

The fight against this government must take the form of an extra-parliamentary movement to inflict a stinging defeat on this government and thus restore workers’ confidence in their ability to fight and in the possibility of victories. This would be a first step towards the revolutionary overthrow of reactionary governments and the capitalist edifice of which they are the political representatives.

Book Review by Michael Roberts: Abundance or scarcity?

By Michael Roberts

Abundance is a new book that has been attracting attention and debate among mainstream economists and politicians.  It aims to explain to Democrat members in the US why their party lost the election to Trump (narrow as that result was).  The authors, Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson, writers at very liberal mainstream The New York Times and The Atlantic, respectively, argue that it was because the Democrats and supporters of ‘liberal democracy’ have lost their ability in government to carry out great projects that could deliver the things and services that working people (called the ‘middle class’ in America) need.

Why did the Biden administration fail, despite the infrastructure programme and despite the green climate change programme?  Well, according to the authors, it was not to do with high inflation causing falling average real incomes etc.  It was more because of the failure of Democrat administrations to get the US back to making stuff to meet people’s needs.  Abundance, not distribution; growth, not stagnation. What was really needed was not more environmental controls or equality measures, but just more things – in abundance. You see, the Democrats and the liberal elite were only interested in things like regulations on pollution, or on housing projects, or on roads etc.  This stood in the way of just allowing capitalism (or to be more exact, capitalist combines) to get on with delivering. 

The authors outline many examples of how production, resources and projects could be done to raise living standards if only government regulations and middle-class nimbyism stood aside. Take housing, the authors argue that the housing crisis in America with rising rents, and unaffordable home prices, is due to a sheer lack of supply.  This housing scarcity has been caused by restrictive zoning regulations and community vetos, which collectively prevent housing from being built where it is most needed, sending house prices skyrocketing.

Take global warming and climate change.  Environmental regulations intended to stop the use of fossil fuels have actually inhibited the large-scale deployment of clean energy alternatives. For example, efforts to build energy infrastructure—from solar panels to the transmission lines needed to connect them to electrical grids—face fierce opposition, often from the same liberals trying to block housing projects.

Fellow ‘Abundist’ Matt Yglesias reckons these blockages to delivering the needs of working people is due to the liberal left adopting the interests of the upper-middle class elite, which has led to “the adoption of a kind of English gentry attitude that prioritizes ‘open space,’ quiet, good taste, and a harmonious social order over dynamism, prosperity, and the kind of broad, upward absolute mobility that is made possible by growth.”  These interests are what stop governments and companies from delivering ‘abundance’.

A central argument of the authors is that it is these middle-class well-off, property owners who oppose getting things done. Projects that would make a difference are blocked by local participation and litigation from a narrow band of rich homeowners and interest groups.  Abundance is a call to dislodge these concentrated interests, who are basically the friends and neighbours of the authors themselves.

There is much truth in the author’s argument that America is no longer delivering on basic needs; and it is falling behind in implementing important technologies. But is it true that why America is failing to deliver a decent, reasonably priced health service is because of too much regulation and nimbyism ‘(not in my backyard’)?  Is it true that America has failed to deliver a high quality education service for young people without huge student debt because of too much regulation and cultural elitism?  Is it true that America’s roads and bridges are falling apart because of planning regulations and legal actions? 

Surely, the reason that America has the most expensive healthcare in the major economies with the lowest health outcomes is because it is the only major economy that does not have a health service financed by government and taxpayers free at the point of use.  Instead, it has huge private health insurance companies and hospital hiking up fees and avoiding payments and services at every opportunity. 

Surely, the reason education levels have deteriorated is because public investment in education has been continually reduced and governments have imposed huge debt burdens on students that deter many from getting qualifications. 

Surely, America’s poor infrastructure is due to the very low levels of government spending for decades. The US rail network is tiny, slow and inadequate not because of nimbyism and regulations, but because it has been left to the private sector to consider it and it is just not profitable.  Compare that to the massive state investment in the rail network in China that has transformed transport and communications there in just a decade or so.

When one of the Abundance authors, Klein, was asked if he favoured a universal public health insurance model, he said that it would be hugely preferable over the status quo, but making Medicare for All the centrepiece of a Democratic health care agenda was not ‘politically practical’. Klein argued that this was so because of the vested interests of the medical profession.  But surely the main reason is because of the mighty power of the health insurers, drug makers and private equity-owned hospitals that lobby the political parties.  And since when do we not advocate the right solution because it won’t be accepted by vested interests?  Should people have not fought to get rid of slavery in 19th century America because it was not ‘politically practical’?

The authors make much of the housing crisis in America – a crisis that they blame on regulations, local opposition to planning etc.  But whatever truth there is in that, it pales into insignificence with the real cause of the housing crisis. There are just not enough homes being built, even though US population growth is slowing and household formation is slowing. 

Though estimates vary, experts put the US housing shortage at somewhere between 3.7 million and 6.8 million homes.  If more homes were built and demand for homes was met, then the price of homes would fall or stop rising and incomes would start to close the gap on affordability. But at the current rate of build, it would take 7.5 years to close the current housing gap – in other words, never.

Why are not enough affordable homes being built?  It is because the privately owned building sector does not want to build them unless they are profitable. More research has emerged over the last few years showing the link between the housing shortage and higher costs.  So does America have a national house building programme funded by federal and state governments and built by a publicly owned national construction agency to solve this problem?  No, of course not – this is America.  Such a policy proposal would be ‘politically unacceptable’.

The abundance agenda appears to be an attack on the Trumpist right, but it is really an attack on the socialist left. The left is attacked for concentrating on inequality and discrimination and not on increasing production to meet working class needs.  But what is the authors’ solution to getting more stuff – it is getting rid of regulations, even those supposedly there to protect our health, the environment and the planet.  By the way, we hear the same argument in the UK from our ‘Labour’ government – namely the way to get millions of houses built is to do away with local planning and environmental regulations. Apparently, there is nothing wrong with capitalist system in the US (or in the UK), it’s just that it is hampered by petty regulations and bureaucracy.  

Yes, we need more stuff and an ‘abundance’ of what working people need. But this book directs its sights towards planning regulations as the obstacle to abundance not to the real blockages imposed by the vested interests of the fossil fuel giants, the private equity moguls, the building and construction companies, and private sector control of America’s health and education.

Moreover, the authors have a naïve belief that new technologies can transform people’s lives if only they were freed up from unnecessary obstacles to implement them. The authors have a completely techno approach: “whether government is bigger or smaller is the wrong question. What it needs to be is better. It needs to justify itself not through the rules it follows but through the outcomes it delivers.”  Take their view on AI. AI means “less work . . . [but] not . . . less pay. [It] is built on the collective knowledge of humanity, and so its profits are shared”.  Really?  Are the likes of OpenAI, Microsoft, Google, Nvidia etc going to share the profits of AI implementation with the rest of us? Intellectual property rights and monopoly control of new technology are the biggest obstacles to getting abundance.  This book has an abundant title, but a scarcity of answers. 

Greece: another chapter

 by Michael Roberts

Greece has a general election today.  The conservative New Democracy party under Kyriakos Mitsotakis currently forms the government, having defeated the leftist Syriza party under Alexia Tsipras in the 2019 election. In 2019, New Democracy took 39% of the vote to Syriza’s 32%.  When Syriza took power in 2015 at the height of the euro debt crisis, Syriza polled 35% to ND’s 28%.  Disillusionment with Syriza among previous strong working-class support was enough for the ND to gain a substantial victory in 2019.  The former social democrat party PASOK, which had adopted neo-liberal policies during the debt crisis, polled only 10% and the Communists (who called for leaving the EU) fell to just 5%.

Although voting is formally compulsory, turnout was only 57% in 2019.  Indeed, voter turnout has steadily fallen since Greece joined the EU in the early 1980s, but it did rise during the euro debt crisis between 2012 and 2015, which saw Syriza come to power and take on the Troika (the EU, the ECB and the IMF) against their attempt to impose huge austerity measures on the Greek people.  Disillusionment with Syriza saw a drop in turnout in 2019.

The latest opinion poll puts ND on 36% and Syriza on 29%, with PASOK on 10% and the Communists on 7%.  If that turns out to be accurate then, given that seats are distributed according to the proportion of votes for each party, no one party will get 151 seats in parliament and another election would follow in July.  However, in that follow-up election, the leading party will receive a bonus of 50 extra seats (ensuring a ‘super-majority’ in parliament).  So it seems likely that ND will be returned to office. 

Why is the conservative New Democracy likely to win again?  There is no great enthusiasm for either of the main parties and voter turnout is likely to be even lower than in 2019 (even though 17-year olds can vote for the first time).  The ND government has lost some support because of its handling of the COVID pandemic; its secret spying (Watergate style) on Pasok’s private communications; and its admission that the terrible recent train crash, which led to the deaths of 57 people, was due to safety regulations being relaxed by the government. 

But that will not be enough for the ND to lose for two reasons.  First, the ND government is riding on the relative recovery in the Greek economy (even in wages and employment for Greek workers).  The Greek economy made one of the strongest recoveries from the Covid-19 pandemic, with real GDP up 8.4% in 2021 and another 5.9% last year.  The average annual rate of change of Greece’s GDP has grown 3x during 2019-2022 as compared to the previous period in 2014-2018, from 0.5% to 1.8%. It is now even higher than the EU average rate of 1.3%, growing faster than many other advanced economies in Europe. A similar shift can be seen in GDP per capita.

The amount of loans that are now non-performing on banks’ balance sheets has fallen from more than 50% in 2016 to close to 7%. Total investment in Greece has increased from an average annual rate of 0.7% during 2014-2018 to 7.7% between 2019-2022.  At the same time, the EU average fell from 3.6% to 2.2%.

Foreign direct investment rose 50% last year to its highest level since records began in 2002.  And the EU’s post-pandemic recovery fund is set to provide €30.5bn of grants and loans to Greece by 2026, equal to 18% of current GDP a long-term boost to the economy.

Tourism — the Greek economy’s largest sector, accounting for about one-fifth of GDP — last year rebounded to reach 97% of pre-pandemic levels.  Foreigners are buying up Greek homes like there was no tomorrow (outpricing local Greeks). Unemployment in Greece has been steadily falling, inching closer to the EU average (although youth unemployment is still near 25%).

During the euro debt crisis, half a million Greeks (those educated and better-off) left the country.  The ‘brain drain’ is now slowing.  But with youth unemployment still nudging 25%, many young Greeks still say that, if they can, they will join the 500,000 who fled overseas during the debt crisis. 

The number of companies in Greece has been steadily rising, increasing by almost 38% since 2014. Business activity has been booming.

Investment is up and companies are expanding because the profitability of capital has risen sharply by: cutting wages and jobs; privatisations; and lower corporate taxes.

Source: AMECO, MR calcs

But there is a long way to go to turn Greek capitalism round.  While profitability is up, productive investment in Greece remains among the lowest in the advanced capitalist world.

Nevertheless, this relative improvement in the economy is a key reason why the ND is likely to win.  But the emphasis is on relative.  The recent fast GDP growth since COVID is coming from a really low level of GDP.  The Greek economy remains still some 20% smaller than before the Great Recession and euro debt crisis.  And the recent investment rise is mostly in unproductive real estate investment. 

Finally, a small capitalist economy like Greece, is dependent on what is happening globally.  If the major economies enter a slump over the next year, then Greece will not escape.  The relative improvement in the economy could be swept away by a new squall in the Aegean and Mitsotakis’ luck will run out. As the OECD puts it in its latest survey, “Greece’s strong recovery is facing mounting external headwinds”.  Even without a slump, real GDP growth this year will slow to just 1.3% and reach only 1.8% next year – hardly a boom. 

Surging energy prices, supply disruptions and renewed uncertainty, especially since Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, is sharply slowing the recovery. 

Also the Troika-set targets on fiscal spending were disrupted by COVID spending, so the new government must apply yet more severe spending cuts to restore those targets.

Above all, this recovery that pleases so much foreign investors, the banks and the corporate sector – and the Troika – has been at the expense of workers’ living standards.  Profitability of Greek capital has risen, but Greek workers’ living standards have not. Painful austerity measures have left their mark on a country that now has one of the highest rates of poverty in Europe.

As Syriza leader Tsipras put it: “Greece has Bulgarian wages and British prices.”  Real wages have fallen sharply since the debt crisis and the minimum wage is still lower than it was 12 years ago (and the minimum is the base for many wage settlements in Greece). Even Dimitris Malliaropulos, chief economist of the Greek central bank, admitted that Greek capitalism has recovered only by what he called “outright” cuts in wages.

And even though the humungous public debt to GDP ratio, which reached 206% during the pandemic, is now down to 171%, the lowest level since the start of the euro debt crisis, that is still the highest in Europe by some distance – so fiscal austerity will be on the policy agenda for decades ahead. And on nearly every key indicator of public spending that matters, Greece is still way behind. 

Only in defence spending is Greece ahead – at 3.5% of GDP, it’s the highest in NATO!

The other main reason that the ND is likely to win is that Syriza disillusioned its working-class support when it capitulated to the Troika in 2015.  Back then, in the face of a massive media campaign and threats by the Troika leaders to vote yes to their terms, the Greek people voted 60-40 to reject the austerity measures in a referendum.  But immediately afterwards, Syriza ignored the result and agreed to the Troika terms.

I related and discussed the momentous events of 2015 in many posts at the time.  I won’t go over the arguments presented then by the mainstream and within the left over what policy to adopt and what mistakes were made.  You can read my views here. 

But also see this excellent account of the Greek debt crisis by Eric Toussaint. for which I wrote a preface.  Syriza’s capitulation to the Troika despite the vote of the Greek people and its implementation of their demands in return for funding ensured victory for the ND in 2019. The legacy of that defeat in 2015 and the revival of Greek capitalism at the expense of Greek workers’ livelihoods since remains a black mark against the Syriza leaders.

Britain: The Workshop of the World No Longer Works

There are differing opinions about the situation in Britain, and indeed the world, at the present time. Is a General Strike likely and on the Labor Party, its relevance in the period ahead, the likelihood of a split or a resurgence and so on. Open debates and views on politics are inevitable and crucial if the left is to have any influence among the working class at all. One thing is agreed upon, and that is British and global capitalism is in an acute crisis. The following is an extract from a recent editorial in, On The Brink, the journal of the Workers’ International Network. FFWP Admin

 

Huge demo against cuts and the Tories in June 2022

 

 

From Roger Silverman London UK

The death of a monarch who had reigned for 70 years, and the early defenestration of a prime minister less than three years after winning a landslide election victory, both mark a significant turning point in British history. The following extract from a recent editorial in our journal ON THE BRINK (published by the Workers' International Network) is relevant...

 

* * * *

 

What we are witnessing is the chronic decline and death agony of British capitalism. Where once it was the “workshop of the world”, today it is losing its last remnants of productive industry, most of them by now just assembly plants owned by Japanese, Indian and other foreign companies, which had only nested here because it was a springboard into the EU, and which are now on the point of leaving. 

 

Where once it ruled “an empire on which the sun never sets”, following the collapse of the British Empire has come the disintegration of the United Kingdom itself. It is just one referendum away from losing Scotland. And the current convulsions over the status of Northern Ireland following Brexit mean that before long Northern Ireland could easily conclude some kind of accommodation, if not a straight reunification deal, with the Irish Republic; despite the prejudices of the Unionists, a majority of both communities in Northern Ireland opposed Brexit. 

 

“Great Britain” could soon no longer exist, let alone constitute a “United Kingdom”: instead just England and (perhaps) Wales would remain. England could sink to the status of an offshore island off the European mainland, a tourist spot for sightseers visiting such ancient relics as the Tower of London and Shakespeare’s birthplace, perhaps also taking in the whisky stills of its neighbouring country Scotland in a double bill. 

 

The scandals of the British monarchy too are not, as some argue, irrelevant side shows. It is wrong to dismiss the monarchy as a trivial diversionary soap-opera. The disgrace of Prince Andrew, the distaste for Charles and Camilla, and the abdication of Harry are precursors to the demise of the dynasty itself. Where the current sovereign is still held in some reverence, once her reign comes to an end the surviving members of the dynasty will hold no such charisma or appeal. 

 

Along with Britain’s decay, a new faction has displaced the old establishment. Over the centuries since the end of the English civil war, behind a permanent royal façade political power had shifted from the aristocracy to industry to finance. Johnson ruthlessly squashed the remnants of the old patrician establishment, the captains of industry and the banks. The party which ruled England for 350 years has fallen into the clutches of a bunch of property speculators and hedge fund managers. This explains the spasms currently convulsing the Tory Party. 

 

There is a brilliant history of the years preceding the First World War called The Strange Death of Liberal England. In it, the author ascribes the demise of the Liberal Party to the rise of the suffragette movement, the Irish independence struggle, and the growth of trade unionism. The ruling party today is the new face of UKIP and the Brexit Party. They have split the oldest and most stable political party in Europe to bring about what we might call “the strange death of Conservative England”. 

 

Today both the two main parties are facing existential crises. The Labour Party is in the throes of a historic and long-overdue split, inflicted with ruthless determination by one side and throwing the other temporarily into a state of confusion, with unremitting pressure building up for a delayed explosion. It is up to now a one-sided split, but none the less systematic and deadly for all that. Inevitably, irrevocably, a new explosion of resistance and revolution is coming.

US and UK: Together in the War Against the Poor

We can see that capitalism is indeed global and the effects on working class people and the poor are very similar between nations. The UK, with the right wing Tory (Conservative Party) government headed by Boris Johnson is Washington’s longtime friend and partner. The US mass media is so bad, among much of the population the BBC is seen as left wing.

 

From Mike Craig in Northern Ireland UK

 

The BBC has a story on its website today titled, "Deaths of people on benefits prompt inquiry call".

On seeing this I thought, '10 years too late! we need to challenge the BBC on the part it has played in the deaths of an estimated 150,000 claimants.' The death toll due to withdrawing benefits from the sick and disabled has far exceeded that of Covid 19.

This has been going on for 10 years now yet this is the first time the BBC has mentioned it. Does nobody ever ask why this is?

The bogus work capability assessments carried out by private companies, have never been challenged by the mainstream media because its role is to support neoliberal government.

Unspoken neo-liberal policy is to euthanize the old and the sick. The public began to see this during the first months of the Covid pandemic with the inaction of the Government and its policy of Herd immunity. Public outrage was ignored, especially by the so-called Labour Opposition which said that Boris was doing a good job.

Just as with the response to Covid, there was no real opposition to problems with the welfare system. A couple of years into 'welfare reform', a few MPs, like Glenda Jackson, and the late Michael Meacher spelled out the damage which was being done to claimants, but when they asked for changes, most of their fellow MPs abstained allowing the culling to continue. Unless you watched BBC parliament, you wouldn't have heard about any of this.

There are many issues we need to fight on as the Covid pandemic subsides, especially with so many people losing their jobs or being subjected to the 'fire and rehire' tactics of opportunist employers, but the scrapping of Universal Credit and bogus work capability assessments needs to be among our top priorities.

The DWP calls those who claim benefits 'customers'. Customers are consumers, and the proponents of the Market System defend it by telling us that it gives us choices. Some of its defenders have even suggested that our choice as consumers should replace the democratic system entirely.

Next time you go into a shop, ask if they sell poverty, misery, destitution or death. You already know the response you would get, "Who would want to buy those?"

Biden Harris Ticket Good For Wall Street.

In Wall Street We Trust

By Richard Mellor

Afscme Local 444, retired

8-13-20

So Joe Biden has chosen California Senator, Kamala Harris for his running mate. Most people assumed he would pick a woman, most likely a woman of color as US politics is all about personalities and identity politics, and the issue of racism in the US is on the front burner at the moment thanks to the Black Lives Matter movement. This is probably the most powerful and far reaching uprising against racism in US history. I am not including here the centuries long wars Native Americans have fought against colonization.

 

There are numerous articles about Biden’s choice, many of them pointing out the inconsistencies in Kamala Harris’ political decisions and rhetoric. Perhaps wanting to appear fair, some writers point to her positive points before stressing her extremely poor record when it comes to the rights of workers and the poor. Harris put a lot of black youth in prison and I had the opportunity to see her in action when she was the assistant DA in Oakland CA. She prosecuted a young friend of mine and I attended to speak on his behalf. He claimed his innocence and I believed him. He had served 10 months. Had he pled guilty he would have been free but he refused to accept guilt for something he didn’t do. He was sentenced to 18 years. That’s the US justice system for you.

 

Firstly, it is no accident Kamala Harris is a mixed bag, at least outwardly. This is to be expected from opportunists and Ms Harris is a sharp and astute opportunist.

 

Instead of detailing this history, her opportunistic shifts and weighing up what she did good and what she did bad like some sort of resume, we can tell exactly where she’s headed from what the enemies of working class people say about Biden’s decision.

 

Big Business Relieved
In response to Biden’s choice of Harris for VP, the front-page headline in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal reads: “Wall Street Exhales Relief”. Wall Street is relieved because Biden’s choice is a good one for the ruling class in the US. The more astute sections of the US capitalist class desperately want their renegade class colleague, Trump, evicted from the White House before he does even more damage to their interests. And Biden picking Harris as his running mate has thrown a blanket over the Democratic Party’s left wing and let the Wall Street crowd know that the Trump nightmare can be over in January 2021 if Biden is elected. A Biden-Harris ticket makes that a real possibility and as usual, the so-called socialist Bernie Sanders has supported her as a champion of working class people.

 

Not only has “Wall Street Cheered” the decision as the WSJ puts it, Biden has “fended off the more progressive wing of the Democratic Party that has called for tougher financial regulation” That Harris and people like her can also be called progressive, shows how worthless that term is as far as working people go, is when describing political currents.

 

By selecting Harris there is a whole section of Wall Street that believes he has chosen a “….noncontroversial partner—closely aligned with him on the issues nearest and dearest to their hearts—and an asset with big donors” the Journal continues.

 

Some of Senator Harris’ supporters have claimed that one of her strong points is that she took the big banks to task. I have no real idea what that means. Apparently she criticized them for their role in the 2008 crash when some 5 million people had their homes stolen from them, (they didn’t “lose their homes” as the media puts it, they knew where they were) but here we are over a decade later, bailing out the system yet again and the top five banks are making billions in profits. Citi took home $19 billion and Chase $36.4 billion, in 2019.

She is talking of a tax on financial transactions a demand that has been popular for some time but bankers aren’t worried at all. “I think she is a reasonable, rational person who has worked in the system….”, Wells Fargo’s head of public affairs, Bill Daley, tells the WSJ.  “Is she a progressive? Yes. Is she someone who wants to burn the building down? No. I think she wants to strengthen the building.”. That dialogue sounds like it’s straight out of Seinfeld and some people involved in various negotiations over banking issues with Harris have said that, “… her efforts to hold banks accountable amounted more to style—seen at times as impeding a resolution—than substance.”, the Journal reports.

 

Blair Effron is a founder of an investment bank and is confident Ms Harris believes that big business has, “a responsibility to be part of the solution, but she makes clear how we will all benefit with shared prosperity.”

 

“She thinks what’s good for business should be and can be good for the country,” said Charles Phillips. Phillips is co-chair of the Black Economic Alliance and a longtime Harris supporter according to the WSJ. “She wants to figure out a way for the system to work for everyone and expand the pie” It seems that all these capitalist apologists want an economic system that “works for everyone”. But that’s not possible and they know it. It all comes down to defining who “everyone” is.

Neither Joe Biden nor Kamala Harris can be their friend and ours.

It seems that barring a catastrophe, Trump will be out of office by January. Whether he will leave graciously or not we know the answer to that. What he might do I will not attempt to predict. Many of those voting for the Democratic alternative, the only alternative we have in the electoral arena, are voting “blue no matter who” which is a popular slogan in these times. The dream is that with the Biden ticket a return to the status quo before the Trump disaster is possible. I sympathize completely with those that take this position and believe that it will give us time to build the alternative and do so on. I just don’t agree with it. All was not well with US capitalism before Trump and that situation will continue when he’s gone.

For others that think the Democratic Party will reverse the declining living standards and the poverty, racism and environmental catastrophe that global capitalism is preparing for the future, they will be sorely disappointed. The pandemic has changed everything. It has had a very positive affect on class consciousness as those workers who have always been essential are being recognized as such to a far greater extent than they ever were. They have seen what money can be found when it comes to saving business and they have also seen how the so-called free market capitalist system in the greatest country in the world, has proved inadequate when it comes to social needs and national crises. The drive to keep schools open are all based on saving the economy, if kids and education workers have to be sacrificed, so be it.

While deficits are popular now and all the stops are being pulled to prevent a complete economic collapse, this unprecedented stimulus has to be paid for and we know which class will pay for it. The deficit increased by over two trillion in the first 8 months of this year alone.It is predicted there will be a tsunami of evictions in the near future. Many employers will not need workers to come back to work and many workers won’t want to come back through fear of sickness. There will be further layoffs as the economic crisis worsens.

Those workers, the lower paid, the young workers who see no future will be testing their collective power and we will see huge class clashes at some point as the US ruling class is forced to impose the costs of the pandemic on to the backs of working people. There may well be some success squeezing some funds from the elite but we should not fool ourselves, the crisis of capitalism that existed pre-pandemic is still with us.

The situation clearly points to the terrible consequences that working class people in the US are faced with when it comes to politics. We have only the two Wall Street parties to choose from. There are many other small parties but a national political party based on working class people our communities and allies will have to be built if we are to challenge the political rule of the billionaires and capital in general. The trade unions have the social structure, thousands of locals around the country, some 1000 county AFL-CIO labor councils and they have the numbers.

Thousands of union members walk precincts, participate in phone banks and the unions have given the Democratic Party billions over the years.  I have written on many occasions why this is so, why the labor hierarchy refuses to break from the Democrats and offer the US working class an alternative. It’s the same reason they suppress rank and file movements within organized labor that want to wage a real fightback of our own, it threatens the relationship they have built with the bosses based on labor peace. It’s the Team Concept in the political sphere.

There was close to 100 million people that didn’t vote in the last election. This 100 million has drawn the conclusion that both parties do not represent their interests. With Trump’s exit we will be faced with a continuation of the capitalist offensive as the system cannot show a way out of this mess, cannot escape its own inherent contradictions.

The Black Lives Matter movement has shown how quickly things can change in the face of a mass direct action movement. In the blink of an eye, the billionaires that own the sports teams (NFL) decided they were wrong about Colin kaepernick’s mild protest against racism and police violence. Johnny Cochrane Melvin Belli and Alan Dershowitz all rolled in to one couldn’t have done that. All sorts of money is being thrown at Black Colleges and businesses. The white racist ruling class needs to strengthen the Black middle class and black capitalism as a beacon to the Black working class with the message that you can work through the system, look at me. It’s what we call a buffer zone but it might be too late for that old trick to work.

After what we are living through and how heroic those who have worked through it on behalf of all of us have been, it is not going to be easy to impose further austerity millions of US workers but impose it they must no matter who is in the Oval Office.

Kamala Harris was the smart choice for the Democrats. It will be hard from Trump to attack her as soft on crime. The older Black voter will be vote for her, even those who have been very critical in the past. If elected, she  will be the first Black and Asian woman to hold the Vice President’s office and, will be the front runner for the presidency if Biden serves two terms with the possibility of becoming the first Asian/Black woman to occupy the White House as president.

But if we want to know where Kamala Harris' allegiances we just have to read what our enemies think about her.