Economy & Labor

by Gregg Brazel

An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment

of all republics.  – Plutarch 

The American Worker, and by extension the American Family, face a number of challenges that are largely ignored in modern politics and the media – the so-called “third-rail” issues.  Discussion of economic treaties such as NAFTA and GATT have been limited to a small, select group.  Serious public debate on these bodies and global policies that affect virtually every citizen have been non-existent.  Voters have no say in their creation or content, and little knowledge of their objectives or consequences.  So, what do we know of the actual results of these programs that are now a decade old? 

It is repeatedly said in the corporate-owned media that these treaties are good for economies, great for developing nations, and will lead to a rise in global prosperity – even democracy!  The data coming back, however, indicates that the exact opposite is happening.  In fact, developing nations such as Mexico, Chile and Brazil are not interested in continuing or expanding these treaties as demonstrated in Cancun and Miami in 2003. 

We know that liberalized global trade policy has also caused many US jobs to be exported by corporations seeking the lowest labor costs and maximum profits.  Health benefits have gone with them, and as jobs become scarce, wages fall accordingly – the “free-market” at work.

Our jobs are going to countries where labor costs are the lowest, which by definition are those nations with the worst records in human/worker rights and environmental abuse.  Most have substandard and dangerous working conditions.  Wages are so low that many sweat shops in India, China and Saipan bar the factory doors and hold workers in guarded camps at night, creating slave labor conditions.  When you hear the pro-globalization crowd say that $2 per day is good money in China, trust your intuition – it’s a non-sustaining, sub-poverty wage ~ those bars are there for a reason.

So, who exactly are the winners in our new game of global risk?  If the charts and data that track the wage gap are any indicator, it would appear that the gains of globalization go to the already ultra-rich top 0.1 percent, at the expense of the poor and middle class.

These new trade laws have created a class of people in America and abroad called the “Working Poor.”  These are people who work one, two, even three jobs, but because of low wages and no health coverage, they live on the edge of bankruptcy every day.

In order for our society to be prosperous and secure, it is necessary that we begin to narrow the enormous gulf between the rich and the poor.  Doing so will create a much healthier global community by reducing crime and violence, while helping the economy by spreading the wealth and increasing worker incentive.  

In the not so distant future, we will all understand that every American citizen, rich and poor, will benefit from a more equitable sharing of wealth and capital - or suffer from the growing disparity.  Will we intervene now, or let our nation's children pay the price for mismanaged globalization? 

This is a huge, common issue, and therefore warrants a national discussion within our democracy.  Did you get an invitation to the G8 Spring Gala and New World Order Planning Festival?   Me either.  Since we're being completely excluded from writing the new laws of the land, it's time to crash the party!

   issues:

  4 economy & labor

  4 community

  4 environment

 flash movie on economy

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  4 coming up empty

  4 goodbye horatio alger

  4 walmart's hidden costs

  4 cafta/nafta

  4 creative class

  4 global scorecard

  4 cause and effect

"Thirty years ago we were a relatively middle-class nation. It had not always been thus: Gilded Age America was a highly unequal society, and it stayed that way through the 1920s. During the 1930s and '40s, however, America experienced what the economic historians Claudia Goldin and Robert Margo have dubbed the Great Compression: a drastic narrowing of income gaps, probably as a result of New Deal policies. And the new economic order persisted for more than a generation: Strong unions; taxes on inherited wealth, corporate profits and high incomes; close public scrutiny of corporate management--all helped to keep income gaps relatively small. The economy was hardly egalitarian, but a generation ago the gross inequalities of the 1920s seemed very distant.

Now they're back."

 - Paul Krugman, The Nation

4 Hear the late, great Senator John

     Blutarski's comments on globalization here