Austerity

COVID19 Brings American Decline Out In The Open

July 1, 2020 Noah Smith, Bloomberg. Educate! Austerity, COVID-19, Infrastructure, Recession

The U.S.’s decline started with little things that people got used to. Americans drove past empty construction sites and didn’t even think about why the workers weren’t working, then wondered why roads and buildings took so long to finish. They got used to avoiding hospitals because of the unpredictable and enormous bills they’d receive. They paid 6% real-estate commissions, never realizing that Australians were paying 2%. They grumbled about high taxes and high health-insurance premiums and potholed roads, but rarely imagined what it would be like to live in a system that worked better. When writers speak of American decline, they’re usually talking about international power -- the rise of China and the waning of U.S. hegemony and moral authority.

Protest At Rutgers Against Austerity Response To Pandemic

June 23, 2020 By Sarah Jaffe, Dissent Magazine. Resist! Austerity, COVID-19, New Jersey (NJ), Workers Rights and Jobs

Two months into the pandemic-induced crisis at Rutgers University in New Jersey, the unions representing 20,000 of the university’s workers came together and held a car caravan to the university president’s house to protest layoffs. Protest signs reading #WeRNotDisposable and calling on the university to “protect the most vulnerable” decorated car windows; inside the cars, union members and their supporters wore red and their face masks. The coalition of unions includes AAUP-AFT, the Part-Time Lecturer Faculty Chapter of Rutgers AAUP-AFT, AFSCME Local 888, and the Union of Rutgers Administrators-AFT; together, the unions have proposed a work-sharing program where some workers would accept furloughs, allowing them to replace their income with CARES-Act mandated expanded unemployment benefits, in order to prevent layoffs. But so far, the workers say, the university hasn’t listened.

Neoliberalism Is In Critical Condition

June 17, 2020 Riccardo Mastini, The Ecologist. Strategize! Austerity, Capitalism, COVID-19, Neoliberalis, Privatization

Now is the moment to transition away from an economic system that thrives on exploitation. The Covid-19 pandemic is tearing the neoliberal playbook apart as politicians and citizens realise that, in times of pandemic, markets won’t save the day. The privatisation-deregulation-austerity recipe is becoming obsolete, leaving ways for a diversity of interventionist policies. Meanwhile, outside of markets, solidarity initiatives are blooming, creating the experiential and affective base for a paradigm shift away from self-interested individualism. This is an opportunity for a long-awaited transition away from an economic system that thrives on the exploitation of the vulnerable, from precarious workers to animals and ecosystems.

Schools Are Feeding Millions Of Children

May 27, 2020 By Chuck Abbott, The Fern. Educate! Austerity, COVID-19, Food and Agriculture, Public schools

Public schools served tens of millions of emergency meals in April to low-income children after coronavirus closures ended cafeteria service, said a survey released on Monday. But with roughly half of the 1,894 districts taking part in the School Nutrition Association survey reporting a drop-off of at least 50 percent in meals served, losses are expected to balloon this year. School food directors put the median loss at $200,000, meaning half of all schools will lose more money, and half less. Among large districts, the median loss could be $2.5 million. SNA president Gay Anderson said schools would be hobbled in feeding students in the new school year if they lose large amounts of money during this school year, which ends in a few weeks.

Ecuador Persecutes Opponents As COVID-19 Crisis Exposes Neoliberal War On Public Sector

May 13, 2020 Denis Rogatyuk, The Grayzone. Educate! Austerity, COVID-19, Ecuador, Neoliberalism

Up to the end of April, the number of infected and deceased caused by the COVID19 pandemic had spiraled out of control, nearly collapsing the country’s public healthcare sector, already struggling with the cuts and austerity due to the Moreno government’s IMF deal. The official figures tracking the number of infected finally began demonstrating the more accurate picture of the catastrophe, with the total number of infected and dead reaching 7,161 and 297 on April 10 — an increase of 30 percent within 24 hours. By the end of the month, the official figure for the infected stood at 24,934 infected and around 900 dead. These numbers have been widely disputed by the citizenry, the international media and the medical staff on the ground, who have reportedly been terrorized and silenced about what they have witnessed.

Diseased System In Shut-Lockdown

April 26, 2020 Glen Ford, Black Agenda Report. Educate! Austerity, Capitalism, Pandemic, Recession, Socialism

If growing misery among the masses is what made revolutions, the Lords of Capital would have been deposed from their ruling perches long ago. But human beings do not spend their lives tallying cumulative assaults on their well being and dignity, and ruling classes are expert at blaming despised Others, foreign and domestic, for the ills of society. History shows us that economic crises do not become political crises that seriously threaten the ruling order until a critical mass of people come to the realization that the system itself is rotten, unbearable and incapable of meaningful reform. They must not only hate the rulers, but also hate the rulers’ system of governance more than they despise domestic Others and “threatening” foreigners.

Starving Cities And States

April 23, 2020 Eve Ottenberg, Counterpunch. Educate! Austerity, Capitalism, COVID-19, Shock Doctrine

Disaster capitalism is in high gear. The stock market plunged, so Trump, hysterical, whipped out the federal checkbook. The result? Unlimited bailouts of shoddily-run corporations, criminally managed banks and other assorted oligarchs with their hands out. But hey, it got the stock market soaring, because now investors know Washington will rescue them, whatever idiocies they commit. Everybody else is on their own. After they cash that one-time stimulus check, they get to join the rest of the unemployed in the line at the food bank. Meanwhile the lifeline for the 22 million people who have lost their jobs is their unemployment check. For that they turn to their state. And guess what? The Covid-19-caused economic shutdown is bankrupting the states.

Bodies In The Streets: IMF Imposed Measures Have Left Ecuador Unable To Cope With Coronavirus

April 18, 2020 Alan Macleod, Mintpress News. Educate! Austerity, COVID-19, Ecuador, IMF, Lenin Moreno

If you are using one of the many coronavirus incidence trackers, the Pacific country of Ecuador does not seem to be particularly badly affected by COVID-19. Officially, the country has less than 7,500 cases and 333 deaths. But everybody knows this number is nonsense, including President Lenín Moreno, who freely admitted that authorities were collecting over 100 dead bodies a day from Guayaquil city alone, the epicenter of the pandemic tormenting his country. Ecuador’s limited state has essentially collapsed under the strain of COVID-19, with dozens of videos circulating showing dead bodies left in the streets, with no one to collect them. The country has already run out of coffins, so corpses are buried in cardboard boxes or simply left in trucking containers.

Colombians Reject Government Acting Like A Doormat For The United States

April 15, 2020 By Vijay Prashad, Paola Estrada, Ana Maldonado, and Zoe PC, Pressenza. Resist! Austerity, Colombia, Peace, US Imperialism

Last year, on November 21, the Colombian people took to the streets in massive numbers to reject the policies of the government led by President Iván Duque. In particular, the people called on the government to withdraw two policies. First, the people wanted the right-wing government of Duque to advance the 2016 peace accords between the government and the left-wing FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia). These accords, negotiated in good faith, would have ended a war that has lasted for six decades; 70 percent of Colombian society has been born during this war. Second, the people wanted to end the harsh austerity policies driven by Duque’s government, which includes cuts to public universities, cuts to the pension system, and cuts against broad social spending.

Wayne State Teachers Protest Mass Firings

March 8, 2020 Jamie McQuaid, Workers World. Resist! Austerity, Higher Education, Teachers, Worker Rights

On Feb. 26, nearly 100 lecturers, graduate instructors, students and allied workers marched through Wayne State University’s main campus in Detroit to protest the mass firing of lecturers, who are nontenured instructors, announced in February. Chanting passionately and carrying protest signs, teachers and their allies marched in the wind and snow through the campus student center and around the main library. Some historically minded lecturers created signs with nothing on them save illustrations of the traditional French guillotine. The march ended in the atrium of the Faculty Administration Building, where the offices of WSU’s president are located. The atmosphere was one of frustration and uncertainty, but also of solidarity and hope. While a representative of the lecturers’ union, the American Association of University Professors-AFT Local 6123, promised further protests at the next Board of Governors meeting, armed campus police assembled in the area.

In New Year’s Address, French President Macron Pledges To Impose Austerity Despite Mass Strike

January 7, 2020 Alex Lantier, Wsws.org Resist! Austerity, Emmanuel Macron, France, Strikes

In a brief, perfunctory speech on New Year’s Eve, French President Emmanuel Macron pledged to impose his pension cuts despite mass strikes and overwhelming popular opposition, which he derided as “pessimism” and “motionlessness.” On January 2, the rail and transport strike against Macron’s pension “reform,” at 29 days, became the longest-running continuous national strike in France since the May 1968 general strike. Over two-thirds of the population opposes the pension cuts, and strikes continue to break out affecting wider layers of the working population...

In And Against The European Union?

December 29, 2019 Hilary Wainwright, Transnational Institute. Strategize! Austerity, European Union (EU), Portugal, Socialism

The government of the Portuguese Socialist Party supported and pressured by an alliance with the Communist Party and the Left Bloc have shown that it is possible to implement an effective anti-austerity programme as a member of the EU. This entailed successfully standing up to EU negotiators and facing down their repeated opposition to the government’s measures, leading to tough but ultimately successful negotiations. The result was a reversal of all the austerity measures introduced under the supervision of the Troika by the previous conservative government, while remaining within the EU’s 3% deficit limit. From the Portuguese standpoint, the success of these negotiations depended on a favourable balance of power reinforcing the government’s bargaining position.

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