Karl Marx --- And the Wall Street Journal?

There is what I think to be a pretty good, if brief and fairly light article in none other than Right Wing-owned, Rupert Murdoch's own Wall Street Journal, describing where America and Americans are today, financially and socially:

The Middle-Class Squeeze

Seeing it, I was pretty stunned.

It recognizes that America's middle class is struggling, shrinking, in fact, along with what got us here, where it stands in history and what we should maybe do to correct our financial, national problems. It begins with this sub-line heading:

Over the past few decades, the Western World has increasingly become a society of "have lesses," if not yet of "have nots." 

They already had me right there, just with that opening, recognizing that the middle-, lower- and working-classes were being crushed with our economic system in that business-supporting rag. But then they go on to outdo themselves:

If Western countries want to disprove the dire forecasts of Karl Marx, we must think creatively about how to make the middle class more prosperous and secure.

They had me at "Karl Marx."

Some of the article:

In the U.S. and Britain, the percentage of citizens owning stocks or houses is well down from the late 1980s. In Britain, the average age for buying a first home is now 31 (and many more people than before depend on “the bank of Mom and Dad” to help them do so). In the mid-’80s, it was 27. My own children, who started work in London in the last two years, earn a little less, in real terms, than I did when I began in 1979, yet house prices are 15 times higher. We have become a society of “have lesses,” if not yet of “have nots.”

In a few lines of work, earnings have shot forward. In 1982, only seven U.K. financial executives were receiving six-figure salaries. Today, tens of thousands are (an enormous increase, even allowing for inflation). The situation is very different for the middle-ranking civil servant, attorney, doctor, teacher or small-business owner. Many middle-class families now depend absolutely on the income of both parents in a way that was unusual even as late as the 1980s...

The author asks an important question, an extremely important one;

What is the use of capitalism if its rewards go to the few and its risks are dumped on the many?

And here is where the under-rated, discounted and even disregarded, if brilliant Karl Marx comes in:

Where might one find a useful analysis of what is happening today in the market democracies of the West? How about this: “The executive of the modern State is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the bourgeoisie.”

Or this: “Modern bourgeois society…is like the sorcerer, who is no longer able to control the power of the nether world which he has called up by his spells.” 

Or this: “The productive forces no longer tend to further the development of the conditions of bourgeois property: on the contrary, they have become too powerful for these conditions…[and] they bring disorder into the whole of bourgeois society, endanger the existence of bourgeois property.”

The celebrated bearded communists had argued that capitalism would reduce all of society to only two classes: the prosperous bourgeoisie, who owned the capital, and the impoverished proletariat, who contributed their labor.

Who, today, is able to say this isn't precisely what's happening and what's been happening here in America? Who can honestly deny this? It's incontrovertible.

Is that not what's been happening in the last at least 30 years? I can't count the number of articles and news segments pointing out how the "people at the top", the "1%", with hedge fund managers as the best example, have been getting many more millions upon millions of dollars and wealth and riches while, again, the middle-, lower- and working classes have seen their costs escalate but wages stagnate---shrink, in fact.

And here is where the article and the Pope's visit, this week, to our shores coincidentally converge:

The relationship between money and morality, on which the middle-class order depends, has been seriously compromised over the past decade.

I'm not advocating Communism here by any means. While I think Karl Marx was correct in his writing, I also know Mr. Marx didn't take into account the human factors, especially the factor of just sheer greed, let alone the love of power. Communism would only work in a perfect world. Would that we were so lucky.

But the fact is, what we have going on in America now and what we've had doing on financially, fiscally and economically is precisely what Karl Marx and Friederich Engels described in their famous-through-the-ages "The Communist Manifesto."

The author of the article ends it very well and correctly:

...Marx did have an insight about the disproportionate power of the ownership of capital. The owner of capital decides where money goes, whereas the people who sell only their labor lack that power. This makes it hard for society to be shaped in their interests. In recent years, that disproportion has reached destructive levels, so if we don’t want to be a Marxist society, we need to put it right.

What we need to do as a nation, through our government is get our government back for the people. We have to end the Supreme Court's Citizen United ruling and end campaign contributions--both--so we can then begin to put back into place the simplest of rules to keep corporations and the already-wealthy, and the greedy and power-hungry among them, from crushing these 3 classes (middle, lower and working) with rules and government that only works for them.

We have to get the government back for the people.

Links:  Believe it or not: Karl Marx is making a comeback

Marx Was Right: Five Ways Karl Marx Predicted 2014

Labor Day, 2015

Twinkies will be back, all right

Announced today:

Hostess: Twinkies to return to shelves July 15

The executives fleeced the company, blamed it on the workers in general but the Union, in specific.

They won, the executives won. They took home big paychecks, screwed the workers and Union and Union members so we all lose. Now they'll have new, different employee, likely.  And they'll pay a lower wage, to them, to boot.

Those damn Union members wanted--get this--a true, living wage.  What chutzpah.

But at least we get Twinkies back, eh?

Yeehaw.

On Dems vs. Repubs

 

Keeping in mind, of course, that it was also these same Republicans who voted in their pack to also give the already-wealthy tax cuts the nation is now trying so desperately to afford and pay back during Dubya's grossly irresponsible administration.

People and groups who shouldn't vote Republican

Herewith, a list of people who, given the Republican Party's stated, formal platform, absolutely should not vote Republican:

--Women

Does Todd Akin mean anything to you? How about women's reproductive rights? How about equal pay for women? They're against all that.

--Blacks/African-Americans

These are the people who have publicly tried to do away with both the Civil Rights Act ("We don't need it any more") and affirmative action ("We never needed it).

--Gays

Please. They virtually hate gays and legislate and vote accordingly and repeatedly.

--Union and/or Labor supporters

They vote against every union-supporting measure that comes up, as we all know.

--Anyone from the middle-class

They've been gutting and helping to gut the middle-class for decades, since Ronald Reagan, at least, in spite of what they tell everyone otherwise.

--Likewise from the lower-classes

Ditto, here. (See "Anyone from the middle-class", above). Also, check their lack of support for welfare, Head Start programs and financing, etc., etc.

--Working-class Americans

This ties in with not supporting measures for Unions, the middle class and lower-classes. It all goes hand in hand.

If all these groups, above, vote Democratic this November, as they should, the Romney/Ryan ticket hasn't got a chance.

Here's hoping.

The brilliant Helen Keller on rich v. poor and the working class

The Republican party, yesterday and today

Our own Harry Truman said it so right, so many years ago. Sad that they've never changed. Sad for the nation. And our future.

Nearly unbelievable legislation coming out of Jeff City right now

It shouldn't surprise me but it does. According to Missouri Legislator Jake Hummell, "bills have already been filed to strip prevailing wage from the Joplin reconstruction work and for Right to Work." As I said, nearly unbelievable. The people of Joplin need this work done, clearly, and the people doing the work need the employment, of course. More than that, all of us need a decent, living wage, a "prevailing wage." Is that so much to ask? Apparently, of the Republican leadership down in Jeff City---and, of course, in Washington, too--it is. It's so disappointing. So disgusting.

Quote of the day

"...I'm a Democratic Socialist which means the function of government is to represent middle-income and working people rather than just the wealthy and the powerful. You know, one of the things we have done here, we've become very religious in worshipping greed and we put on the front pages of magazines pictures of people who have made millions of dollars. We ignore the cops, the policemen, the teachers, the nurses wo every day are doing so much to improve the lives of people. We need to change our value system." --Senator Bernie Sanders, Independent, Vermont. Links: http://michaelmoore.com/books-films/capitalism-love-story; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1232207/; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhydyxRjujU; http://sanders.senate.gov/

Why we're "alienated" and "pessimistic"?

I saw this headline today, online:

Why the white working class is alienated, pessimistic

Who, exactly, but the wealthy needs to read this article?

Who doesn't know why we're "alienated" and "pessimistic"?

So for grins, I thought I'd see what I can come up with, before reading the article:

--wages are stagnant, at least, if not shrinking;

--big companies are getting multi-billion dollar bailouts but no one's doing anything for us;

--the wealthy got big tax cuts so they can have yet more money in the last administration;

--that same policy has been continued in THIS administration;

--lots of white people are fearful of Hispanics (for not legitimate reasons but hey, the article is why we're alienated and pessimistic;

--the economic turmoil of the last 3 years is hurting the Middle- and Lower-classes hardest, without doubt;

--jobs are going overseas, both manufacturing and service (phone banks, etc.);

--Congress is doing virtually nothing of any importance about those same jobs going overseas in spite of the fact that we'd like them to take away tax credits for companies to take those jobs overseas that, by the way, THEY created;

--we'd like to get the money from corporations, the wealthy and their lobbyists out of Congress (but aren't smart enough to be for campaign finance reform);

--our health care system truly does not work--it's for the wealthy and the employed who can afford it and most can't;

--Congress takes care of itself nicely and first but gives us lip service;

--the price of gasoline is eating up our paychecks while "Big Oil" gets to keep their tax subsidies (WTH);

--state budgets are being cut due to budget deficits so jobs are also being cut;

--with the state budgets being cut, services to us are also being cut;

--our taxes stay the same or go up;

--the Federal Government is spending more money than it has ever spent and it doesn't seem as though anything good is coming from it;

--finally, at least here, we feel as though our country has, at last, turned a big, ugly corner and that we're going downhill financially.  Sadly, it seems as though we are correct.

And that's just off the top of my head.  The list can--and should--go on and on, if it's to be complete.

It all ends up with us feeling as though nothing good is coming for us and the country is falling down.


We also think we're right on this, as I said.

A splash of ice water to the face

It's the holidays, technically, and I had some time on my hands, so I was putzing around out here on the internets, reading different things I wanted to check out when I ran across the following article, resplendent with facts, figures, statistics...

And a dire forecast.  (Don't miss statistics no. 6 and 8, below, too--they're doozies).

The Working Poor

As the middle class in America continues to be slowly wiped out, the number of working poor continues to increase. Today, nearly one out of every three families in the United States is considered to be "low income". Millions of American families are finding that they can barely make it from month to month even with both parents working as hard as they possibly can. Blue collar American workers from coast to coast are having their wages decreased at a time when it seems like the cost of virtually every monthly bill is going up. Unfortunately, there is every indication that things are only going to get worse and that average American families are going to be financially squeezed even more in the months and years to come.

The Working Poor Families Project has just released their policy brief for the winter of 2010-11. What they have discovered is that the number of working poor in the United States is higher than they have ever seen it before and it continues to increase at a staggering pace. The following are some of the key findings for 2009 that were pulled right out of their report....

* There were more than 10 million low-income working families in the United States, an increase of nearly a quarter million from the previous year.

* Forty-five million people, including 22 million children, lived in low-income working families, an increase of 1.7 million people from 2008.

* Forty-three percent of working families with at least one minority parent were low income, nearly twice the proportion of white working families (22 percent).

* Income inequality continued to grow with the richest 20 percent of working families taking home 47 percent of all income and earning 10 times that of low-income working families.

* More than half of the U.S. labor force (55 percent) has “suffered a spell of unemployment, a cut in pay, a reduction in hours or have become involuntary part-time workers” since the recession began in December 2007.

Unfortunately, things are not going to be getting any better for the working poor.  In the new "one world economy" that our politicians keep insisting is so good for us, millions upon millions of American workers now find that they have to compete for work with laborers on the other side of the globe that are willing to work for slave labor wages.  This is causing millions of jobs to leave the United States and it is forcing wages down.

Millions of Americans now find that they are making substantially less than they used to.  If that has happened to you, perhaps you can take comfort in the fact that you are not alone.  Or perhaps it is not that comforting.  In any event, American workers are not just competing with each other anymore.  Now there is the constant threat that all the jobs could just be sent overseas.

As wages are forced down, a record number of working Americans are finding themselves forced to turn to food stamps and to other government anti-poverty programs.  Millions of Americans have been forced to take part-time jobs in order to supplement their incomes.  Millions of others have been forced to take part-time jobs because that is all they can find.

This is all part of a long-term trend.  The numbers don't lie.  About the only people doing well are those on Wall Street and the very rich.  Nearly every other segment of the population is getting poorer.

The following are 10 statistics that I have shared previously, but I think that they do a really good job of highlighting the plight that the working poor in this country are now facing....

#1 In 2009, total wages, median wages, and average wages all declined in the United States.

#2 Since the year 2000, we have lost 10% of our middle class jobs.  In the year 2000 there were about 72 million middle class jobs in the United States but today there are only about 65 million middle class jobs.  Meanwhile, our population is getting larger.

#3 As 2007 began, only 26 million Americans were on food stamps, but now42 million Americans are on food stamps and that number keeps rising every single month.

#4 Since 2001, over 42,000 U.S. factories have closed down for good.

#5 One out of every six Americans is now enrolled in at least one anti-poverty program run by the federal government.

#6 Half of all American workers now earn $505 or less per week.

#7 The number of Americans working part-time jobs "for economic reasons" is now the highest it has been in at least five decades.

#8 Ten years ago, the United States was ranked number one in average wealth per adult.  In 2010, the United States has fallen to seventh.

#9 In 1976, the top 1 percent of earners in the United States took in 8.9 percent of all income.  By 2007, that number had risen to 23.5 percent.

#10 According to one recent study, approximately 21 percent of all children in the United States are living below the poverty line in 2010.

The United States is becoming poorer as a nation even as the boys up on Wall Street are busy grabbing a bigger share for themselves.

We are rapidly becoming a nation that will have a very small privileged class of ultra-wealthy and a very large class of "workers" that is just barely trying to survive.

So is the answer even more government handouts and even more government social programs?

Of course not.

What middle class Americans need are middle class jobs.

But as I have written about previously, the United States is rapidly bleeding middle class jobs with no end in sight.

Globalism has permanently changed the game.  The middle class way of life that so many millions of Americans have been enjoying for so many decades is disappearing.

Just because things were a certain way yesterday does not mean that things are going to be the same way tomorrow.  The long-term economic trends that this column keeps talking about day after day after day are taking us all to a very dark economic place.

But instead of facing reality, our federal government, our state governments and our local governments just keep borrowing massive amounts of dollars to try to paper over all of our problems.

It is not going to work.  Unless something is done to fix our structural economic problems, the economic decay is just going to get worse and all of this debt is eventually going to collapse our entire financial system.

If you are a member of the working poor I wish I had better news for you.  Things are not going to be getting better, and unfortunately millions more Americans will probably be joining you soon.

Link to original post:  http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/the-working-poor

Cheers

Today, as you've likely heard, is the day of the final burial and memorial service for Senator Ted Kennedy, along with the 4th annual anniversary of Hurricane Katrina coming onshore in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.

Raise a glass, sometime today, to the working class, the little men and women of our society--and the people who work for them, however few there are.




Have a great weekend, y'all.