G-20 or more G-money

MUMIA ABU-JAMAL FROM DEATH ROW

Mumia Abu-Jamal

From an Aug. 18 audio column which will be played at the Sept. 20 jobs march and rally for the unemployed in Pittsburgh.

As the G-20 gathers again, they assemble amidst the wreckage of their own creation.

Representatives of 20 of the alleged developed economies, they are instead representatives of casino capitalism: the use, misuse and grand theft of public wealth to fund the bonuses of financial pirates that have looted the treasury of billions.

A few months ago, as they gathered in London, the nations’ finance ministers talked about tax havens, but few had any real substantial solutions to the economic turmoil roiling in their own countries.

Much has been said about stimulus packages, and even about the enormous amounts of money being allocated for this purpose, but a modest amount has actually been spent, with the lion’s share being devoted to boosting the very banks and businesses that created this disaster.

And while banks and billionaires have been rewarded for their insatiable greed, average people, working people, families struggling in the worst economic environment since the 1930s, are on their own. Millions are jobless. Many are homeless. Many more are helpless.

And while they barely survive day after day, big buck bonuses are back on track at Goldman Sachs and other such entitles in the City.

Politicians, meanwhile, talk of a “jobless recovery.” If there are no jobs, who can really speak of a recovery? Wall Street is recovering—but are you?

Even the French conservative president, Nicolas Sarkozy, said the economic disaster of last fall spelled the end to laissez-faire (French for ‘let it be’) economic theory. Governments on both sides of the Atlantic are giving various stimulus packages to banks and businesses that look an awful lot like life support.

If this is free market, then slavery was free labor. Only a bold, unified people’s movement can put the people’s interests before that of big finance. It’s going to take protests—real protests—to break through this vampire’s bite on the wealth of nations.

Youth jobless stats “beyond scary; they’re catastrophic,” says NY Times Columnist Bob Herbert
Sept. 20 Pittsburgh march for jobs right on time

On Sunday, Sept. 20 a National March for Jobs will step off from the historic Hill District in Pittsburgh, PA just prior to the G20 summit declaring that the unemployed, the homeless, the hungry and the poor must no longer be invisible and silent. This is particularly urgent for young workers as highlighted by New York Times columnist Bob Herbert this week. (www.nytimes.com/2009/08/11/opinion/11herbert.html)

Herbert wrote, “Two issues that absolutely undermine any rosy assessment of last week’s employment report are the swelling ranks of the long-term unemployed and the crushing levels of joblessness among young” workers. … The plight of young workers, especially young men, is particularly frightening. The percentage of young … men who are actually working is the lowest it has been in the 61 years of record-keeping, according to the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston.

“Only 65 of every 100 men aged 20 through 24 years old were working on any given day in the first six months of this year. … For male teenagers, the numbers were disastrous: only 28 of every 100 males were employed in the 16 through 19-year-old age group. For minority teenagers, forget about it. The numbers are beyond scary; they’re catastrophic.”

Herbert called the 0.1 percent unemployment drop in July “wildly deceptive,” because the decline was “not because more people found jobs, but because 450,000 people withdrew from the labor market. They stopped looking, so they weren’t counted as unemployed.”

Herbert noted that "The country has lost a crippling 6.7 million jobs since the Great Recession began in December 2007. No one is predicting a recovery in the foreseeable future powerful enough to replace the millions of jobs that have vanished in this historic downturn."

The magnitude of the jobs crisis is giving momentum to the September 20 National March for Jobs. On Monday, August 10, the San Francisco Labor Council unanimously passed a resolution endorsing the march, which reads in part:

"Whereas, there is no recovery in sight from the current economic crisis. Although government measures have enabled Wall Street to pocket hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars, still unemployment, foreclosures and poverty continue to soar; and

Whereas, in September the eyes of the world will be on Pittsburgh, where the G20 countries will meet on what to do about the global crisis, and this will be an excellent opportunity for labor and its allies to present OUR workers’ recovery agenda; and...

Resolved, that the San Francisco Labor Council endorse the March for Jobs in Pittsburgh on September 20, 2009, and the Global Week in Solidarity with the Unemployed, on the occasion of the G20 summit in that city." (read the full resolution at : http://www.bailoutpeople.org/sflc.shtml)

The ILWU (International Longshore Workers Union) Local 10 and the Letter Carriers Union Local 214 have also passed similar resolutions in support of the March for Jobs.

There is much work to be done in the next few weeks. Here's how you can help:

• We need your help! Funds are urgently needed to help subsidize buses and vans and to assist with organizing costs for the "March for Jobs." - http://bailoutpeople.org/donate.shtml
• Become a local organizer - help organize a "Jobs or Income Now" caravan (cars, vans, bus, etc) to Pittsburgh for the G20. http://www.bailoutpeople.org/septg20volorgcents.shtml
• Volunteer - http://www.bailoutpeople.org/septg20volorgcents.shtml
• Download leaflets at http://www.bailoutpeople.org/pdfs/g20leaflecolor.pdf
• Join the BOPM Facebook Group - http://www.facebook.com/business/dashboard/?ref=sb#/pages/Bail-Out-The-People-Movement/112781742929
  

Unemployment "by far, the nation's biggest problem and should be it's No. 1 priority"

Unemployment "by far, the nation's biggest problem and should be it's No. 1 priority"

A Scary Reality
By BOB HERBERT

But for American workers peering anxiously through their family portholes, the economic ship is still sinking. You can put whatever kind of gloss you want on last week’s jobs numbers, but the truth is that while they may have been a bit better than most economists were expecting, they were still bad, bad, bad.

Some 247,000 jobs were lost in July, a number that under ordinary circumstances would send a shudder through the country. It was the smallest monthly loss of jobs since last summer. And for that reason, it was seen as a hopeful sign. The official monthly unemployment rate ticked down from 9.5 percent to 9.4 percent.

But behind the official numbers is a scary story that illustrates the single biggest challenge facing the United States today. The American economy does not seem able to provide enough jobs — and nowhere near enough good jobs — to maintain the standard of living that most Americans have come to expect.

The country has lost a crippling 6.7 million jobs since the Great Recession began in December 2007. No one is predicting a recovery in the foreseeable future powerful enough to replace the millions of jobs that have vanished in this historic downturn.

read the full editorial here