Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Reap the Whirlwind. . . .

In there States many Walmart stores tutor their employees on how to apply for various kinds of government  assistance because they don't make enough money at Walmart to get above the poverty line. Meanwhile Walmart's corporate profits are soaring. This is how capitalism works - at a systemic level it seeks to shift money away from average people and amass it into a small portion of the population. Historically, the only thing that has really pushed in the other direction is the union movement which, at a very simple level, seeks to ensure that some of the wealth stays with the workers and that those workers are protected from the worst kinds of exploitation. There is a direct inverse ratio between the reduction of union membership in countries like the US and the relative impoverishment of the majority of working people. Globalization, touted as the great panacea of working-class troubles by those who hope to increase their fortunes, only makes the issue worse for the majority of workers here and abroad. It makes things worse for workers in the north because it depresses wages and robs them of full-time, stable jobs. But in the long run it makes things worse for workers in the so-called 'third-world as well, because while workers in many countries receive some employment that they didn't have before, they do on terrible terms. Globalized capital increases the power of corporations to exploit workers, teaches 'third-world' workers that they have no choice but to obey the corporate order, sets country against country in a race to the bottom, and eventually impoverishes all of us. Thus in Western Capitalist nations, real wages for most people have not increased for a generation, while in 'less-developed' countries the majority of workers become like indentured slaves in a pattern of poverty and work from which they cannot emerge.

So-called conservative politicians everywhere are desperate to impoverish you and enslave you in a world devoid of meaning and beauty wherein the majority are working endlessly to increase the wealth of the few and where many workers are foolishly duped into believing that maybe someday they will be rich and so they labor like slaves toward a future that never arrives.

Reap the whirlwind of poverty and powerlessness folks, or start the revolution toward a better humanity. Your choice.

1 comment:

Owen Gray said...

There has to be a tipping point, Kirby.

Like the storming of the Bastille, there will come a point when the poor will not take it any more.