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No Armistice In War on Poor
Armistice Day reminds us that when wars end, the winners and losers are
supposed to make peace. For the first time, in 2009, leaders of World
War II enemies, Germany and France, commemorated the date together as a
sign of new mutual respect. But this week also marked the ten-year
anniversary of a different kind of war -- a war on Americans' assets
and the poor. Ten years later, while the winners and losers are
obvious, there's no armistice in sight.
Nov 12, 2009
Armistice Day reminds us that when wars end, the winners and losers are supposed to make peace. For the first time, in 2009, leaders of World War II enemies, Germany and France, commemorated the date together as a sign of new mutual respect. But this week also marked the ten-year anniversary of a different kind of war -- a war on Americans' assets and the poor. Ten years later, while the winners and losers are obvious, there's no armistice in sight.
On November 12, 1999, after decades of banking deregulation, congress repealed the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act, which up until that point had kept Main Street banks and commercial financial speculation apart. Glass-Steagall's repeal unleashed a wave of derivative marketing that rewarded shameless loan sharks for selling the most vulnerable Americans into a bubble of debt.
The bubble having burst, now the stock market is up. Companies are reporting strong earnings and Wall Street's clearly at peace. The top three banks announced this week that they'll be giving out their biggest bonuses yet. But this week's news also brought US double-digit unemployment and regardless of those good earnings, the layoffs just don't stop; Sprint says it's cutting another 2,500 jobs; Pfizer, 2,000 jobs; even supposedly new and growing parts of the economy aren't growing -- software developer Adobe's cutting 6 percent of its workforce, game-maker Electronic Arts is cutting 1,500 jobs. And that's just this week.
Winners and losers? You betcha. And the winners have won some serious loot.
Having suppressed wages for decades, now employers are suppressing jobs. Workers are not only making do with less -- they're working harder than ever, and there are no new hires, because fewer people seem to get the job done just fine. In fact their productivity's up. And the personal costs are off the books.
Call me crazy, but the spoils are pretty nifty: fewer workers, lower wages, a more terrified workforce. From a winners' point of view, what's not to like?
The proof of no peace is in the fact that the president and congress keep talking about recovery and jobs bouncing back...but there's no real structural change on the table, no new economic tools, no regulation -- certainly no reparations -- in sight. The losers are weak and the winners are stronger than ever.
The US economy has lost some 10 million jobs since the recession began. Do you really think those 10 million jobs are coming back? It seems to me, the war is far from over and the spoils are just beginning to mount.
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Laura Flanders
Laura Flanders interviews forward-thinking people about the key questions of our time on The Laura Flanders Show, a nationally syndicated radio and television program also available as a podcast. A contributing writer to The Nation, Flanders is also the author of six books, including "Bushwomen: How They Won the White House for Their Man" (2005). She is the recipient of a 2019 Izzy Award for excellence in independent journalism, the Pat Mitchell Lifetime Achievement Award for advancing women's and girls' visibility in media, and a 2020 Lannan Cultural Freedom Fellowship for her reporting and advocacy for public media. lauraflanders.org
Armistice Day reminds us that when wars end, the winners and losers are supposed to make peace. For the first time, in 2009, leaders of World War II enemies, Germany and France, commemorated the date together as a sign of new mutual respect. But this week also marked the ten-year anniversary of a different kind of war -- a war on Americans' assets and the poor. Ten years later, while the winners and losers are obvious, there's no armistice in sight.
On November 12, 1999, after decades of banking deregulation, congress repealed the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act, which up until that point had kept Main Street banks and commercial financial speculation apart. Glass-Steagall's repeal unleashed a wave of derivative marketing that rewarded shameless loan sharks for selling the most vulnerable Americans into a bubble of debt.
The bubble having burst, now the stock market is up. Companies are reporting strong earnings and Wall Street's clearly at peace. The top three banks announced this week that they'll be giving out their biggest bonuses yet. But this week's news also brought US double-digit unemployment and regardless of those good earnings, the layoffs just don't stop; Sprint says it's cutting another 2,500 jobs; Pfizer, 2,000 jobs; even supposedly new and growing parts of the economy aren't growing -- software developer Adobe's cutting 6 percent of its workforce, game-maker Electronic Arts is cutting 1,500 jobs. And that's just this week.
Winners and losers? You betcha. And the winners have won some serious loot.
Having suppressed wages for decades, now employers are suppressing jobs. Workers are not only making do with less -- they're working harder than ever, and there are no new hires, because fewer people seem to get the job done just fine. In fact their productivity's up. And the personal costs are off the books.
Call me crazy, but the spoils are pretty nifty: fewer workers, lower wages, a more terrified workforce. From a winners' point of view, what's not to like?
The proof of no peace is in the fact that the president and congress keep talking about recovery and jobs bouncing back...but there's no real structural change on the table, no new economic tools, no regulation -- certainly no reparations -- in sight. The losers are weak and the winners are stronger than ever.
The US economy has lost some 10 million jobs since the recession began. Do you really think those 10 million jobs are coming back? It seems to me, the war is far from over and the spoils are just beginning to mount.
Laura Flanders
Laura Flanders interviews forward-thinking people about the key questions of our time on The Laura Flanders Show, a nationally syndicated radio and television program also available as a podcast. A contributing writer to The Nation, Flanders is also the author of six books, including "Bushwomen: How They Won the White House for Their Man" (2005). She is the recipient of a 2019 Izzy Award for excellence in independent journalism, the Pat Mitchell Lifetime Achievement Award for advancing women's and girls' visibility in media, and a 2020 Lannan Cultural Freedom Fellowship for her reporting and advocacy for public media. lauraflanders.org
Armistice Day reminds us that when wars end, the winners and losers are supposed to make peace. For the first time, in 2009, leaders of World War II enemies, Germany and France, commemorated the date together as a sign of new mutual respect. But this week also marked the ten-year anniversary of a different kind of war -- a war on Americans' assets and the poor. Ten years later, while the winners and losers are obvious, there's no armistice in sight.
On November 12, 1999, after decades of banking deregulation, congress repealed the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act, which up until that point had kept Main Street banks and commercial financial speculation apart. Glass-Steagall's repeal unleashed a wave of derivative marketing that rewarded shameless loan sharks for selling the most vulnerable Americans into a bubble of debt.
The bubble having burst, now the stock market is up. Companies are reporting strong earnings and Wall Street's clearly at peace. The top three banks announced this week that they'll be giving out their biggest bonuses yet. But this week's news also brought US double-digit unemployment and regardless of those good earnings, the layoffs just don't stop; Sprint says it's cutting another 2,500 jobs; Pfizer, 2,000 jobs; even supposedly new and growing parts of the economy aren't growing -- software developer Adobe's cutting 6 percent of its workforce, game-maker Electronic Arts is cutting 1,500 jobs. And that's just this week.
Winners and losers? You betcha. And the winners have won some serious loot.
Having suppressed wages for decades, now employers are suppressing jobs. Workers are not only making do with less -- they're working harder than ever, and there are no new hires, because fewer people seem to get the job done just fine. In fact their productivity's up. And the personal costs are off the books.
Call me crazy, but the spoils are pretty nifty: fewer workers, lower wages, a more terrified workforce. From a winners' point of view, what's not to like?
The proof of no peace is in the fact that the president and congress keep talking about recovery and jobs bouncing back...but there's no real structural change on the table, no new economic tools, no regulation -- certainly no reparations -- in sight. The losers are weak and the winners are stronger than ever.
The US economy has lost some 10 million jobs since the recession began. Do you really think those 10 million jobs are coming back? It seems to me, the war is far from over and the spoils are just beginning to mount.
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