It's All About Wages

[marmar]

from the Working Life blog:



It's All About Wages
by Jonathan Tasini

Friday 29 of January, 2010


We are being distracted by numbers that are a sideshow. The new Gross Domestic Product numbers and the obsession about the fiscal deficits are obscuring the real problem in America--wages.

Yes, we have a massive jobs crisis. I have been pretty clearly supporting the idea that we need far bigger stimulus and that the deficit is not our immediate problem (hat tip to McJoan who has been on the mark criticizing the undemocratic deficit-cutting commission--which would cut Medicare and Social Security)

But, the real question is: what do we do to raise wages in this country? We can create all the jobs we want. But, it will not matter if people cannot make a decent living working at the jobs they have. To paraphrase Jesse Jackson, even slaves had jobs.

The GDP numbers underscore this. The GDP went up for mainly because companies had slashed costs--that means workers--so deeply and had used up what they had already produced (inventories) that they had nowhere to go but up in terms of making things. Consumer spending--two-thirds of the economy--is still weak. Which is obvious--people don't have jobs AND they do not have money, either in cash or credit.

Wages. Wages. Wages. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.workinglife.org/blogs/view_post.php?content_id=14699

[endless october]

1. discourage outsourcing, encourage unionization

and aggressive antitrust action against large, anti-competitive corporations.