poverty – Unspoken Politics

Brexit: more hate crimes, and the same austerity

The spike in hate crimes following the Brexit vote in the United Kingdom is not surprising. It also shows how democratic structures can be used to propel intolerance. Psychologically, the 52%-48% vote for leaving the European Union is giving people the feeling that their actions are sanctioned and justified. This is an issue with majoritarianism- there are too many Remain voters for their camp to treat the referendum as the final say. But the majority requirement allows a radical policy shift despite many key parts of the country rejecting Leave- often by a larger margin than the overall vote.

A halal butcher firebombed by a white arsonist after the UK’s Brexit vote.

Since the late-90s Labour administration, the UK has become an increasingly federal system. The devolved parliaments and self-government creates a serious legitimacy crisis. In concrete terms, I think a vote that fundamentally changes the domestic and foreign policy of the whole country should have to win a majority in each of the components of the UK- Wales, England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. Only the first two voted Leave; Scotland has the biggest gap of the four- Remain won by 24 points. To use an American example, a constitutional amendment (per Article V of the Constitution) requires 2/3 of the national legislature, followed by 3/4ths of the states to ratify. States are given equal weight in this case, so even though California has almost one hundred times the people of Wyoming, the interest of the latter matter just as much.

Austerity cuts — Credit: Chappatte in “NZZ am Sonntag” (Zurich)

It says something that despite immense conflict and terrible austerity, Greece never left the Eurozone, let alone the EU. They saw the worst that the EU has to offer- its stern demand for failed economic models, and the great financial power it has on struggling member states. The United Kingdom had the privilege of high status, with major benefits of membership. Such perks are now becoming clear in their likely absence going forward. Leave could have been motivated by a good reason- austerity. Instead the campaign was more about those gosh-darned immigrants and their problems.

The bizarre thing is that the vote is actually a vote against austerity in disguise. The core of working-class areas voting Leave is a result of deindustrialization and unending Tory cuts to services and housing. The one force that has actually been in favor of real solutions is Jeremy Corbyn. His reward is a coup against his leadership- despite Labour voters supporting Remain more than the Conservative party that called for the vote. It’s a convenient excuse, and it remains to be seen whether short of ballot-stuffing the right wing can actually win a leadership election. That’s because grassroots activists and regular working people see in Corbyn what they actually want- not the bullshit about the UK’s standing in the EU.

Much like after the general election, I see nothing but meaningless word salad from the mainstream opposition. Any person with the slightest insight could see that Labour lost in 2015 just like it did this week- it failed to provide an alternative to austerity. It says something about neoliberalism (which even the IMF is now admitting doesn’t work as advertised), that a party based on working people didn’t think to talk about schools, housing, food, legal aid, investment, job training, etc. To the casual voter, Labour’s plans have devolved to a semantic difference while talking about everything the Conservatives want to talk about- debt, spending, and the deficit. The first rule of politics is offer voters something they want. That the party leader who wants to do that is voted out by his colleagues after a year is absurd. A genuine component of the SNP’s pitch for an independent Scotland is that an inept, corporate Labour is never going to defeat Tory rule. Their anti-austerity chops, though not amazing, are enough that they may very well get something the party wants- independence- by offering voters all the obvious things regular working people want.

And that’s a hell of a better strategy to win a referendum than whatever happened this week.

Poverty: don’t treat the symptoms, treat the disease

From Chris Rhomberg, sociology professor at Fordham University, is this editorial “We Forgot to End Poverty“. In the season of Toys for Tots, soup kitchens, and in-the-spirit-of-Christmas altruism, it’s important to figure out why the United States still has tens of millions of its people living in poverty. As he writes:

Both sides attempt to “reform” poor parents to push them into the low-wage labor market, but neither side questions the failure of that market to provide families a secure way out of poverty.

Even as unemployment edges downward, millions of Americans remain poor, exposing a basic flaw in the TANF approach: the lack of jobs that pay a living wage.

It comes down to this: there are two ways that welfare ceases to exist. Either poverty is eradicated and people no longer need state assistance, or welfare is gutted or transformed without dealing with structural problems in labor and education. The United States with the bipartisan welfare reform bills in the mid-1990s, assistance was capped and shortened, continuing to shrink in its scope and amount in the past two decades. This would make sense if welfare reform was getting rid of poverty, but it hasn’t. Escaping poverty requires jobs that don’t exist and wages that are not offered- plenty of people in poverty work full-time.

Source: http://www.nj.com/njvoices/index.ssf/2011/09/census_us_poverty_rate_broke_1.html

So policy needs to keep in sight the major social problem. If the goal is to reduce welfare, make it cheaper and more efficient, you can do that. But that requires a narrow view that ignores why welfare exists in the first place. Never lose sight of the core problem. Welfare is the symptom of an underlying illness. To erase welfare does not cure anything, merely remove a way that we are reminded of poverty’s extent and persistence.

Fast food poverty wages: a tax on everyone

In a few hours I’ll join in a series of protests, for December 4th will be the latest set of strikes by fast food workers. In around 150 cities at least some workers will walk off the job, joined with the low-wage workers in major international airports. The past 18 months has seen a dramatic change in the national discussion on wages. $15 an hour was viewed as a pipe dream. Yet with the election of Kshama Sawant in Seattle, running with $15 as her central policy goal, and an overwhelming majority of San Francisco voters voting in favor last month, things have changed. The debate in Washington about small, incremental increases that may not even keep pace with inflation has been overshadowed by the idea of radically higher wages that lift hundreds of thousands of people out of poverty.

These strikes will have the same conservative criticism, in particular that these companies cannot absorb higher prices, and your favorite items will see a sharp price increase.

I’ll break this down into the simplest form I know. Higher wages will increase item prices, but in a given industry that will hold true across the board. A hamburger costs an extra dollar, but all restaurants will face the same reality. This isn’t an issue for bottom-rung workers because they have more money to spend, and in fact their wages will usually increase by more than the prices do. Workers in Seattle will be going from about $9 to $15 plus inflation. Prices are not going up by two-thirds.

But won’t people just above the minimum wage have problems? No, because one of the fundamentals of the labor hierarchy is that wage hikes at the bottom echo throughout the system (PDF). If $10/hr workers go to $15, $14/hr workers in different jobs will go to $19, or something similar. Wage increases for the working poor are good for everyone.

The most crucial thing I want to get across is that we all pay for the current wage levels in fast food restaurants. Fast food workers received about $7 billion in government assistance because their wages fall below what is needed to survive. All taxpaying people in the United States subsidize these low wage policies. Unlike paying more for a burger after a higher wage law passes, this cost is not optional. We can choose not to eat at McDonalds (and really, why would you?) , but taxes are compulsory.

Almost all situations like this boil down to this: the economy is complicated. Groups like Heritage want to scare the public with the specter of high prices, but that ignores positive effects from higher wages, and current costs that we pay for low wages.

Finally, I want to speak out about the civil war among labor in this country. Many people look down at fast food workers. I understand that. But what happens to them will affect you- especially those in the lower echelons of the labor hierarchy. Strikes are inconvenient (oh lord, the BART transit strike in the Bay Area got tech workers into a frenzy), but there will never be an empowered working class unless the bottom has strength.

Saving the entire world

“whoever saves a life, it is considered as if he saved an entire world.”

-Quote from the Talmud

How is humanity redeemed?

This year has brought war, genocide, disease, and conflict- religious, ethnic, between genders and sexual orientations. So grave are these social problems, it would seem that they would drag all of humankind down. Present actions and past injustice merge together and tar the seven billion people living today.

Despite the power of moral failing, there is a countering force. Our time here is justified by those that step beyond self-interest and reach out. They blow apart social barriers, help those that society would rather erase from memory.

It is typical to help a friend who is struggling with homelessness. It is transformative to do the same for a complete stranger.

It is expected that we counsel a relative in their times of crisis. It is transformative to listen to those who no relatives to hear them.

The moral universe is large, but it is sustained by tiny actions done in a concerted way. No individual can feed all the hunger, heal all the sick, bring back fathers and children from the dead. We are born into a broken world, and lacking perfection we must choose progress instead.

One life. We can all try to save one life, at some point. In doing so, all the suffering and strife is put into a new, more bearable perspective.

Money I didn’t ask for: a UU Sunday quandary

Sunday I received a Presidential Dollar coin. Andrew Johnson, one of the most incompetent and ineffectual executives in American history. Everyone else in the congregation received their own coin- Washington, Adams, Jackson, Lincoln, Grant. Some of the older Sacagawea designs as well.

This was an attempt to drive home the sermon’s main point on money- that money is just another name for power. And in the current economic system, using money is exerting power. It buys goods and services. It influences people’s emotions, ideals, and motivations. It separates groups of people into classes and castes.

So I still have this coin, despite having options to use it. I’ve paid for transactions in cash, passed tip jars and fountains. But it’s still here. Even as just one dollar, there is something profoundly unsettling about being given money you did not earn or ask for. Since the coins were provided by the lay member giving the sermon and not the church, I can’t view it as a rebate or credit for my church giving.

How do you deal with random money? Randomly, I suppose. It’ll end up with the first homeless individual I encounter. This dollar is not only unearned and unasked for, but unneeded. Money gains its greatest value when it’s used to meet clear needs for people. And there are always those in need.

In the dark: world poverty

A collection of important visualizations of poverty have been posted up at One.org. All of them have something to say, but I thought I’d share the one I think is the most important.

I was reminded of an article about access to electricity in the developing world. I couldn’t find that one, but there is a more recent feature was written by the CEO of the website that posted these visuals up.

In developing countries, when you lose electricity, it’s usually temporary. And even if your power is out for the afternoon, you’re surrounded by businesses and infrastructure that’s running 24/7. To live in the dark – not just in your own home, but whole communities – is something that the developing world knows all too well. Former colonies, abandoned by imperial powers and left to rot, are left in the dark in other, less literal ways. Little or no access to the internet. Lack of literacy and libraries. Terrible transit infrastructure. Crippling poverty that makes almost all types of goods out of reach.

There are a thousand ways to demonstrate inequality. It depends on what you are contrasting. Some inequalities only hit home when you got beyond domestic, and look at a global scale. This isn’t about people in different tax brackets, it’s the realization that billions of people have lights and billions do not.