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Category: inequality

  • Infrastructure Should Be the Great Economic Equalizer

    Construction equipment is used to move earth

    During the Trump years, the phrase “Infrastructure Week” rang out as a sort of Groundhog Day-style punchline. What began in June 2017 as a failed effort by The Donald’s White House and a Republican Senate to focus on the desperately needed rebuilding of American infrastructure morphed into a meme and a running joke in Washington.

    Despite the focus in recent years on President Trump’s failure to do anything for the country’s crumbling infrastructure, here’s a sad reality: considered over a longer period of time, Washington’s political failure to fund the repairing, modernizing, or in some cases simply the building of that national infrastructure has proven a remarkably bipartisan “effort.” After all, the same grand unfulfilled ambitions for infrastructure were part and parcel of the Obama White House from 2009 on and could well typify the Biden years, if Congress doesn’t get its act together (or the filibuster doesn’t go down in flames). The disastrous electric grid power outages that occurred during the recent deep freeze in Texas are but the latest example of the pressing need for infrastructure upgrades and investments of every sort. If nothing is done, more people will suffer, more jobs will be lost, and the economy will face drastic consequences.

    Since the mid-twentieth century, when most of this country’s modern infrastructure systems were first established, the population has doubled. Not only are American roads, airports, electric grids, waterways, railways and more distinctly outdated, but today’s crucial telecommunications sector hasn’t ever been subjected to a comprehensive broadband strategy.

    Worse yet, what’s known as America’s “infrastructure gap” only continues to widen. The cost of what we need but haven’t done to modernize our infrastructure has expanded to $5.6 trillion over the last 20 years ($3 trillion in the last decade alone), according to a report by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). Some estimates now even run as high as $7 trillion.

    In other words, as old infrastructure deteriorates and new infrastructure and technology are needed, the cost of addressing this ongoing problem only escalates. Currently, there is a $1-trillion backlog of (yet unapproved) deferred-maintenance funding floating around Capitol Hill. Without action in the reasonable future, certain kinds of American infrastructure could, like that Texas energy grid, soon be deemed unsafe.

    Now, it’s true that the U.S. continues to battle Covid-19 with more than half a million lives already lost and significant parts of the economy struggling to make ends meet. Even before the pandemic, however, America’s failing infrastructure system was already costing the average household nearly $3,300 a year.

    According to ASCE, “The nation’s economy could see the loss of $10 trillion in GDP [gross domestic product] and a decline of more than $23 trillion in business productivity cumulatively over the next two decades if current investment trends continue.” Whatever a post-pandemic economy looks like, our country is already starved for policies that offer safe, reliable, efficient, and sustainable future infrastructure systems. Such a down payment on our future is crucial not just for us, but for generations to come.

    As early as 2016, ASCE researchers found that the overall number of dams with potential high-hazard status had already climbed to nearly 15,500. At the time, the organization also discovered that nearly four out of every 10 bridges in America were 50 years old or more and identified 56,007 of them as already structurally deficient. Those numbers would obviously be even higher today.

    And yet, in 2021, what Americans face is hardly just a transportation crisis. The country’s energy system largely predates the twenty-first century. The majority of American electric transmission and distribution systems were established in the 1950s and 1960s with only a 50-year life cycle. ASCE reports that, “More than 640,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines in the lower 48 states’ power grids are at full capacity.” That means our systems weren’t and aren’t equipped to handle excess needs — especially in emergencies.

    The country is critically overdue for infrastructure development in which the government and the private sector would collaborate with intention and urgency. Infrastructure could be the great equalizer in our economy, if only the Biden administration and a now-dogmatically partisan Congress had the fortitude and foresight to make it happen.

    American History Offers a Roadmap for Infrastructure Success

    It wasn’t always like this. Over the course of American history, building infrastructure has not only had a powerful economic impact, but regularly garnered bipartisan political support for the public good.

    In December 1928, President Calvin Coolidge signed a bill authorizing the construction of a dam in the Black Canyon of the Colorado River in the American Southwest, a region that had faced unpredictable flooding and lacked reliable electricity. Despite the stock market crash of 1929 and the start of the Great Depression, by early 1931, the private sector, with government support, had begun constructing a structure of unprecedented magnitude, known today as the Hoover Dam. As an infrastructure project, it would eventually pay for itself through the sale of the electricity that it generated. Today, that dam still provides electricity and water to tens of millions of people.

    Having grasped the power of the German system of autobahns while a general in World War II, President Dwight D. Eisenhower would, under the guise of “national security,” launch the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, with bipartisan support, creating the interstate highway system. In its time, that system would be considered one of the “greatest public works projects in history.”

    In the end, that act would lead to the creation of more than 47,000 miles of roads across all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. It would have a powerful effect on commercial business activity, national defense planning, and personal travel, helping to launch whole new sectors of the economy, ranging from roadside fast-food restaurants to theme parks. According to estimates, it would return more than six dollars in economic productivity for every dollar it cost to build and support, a result any investor would be happy with.

    Equivalent efforts today would undoubtedly prove to be similar economic drivers. Domestically, such investments in infrastructure have always proven beneficial. New efforts to create sustainable green energy businesses, reconfigure energy grids, and rebuild crippled transit systems for a new age would help guarantee U.S global economic competitiveness deep into the twenty-first century.

    Infrastructure as an International Race for Influence

    In an interview with CNBC in February 2021, after being confirmed as the first female treasury secretary, Janet Yellen stressed the crucial need not just for a Covid-19 stimulus relief but for a sustainable infrastructure one as well.

    As part of what the Biden administration has labeled its “Build Back Better” agenda, she underscored the “long-term structural problems in the U.S. economy that have resulted in inequality [and] slow productivity growth.” She also highlighted how a major new focus on clean-energy investments could make the economy more competitive globally.

    When it comes to infrastructure and sustainable development efforts, the U.S. is being left in the dust by its primary economic rivals. Following his first phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping, President Biden noted to a group of senators on the Environment and Public Works Committee that, “if we don’t get moving, they are going to eat our lunch.” He went on to say, “They’re investing billions of dollars dealing with a whole range of issues that relate to transportation, the environment, and a whole range of other things. We just have to step up.”

    As this country, deep in partisan gridlock, stalls on infrastructure measures of any sort, its global competitors are proceeding full speed ahead. Having helped to jumpstart its economy with projects like high-speed railways and massive new bridges, China is now accelerating its efforts to further develop its technological infrastructure. As Bloomberg reported, the Chinese are focused on supporting the build-up of “everything from wireless networks to artificial intelligence. In the master plan backed by President Jinping himself, China will invest an estimated $1.4 trillion over six years” in such projects.

    And it’s not just that Asian giant leaving the U.S. behind. Major trading partners like Australia, India, and Japan are projected to significantly out-invest the United States. The World Economic Forum’s 2019 Global Competitiveness Report typically listed this country in 13th place among the world’s nations when it came to its infrastructure quality. (It had been ranked 5th in 2002.) In 2020, that organization ranked the U.S. 32nd out of 115 countries on its Energy Transition Index.

    Despite the multiple stimulus packages that Congress has passed in the Covid-19 era, no funding — not a cent — has been designated for capital-building projects. In contrast, China, Japan, and the European Union have all crafted stimulus programs in which infrastructure spending was a core component.

    Infrastructure Development as a Political Equalizer

    Infrastructure could be the engine for the most advantageous kinds of growth in this country. An optimal combination of federal and private funds, strategic partnerships, targeted infrastructure bonds, and even the creation of an infrastructure bank could help jumpstart a range of sustainable and ultimately revenue-generating businesses.

    Such investment is a matter of economics, of cost versus benefit. These days, however, such calculations are both obstructed and obfuscated by politics. In the end, however, political economics comes down to getting creative about sources of funding and how to allocate them. To launch a meaningful infrastructure program would mean deciding who will produce it, who will consume it, and what kinds of transfer of wealth would be involved in the short and long run. Though the private sector certainly would help drive such a new set of programs, government funding would, as in the past, be crucial, whether under the rubric of national security, competitive innovation, sustainable clean energy, or creating a carbon-neutral future America. Any effort, no matter the label, would undoubtedly generate sustainable public and private jobs for the future.

    On both the domestic and international fronts, infrastructure is big business. Wall Street, as well as the energy and construction sectors, are all eager to learn more about Biden’s Build Back Better infrastructure plan, which he is expected to take up in his already delayed first joint address to Congress. Actions, not just words, are needed.

    Expectations are running high about what might prove to be a multitrillion-dollar infrastructure initiative. Such anticipation has already elevated the stock prices of construction companies, as well as shares in the sustainable energy sector.

    There are concerns, to be sure. A big infrastructure package might never make it through an evenly split Senate, where partisanship is the name of the game. Some economists also fear that it could bring on inflation. There is, of course, debate over the role of the private sector in any such plan, as well as horse-trading about what kinds of projects should get priority. But the reality is that this country desperately needs infrastructure that, in turn, can secure a sustainable and green future. Someday this will have to be done, and the longer the delay, the more those costs are likely to rise. The future revenues and economic benefits from a solid infrastructure package should be key drivers in any post-pandemic economy.

    The biggest asset managers in the country are already seeing more money flowing into their infrastructure and sustainable-energy funds. Financing for such deals in the private sector is also increasing. Any significant funding on the public side will only spur and augment that financing. Such projects could drive the economy for years to come. They would run the gamut from establishing smart grids and expanding broadband reach to building electric transmission systems that run off more sustainable energy sources, while manufacturing cleaner vehicles and ways to use them. Going big with futuristic transit projects like Virgin’s Hyperloop, a high-speed variant of a vacuum train, or Elon Musk’s initiative for the development of carbon-capture technology, could even be included in a joint drive to create the necessary clean-energy infrastructure and economy of the future.

    Polling also shows that such infrastructure spending has broad public support, even if, in Congress, much-needed bipartisan backing for such a program remains distinctly in question. Still, in February, the ranking Republican senator on the environment and public works committee, West Virginia’s Shelley Moore Capito, said that “transportation infrastructure is the platform that can drive economic growth — all-American jobs, right there, right on the ground — now and in the future, and improve the quality of life for everyone on the safety aspects.” Meanwhile, the committee’s chairman, Democratic Senator Tom Carper of Delaware, stressed that “the burdens of poor road conditions are disproportionately shouldered by marginalized communities.” He pointed out that “low-income families and peoples of color are frequently left behind or left out by our investments in infrastructure, blocking their access to jobs and education opportunities.”

    Sadly, given the way leadership in Washington wasted endless months dithering over the merits of supporting American workers during a pandemic, it may be too much to hope that a transformative bipartisan infrastructure deal will materialize.

    Infrastructure as the Great Economic Equalizer

    Here’s a simple reality: a strong American economy is dependent on infrastructure. That means more than just a “big umbrella” effort focused on transportation and electricity. Yes, airports, railroads, electrical grids, and roadways are all-important economic drivers, but in the twenty-first-century world, high-capacity communications systems are also essential to economic prosperity, as are distribution channels of various sorts. At the moment, there’s a water main break every two minutes in the U.S. Nearly six billion gallons of treated water are lost daily thanks to such breaks. Situations like the one in Flint, Michigan, in which economic pressure and bankruptcy eventually led a city to expose thousands of its children to poisonous drinking water, will become increasingly unavoidable in a country with an ever-deteriorating infrastructure.

    The great economic equalizer is this: the more efficient our infrastructure systems become, the less they cost, and the more they can be readily used by those across the income spectrum. What American history shows since the time of Abraham Lincoln is that, in periods of economic turmoil, major infrastructure building or rebuilding will not only pay for itself but support the economy for generations to come.

    For the next generation, it’s already clear that clean and sustainable energy will be crucial to achieving a more equal, economically prosperous, and less climate-challenged future. A renewables-based rebuilding of the economy and the creation of the jobs to go with it would be anything but some niche set of activities in the usual infrastructure spectrum. It would be the future. High-paying jobs within the sustainable energy sector are already booming. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that among the occupations projected to have the fastest employment growth from 2016 to 2026 will be those in “green” work.

    Wall Street and big tech companies are also paying attention. Amazon, Google, and Facebook have become the world’s biggest corporate purchasers of clean energy and are now planning for some of the world’s most transformational climate targets. That will mean smaller companies will also be able to enter that workspace as innovation and infrastructure drive economic incentives.

    The Next Generation

    It may be ambitious to expect that we’ve left the Groundhog Day vortex of “infrastructure week” behind us, but the critical demand for a new Infrastructure Age confronts us now. From Main Street to Wall Street, the need and the growing market for a sustainable, efficient, and clean future couldn’t be more real. An abundance of avenues to finance such a future are available and it makes logical business sense to pursue them.

    It’s obvious enough what should be done. The only question, given American politics in 2021, is: Can it be done?

    The economy of tomorrow will be built upon the infrastructure measures of today. You can’t see the value of stocks from space, nor can you see the physical value of what you’ve left to the next generation from stat sheets. But from the International Space Station you can see the Hoover Dam and even San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge. What will future generations see that we’ve left behind? If the answer is nothing, that will be a tragedy of our age.

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Building or Unbuilding America?

    Infrastructure should be the great economic equalizer. Continue reading

    The post Building or Unbuilding America? appeared first on BillMoyers.com.

    This post was originally published on BillMoyers.com.

  • To Tackle Inequality, We Need to Start Talking About Where Wealth Comes From

    Thatcherite narrative on wealth creation has gone unchallenged for decades.

    The post To Tackle Inequality, We Need to Start Talking About Where Wealth Comes From appeared first on Evonomics.

    This post was originally published on Evonomics.

  • A Labour MP just put Keir Starmer’s leadership to shame

    A backbench Labour MP has made a video about the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic. Its narrative and analysis have shamed Keir Starmer’s response to the crisis. Because it highlights in under two minutes the ‘tale of two Covids’. It’s the story of how rich people have made a killing while the rest of us suffered.

    A Tale of Two Covids: us…

    Jon Trickett has been the Labour MP for Hemsworth since 1996. On Thursday 11 March, he put out a short video. It was called A Tale of Two Covids. In it, Trickett showed how the pandemic has affected people differently. And the video clearly highlights how for many of us, coronavirus has been a disaster.

    Trickett highlighted how the NHS has:

    • “Lost” 22,000 beds.
    • “A record 4.5 million people still waiting for treatment”.
    • Been ‘insulted’ by the Tories with a 1% pay rise.

    Then, he moved on to workers. Trickett noted that there are:

    • 10 million people “precariously employed”.
    • 5.5 million people “paid below the living wage”.
    • 4.7 million people on furlough.

    He also detailed the effect of the pandemic on communities:

    • 4.2 million children live in poverty.
    • 10 million adults do too.
    • “Deprived areas have the highest Covid death rates”.

    Trickett then turned his attention to who had benefitted from the pandemic.

    … and them

    He noted that:

    • “1,000 billionaires’ wealth soared by £2.76 trillion globally”.
    • ‘The London Stock Exchange increased by £639bn during the pandemic’.
    • “Big business” has cash reserves of £909bn; equal to 35% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

    Of course, all this is the tip of the iceberg. For example, six out of ten Covid deaths have been disabled people. The number of destitute households has more than doubled. Meanwhile, the number of so-called “dollar millionaires” in London (those worth the equivalent of $1m) has exploded. The Guardian wrote that:

    one in 10 people living in London are dollar millionaires, with the data highlighting the yawning inequality gap in the capital. More than 2.5 million (or 28%) of those living in London are classed as “living in poverty”

    Socialist solutions

    So, Trickett outlined in the video what policies he think would help. His ideas included a wealth tax:

    But ultimately what Trickett has done is shown up the Labour leadership.

    Showing up Starmer

    People have been critical of Starmer for effectively aping the Tories. He has repeatedly backed Boris Johnson. But despite Labour’s polling seeing a bounce after Starmer became leader, its numbers have since gone into reverse.

    Trickett’s video also appears to be a dig at Starmer’s leadership. Because it ends by saying that these ideas represent:

    a radical socialist agenda. Join us.

    This is put on screen with no link to joining the Labour Party. As SKWAWKBOX wrote:

    was Trickett talking to the dreary party leader when he posted just two words with the video? “Brace yourself.”

    His video is at odds with the Labour leadership. And it’s clear it was intentionally so. Where Trickett is going with this remains to be seen. And as one Twitter user said:

    Some one needs to tell Keir… this is how you do it.

    Whether Starmer would listen or not is another matter entirely.

    Featured image via ITV News – YouTube and Wikimedia – Chris McAndrew 

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on The Canary.

  • To Win a Green New Deal, Pass the PRO Act

    The PRO Act would establish a baseline for ensuring that working people can fight for and win transformative climate policies that benefit everyone.

    This post was originally published on Dissent MagazineDissent Magazine.

  • Millions Honor International Women’s Day Amid Pandemic and Global Violence

    Millions of women around the world are taking to the streets today to mark International Women’s Day — in a year where women have been disproportionately impacted by rising poverty, unemployment and violence during the pandemic. We hear voices from protests in the Philippines, Mexico and Guatemala.

    TRANSCRIPT

    This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

    AMY GOODMAN: Millions of women around the world are taking to the streets today to mark this International Women’s Day — in a year where women have been disproportionately impacted by rising poverty, unemployment and violence during the pandemic.

    In the Philippines, hundreds of women led a rally outside the presidential palace in Manila, chanting “Stop killing us.” Protesters are demanding the resignation of President Duterte. This is an advocate with the women’s rights group Gabriela.

    JOMS SALVADOR: We would like to underline the fact that we are in a deeper crisis and we are facing a virus far deadlier than COVID. And it is the rotten, anti-people, pro-foreign interest and fascist, macho-fascist presidency and leadership of President Duterte.

    AMY GOODMAN: In India, thousands of women farmers led hunger strikes and sit-ins at multiple sites on the outskirts of New Delhi, where tens of thousands of farmers have camped out for over three months protesting new neoliberal agricultural laws promoted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

    In Australia, hundreds of workers, from nurses to teachers, gathered outside a government building in Sydney condemning violence against women and calling for greater gender equality and protections in the workplace.

    In Mexico, the names of femicide victims were painted on security barriers placed in front of the presidential palace in Mexico City’s Zócalo ahead of a massive march today. Over 900 femicides were reported in Mexico last year alone.

    MARCELA: [translated] We believe that it is important that they are written because the fight is for them. What we want is to ask for justice, for the people to be aware and for the president who lives here to understand that we are fighting because they are killing us.

    AMY GOODMAN: In Guatemala City, hundreds of women and girls gathered outside the presidential palace to protest the rising number of femicides. After a march, advocates filled the Constitutional Plaza for a music festival, where activists danced and artists painted colorful murals commemorating the victims of femicide. This is one of the protesters.

    PROTESTER: [translated] I dream that women are free from violence, that I can go out on the streets and be at peace, know that I’m going to come back home alive. We want the liberation of women from this patriarchal system.

    AMY GOODMAN: International Women’s Day also marks four years since 41 girls were burnt to death inside an orphanage near Guatemala City for protesting sexual and physical violence.

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • The Frantic Push to Reopen Schools Ignores Educational Inequality Before COVID

    Mother of the year takes her in-arms and masked child home from school during a pandemic

    Public K-12 schooling has long been intertwined with economic concerns in the United States, and the dysfunction of this relationship has never been clearer than in the educational fallout from the COVID-19 crisis. The complex relationship between federal, state and local control over schools — coupled with over two decades of neoliberal, corporate-driven education policies — has left the majority of schools and families in a complete tailspin in the wake of an unprecedented public health crisis. Communities are being fractured as people argue over the safety of opening schools. Local school board members are making potentially life-and-death decisions based on newly acquired knowledge of everything from HVAC metrics, to architectural blueprints, to public health codes. Misinformed tropes about powerful teachers’ unions and self-interested teachers are popping up in mainstream media, and seeping onto social media platforms and public comment forums. Parents pushed to the brink by full-time parenting and at-home work are breaking down in front of hundreds of community members on late-night Zoom meetings.

    While recent polls have shown that much of the divide over whether to reopen schools during the pandemic largely falls along political lines, there are no easy answers on either side. The problems unearthed by attempting to reopen schools and by keeping schools remote are equally profound. Recent data confirms what school employees and students have known for decades — that school buildings in over half of U.S. districts are in grave disrepair, needing major updates in everything from roofing, to lighting, to, most critically, HVAC systems. Also common knowledge to most school employees is a shortage of staff, a problem that has been handled over decades by overcrowding classrooms, cutting programming and stretching available workers as far as possible. With the added need for regular quarantining due to COVID exposure, as well as requirements for in-person distancing, this shortage is now stymying in-person schooling in many places. Remote schooling too, has had its share of problems, ranging from lack of reliable technology, issues with attendance and a huge learning-curve for many teachers. Even more serious has been the psychological, physical and emotional toll on students during remote schooling.

    Beyond all of the issues arising with both in-person and remote schooling, an underlying debate ensues about the actual safety of sending students and adults into school buildings during the pandemic. As new research and reporting emerge nearly daily on the topic, it is fair to say that both the short-term and long-term safety of school reopening is still unknown; it is an experiment at best, one that some families and school employees have chosen to or been forced to engage in, and others have not.

    But one thing is clear: that many debates about school reopening fail to account for a larger political, economic and historical context of public education in the United States. Ironically, to now continue functioning, the economy is reliant on schools, yet it is this same economy that has, over decades, driven public schools to the brink of collapse.

    For at least 30 years, the approach to education in the United States — and in other advanced nations — has been fully subsumed under a logic of free-market capitalism. Reaching back to the notorious “A Nation at Risk” report in the 1980s, our education system has been attacked for failing to provide a skilled, educated workforce, and for putting the United States at peril of losing its superpower status. Business leaders, national and international economic organizations, and politicians of both major parties have framed the most important goals of education as individual and national economic gain. In most public and policy rhetoric, the notion of school for workforce preparation and economic growth — with students and teachers as a form of “human capital” — is a paradigm that is not even questioned anymore.

    This ideology is part and parcel of the neoliberal policies that have dominated society since the 1980s, which have materialized in the privatization of public assets and services, the deregulation of the market, and severe cuts to spending on the public sector and social welfare. Institutions such as public health, public education and other social services have faced untenable budget cuts and have been left to the whims of the market. In at least 22 states, school districts reported budgets in 2017 lower than they had had prior to the 2008 recession, and most are likely facing even more perilous cuts post-pandemic.

    Deprived of adequate public funding, every facet of the education system has become increasingly privatized. An ethos of individual school, teacher and student responsibility has replaced support for public schools and the common public good. Everything from the proliferation of charter schools and voucher programs, to the multibillion-dollar high-stakes testing and textbook industries, to contracts for school technology have become highly sought sources of profit. The value of the U.S. K-12 education market alone in 2018 was estimated to be close to $1.5 billion, and has recently been projected to grow by over 30 percent in the next five years.

    The privatization of education is deeply intertwined with and implicated by arguments about the economic goals of education, and about social and economic inequalities. Republican and Democratic administrations alike have unrolled decades of punitive, corporate-driven policies and reforms in the name of rectifying the persistent educational “achievement gap” between whites and non-whites. Rather than seeing discrepancies in educational achievement as the result of both a biased system of measurement, and generations of discrimination and oppression — what educator Gloria Ladson-Billings rightly calls the “education debt” — policy-makers have responded with large-scale, private-sector reforms to the education system.

    These reforms have largely focused on “accountability” in the form of high-stakes testing, and “choice” in the form of charter schools and vouchers. No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top and the Every Student Succeeds Act all encompass the same misguided premises: educational inequality exists because schools, students and teachers aren’t being held accountable. Under this flawed ideology, rather than more funding, what is needed is corporate-style management and data-driven efficiency; and if allowed, families as consumers will make choices in their individual best interests in a marketplace of schools successful at producing workforce-ready students. The explosion of charter schools over the last several decades, particularly prevalent in communities of color, has been shown to actually worsen segregation and to hurt the traditional public schools that educate the majority of students. High-stakes testing has been shown to disproportionately disadvantage low-income students and students of color, and to have actually widened social and economic inequalities.

    Individual schools, students and teachers who have failed to meet the standards of the enormously profitable and high-stakes testing that has come to measure success have been increasingly subject to outside-contracted, private services for remediation and support — itself a multibillion-dollar industry and growing, and highly racialized.

    The effect of these reforms on the ability of schools and districts to function as healthy communities and vibrant educational ecosystems has been well documented over the past three decades. A robust resistance movement — in the form of activist teachers’ unions, parent and community groups, and a growing chorus of progressive educators — has persisted, as have on-the-ground practices rooted in a more holistic vision of education. The human lives and communities that make up public schools have not, ultimately, been successfully replaced by corporate-driven policies and data points, but the toll has been profound. Administrators and teachers have been forced to spend more time administering poorly designed tests and parsing data than exploring ideas and building healthy communities. Support staff and programming have been underfunded at the same time that the problems students come to school with have become more and more dire. Educators have reported feeling less able to reach their students in meaningful ways, and over time, the material and social conditions in all but the most affluent public districts have continued to deteriorate.

    School employees on the ground have for years been sounding alarms about overcrowded classrooms, dilapidated buildings, a deficit of supplies and insufficient support services. Instead of addressing these glaring problems, research shows that money has been poured into surveillance, security and data collection — also a hallmark of neoliberal governance and a trend that has ballooned with the rise in mass school shootings. As has become particularly clear in schools serving Black, Brown and low-income students, money that goes to policing cannot go toward support services, and schools that exist in a culture of surveillance and discipline cannot function as healthy communities.

    Despite resistance, education policy has continued to be viewed largely through the same distorted economic lens for decades. Concerns for children’s well-being have been couched in business-laden terms and practices: teachers are evaluated by “value-added measures,” students become “college and career ready,” school leaders are being trained to be “CEOs,” schools are managed as stock-market style “portfolio districts,” and above all, “data” rules.

    In the wake of the pandemic, the panic over education loss has been similarly framed in terms of the economy, and arguments that focus on racial disparities. The loudest arguments for school reopening are often framed in terms of race, class and purported social justice. Black, Brown and low-income students are being the most hurt by the lack of in-person schooling, the argument goes, falling ever further behind in their education — and by extension, their life trajectory. Coupled with inequities in quality of health care and access to support resources, these students are being exponentially hurt by school closures and by the pandemic. Racial disparities have been used as a rallying cry to reopen schools before the pandemic is under control, and have bolstered arguments for more data-gathering to closely track academic losses. Yet, as scholar Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor writes in a recent New Yorker article, “no one needs to invent a new metric to discover that, during the worst crisis in modern American history, students might be falling behind. It stands to reason that those students who were already the victims of the maldistribution of wealth and resources that mars the entire enterprise of public education in the United States would fall behind even more.”

    Some studies have gone as far as to project lifetime losses in earning between whites and non-whites as a result of remote learning. Also noting greater losses for non-white children, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development issued a report in September 2020 arguing that COVID-19 school closures could cause nations “1.5% lower GDP throughout the remainder of the century” and that these “losses will be permanent unless the schools return to better performance levels than those in 2019.”

    While in fact Black, Latinx and low-income children are undoubtedly bearing greater costs during the pandemic than their white and affluent counterparts, the push for a return to in-person schooling at the height of a pandemic fails to account for the underlying causes of racial and economic inequities in U.S. society, and in education in particular. It has also been documented that some students of color are actually benefiting from remote schooling, given a chance to learn with fewer pressures from a system that was not designed to serve them. An understanding of the larger context of educational inequities, and of the myriad ways the inequalities translate on-the-ground in actual schools and classrooms should be crucial to any decisions we make during and after the pandemic. It is also essential that we not see school closures as the cause of these inequities. The economy we’ve built and the systems we’ve shaped in its image have all but ensured these conditions in the face of a public health crisis. The push to reopen schools before we really know if it is safe to do so is 100 percent about saving that very economy, and getting us all back as quickly as possible to a system that actually wrought many of our social problems to begin with. The panicked rhetoric about children “falling behind” is about a desire to maintain the broken, inequitable status quo, not a desire for true social and economic equity.

    Perhaps this is why a much higher number of Black families — who are more likely to have experienced the ravages of corporate education reform — are opting for remote schooling until school buildings are proven safe. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor also points out the push for school reopening in the name of equity “rings hollow,” and that it actually perpetuates white educational privilege: “Pushing for schools to re-open even as the majority of Black and Latinx parents opt for remote learning will only undermine remote instruction, all while catering to the disproportionate number of white students who show up in person.” The pushback from teacher and school-employee unions also reflects a crucial level of lived experience, in that people working on-the-ground in schools understand in very real ways the many reasons that school reopening protocols are likely to go wrong.

    It has been clear from the beginning that the best way to stop the spread of the virus is for workers and families to stay home, yet U.S. politicians and business leaders have been unwilling to come close to the kinds of support that many other nations have provided to enable this to happen. The pandemic has laid bare our absolute subservience to an economy that has been designed to work against the majority of us.

    There is an even greater risk, post-pandemic, of private interests capitalizing on a beleaguered school system, a phenomenon writer Naomi Klein has called “disaster capitalism,” which we can already see happening as tech companies and online schools swoop in to profit from the mess of public schooling gone remote. It is more essential than ever that we now bolster our public sector, and dismantle the corporate education reforms that have brought such damage to our public schools. When it comes to debates about school reopening, we should take our lead from the professionals who work in education day in and day out with children, not from business people or politicians who are beholden to them.

    Even more, we should use this as an opportunity to grow social reconstructionist, critical and democratic aims of education. Public schools are “essential” places — despite the beating they continue to take — in that they are one of only a few places in U.S. society that have the potential to provide a forum for an open exchange of ideas between people of different backgrounds, and a forum for collectively exploring and countering the most pressing problems of our times. It is hard to imagine a time riper than now for the kind of emancipatory vision of education championed by Paulo Freire and other critical educators: an education that could truly liberate all of us from entrenched inequalities and suffering. In the past year alone that schools have been disrupted, students have witnessed: an unchecked pandemic kill over 500,000 people in the United States; the worst fire season in U.S. history ravage the West; the greatest call for racial justice since the civil rights movement; an attempted political coup and overthrow of the U.S. Congress; and an incapacitation of the power grid in Texas after a climate-change induced snowstorm. What could be a more powerful gift to give to our nation’s children than an education to help them understand these issues, and the tools to make a better world?

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Hiking the Minimum Wage to $15 Is Key — But It’s Hardly a Living Wage

    Economist Robert Pollin says a $15 federal minimum wage is an essential but limited step toward decent wage standards.

    The federal minimum wage hasn’t increased in over a decade. After a brief but failed attempt by the Biden administration to raise it to $15 an hour, it will most likely remain at the current $7.25 for an indefinite time to come. This is a shame, for the economic benefits of wage hikes are beyond dispute, as many studies have shown, including those authored by Robert Pollin, distinguished professor of economics and co-director of the Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Pollin is co-author of The Living Wage: Building a Fair Economy (1998) and A Measure of Fairness: The Economics of Living Wages and Minimum Wages in the United States (2008) and has worked with many U.S. non-governmental organizations on creating living wage statutes at both the statewide and municipal levels. In this interview, Pollin discusses why, even though we must continue to push for a $15 minimum wage, we must also consider what a true living wage looks like.

    C.J. Polychroniou: The general argument against raising the minimum wage is that it is bad for small business and the economy in general. Is there any truth in this claim?

    Robert Pollin: Going through a bit of background will be helpful here. The federal minimum wage was last increased in July 2009, from $6.55 an hour to $7.25. So, no increase in 12 years. But actually, the situation is far worse than even what this suggests. That is because, at the very least, we have to factor in the effects of inflation on people’s ability to buy the things they need to live. Inflation means that the prices of food, housing, transportation, clothing and other necessities have been rising. So the minimum wage today would need to be $8.77 in order to buy what $7.25 could buy in 2009.

    But there is still much more to the story once we take account of inflation. That is, after we factor in inflation, the U.S. minimum wage actually peaked in 1968, 52 years ago. In today’s dollars, after factoring in inflation, the federal minimum wage in 1968 was $11.90, 64 percent higher than today’s $7.25 figure. Further still, average labor productivity — i.e., the amount of goods or services an average worker can produce over the course of a day in the U.S. — has risen at an average rate of 1.9 percent per year since 1968. What if, starting in 1968, the federal minimum wage had risen every year in step with the 1.9 percent average increase in productivity as well as inflation? That would mean that minimum wage workers would get raises when they are producing more every day, but their raise would only equal exactly their 1.9 percent improvement in productivity but not a penny more. In that case, the federal minimum wage today would be $31.67 an hour — over four times higher than the actual federal minimum wage today.

    Now if we go back to 1968, when the federal minimum wage was approximately $11.90 in today’s dollars, in fact the U.S. economy was booming. The official unemployment rate was 3.6 percent, i.e., less than half of the average 8.1 percent unemployment rate over 2020. So it is obvious that the U.S. economy can function just fine at a much higher federal minimum wage rate than the $7.25 rate that prevails today.

    We also get basically the same result by looking at the experiences in recent years with minimum wage laws in U.S. states and living wage statues in some municipalities that are higher than the federal minimum wage. Right now, 29 states along with the District of Columbia operate with minimum wage rates higher than the federal minimum. The citywide minimum in Washington, D.C., is already at $15.00, and the State of Washington is next highest at $13.69. The evidence on the experiences in these states and cities is that businesses function at least as well if not better than those states that still operate at the federal $7.25 minimum. The employment opportunities in these states and cities are also at least as good if not better.

    It is fair to ask: If businesses are mandated to pay higher wages than they would choose to pay otherwise, then why is it that we don’t see these businesses lay off employees or close up operations after they are forced to give raises? The answer is that the overwhelming majority of businesses don’t want to be forced to raise wages for their employees, but they learn to adjust. They might raise their prices modestly to cover their increased payroll. The businesses’ level of productivity is also likely to improve. This is because their workers become more committed to their jobs when they are paid at minimally decent levels. These productivity increases will not be enough to compensate for the businesses’ increased payroll, but they will help to partially cover some of their higher costs.

    Finally, some businesses may just end up accepting modestly lower profits, even if reluctantly. To the extent this occurs, raising the minimum wage will end up advancing a more equal distribution of income between businesses and workers. This is after 40 years under neoliberalism in which inequality has risen relentlessly. The decline in the value of the minimum wage, after adjusting for inflation, has been a significant factor contributing to the overall rise in inequality under neoliberalism.

    Millions of Americans earn wages at or below the federal minimum. Are there estimates of the consequences of a wage hike to $15 an hour on the lives of the working poor?

    According to a range of research compiled by the Economic Policy Institute, increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 would deliver pay increases for nearly 32 million workers, 21 percent of the entire U.S. workforce. Nearly 60 percent of workers whose families are currently living below the official poverty line would see their pay go up. The average affected worker with a year-round full-time job would earn an extra $3,300 per year. This would have a major impact on the lives of these workers and their families. It would mean, for example, they would be able to take care of an elderly relative rather than work a second job to cover rent. It would mean they could get their car repaired when that becomes necessary without having to cut back on buying food. It could even mean that they could take a modest vacation.

    It is also important to note that the minimum wage increase to $15 an hour would disproportionately benefit Black and Latino workers — with 31 percent of Black people and 26 percent of Latinos getting raises through the minimum wage increase. Finally, we have to dispel the idea that a minimum wage increase largely benefits teenagers with after-school part-time jobs. Only 10 percent of the workers who would benefit from the $15 minimum wage are teenagers. But it is also the case that teenagers deserve to be paid decently. A large share of them are making significant contributions to their families’ overall income level.

    Is a $15 minimum wage itself really enough for a worker to live on decently?

    We should be clear that raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour takes us only a small way towards establishing decent wage standards in the U.S. A critical question to ask here is: What would constitute a living wage standard in the U.S.? There have been various efforts at addressing this question. One of the most comprehensive efforts has been by a team of researchers at MIT, led by Professor Amy Glasmeier, who produce what they call a “Living Wage Calculator.” The MIT researchers describe their living wage standard as follows: “It is a market-based approach that draws upon geographically specific expenditure data related to a family’s likely minimum food, childcare, health insurance, housing, transportation and other basic necessities (e.g. clothing, personal care items, etc.) costs.”

    The MIT researchers also make clear what their living wage standard is capable of purchasing in all the various regions of the U.S. They write:

    The living wage model does not allow for what many consider the basic necessities enjoyed by many Americans. It does not budget funds for pre-prepared meals or those eaten in restaurants. It does not include money for entertainment, nor does it allocate leisure time for unpaid vacations or holidays. Lastly, it does not provide a financial means for planning for the future through savings and investment or for the purchase of capital assets. The living wage is the minimum income standard that, if met, draws a very fine line between the financial independence of the working poor and the need to seek out public assistance or suffer consistent and severe housing and food insecurity. In light of this fact, the living wage is perhaps better defined as a minimum subsistence wage for persons living in the United States.

    Given this description of how the MIT researchers define a “living wage” standard, their results as to what constitutes a living wage in various regions of the U.S. are striking. For example, considering a family with a single parent and one child, the MIT Calculator finds that as a statewide average, the living wage would range from a low in Mississippi of $26.74 to a high in Massachusetts of $36.88. Wisconsin is in the middle of the state living wage average, at $30.17.

    In short, the fight for a $15 federal minimum wage needs to be won. But it should also be recognized as being an important but still small step toward reversing the impact of 40 years of neoliberal economic policies on the lives of working people in the United States.

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Women Lead, Resist And Thrive – Even In The Midst Of Crises

    The past decade, particularly 2020 with the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, has shone a light on the full extent of existing inequalities in the world. Ahead of this International Women’s Day, we would like to draw attention to ways that women – whether Indigenous, rural workers or those enduring an occupation – resist and mobilise in the face of multiple, long-term crises. Existing patriarchal systems, structural inequalities and discriminatory laws have long stalled meaningful progress towards gender equality and women’s rights. For women living in crises such as conflicts, facing recurrent environmental disasters and cyclical financial shocks, the Covid-19 pandemic has come as an additional blow, severely impacting their right to adequate food.

    Conflict is a key and persistent driver of food system breakdown: more than half of undernourished people live in countries experiencing conflict. Extreme weather, economic shocks and climate change are also prevalent drivers of food crises and greatly affect food systems.

    The post Women Lead, Resist And Thrive – Even In The Midst Of Crises appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

    This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.

  • Universal Basic Income, Racial Justice, Climate Justice

    UBI can help create a broad-based collaborative security for present and future crises.

    The post Universal Basic Income, Racial Justice, Climate Justice appeared first on Evonomics.

    This post was originally published on Evonomics.

  • A child poverty investigation wants to hear from you

    A parliamentary committee is running an inquiry into child poverty. And it wants to hear people’s voices on the issue. It may seem like the committee wants to hear from professionals, but this can also involve people who’ve actually lived through child poverty.

    Child poverty: out of control?

    The Canary has previously written about child poverty. In the last decade, it began to rise again – after falling previously. The Conversation summed this up in a graph:

    Child poverty 2010-2019

    But herein lies the problem. Because the figures above are based on one way of measuring poverty. If you take another method, devised by the Social Metrics Commission, then it’s higher but has remained fairly stable:

    SMC Child Poverty

    You can also measure child poverty by looking at low income households. Meaning that the waters can be muddied around the figures. For example, as the Conversation noted, it’s this muddying which allowed Boris Johnson to claim child poverty had fallen – by him using only one measure.

    So the Work and Pensions Select Committee has launched an inquiry into child poverty.

    An inquiry

    It states that:

    A new wide-ranging inquiry from the Work and Pensions Committee is to examine what steps the Government could take to reduce the numbers of children who grow up in poverty in the UK.

    The inquiry will be looking at several areas. The Canary previously reported that work and pensions secretary Thérèse Coffey may as well have stuck two fingers up at the poorest children in the UK. This is because she dismissed many of the committee’s concerns. But now, the committee is taking its work one step further. It’s asking for people to get involved.

    Looking for evidence

    It states on the website that:

    The Committee would like to hear your views on the following questions. You don’t have to answer all of the questions. You can respond on behalf of an organisation, or as an individual.

    The questions were overarching, but they included:

    • “What is the impact of child poverty…?”
    • “How effectively does the [DWP] work with local authorities and with support organisations to reduce the numbers of children living in poverty and to mitigate the impact of poverty on children?”

    WP Committee Questions For Inquiry

    You can submit your answers by uploading a document. If you can’t do this, email workpencom(at)parliament.uk for support.

    Collective voice-raising

    The committee needs a true picture of child poverty. To do this best, it should look at evidence from people with lived experience. And the more people who get involved, the better. At best, the Conservative government is playing down the issue. At worst, it’s wilfully ignoring it. Society needs to collectively raise its voice about this. And the Work and Pensions Committee’s inquiry is one way of doing it.

    Featured image via jatocreate – pixabay 

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on The Canary.

  • Exposed: Devastating DWP cuts have led to more people dying during the pandemic

    Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) welfare cuts have had a “direct” and “negative” impact on people’s mental and physical health. That’s the view of a new report into the UK’s social security system. Moreover, the research also highlights how DWP’s changes over the past five years led to a perfect storm of deprivation and ill health when the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic hit. Taken as a whole, the report’s findings suggest a greater number of people have died and suffered during the pandemic because of the cuts.

    DWP: back to 2016

    In 2016, the Conservative government put in place the Welfare Reform and Work Act. It made sweeping changes to the social security system. The then work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith said at the time it would form part of:

    the Government’s aim to move from a high tax, high welfare and low wage society to a low tax, lower welfare and higher wage society. This Bill lays the ground for that commitment and helps us to continue the job of reversing the Labour’s Government’s failure that led us into the difficulties we inherited.

    Now, five years on, the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Health in All Policies has looked at the Act. It has analysed the effect it has had on social security claimants. And the APPG has also looked at how the 2016 changes have affected society overall. Its findings and conclusion are damning.

    Sweeping changes

    The act made numerous changes to social security. As the APPG’s report laid out, it:

    • “Reduced the benefit cap (the total income from social security support)”.
    • Put in place the “benefits freeze“.
    • “Limited the amount of support provided by child tax credit for families who become responsible to a third or subsequent child born on or after 6 April 2017”.
    • “Limited the child element of universal credit to a maximum of two children”.
    • “Removed the Work-Related Activity [WRAG] component in Employment and Support Allowance [ESA] and the Limited Capability for Work element in Universal Credit”.

    In short, all these were effectively cuts or restrictions on the amount of money the DWP gave to claimants. Now, by combining lots of research, the APPG has reported on the vast impact the act has had.

    Five key areas

    The APPG looked at the act in the context of five areas. These were:

    • Benefit cap: £1.62bn cut.
    • Benefit freeze: £10.2bn cut; 30% of households saw a reduction in money.
    • Two child limit: £5.35bn cut, affecting 3.8 million families.
    • “Abolition of £30 a week support for disabled people who were unfit for work (ESA WRAG)”: £1.365bn cut, affecting half a million disabled and sick people.
    • “Extension of sanctions to ‘responsible carers’ (parents of pre-nursery age children)”.

    Then, its report compiled lots of evidence. This showed that the 2016 act has not done what the Tories claimed it would do. In fact, when you look at what has happened, it has really done the opposite.

    Overarching negative effects

    After the Tories put the 2016 Act, and one from 2013, in place, The APPG report notes the following effects. Child poverty went up:

    APPG Report Child Poverty

    The number of homeless children in March 2019 was 51% higher than in 2014:

    APPG Child Homelessness

    Trussell Trust foodbank use went up:

    APPG Foodbanks

    There was a rise in children on Free School Meals:

    APPG Free School Meals

    But it was the APPG’s analysis on welfare reform’s effects on people’s physical and mental health which made for the starkest reading.

    DWP reforms: literally making people sick

    Its research noted that:

    • Infant mortality rose from 3.6 per 1,000 live births in 2017 to 3.9. The report said this was “unprecedented in modern history”. The report also said that from 2016-18 there was a “16.4% increase in the number of women with 2 or more children terminating their pregnancies compared to increases of 7% and 10.3% for women with no children and one child, respectively“.
    • Disabled people’s anxiety increased:

    APPG anxiety

    APPG Loneliness

    It also noted that:

    more than half of the 14 million people living in poverty have a disabled person in their household. Approximately 6.5 million disabled adults and children are living in poverty, with disabled working age adults having the highest rate (40%). Although physical disability rates have stayed the same over the last 5 years, mental health conditions have increased. Since 2012, there are an additional 1.6 million people with a severe mental health condition or mental disability.

    Then, it cited 2017 research which said that negative health behaviours like smoking and not eating fresh fruit and vegetables were associated with increased poverty. More research showed that poor children:

    were more likely to have socioemotional behavioural problems, cognitive disability and to be overweight or obese

    Shortening claimant’s lives?

    The report also noted that:

    • There was a 9% increase in claimants with “depressive-like symptoms” due to the benefit cap.
    • Another study found a “causal relationship between the psychological distress that claimants experienced and moving onto” Universal Credit.

    Abrahams summed up by saying:

    The impacts of this social security-driven poverty on the health and wellbeing on the population is profound. The United Kingdom is one of a few advanced economies where our life expectancy has flatlined since 2018, with poor areas seeing a decline. But the impact of this poverty on our children on their life chances but also on their longevity is shocking for the 5th richest country in the world. The evidence that for every 1% increase in child poverty there’s an extra 5.8 infant deaths per 100 000 live births shame us.

    But then the pandemic hit. And as the report highlights, all of the problems the DWP created made this worse.

    Entrenching the issues

    In early 2020, professor Michael Marmot released a report. It looked at the 10 years after The Marmot Review and looked at the health of society. Marmot found that:

    • people can expect to spend more of their lives in poor health.
    • improvements to life expectancy have stalled, and declined for the poorest 10% of women.
    • the health gap has grown between wealthy and deprived areas.

    In December last year, he added to his “call” on the government. This was because coronavirus had hit poorest communities the hardest. Marmot said that the causes of this were the:

    • “governance and political culture which has damaged social cohesion and inclusivity”.
    • “widening inequalities in power, money and resources”.
    • “regressive austerity policies over the last decade”.
    • “declining life expectancy and healthy life expectancy of the poorest, particularly women, which is amongst the worst of all comparable economies”.

    In other words, things like the Welfare Reform and Work Act 2016 had directly led to people dying during the pandemic.

    The ‘dehumanisation’ of claimants

    Abrahams said in a statement that:

    There is a growing evidence base of the direct and negative impacts of different aspects of the social security system on the mental and physical health of claimants and their families, in addition to the indirect impacts mediated by poverty as a result of having inadequate income from work and/or social security support.

    In addition to quantitative evidence we looked at qualitative studies which pointed to a process of ‘dehumanising’ claimants that eroded their self-esteem and confidence, making them feel worthless. In some cases, the whole experience had proved too much for some claimants and they have taken their own lives.

    It’s important to note the knock-on impact that this ill health will have on health services and for social protection to be recognised as mitigating against socio-economic health risk factors.

    So, what can be done?

    Overarching changes needed

    The APPG said it wanted the government to make 16 changes. These included:

    • “making permanent” the £20 a week Universal Credit uplift.
    • “Removing sanctions”.
    • “Eradicating benefit caps and lifting the two-child limit”.
    • “Ending the five-week wait for Universal Credit and providing cash grants for low-income households”.

    But will the DWP and the Tories listen?

    The DWP says…

    The Canary asked the DWP for comment. It said in response to the APPG report:

    This Government has always been committed to supporting the most vulnerable and targeting support to those in greatest need, including boosting welfare support by billions and investing at least £2.3 billion of extra funding a year in mental health services by 2023/24.

    The DWP also pointed The Canary to additional measures it has put in place. These included the £20 Universal Credit uplift which runs until the end of March, and additional investment in mental health services.

    But Abrahams disagrees.

    Money-saving at the expense of people’s lives

    She said the 2016 act has literally done little else except save money:

    Although the Government achieved their aim of cutting welfare spending by introducing these measures – working age spending on social security has shrunk by £34bn since 2010 – there has been minimal impact on helping to get people into work who wouldn’t have got into work without these measures.

    In the short term, Abrahams said:

    This is a clear warning to the Chancellor that, as a bare minimum, he must maintain the £20 Universal Credit uplift in his Budget this week to help alleviate some of the devastating damage caused by this act, and the ongoing effects Covid, on low income families who are already struggling to survive.

    But it remains to be seen how UK social security will pan out in the long term. The number of Universal Credit claimants has doubled since the pandemic started. With around six million people now claiming, it’s likely the problems that the APPG highlighted will now affect even more people. And given its track record, it’s unlikely the Tory government will act to stop this.

    Featured image via The Canary and Wikimedia 

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on The Canary.

  • Texas power outages highlight the gulf between rich and poor

    A winter storm in the US has caused widespread power outages that have disproportionately impacted disadvantaged communities.

    More than 30 people have died and millions have been left without power in Texas, where inequality in access to the power grid is larger.

    Meanwhile, republicans have come under fire for their actions during the crisis.

    The storm

    Last week, a major winter storm left frozen energy sources unable to cope with demand, leaving people across the state without light or heating.

    The lack of electricity has hit poorer households and families of colour the hardest, as they are less likely to live in neighbourhoods with critical infrastructure unaffected by the outages.

    According to the Texas Tribune, dozens of deaths have already been attributed to the storm, with officials saying there are likely more not yet recorded. An 11-year-old boy died in a house without power, and other deaths have been officially classed as due to hypothermia.

    Power prices

    According to experts, none of Texas’ sources of electricity were adequately prepared for the freezing weather brought by the storm, despite similar outages in 2011. This is compounded by Texas having its own power grid, separate from the rest of the US. The independent grid means Texas avoids trading electricity regulations. Experts are now saying the avoidance of these regulations may have led to the Texas grid not being properly maintained.

    As temperatures dropped, Texas’ Power Utility Commission ordered the Electricity Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) to raise prices of electricity to reflect demand, saying “energy prices should reflect scarcity of the supply”.

    This has led to Texans whose electricity stayed on being hit with large bills. One 63-year-old veteran living on social security payments told the New York Times he had been forced to use most of his savings to pay a $16,752 electricity bill.

    Republican response

    Leadership in Texas has faced criticism for their response to the crisis.

    The mayor of Colorado City, Tim Boyd, wrote a long post on Facebook calling his citizens products of the “socialist government”. He said:

    No one owes you or your family anything; nor is it the local governments responsibility to support you during trying times like this! Sink or swim, it’s your choice! The City and County, along with power providers or any other service owes you NOTHING! I’m sick and tired of people looking for a damn hand out! If you don’t have electricity you step up and come up with a game plan to keep your family warm and safe.

    He has since resigned.

    There has been outrage over Ted Cruz, republican Texas senator, flying to Mexico during the blackouts.

    Republican Texas governor Greg Abbott has called for an investigation into ERCOT. In an interview with Fox News, Abbott blamed green energy for the outages, despite experts saying the majority of energy losses has consisted of fossil fuels.

    Republican leaders mocked California during power outages only last year. However, experts have said this blackout should have come as no surprise to republicans.

    Severin Borenstein, a Berkeley professor of public policy and business administration, told AP News: 

    One big difference is that leadership in California recognizes that climate change is happening, but that doesn’t seem to be the case in Texas.

    Featured image via Pixabay/blindguard & Wikimedia Commons/Gage Skidmore

    By Jasmine Norden

    This post was originally published on The Canary.

  • Family Ties

    We’re still living with the punitive politics of family values. A broader, universal vision can break its vise grip.

    This post was originally published on Dissent MagazineDissent Magazine.

  • Human rights in the time of Covid: ‘a pandemic of abuses’, says UN head

    Exclusive: The ‘biggest international crisis in generations’ has rolled back years of progress and been used as a pretext to crackdown on freedoms, says António Guterres

    The world is facing a “pandemic of human rights abuses”, the UN secretary general António Guterres has said.

    Authoritarian regimes had imposed drastic curbs on rights and freedoms and had used the virus as a pretext to restrict free speech and stifle dissent.

    Continue reading…

    This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.

  • Confirmed: the Tories have caused destitution to explode

    The number of households living in destitution has more than doubled in 2020. That’s according to new research. It shows nearly half a million two-adult families survive on less than £100 a week. But given what we know about the Tories’ coronavirus (Covid-19) response and pre-existing poverty, it’s hardly surprising.

    Destitution: out of control?

    The National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) has looked into UK destitution. It has done this for an episode of Channel 4 Dispatches. The NIESR hasn’t published its research yet. But the Guardian reported on the headline figures. It said that:

    Destitution is defined as a two-adult household living on less than £100 a week and a single-adult household on less than £70 a week after housing costs.

    It noted that the NIESR found:

    there were 220,000 more households living in destitution by the end of last year, potentially more than half a million people.

    This is an increase in the number of destitute families from 197,400 to 421,500. The NIESR also found that the amount of destitution was different across the UK. For example, in the North West of England rates were three times higher than the UK figure. But the NIESR research is against a backdrop of increasing social decay.

    Poverty: already entrenched in foodbank Britain

    The Canary previously reported on growing poverty. So far, there are no official figures for how much it has grown during the pandemic. But one study found that at least 700,000 more people were in poverty than before. The figure included 120,000 more children. This would mean more than 15 million people live in poverty in the UK. Foodbank figures also bear this out.

    The Independent Food Aid Network (IFAN) said that it saw an 88% increase between February and October 2020. The Trussell Trust said it saw a 47% increase in “need” between 1 April and 30 September 2020. It gave out 1.2m food parcels. The Trussell Trust said this was its busiest ever half-year. This was despite the previous year being a record one for it. As the Trussell Trust wrote:

    2,600 emergency food parcels were provided for children every day on average… during the first six months of the pandemic.

    And on top of this, there’s been chaos with the social security system.

    Social security chaos

    The Canary has been covering Universal Credit during the pandemic. A lot of debate has been about the £20 a week uplift. In April 2020, the DWP increased the rate of Universal Credit by this amount. But ever since, uncertainty has existed over what will happen this April. If the Tories end the increase, people will see the DWP cut £20 per week from their money. Then, on Friday 19 February, ITV News reported that the Tories would keep the uplift. But this would only be for another six months.

    This won’t solve several basic issues; not least destitution. For example, for around 1.5 million claimants of things like Employment and Support Allowance (ESA), the government hasn’t given any extra support at all during the pandemic. Also, a survey of Universal Credit claimants found the £20 uplift to be “inadequate” anyway. For example, over 50% of new claimants said they either:

    • Struggled with affording food.
    • Couldn’t afford fresh fruit and veg.
    • Fell behind on their housing costs.
    • Couldn’t keep up with bills/debts.

    The pandemic has seen a perfect storm of factors entrenching severe hardship and destitution. But what’s the answer?

    We don’t need a new “Beveridge report”

    The Guardian reported that Louise Casey, Boris Johnson’s “adviser on homelessness last year”, said the UK needs:

    A new Beveridge report. That’s the kind of thing I’m talking about. Government can, if it wants to, do something on a different scale now. The nation has been torn apart, and there’s no point being defensive about that. We’ve got to gift each other some proper space to think. We’ve got to work out how not to leave the badly wounded behind.

    The Beveridge Report was a 1942 “blueprint” for social policy, designed to reduce poverty. But Casey saying we need one naively assumes that the Tories want to tackle it. Given that in over ten years, right up until this January, they haven’t bothered, what’s changed? Very little. So, we don’t need another report telling us that Tory-led capitalism causes poverty. We need radical change from the bottom, up. And the sooner that happens, the better.

    Featured image via Garry Knight – Flickr and the Telegraph – YouTube 

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on The Canary.

  • Unprotected African Health Workers Die As Rich Countries Buy Up COVID-19 Vaccines

    On 6 January, gastroenterologist Leolin Katsidzira received a troubling message from his colleague James Gita Hakim, a heart specialist and noted HIV/AIDS researcher. Hakim, chair of the department of medicine at the University of Zimbabwe, had fallen sick and had tested positive for COVID-19. He was admitted to a hospital in Harare 10 days later and moved to an intensive care unit (ICU) after his condition deteriorated. He died on 26 January.

    It is a crushing loss to Zimbabwean medicine, Katsidzira says. “Don’t forget: We have had a huge brain drain. So people like James are people who keep the system going,” he adds. Scientists around the world mourned Hakim as well. He was “a unique research leader, a brilliant clinical scientist and mentor, humble, welcoming and empowering,” wrote Melanie Abas, a collaborator at King’s College London.

    The post Unprotected African Health Workers Die As Rich Countries Buy Up COVID-19 Vaccines appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

    This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.

  • A report just slammed the Universal Credit £20 uplift as ‘inadequate’

    The Department for Work and Pensions’ (DWP) Universal Credit is under the microscope again. This time, a survey of claimants found the benefit left them in chaos. It called the £20 uplift “inadequate”. But the problem is that this isn’t exactly news to the countless people who’ve been struggling on it for years.

    The DWP: here we go again

    The Canary has been covering Universal Credit during the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic. A lot of debate has been about the £20 a week uplift. In April 2020, the DWP increased the rate of Universal Credit by this amount. But ever since, uncertainty has existed over what will happen this April. If the Tories end the increase, people will see the DWP cut £20 per week from their money. So far, the Tories have not budged on the issue.

    But now, a survey of claimants has found many have been struggling. Most notably, it showed that the £20 a week increase hasn’t made much difference.

    Welfare at a (Social) Distance is a research project that’s looked into social security during the pandemic. The Guardian reported the project:

    surveyed 6,431 new and existing benefit claimants between May and June, and carried out 74 in-depth interviews between June and September.

    The survey’s results were unsurprising.

    No surprises here

    It found the problems with Universal Credit for new claimants were numerous. The research noted that when they applied for it:

    • 37% had problems with the website.
    • 28% had problems with the phone process:

    UC survey one

    Then, while people waited for their first payment, many didn’t apply for the built in advance:

    • 28% said it was because they didn’t want to get into debt.
    • 9.3% said it was because they hadn’t heard of it:

    UC Survey Two

    If people did apply for an advance, the DWP still didn’t leave them with enough money:

    • 28% had to borrow from a bank, credit card or other financial institution.
    • 28% borrowed money friends:

    UC Survey Three

    Also for people who didn’t claim an advance, 42% of them said they either:

    • Skipped meals.
    • Fell behind on housing costs.
    • Didn’t keep up with bills/other debt:

    UC Survey Four

    Overall, the DWP hit 41% of new claimants with a deduction, cap, or charge related to their claim:

    UC Survey Five

    Where’s the £20 a week gone?

    When people did start getting Universal Credit payments, over 50% of new claimants said their income had fallen by more than 25%:

    UC Survey Six

    This is while over 50% said their outgoings either stayed the same or increased:

    UC Survey Seven

    UC Survey Eight

    When people were properly on Universal Credit, they said the DWP still didn’t give them enough to live on. For example, almost 5% had to use a foodbank:

    UC Survey Nine

    Around 62% of people couldn’t even save £10 a month. And roughly the same number wouldn’t have been able to buy something like a fridge if theirs broke:

    UC Survey Ten

    But these were the “less severe” impacts of the DWP’s level of payments. Over 50% of new claimants said they either:

    • Struggled with affording food.
    • Couldn’t afford fresh fruit and veg.
    • Fell behind on their housing costs.
    • Couldn’t keep up with bills/debts:

    UC Survey Twelve

    The hardest hit group? Disabled people:

    UC Survey Fourteen

    Dr Kate Summers led the report. She said:

    We should think more ambitiously about what ‘success’ means within our social security benefits system. Yes, the benefits system held up through the first wave of the pandemic, but fundamental issues remain in terms of the adequacy of payment levels, and people’s ability to access and understand the system.

    Indeed. Because the report paints a damning snapshot of the current situation. But the problems with Universal Credit have been there since the start.

    Systemic issues

    Survey after survey has found Universal Credit doesn’t work. Nearly four years ago, the DWP did its own survey. The Canary reported the findings. For example, they showed that:

    • 25% of people couldn’t complete their claim online.
    • 72% of claimants either financially struggled from “time to time” or constantly, fell behind, or were having “real financial difficulties”.
    • Around 35% of claimants were in arrears with housing costs.
    • About 22% of claimants were struggling with both bills/financial commitments and housing costs.

    So, it seems little has changed since then. All the Welfare at a (Social) Distance project’s findings for new claimants include the £20 a week uplift. It’s report said that:

    our evidence suggests that even with the £20 uplift, benefit levels are inadequate for many claimants

    Campaigning to keep the £20 extra isn’t sufficient. Because it’s barely helping many people at the minute anyway. But moreover, it’s because the UK’s social security system is broken beyond repair. We need a fresh start for the welfare state. £20 a week empty gestures are simply not good enough.

    Featured image via EliasSch2 – pixabay and Wikimedia 

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on The Canary.

  • Bitcoin Could Push Global Emissions Above 2 Degrees Celsius, Scientists Say

    A bitcoin mine site manager checks mining equipment inside a bitcoin mine near Kongyuxiang, Sichuan, China.

    In late January, the price of stock in the video game retailer GameStop soared some 1,700 percent over several days before crashing back down. And while GameStop’s wild ride appears over for now, some of the same speculative frenzy and hype has spilled over into the cryptocurrency markets. Unlike traditional currencies, which are issued by central banks, cryptocurrencies are digital currencies that are managed collectively. Just as equity bubbles often have dire side effects like the exacerbation of inequality, the price of Bitcoin surging to record highs has potential negative consequences for the climate.

    Bitcoin, whose technology is open source, is the oldest cryptocurrency. One of its more interesting innovations is the concept of the “blockchain,” where all transactions are recorded in a public list. First theorized in a white paper attributed to the cryptocurrency’s founder, who is known as Satoshi Nakamoto, Bitcoin was meant to create an alternative payments system not controlled by the titans of finance. Yet, many corporations, so-called “FinTech” startups, and even Wall Street firms have also leapt head first into the innovations of Bitcoin. Since Bitcoin’s creation, not only have we seen the creation of many other kinds of cryptocurrency, we’ve also seen the creation of multiple exchanges that allow people to buy and sell cryptocurrency, making speculation on the price of crypto easier.

    People can purchase Bitcoin on exchanges, but they can also obtain Bitcoin by “mining” it. Bitcoin mining is the process by which new Bitcoin is added into circulation. About every 10 minutes, a new “block” is added to the Bitcoin blockchain. The first miner to both verify 1 megabyte worth of transactions on the network, and correctly identify a 64-digit hexadecimal number associated with the new block (called “proof of work”), receives 6.25 Bitcoins as a reward. Those 6.25 Bitcoins are currently worth about $293,000 with Bitcoin trading around $47,000. Identifying this number is essentially guesswork, and requires a ton of computing power to do. Miners can mine up to a hard limit of 21 million Bitcoin (there are currently 18.5 million Bitcoin in circulation).

    To be profitable, Bitcoin miners need to operate in areas where the price of electricity is low, because the practice uses a lot of energy. That often means mining in areas with some of the dirtiest energy. Research from the University of Cambridge shows that about one-third of global Bitcoin production occurred in Xinjiang, China. As Bloomberg reports, Bitcoin miners are drawn to Xinjiang because its power rates are extremely low, “as little as 0.22 yuan ($0.03) per kilowatt-hour, compared with 0.6 to 0.7 yuan in central China.” While Xinjiang is developing renewable wind turbine-powered energy, the majority of electricity in the region is generated from coal.

    That’s part of the reason why Bitcoin mining has a growing environmental impact. In 2018, Princeton Professor Arvind Narayanan estimated in congressional testimony that the Bitcoin network accounted for slightly under 1 percent of world electricity consumption — a bit more than the electricity consumption of the state of Ohio or the state of New York. Scientists writing in the journal Nature warned in 2018 that Bitcoin’s growth could single-handedly push global emissions above 2 degrees Celsius. More recent estimates found that the carbon emissions of Bitcoin mining “sits between the levels produced by the nations of Jordan and Sri Lanka.” The University of Cambridge Judge Business School’s Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index estimates that Bitcoin mining will consume more than 120 terawatt-hours of electricity globally this year — more energy than Argentina. (One terawatt-hour is equal to outputting 1 trillion watts of energy for one hour.) Researchers have also found that Bitcoin mining is more energy-intensive than mining both gold and platinum.

    As the price of Bitcoin skyrockets, so do the incentives to mine it. Bitcoin is up more than 37 percent in 2021 alone, and has more than doubled since December 2020. One new incentive for mining Bitcoin came recently when electric carmaker Tesla revealed in a filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission on February 8 that it had purchased $1.5 billion of Bitcoin, and would begin accepting the cryptocurrency as payment for its cars. Bitcoin surged 13 percent off the news, and hit a then-record high of over $44,000. (It’s since moved higher, at one point surpassing $48,000).

    Tesla’s purchase of Bitcoin has raised questions in the financial press about its commitment to sustainability, with the Financial Times writing that it may “undermine [the firm’s] sustainability stance.” Much of Tesla’s revenue comes from selling carbon credits for its electric vehicles. As Jacob Silverman noted in The New Republic, Tesla sold approximately $1.58 billion worth of carbon credits in 2020 — almost the same amount it purchased in Bitcoin.

    Bitcoin is hardly the only cryptocurrency that Tesla’s founder, billionaire Elon Musk, has been boosting. Musk has been repeatedly hyping another cryptocurrency, Dogecoin, over the last few weeks. Dogecoin is also a mined cryptocurrency, though research on the emissions impact of mining it and other non-Bitcoin cryptocurrencies is just beginning.

    It’s not just Tesla driving Bitcoin to a record high (it briefly hit $50,000 over the weekend) and making mining more attractive than ever. On February 10, the credit card company Mastercard announced it would allow merchants to receive Bitcoin as payment sometime later this year. Then on February 12, the Bank of New York Mellon Corporation (commonly known as BNY Mellon) said it would begin to allow its clients to hold Bitcoin at the bank, and PayPal announced its plans to introduce support for buying, selling and holding Bitcoin at Venmo (which PayPal owns).

    Bitcoin mining needn’t be emissions-generating; if all Bitcoin were mined in locations generating electricity through renewable energy, it wouldn’t be an issue at all. But as the world slowly transitions off of fossil fuels, and with one-third of Bitcoin being mined in the coal-dominated Xinjiang, Bitcoin mining will continue to raise climate concerns in the near term. And as the speculative bubble around Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies increases, the incentives to mine in areas with the cheapest electricity will only rise. This should raise concerns for climate regulators and advocates everywhere.

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Profiting From Desperation: Oxygen Tanks Become an Underground Market in Mexico

    An INFRA worker refills an oxygen tank.

    Water became a commodity traded on Wall Street in December amid fear of scarcity, and now oxygen is being speculated on in Mexico.

    With most hospitals full, many Mexicans are battling COVID-19 at home. Oxygen tanks and oxygen concentrators (devices that concentrate the oxygen from a gas supply, typically the air) have become scarce, as individuals and companies are taking advantage of the pandemic and selling or renting them at extremely high prices. Others are using the situation to fraudulently sell tanks without delivering them, or to steal customers’ personal information. The situation is only compounding the debt, poverty and inequality that has worsened with the pandemic. It also portends a new wave of fraud and speculation, when vaccines arrive.

    At the time of writing, Mexico had registered 160,000 deaths from COVID-19. However, Mexico’s emergency service says the real figures are at least three times that, given how many people are dying at home, and given that testing — especially outside of the capital, Mexico City — is expensive and difficult to access.

    In Mexico City, people have been lining up for up to five hours to refill tanks, many of which only provide a few hours’ worth of oxygen. The demand for oxygen has grown by 700 percent over the past month, according to the Office of the Federal Prosecutor for the Consumer (PROFECO).

    People have turned to social networks to try to find oxygen supplies, using lists compiled informally by individuals, as the government is not providing such information. Most of the companies or names on these lists are part of an underground market, and the minister for internal affairs, Olga Sánchez, says crime networks are getting involved.

    Speculating With Human Lives

    I contacted various numbers on a list for the city of Puebla to confirm whether the owners of the listed numbers were speculating, and under what conditions they were supplying oxygen products. Many of them never replied. I wrote to someone identifying as Andres Madrid on Twitter, who was advertising oxygen concentrators for sale in Puebla. He said he was selling six-liter concentrators for 30,000 pesos (US$1,484), but when I asked if he represented a laboratory or where he got the concentrators from, he stopped replying.

    Another supplier asked for a 10,000 peso deposit (US$495) and would only accept cash, while another was selling a normal eight-liter tank for 36,000 pesos (US$1,782). Those only accepting cash likely didn’t want any records of the transactions.

    The figures represent roughly a quadrupling of prices since November. The National Alliance for Small Businesses (Anpec) stated that an oxygen refill has gone from 250 pesos in December, to 690 pesos on average today, while concentrators used to cost 11,000 pesos, and on average are being sold for 60,000 pesos. In most of Mexico, the minimum wage is 123 pesos per day, though many informal workers don’t earn that much. Such prices mean people having to pay up to 20 months’ wage for an oxygen concentrator.

    Given the demand and profit rates, it is no surprise that there have been incidences of people intercepting trucks delivering oxygen tanks and stealing all of them, and that police escorts sometimes have to be provided when oxygen is being transported.

    There are numerous Twitter accounts and fake websites selling oxygen tanks. Some are being used to commit fraud and obtain people’s personal and banking details; many involve using stolen IDs when sending quotes to customers, and others ask for an advance payment and then don’t follow through.

    PROFECO acknowledges that the situation is serious. The head of the office, Ricardo Sheffield, says the agency has already deactivated 700 Facebook profiles and 100 pages involved in the fraudulent sale of oxygen. He also noted that some companies sell industrial oxygen tanks that aren’t medical grade and thus not fit for personal use, and told people to only buy from officially recognized companies like INFRA, Linde or Air Liquide.

    INFRA is a producer and distributor of industrial gases and welding materials, but is also one of the main suppliers of medicinal oxygen. I visited one of its stores in Puebla. People were lining up in cars going back almost three blocks. I wondered what the majority of people, who don’t own cars, were doing to transport tanks — which are extremely heavy.

    One person waiting for a refill, Antonia Garcia, said, “At first, it was hard because you don’t know where to get oxygen, and then you find out about the different shops, but then you don’t have a tank to refill. We had to buy a tank — it cost 30,000 pesos. It was full, but then we have to fill it up every day, and that costs 470 pesos. We are shopkeepers and we covered the costs between the whole family, but I don’t know what other people do. You wouldn’t be able to pay it because it costs a lot.”

    Gloria Gonzalez, who was refilling a tank for her sick grandmother, said, “We asked friends and we went on social media asking for tanks. They are very hard to get, and in the end, we borrowed one. The prices keep going up. The tiny one we’re using costs 6,000 pesos and you have to refill it a few times a day. It’s very stressful, and it’s very sad.”

    Given the under-the-table nature of the underground market, and the lack of studies or reporting into the situation, it is hard to quantify the impact this is having. However, there is no doubt that many people are going into debt to buy oxygen tanks, to pay bills and rent, or even just to get COVID-19 tests. And the loans are likely coming from friends or organized crime, as government credit or banking loans are inaccessible for most.

    Local media reported that in one hospital in southern Puebla, four patients died after a private contractor didn’t provide the necessary quantity of oxygen, and around the country, 40 percent of people say that they or a family member have now lost all of their income due to the pandemic and its impacts.

    Violence and Inequality in Underground Markets

    This new underground market and the other crimes only flourish because of already existing black-market structures, organized crime and inequality. The U.S.’s Merida Initiative — an agreement with Mexico and Central America to combat cross-border crime, drug trafficking and money laundering — and the “war on drugs” saw a drastic militarization of Mexico, massive increases in drug prices, an intensification of organized gangs and cartels, increased extortion and an arms black market estimated to be worth US$100 million.

    And with unreliable water and health care systems, there are underground markets flourishing in those sectors as well. For those who can’t access any or enough water, there is a private market of water trucks selling water at elevated prices, while in 2018, Mexico had the sixth-largest medicine black market in the world.

    The pandemic has only seen that worsen, as surgeries are being canceled. There is an increased demand for cancer medications, and in Mexico City, for example, 38,000 of such medicines were stolen from storage by armed men.

    Some 57 percent of the working population are informal workers and therefore not registered for social security, and only 14 percent of second-level hospitals* attend to such people. On top of that, high levels of corruption in the sector mean health resources (from medicine to machines) are diverted into the coffers of private companies. In 2016, at least 6 billion pesos (US$295 million) worth of federal resources assigned to Seguro Popular (public health insurance that covers a wide range of services without co-pays for its affiliates) were mismanaged.

    Corruption also means many hospital buildings contracts were never completed. The disastrous state of Mexico’s health care system, combined with the pandemic and a lack of official information, means that many people feel desperate and helpless when they contract COVID-19. They often don’t investigate or ask questions, because it is better not to know, and many are highly susceptible to social media scams.

    Is the Global Vaccine Market Next?

    In Mexico, there have already been various instances of people trying to profit from the demand for vaccines. Though currently only available through a government program, Mexico has said private companies will be allowed to import the vaccine.

    Meanwhile, the federal health commission, COFEPRIS, is already worried about fake sales of the AstraZeneca vaccine. In the states of Guanajuato and Quintana Roo, there were reports of people visiting houses or calling and asking for personal information with the vaccine as the pretext. One website pretended to be Pfizer Mexico and tried to sell a fake vaccine, and people have tried to sell fake vaccines through social networks.

    This issue isn’t limited to Mexico. The inequality experienced here is also reflected on a global scale; wealthy countries hoarding vaccines will lead to insecurity and deep economic problems that will end up impacting them as well, since poorer countries tend to manufacture and produce a lot of the goods that wealthier countries use.

    Interpol warned of the potential for organized crime related to vaccines, as the pandemic has “already triggered unprecedented opportunistic and predatory criminal behavior.”

    Already, 2 billion people globally lack access to medicines and medical devices, which leaves a gap that is often filled by substandard and falsified products. Up to 169,000 children die yearly from pneumonia after receiving counterfeit drugs, and the figure is similar for adults for fake anti-malarial medication.

    While high-income countries so far have 60 percent of the vaccines (but only 16 percent of the world’s population), the European Union has confirmed it will control vaccine exports in order to put its citizens first. But World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesu says, “We will not end the pandemic anywhere until we end it everywhere.”

    * Mexico has three levels of health care. The first is preventative, emergency etc. The second is the biggest area and covers most health issues that involve hospitalization, such as surgeries, urgent care, as well as children and gynecology. The third level is specialist care.

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • The Education Fix

    The idea that more degrees, credentials, and skills will raise the bottom of the economic floor has become an article of national faith. But educational systems can just as easily reproduce inequality as mitigate it.

    This post was originally published on Dissent MagazineDissent Magazine.

  • A Return to “Normal” Under Biden Is Not Good Enough. We Must Demand More.

    President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris meet with House Democratic leaders, including Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, and committee chairs to discuss the coronavirus relief legislation in the Oval Office at the White House February 5, 2021, in Washington, D.C.

    A return to “normality.” A collective sigh of relief. From Washington, D.C. to living rooms across the world, the inauguration of President Joe Biden signalled a return to “normal.” Back to the old ways of doing politics. The slew of executive actions Biden signed on his first day undid (thankfully) many of the draconian dictates of the Trump administration. For many, January 20, 2021, was like waking up after a four-year nightmare. And of course, the damage of those years — whether in packing courts with right-wing judges or emboldening white supremacists — will be felt for generations. The Trump administration, of course, should not be considered as an aberration, except stylistically, to U.S. empire and the smooth functioning of global capitalism. But perhaps the domestic divide-and-conquer tactics of Stephen Bannon and his craven ilk marked an inward racial war that is usually reserved for overseas.

    But as the unbearably hollow celebrations of the Biden victory subside, we are left with this return to “normal.” What exactly is normal? And why have so many of us been so desperate to embrace it? The answer, of course, is full of contradiction and paradox. Most obviously, the “normal” that most Americans experienced was itself a stultifying order. Why the hurry to embrace a system as depressing and degrading as capitalism? Whether this system is branded with MAGA baseball caps or “I’m with Joe” t-shirts is largely irrelevant. Not unimportant, of course, but it is vital to peer behind the façade to see capital’s unyielding machinery.

    From the moment we are born, this “normality” of capitalism is forced upon us. Everywhere, everything, and everyone is conditioned to swallow “normality.” Low-paid, meaningless jobs, insecurity of livelihood and health care, mountains of debt, and an environment that is pillaged and polluted. All in the name of a normal order. There’s nothing natural about living in such a system of oppression. But nonetheless, this depression and depravity is compensated with a million shiny things and social media “likes.” Consumption temporarily provides the distraction and masks the pain, even as it contributes to the mounting crises tearing through neoliberal societies.

    So perhaps we’ve struck a Faustian bargain with capital’s pervasive normal. We will accept the low-paid bullshit jobs; we will accept the lack of security of housing, health and livelihood; and we will accept a planet on fire — so long as we are able to buy “stuff.” But is this really the reason why we accept normal? Or does the constant manufacture and reinforcement of normal also preclude our imagining and desiring more liberatory alternatives?

    Normal is ideology. Normal patterns how we think, perceive and act. The term ideology is usually associated with Cold War propaganda posters. But ideology is more than mental propaganda or psychological hypnosis. Ideology is made concrete. It materialises itself in the cities we work in (or don’t), in the houses we buy (or don’t), and in the planet we survive upon (or don’t). It’s little wonder then, that normal is so hard to escape. We eat, sleep and breathe normal. But in so doing, we inhale a system that deadens our imaginations, deadens our senses and deadens the planet.

    Without normal, who are we? What should we do for work? This is the most urgent of existential questions: how to go beyond our dystopian normal. Presently, we define ourselves in and through normal: Who we are is our miserable jobs. As Marxist scholar Andy Merrifield writes, “work is revered in our culture, yet at the same time workers are becoming superfluous; you hate your job and your boss, hate the servility of what you do, and how you do it, the pettiness of the tasks involved, yet want to keep your job at all costs. You see no other way of defining yourself other than through work.” And, as the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted, this truncated measure of self-definition has forced millions to make ghastly life and death choices.

    We are therefore led back to the central discontent of normal: the lack of alternatives. How can we possibly desire a different world when we don’t know what it looks like? Our current mainstream society offers absolutely no alternatives to capitalism. It tinkers with the edges, reshuffles identity politics as and when needed, and occasionally cuts a check to “hardworking families.” The lack of alternatives is not an accident. Any threat to capitalism’s order is violently suppressed, both in imagination and on the streets. Our intellectual commons have been violently emptied, and even the mild radicality of academia — which has sometimes nourished our collective unconscious with dreams of difference — has largely fallen in line with the astonishing success of normal.

    The masses have not been duped or tricked into desiring their own repression. They are taught to desire their repression from the day they are born. The wonderful world of normal is forced into our minds, our bodies, our jobs, our neighborhoods, our oceans. But its victory is not in any way assured. Normal can be (and routinely is) challenged. Yet we must strike at the heart of normal’s foundations if we want a truly transformative agenda, since these foundations are rarely discussed “in the open” of mainstream politics. We consider land (or, more precisely, the commons), livelihood and liberty as the three central pillars that must be addressed if we are to create a more dignified world.

    Presently, all three pillars are dominated by the violent injustices of capitalism. Our land — as part of a wider shared commons — has been constantly enclosed, privatized, chopped up and sold off. This creates a principle — or even primary — disconnect in capitalism, since billions are denied a place of their own. Astronomical rent, unfathomable mortgages, feudal land arrangements, a planet of slums and widespread homelessness, all follow from the strange belief that the land beneath our feet is a commodity.

    Second, our livelihoods are similarly privatized, chopped up and sold off. We must sell our labor to survive. And that is only for those “lucky” enough to have a job. What awaits many are underpaid jobs that are all too often supplemented by credit cards to make ends meet. What awaits many more is somehow surviving and making do in the brutal interstices of the global capitalist gulag.

    Finally, injustices in land and livelihood create injustices to our liberty. Saddled by debt, working (or not) a 9 to 5 job, barely able to make rent, we are unable to exercise our most basic human freedoms of creativity and spontaneity. In fact, such freedoms are scarcely even considered. Instead, liberty is narrowed, for the relatively privileged among the masses, to choices made almost exclusively in the arena of consumption: what to buy. For those less fortunate billions, there are few choices of any kind.

    The “normal” constraints placed upon land, livelihood and liberty must be challenged. First, the many existing starting points should be highlighted and used to light up our dormant imaginations. Second, we must seek a new politics of commoning, cooperatives, and — at the very least — large-scale investments in public housing to lift people out of debt and from the yoke of landlords. In so doing, we wish to forefront environmental justice as central to a new kind of socialist geography. Third, we must challenge the assumption that we must work for somebody else — and that the sole horizon of our work is to obtain a subsistence wage, no matter how soul- or planet-killing that work might be. Redefining work as a form of cooperation and mutual reciprocity within a local community (rather than a global market) is vital. Finally, we must redefine liberty as a power to create, to freely assemble across borders and to change the world with our own hands.

    A return to normal is a return to injustice. We must dream differently.

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Billionaires Win and We Lose at Pandemic Super Bowl 2021

    An aerial view of Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida, ahead of Super Bowl LV.

    We won’t know the winner of this year’s Super Bowl till Sunday, but we already know the big winners in our COVID-ravaged economy include dozens of billionaire sports barons.

    On the eve of the big game, and after 10-plus months of the pandemic, 64 billionaire owners of major league sports franchises — including the AFC champion Kansas City Chiefs’ Hunt family and the NFC champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ Glazer family — have enjoyed a $98.5 billion rise in their collective net worth, a 30 percent increase, even as millions of fans have fallen ill, lost jobs, neared eviction, gone hungry and died due to the coronavirus.

    The 64 billionaires, who together own or co-own 68 professional sports franchises, had a combined wealth of $426 billion on January 29, 2021, up from $325 billion on March 18, 2020, roughly since the start of the pandemic lockdowns, according to “Pandemic Super Bowl 2021: Billionaires Win, We Lose,” a new report by the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) and Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) analyzing data from Forbes and Wealth-X. [Note: The increase in total billionaire wealth from March to January was $101 billion, but has been adjusted to $98.5 billion because two billionaires only reached that status in January 2021.]

    The sports billionaires’ private gain in the midst of so much public pain is particularly galling since many of their franchises have been the beneficiaries of taxpayer handouts. Over the past several decades, according to data maintained by Field of Schemes, 28 pro sports teams owned by 26 billionaires have received $9 billion in taxpayer subsidies (see Table 2 here) to help build or update stadiums and arenas and make other investments billionaires could presumably afford on their own. These publicly subsidized team owners have seen their wealth increase $45 billion since mid-March.

    Over the past five years — when a lot of those sweetheart tax deals were cut — the collective wealth of sports billionaires shot up $165 billion, or 66.7 percent. Their combined wealth of $247 billion in March 2016 had grown to $426 billion by January 29 of this year.

    The $98.5 billion wealth gain by 64 sports franchise billionaires since March 2020 could pay for:

    • A stimulus check of $1,400 for over 70 million Americans — almost half of the 153 million people who likely will be eligible under the pandemic relief plan proposed by President Biden based on the 2020 stimulus payments.
    • More than one-third of the $290 billion cost of providing $400-a-week supplements to existing unemployment benefits through September, as proposed by President Biden in his COVID rescue plan.

    March 18 is used as the unofficial beginning of the pandemic because by then most federal and state economic restrictions responding to the virus were in place. Moreover, March 18 was also the date on which Forbes estimated billionaire wealth for the 2020 version of its annual report. That report provided a detailed baseline that ATF and IPS have been comparing periodically with real-time data from the Forbes website. This methodology has been favorably reviewed by PolitiFact.

    Last March is when the nation’s emergency response to the deadly virus threw professional sports along with the rest of society into turmoil. Thousands of low-paid stadium and arena workers lost their jobs as sports seasons were cancelled and curtailed.

    The long winning streak of America’s billionaire sports owners is just part of the dominance of a national dynasty of 661 U.S. billionaires whose wealth has grown by $1.18 trillion, or 40%, during the pandemic, climbing from $2.9 trillion on March 18 to $4.13 trillion, as of January 29, 2021 (see link here for January 29, 2021 data).

    Though only one of their teams will lift the Lombardi Trophy as Super Bowl champs this year, both the Chiefs’ Hunt family — specifically, Ray Lee Hunt and W. Herbert Hunt — and the Bucs’ Glazer family will continue their long reigns among the nation’s biggest economic winners. The Hunts’ net worth is estimated by Forbes at $6.3 billion, up $482 million during the COVID crisis. Their Chiefs received $250 million in taxpayer subsidies for stadium renovations in 2006.

    The Buc’s Glazer family is worth an estimated $1.7 billion, according to Wealth-X. Taxpayers provided a total of $218 million in subsidies for construction and renovation of the Buccaneer stadium in 1998 and 2015.

    Sixty U.S. billionaires — roughly one in ten of the country’s 661 total billionaires — own one or more major league professional sports teams in the National Football League (NFL), National Basketball Association (NBA), Major League Baseball (MBL), and National Hockey League (NHL). Three of the billionaire team owners are Canadian and one is German, for a total of 64.

    Tax reform that ensures the wealthy pay their fair share — the principle President Biden’s tax plan is built on — would transform a good chunk of those huge billionaire gains into public revenue to help heal a hurting nation. But getting at that big boost in billionaire fortunes is not as simple as raising tax rates: tax rules let the rich delay, diminish and even ultimately avoid any tax on the growth in their wealth. What’s needed is structural change to how wealth is taxed.

    The most direct approach is an annual wealth tax on the biggest fortunes, proposed by Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, among others. Another option is the annual taxation of investment gains on stocks and other tradable assets, an idea advanced by the new Senate Finance Committee chair, Ron Wyden. Even under the current discounted tax rates for investment income, if Wyden’s plan had been in effect in 2020 America’s billionaire sports owners would be paying billions of dollars in extra taxes this spring thanks to their gargantuan pandemic profits last year. Another needed reform is to significantly strengthen the estate tax so that the riches accumulated by these ultra-wealthy sports franchise owners pay their fair share of taxes when these dynasties get passed onto their heirs.

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • 14 Books to Read During Black History Month and Beyond

    February is Black History Month, and so we asked the Innocence Project’s staff to share books that have inspired them to reflect on Black history. The powerful books they selected below touch on everything from how the legacy of slavery in the U.S. has contributed to mass incarceration to exploring what it means to be a young Black person in America today — plus some interesting reads by talented Black authors touching on other forms of injustice.

    Throughout this month, we’ll be highlighting the disproportionate impact of mass incarceration on Black people, including on death row, and honoring icons of the civil rights movement and pioneers of change. These essential reads get to the heart of many of these issues, so if you’re looking for a way to learn more this month check our recommendations. And tell us what you’re adding to your reading list in the comments below. 

    1.  The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X by Les Payne and Tamara Payne

    Over 30 years, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Les Payne spoke to anyone he could find who knew Malcolm X. What resulted is this incredible biography of the civil rights leader, which paints a portrait of Malcolm X unlike any other. The winner of the 2020 National Book Award for Non-Fiction, this biography is a must-read. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    2. Heavy by Kiese Laymon

    In this memoir, Mr. Laymon writes about growing up in Jackson, Mississippi. He poignantly discusses his struggles with his weight, abuse and family, and contemplates the dynamics of race and America’s fraught racial history on his life and the lives of those around him. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    3. Punching the Air by Ibi Zoboi and activist Yusef Salaam

    Co-authored by Yusef Salaam, a member of the Exonerated Five and the Innocence Project’s board of directors, this moving young adult novel tells the story of a wrongly convicted boy. Ms. Zoboi told NPR that the main character is inspired by Mr. Salaam because, “I write books for children, and I wanted the world to remember that Yusef was a child when this happened to him and I was a child as well.”

    Innocence Project supporters will receive a free shipping discount when they purchase Punching the Air with this link.

    4. Pushout: The Criminalization of Black Girls in Schools by Dr. Monique Morris

    While arrests of girls between the ages of 13 and 17 have declined overall, Black girls are coming into contact with the juvenile justice system at disproportionately high rates. That has to do with the way society treats young Black girls, Dr. Morris argues. In this work of nonfiction, she examines the unique experiences of young Black girls in school, interrogating the ways in which today’s schools and systems dehumanize and criminalize Black girls from an early age, leaving life-long impacts. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    5. All About Love: New Visions by bell hooks

    Celebrated Black feminist writer and professor bell hooks frequently writes on the intersection of race, gender and society. But in All About Love: New Visions, hooks examines the foundation of love and the ways in which cultural norms have shaped how we love one another. In less than 200 pages, hooks lays out her framework for understanding love and becoming more open to giving and receiving love, and in doing so advancing justice and humanity. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    6. Another Country by James Baldwin

    No list of great Black literature would be complete without Mr. Baldwin’s work. In this 1962 novel, Mr. Baldwin paints a portrait of New York City’s Greenwich Village and Harlem neighborhoods as he saw them. He challenges the characterization of New York City as a harmonious “melting pot,” and instead highlights the ways in which continued racism can become internalized and affect interpersonal relationships. Another Country was criticized by many and banned in some places, including New Orleans and Australia, at the time of publishing. But, today, is considered an important and influential writing. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    7. Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

    In her first novel, Ghanaian-American writer Yaa Gyasi traces the details the slave trade’s impact on two continents over eight generations. Focusing on two half sisters and their descendants, Homegoing highlights the ways in which the legacy of slavery has shaped race dynamics and changed lives over hundreds of years, and still does to this day. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    8. Those Who Know Don’t Say: The Nation of Islam, the Black Freedom Movement, and the Carceral State by Garrett Felber

    Garrett Felber examines the history of the Nation of Islam, a Black political and religious movement, and its struggle against policing and prisons as part of the Black Freedom Movement. The book also looks at the ways in which the Muslim community’s organizing during the civil rights era paved the way for the modern-day prison abolition movement. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    9. Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

    “I am invisible because people refuse to see me … When they approach me they see only my surroundings, themselves, or figments of their imagination — indeed, everything and anything except me,” Mr. Ellison wrote in Invisible Man. 

    The novel follows the life of an unnamed narrator, a Black man who grows up in a small Southern town, attends a Black college, and moves to New York where his life takes a turn. The celebrated work of fiction considers issues of race and social structures still relevant today. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    10. The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson

    Ms. Wilkerson’s book draws its title from a poem by celebrated author Richard Wright, in which he wrote that he had left the South and moved to Chicago in the hopes of feeling “the warmth of other suns.”

    In Ms. Wilkerson’s The Warmth of Other Suns, she tells the powerful, true stories of three Black Americans who, like Mr. Wright and millions of others, left the South between 1915 and 1970 to seek opportunity and freedom from Jim Crow rule elsewhere in the U.S. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    11–13. The Broken Earth Trilogy: The Fifth Season, The Obelisk Gate and The Stone Sky by N.K. Jemisin

    In the first installment of Jemisin’s sci-fi trilogy, Essun, the protagonist, must hide her supernatural abilities as she searches for her kidnapped daughter in an apocalyptic world where natural disasters occur regularly and without warning. If her abilities are discovered, she risks discrimination and even death. The three books in the series deal with themes of oppression, power and revolution. Ms. Jemisin became the first Black woman to win the Hugo Award, the most prestigious award for science fiction and fantasy writing, in 2016. She went on to win the prize the following two years for the subsequent installments of the trilogy. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    14. Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward

    Ms. Ward’s novel is set in a fictional town in Mississippi, but much of it takes place in the very real Mississippi State Penitentiary, modeled after a slavery era plantation, and tells the story of a family impacted by mass incarceration, racism, drugs and poverty. Ms. Ward won the National Book Award for her moving book. Get it here or at your local bookstore.

    What’s on your reading list? Let us know in the comments below. 

    The post 14 Books to Read During Black History Month and Beyond appeared first on Innocence Project.

    This post was originally published on Innocence Project.

  • UK asylum seekers told claims at risk if they ‘misbehave’

    Call for Home Office to act after private contractors tell people their applications will be jeopardised for speaking out, going on hunger strikes or complaining about food

    People held at temporary Home Office refugee camps are being threatened that their asylum claims will be harmed if they “misbehave”, according to testimony from site residents.

    A series of statements from asylum seekers inside the camps, anonymised to protect them from possible reprisals, allege they have been told by staff employed by private contractors that their asylum application will be jeopardised for speaking out about conditions or going on hunger strike.

    Related: Home Office wrong to stop asylum seekers working in UK, court rules

    Continue reading…

    This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.

  • Why Does Inequality Produce High Crime and Low Trust?

    Shuffling of resources so that the worst off are lifted up and the top end is brought down can dramatically increase trust.

    The post Why Does Inequality Produce High Crime and Low Trust? appeared first on Evonomics.

    This post was originally published on Evonomics.

  • ‘Walk the talk’ human rights warning from Fiji NGO over UN chair

    Fiji’s UN ambassador Nazhat Shameem … “Fiji now faces global scrutiny on … human rights obligations.” Image: Wikipedia

    Pacific Media Watch newsdesk

    Fiji’s NGO Coalition on Human Rights has called for stronger accountability and commitment to human rights at home in response to the country taking the world stage as the head of a UN body.

    The UN Human Rights Council (UNHCR) elected Fiji’s ambassador Nazhat Shameem as its 2021 president on Friday.

    “As the president of the UNHCR, Fiji now faces global scrutiny on our human rights obligations,” said the NGOCHR chair Nalini Singh in a statement.

    “This is a welcome opportunity for Fiji to reflect on our progress and the existing human rights concerns that need to be addressed.”

    It was encouraging to witness a small Pacific island nation like Fiji taking the lead at a global forum and representing key regional human rights issues, she said.

    “It is also a critical time for the Pacific and Fiji, as we see the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic exacerbating human rights issues in the region.

    Fiji ‘must act over justice’
    “With Fiji’s new appointment, our government must act to ensure that human rights and the principles of equality and justice are upheld across all sectors,” said Singh.

    A recent concern has been cases of alleged police brutality that have been raised by the NGOCHR.

    The NGOCHR has reaffirmed that there must be “no rollback of human rights” under the guise of response measures and continues to raise concerns on the arrests of Fiji citizens during the nation-wide curfew.

    “We are at the world stage taking a strong stance on human rights but we must walk the talk here at home and set the example,” said Singh.

    Fiji’s selection as the President of the UNHCR is a step forward in the right direction and we must keep this momentum to foster a culture that promotes and protects human rights, justice and democracy.

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    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • ‘Walk the talk’ human rights warning from Fiji NGO over UN chair

    Pacific Media Watch newsdesk

    Fiji’s NGO Coalition on Human Rights has called for stronger accountability and commitment to human rights at home in response to the country taking the world stage as the head of a UN body.

    The UN Human Rights Council (UNHCR) elected Fiji’s ambassador Nazhat Shameem Khan as its 2021 president on Friday.

    “As the president of the UNHCR, Fiji now faces global scrutiny on our human rights obligations,” said the NGOCHR chair Nalini Singh in a statement.

    “This is a welcome opportunity for Fiji to reflect on our progress and the existing human rights concerns that need to be addressed.”

    It was encouraging to witness a small Pacific island nation like Fiji taking the lead at a global forum and representing key regional human rights issues, she said.

    “It is also a critical time for the Pacific and Fiji, as we see the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic exacerbating human rights issues in the region.

    Fiji ‘must act over justice’
    “With Fiji’s new appointment, our government must act to ensure that human rights and the principles of equality and justice are upheld across all sectors,” said Singh.

    A recent concern has been cases of alleged police brutality that have been raised by the NGOCHR.

    The NGOCHR has reaffirmed that there must be “no rollback of human rights” under the guise of response measures and continues to raise concerns on the arrests of Fiji citizens during the nation-wide curfew.

    “We are at the world stage taking a strong stance on human rights but we must walk the talk here at home and set the example,” said Singh.

    Fiji’s selection as the President of the UNHCR is a step forward in the right direction and we must keep this momentum to foster a culture that promotes and protects human rights, justice and democracy.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • The Great Divider: Covid-19 reflects global racism, not equality

    ANALYSIS: By Ramzy Baroud

    The notion that the covid-19 pandemic was “the great equalizer’ should be dead and buried by now. If anything, the lethal disease is another terrible reminder of the deep divisions and inequalities in our societies.

    That said, the treatment of the disease should not be a repeat of the same shameful scenario.

    For an entire year, wealthy celebrities and government officials have been reminding us that “we are in this together”, that “we are on the same boat”, with the likes of US singer, Madonna, speaking from her mansion while submerged in a “milky bath sprinkled with rose petals,” telling us that the pandemic has proved to be the “great equalizer”.

    “Like I used to say at the end of ‘Human Nature’ every night, we are all in the same boat,” she said. “And if the ship goes down, we’re all going down together,” CNN reported at the time.

    Such statements, like that of Madonna, and Ellen DeGeneres as well, have generated much media attention not just because they are both famous people with a massive social media following but also because of the obvious hypocrisy in their empty rhetoric.

    In truth, however, they were only repeating the standard procedure followed by governments, celebrities and wealthy “influencers” worldwide.

    But are we, really, “all in this together”? With unemployment rates skyrocketing across the globe, hundreds of millions scraping by to feed their children, multitudes of nameless and hapless families chugging along without access to proper healthcare, subsisting on hope and a prayer so that they may survive the scourges of poverty – let alone the pandemic – one cannot, with a clear conscience, make such outrageous claims.

    Not only are we not “on the same boat” but, certainly, we have never been. According to World Bank data, nearly half of the world lives on less than US$5.5 a day. This dismal statistic is part of a remarkable trajectory of inequality that has afflicted humanity for a long time.

    The plight of many of the world’s poor is compounded in the case of war refugees, the double victims of state terrorism and violence and the unwillingness of those with the resources to step forward and pay back some of their largely undeserved wealth.

    The boat metaphor is particularly interesting in the case of refugees; millions of them have desperately tried to escape the infernos of war and poverty in rickety boats and dinghies, hoping to get across from their stricken regions to safer places.

    Sadly familiar sight
    This sight has sadly grown familiar in recent years not only throughout the Mediterranean Sea but also in other bodies of water around the world, especially in Burma, where hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have tried to escape their ongoing genocide. Thousands of them have drowned in the Bay of Bengal.

    The covid-19 pandemic has accentuated and, in fact, accelerated the sharp inequalities that exist in every society individually, and the world at large. According to a June 2020 study conducted in the United States by the Brookings Institute, the number of deaths as a result of the disease reflects a clear racial logic.

    Many indicators included in the study leave no doubt that racism is a central factor in the life cycle of covid.

    For example, among those aged between 45 and 54 years, “Black and Hispanic/Latino death rates are at least six times higher than for whites”. Although whites make up 62 percent of the US population of that specific age group, only 22 percent of the total deaths were white.

    Black and Latino communities were the most devastated.

    According to this and other studies, the main assumption behind the discrepancy of infection and death rates resulting from covid among various racial groups in the US is poverty which is, itself, an expression of racial inequality. The poor have no, or limited, access to proper healthcare. For the rich, this factor is of little relevance.

    Moreover, poor communities tend to work in low-paying jobs in the service sector, where social distancing is nearly impossible. With little government support to help them survive the lockdowns, they do everything within their power to provide for their children, only to be infected by the virus or, worse, die.

    Iniquity expected to continue
    This iniquity is expected to continue even in the way that the vaccines are made available. While several Western nations have either launched or scheduled their vaccination campaigns, the poorest nations on earth are expected to wait for a long time before life-saving vaccines are made available.

    In 67 poor or developing countries located mostly in Africa and the Southern hemisphere, only one out of ten individuals will likely receive the vaccine by the end of 2020, the Fortune Magazine website reported.

    The disturbing report cited a study conducted by a humanitarian and rights coalition, the People’s Vaccine Alliance (PVA), which includes Oxfam and Amnesty International.

    If there is such a thing as a strategy at this point, it is the deplorable “hoarding” of the vaccine by rich nations.

    Dr Mohga Kamal-Yanni of the PVA put this realisation into perspective when she said that “rich countries have enough doses to vaccinate everyone nearly three times over, while poor countries don’t even have enough to reach health workers and people at risk”.

    So much for the numerous conferences touting the need for a “global response” to the disease.

    But it does not have to be this way.

    While it is likely that class, race and gender inequalities will continue to ravage human societies after the pandemic, as they did before, it is also possible for governments to use this collective tragedy as an opportunity to bridge the inequality gap, even if just a little, as a starting point to imagine a more equitable future for all of us.

    Poor, dark-skinned people should not be made to die when their lives can be saved by a simple vaccine, which is available in abundance.

    Dr Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of five books. His latest is “These Chains Will Be Broken: Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons” (Clarity Press, Atlanta). Dr Baroud is a non-resident senior research fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), Istanbul Zaim University (IZU). This article is republished with permission. His website is www.ramzybaroud.net

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.