7 months ago
Coming Soon to a Neighborhood Near You?
As the Occupy Wall Street movement goes global, the recent rioting in Rome shows how volatile things might become. A lot of those Occupy Wall Street protesters in the US are young, unemployed Obama voters, for whom the message of “hope and change” has heralded several years of living in their parents’ basements. The President walks a fine line with the message: “challenge the excesses of Wall Street without demonising those who work there”. Good luck with that fine line…
Will he be able to resist working the encampments and fanning the flames against the “millionaires and billionaires”? (I’m counting the days… ) Will his political staff succumb to the temptation to harness the understandable frustration to aid his flagging re-election hopes? His “Jobs Bill” took money from the “millionaires and billionaires” and gave a lot of it to the public sector unions. The failure of the Jobs bill has been blamed on the greedy, obstructionist Republicans who are fronting for the capitalist pigs.
It’s looking a lot like 1936 to me. Rome r US?
1 year ago
The Lost Generation
This New York Times feature article highlights the absence of life prospects for young people in Europe. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/02/world/europe/02youth.html?_r=1&ref=global-home In southern Europe, official unemployment rates for people in their twenties is 40%, even worse than in the US. Almost half of 30 year olds in Italy and Spain are living with their parents, and will be unable to afford their own homes or to have families.
The article makes the point that elaborate job protections and pensions, decreed by powerful labor governments, have locked young people out of jobs, and turned them into a “lost generation”. Sooner or later, politicians will figure it out, and begin taking on the unions. If it is later, some of these governments will be courting revolution.
