Tuesday, November 29, 2011

OCCUPYING THE OCCUPY MOVEMENT ... and a growing fight over inequality between the rich and poor!

As we hear more about cross-continental evictions of occupy sites in the hundreds of cities and towns across North America, the Occupy Movement is shifting into Occupy 2.0. There are reasons they evicted the occupiers from their sites, and it had little to do with neighbours and others being uncomfortable with tent cities and people wandering in the parks after midnight. If this was the case, this by-law would be enforced year round, even when homeless people obviously sleep in these parks, particularly the summer time. Think about the synchronicity in which the various sites were being evicted; nobody denied being in conference at the same time to plan to stop the camp sites. But in many ways, by doing the evictions, the powers that be did the Occupy Movement a favour.

Like Niagara, we moved into Occupy 2.0 ... The occupiers haven't gone away; they just went underground. They are reaching more and more people. Tonight, I attended the monthly Philosophy Cafe that gets held in a downtown coffee shop. About ten to twelve of us at any given time talked about the significance of Occupy Movements across the continent, and whether we felt this was in for the long term or short term. Only two of us present have actually participated in an Occupy Movement; the fellow next to me was involved in the camp at St. James Park in Toronto, and I am sort of involved here. Of course I invited all the people there if they can come, to come to our next general assembly to see what Occupy Niagara is about. Occupy Niagara is on Facebook and anybody can keep track of it to learn when our meetings are, and who is involved with what ....

The people involved in the Occupy Movement are not ragtag hippies, drug addicts and homeless persons, although a few in some sites have been homeless. However, the key here is that even the homeless persons contributed to the sites in a meaningful way. They taught the rest of the folks how to live outside. Others like myself were not in a position to do so, but many people were eager to do so, but as other Occupy Movements have shifted to the next phase, we did too. Most people involved in these communities are working people, a lot of them young, but many are very old or middle aged as well. Many are students, and others are seeking jobs despite a hefty student loan and a poor job market. At the last general assembly, I spoke to a man who had two university degrees, and a college diploma, but was stuck on ODSP. He was recently terminated from a job that he enjoyed and excelled in.

Others I spoke to are business people or working people, many of whom had financial resources of their own to contribute to the cause. Others are like me, who can stand on the hilltops and tell people where the Emperor is walking, and what he is not wearing. In the meantime, the mainstream media is trying to track what the Occupy Movement is doing. We have had mixed coverage in our own region, but the Toronto Sun, both the print and broadcast version, painted those involved as being over-entitled and looking for handouts. Well, I had once written here that about many wealthy persons before, because many of them are over-entitled and seek handouts, but we don't hear about too many of them in the Sun Media, do we?

The Sun Media, as well as some other networks, try to make unionized workers into the demons that caused this recession, when in fact, they fail to recognize that there is a top 1% of the population, which likely includes the ownership of the same media they work for, that earn millions of dollars per year and likely work less hours than most of you do. In my view, nobody is worth millions of dollars per year. I don't care what they do. The government, who acts as their puppet, continues to dish out corporate welfare and tax cuts to this bunch under the delusion that somehow this wealth will trickle down to the rest of us. As someone once said, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results. If it worked in the U.S., their economy would be booming, and there would be such a shortage of workers, that they'd be taking way more immigrants than they are and among its own citizens, anybody that wants a job would have one.

Our politicians say that the Occupy Movement makes sense in the U.S. because of their over-entitled bankers that crashed the economy, and then rewarded themselves with multi-million dollar bonuses after they were bailed out. While Canada might not have the SAME problems, it is as somebody else once said, "Same shit, different country". This video tells the truth about Canada's banking systems, and how the producer claims that part of our deficit is also attributed to high interest rates from the PRIVATE banks that the government borrows from to pay its bills ... What? Did you actually think the Bank of Canada did this? Of course not! Take a look!

While all of this is happening, people living in Ontario who care about poverty and disenfranchisement should note that a commission headed by Don Drummond, an economist, formerly of the federal Minister of Finance, and the TD Canada Trust, has been set up to help the provincial government implement its own range of austerity measures. These cuts and costs will most certainly hit the poor the hardest, as once again, the Premier has promised that only the Health and Education ministries will be spared cuts, but not social services, housing or transportation, etc. that help protect the poor. Given this alone, it is easier to know that the death by a thousand cuts McGuinty government has set deliberate policy decisions to hurt the poor, hoping that maybe they will all die off sooner to save their corporate friends a few bucks. They cannibalized the special diet program, and have kept both OW and ODSP rates well below the real rate of inflation. People receiving these benefits are moving into less and less safe housing, if they can find any at all, and many eat so poorly as to suffer the strangling effects of long term malnutrition. All this, whilst, Don Drummond gets his $1,500 a day consulting fees, and advises his comfortable friends in the government, most of whom just quietly received raises of tens of thousands of dollars each (by appointing almost every non-minister a parliamentary assistant or committee chair). Sneaky, sneaky.

At the same time, we watch sign posts from other countries, such as Great Britain, where they are radically culling their rolls of the Incapacity Benefit (similar to the disability benefit here), which would cut their monthly living allowances and expect them to find non-existent jobs. They did the same thing in British Columbia a few years back only to see at least one suicide a day of persons being reviewed for disability benefits eligibility. It makes me wonder where people get their intelligence from, or more particularly their math skills, when it comes to dousing people like this with a substantially lower income (as costs continue to skyrocket) and then to push them out the door to look for jobs that no employer has any obligation to hire any of them for.

Unfortunately, this ideology may become closer to Ontario than we would like to believe. Last year, Frances Lankin, former head of Toronto's United Way, and Munir Sheikh, former Head Statistician who resigned when Harper made his bone-headed decision to cut the mandatory long form census in 2010, were appointed to head Ontario's Social Assistance Reform Commission. Ontario's largest civil service union, Ontario Public Service Employees' Union, recently published their concerns that Lankin had hinted that one of their recommendations would be to allow municipalities to administer BOTH OW and ODSP, which would spell disaster. This would be a way to help cull the rolls of ODSP, and force many more on the lower paid and more punitive system of Ontario Works, which is certainly not going to serve the majority of people who have major barriers to employment. One wonders when our lovely government who thinks there are so many jobs out there will begin to force employers at gun point to start hiring qualified persons with disabilities, particularly when so many able bodied people are out of work.

Henceforth, it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out now that by doing this, the two programs will now be closer integrated, and persons with disabilities won't have a hope in hell of escaping many of the punitive rules that now impact Ontario Works recipients, such as asset stripping, family as a benefit unit (when this should have been set to individual a long time ago), unreliable delivery of cheques to guarantee one's homelessness, etc. Somebody out there ought to occupy the offices of Frances Lankin and Munir Sheikh if indeed they are planning to recommend this bone-headed idea, which will only set us back by decades.

Your thoughts?

11 comments:

Don McAlpine said...

Ms. Browne: I think you are way off base. The “fight over inequality between the rich and poor!” What you do not address is whether this is a systemic problem inherent in our economic system and that this system has the ability if “properly” adjusted to solve the problem of which you speak.

You deal with the problem on the level of “wages” and that because of the disparity between the wages of the top one per cent and the rest of the population is fundamental to solving the financial problems, within Ontario, nay the world.

You deal with the “homeless” as an undesirable underclass and as if they are a defect in the system. That because they are without homes, that changes their social and personal status from a human being to a lesser being.

You address the issue of Sun Media and its unionized labour while not acknowledging that Sun Media is also constrained by our economic system and one constrain is the cost of labour. I personally have no love for Sun Media, but our economic system is based upon competition and labour cost is an important factor. To cast any corporation as being simply motivated by greed, when it can be shown that the inherit nature of the economic system is to produce more, while at the same time reducing overall costs and maximizing the financial benefit for the share owners is to misrepresent this economic system.

To point out that an individual earning XXXX dollars for his or her labour as being unfair or unjust overlooks the problem of those that hold the money or the “investor”, that benefits because they receive a financial reward because they have this money. This doesn’t even fall under the category of “wages” or XXXX dollars for doing anything other than investing.

Don McAlpine
Aurora

The Advocate said...

Read it again, Don. It is not ME dealing with the homeless as some type of undesirable.

As for wages, I say this to put it at the level of understanding by the average person. Many of my readers are not students of economics, and do not understand other ways of bringing in money, other than through wages.

Many corporations ARE inspired by greed, as they control the economic and political system. Ask anybody a simple question: Describe an "average" family, what they do, what they have, where they live, etc. and most people, including those that don't "have" will talk about those living in the burbs with 2.1 kids, two cars, nice house, pool in back, computers at home and so forth ... that's not true. But we are led to believe this is what we ALL need in order to strive to be "normal".

Unfortunately this bafflegab comes through political campaigns, leading people to actually believe that they too can have these things, when in fact, it isn't going to happen. Nobody is ready to admit there are no more full-time permanent jobs.

p said...

What is not discussed with our banking sytem is that in 1988 the interest rate was 9.5% where you would be getting up to $90 interest on your savings acounting.Today it is less than 2% & it might even cost you money by putting it in the bank.If you put$300 in a mattress after 28 yrs you'd still have $300 but if that same $300 was in a bank account you'd have $0 in your account after 28yrs.It was a bad kept secret the way the Bank of Canada balances out interest rates.

jbkeh said...

A reader opines, "To cast any corporation as being simply motivated by greed, when it can be shown that the inherit nature of the economic system is to produce more, while at the same time reducing overall costs and maximizing the financial benefit for the share owners is to misrepresent this economic system."

Since "it can be shown", where is this "proof"?

As things stand, the numbers show the opposite - wealth is shifting ever further into a shrinking elite as poverty expands ever more into the so-called "middle class".

Capitalism is no more a panacea than Communism (or any other "ism"). Corporations are not greedy - they're mindless "legal fictions". PEOPLE are both thoughtless and greedy - it's the nature of the beast.

It is this unthinking greed that has allowed the masses to be lured into the blind mantra of "lower taxes". They slather at getting a $20 reduction in income tax (while the wealthy earning 500 times as much coups $10,000). At the same time, they are oblivious to the resultant necessary $40 increase in consumption taxes and usage fees which the rich DO NOT pay commensurate to their wealth.

It is this unthinking greed that leads union bosses to extract unsustainable wage increases and benefits that in the end 'kill the golden goose'.

It is this unthinking greed that has allowed self-appointed financial 'gurus' to proclaim what level of profit defines 'success' for a corporation (with dire consequences for the management that fails to meet the 'expectations').

It is this unthinking greed that pushes corporate management to focus solely on the NEXT quarter's results, regardless of the long-term impact on the company, its employees and their community.

It is this unthinking greed that causes 'shareholders' (most of them large financial corporations themselves) to accept insane salaries and bonuses being lavished on 'top executives' in spite of the obvious disaster they are creating.

We cannot send two football teams out on the field and simply say, "Get the ball past the goalposts by any means - you are legally immune as to method" and not expect a few deaths, including 'collateral damage' to the spectators. Similarly, if corporate "competition" is allowed the easier path of sabotage rather than actually producing better at lower cost (in the broad sense of not just the price to the end user, but the price on humanity) don't be surprised by the result.

There need to be 'rules and regulations' and THAT is what government (society) is all about.

'Wealth' in itself is meaningless - it is the continuous exchange of wealth that is an "economy". Concentrate that wealth into a tiny group and the economy grinds to an end of 'financial feudalism'; spread it equally and the result is the infamous "they pretend to pay us and we pretend to work" stagnation.

It is true "proportional taxation" that allows the industrious to get ahead while restricting the runaway of "wealth earning wealth" that leads to inevitable collapse.

But "wealth earning wealth" is everybody's dream. It has lead us to effectively dismantle "proportional taxation".

Unthinking greed.

Don McAlpine said...

Interesting argument to put forward. Anyone smarter than the average the bear as Yogi would say should be excluded from any discussion and that a complex issues should be reduced to their simplest terms, because people are only capable of dealing with the issue in the most simplistic terms.

So the world is flat because that is the way people see it. I have read your Article “It is not ME dealing with the homeless as some type of undesirable.” “Occupy Movement are not ragtag hippies, drug addicts and homeless persons, although a few in some sites have been homeless. However, the key here is that even the homeless persons contributed to the sites in a meaningful way.” You have differentiated between citizens and in doing this have stratified people based on their economic means.

If that is all what the Occupier Movement is about, then the movement is lost from the onset. It becomes simply an appeal from those that have little to those that have much for some form of compensation.

jbkeh: A reader opines, "To cast any corporation as being simply motivated by greed, when it can be shown that the inherit nature of the economic system is to produce more, while at the same time reducing overall costs and maximizing the financial benefit for the share owners is to misrepresent this economic system."

Since "it can be shown", where is this "proof"?

A Corporate ceases to exist because if it is not “profitable” investors will withdraw their money and put it use in a venture that generates a “profit”. So the original corporation cases to exist and that has nothing to do with greed. It is a matter of a “free market economy”.

Don McAlpine
Aurora

jbkeh said...

The statement ' A Corporate ceases to exist because if it is not “profitable” investors will withdraw their money and put it use in a venture that generates a “profit”. So the original corporation cases to exist and that has nothing to do with greed. It is a matter of a “free market economy” ' ignores one point and mischaracterizes another.

Profit can be dissociated from quantity and / or quality of production. A 'free market economy' does not necessitate the increase of goods nor the lowering of prices, if profit can be achieved or increased by 'easier' means.

"Free market" means the state does not control who can 'compete' - it does not mean they can 'compete by any means, fair or foul'.

Don McAlpine said...

Before we start discussing your ideas about economics lets at least agree on a definition.

Let look at the definition of a “free market” and a “free market economy”, per Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A free market is a competitive market where prices are determined by supply and demand. However, the term is also commonly used for markets in which economic intervention and regulation by the state is limited to tax collection, and enforcement of private ownership and contracts. Free markets differs from situations encountered in controlled markets or a monopoly, which can introduce price deviations without any changes to supply and demand. Advocates of a free market traditionally consider the term to imply that the means of production is under private, and not state control or co-operative ownership. This is the contemporary use of the term "free market" by economists and in popular culture; the term has had other uses historically.

A free-market economy is one within which all markets are unregulated by any parties other than market participants. In its purest form, the government plays a neutral role in its administration and legislation of economic activity, neither limiting it (by regulating industries or protecting them from internal/external market pressures) nor actively promoting it (by owning economic interests or offering subsidies to businesses or R&D).

Don McAlpine
Aurora

jbkeh said...

As the definition offered says, this is a "contemporary use" (I'd say, "perversion") of the term.

How be we use the expression unaccountable-to-society-market? It would be far more honest.

I suspect most people still think of a "free-market" as one of open competition that is both fair and responsible.

Don McAlpine said...

What I am dealing with is your notion of “greed” which is an individual characteristic, ambiguous at best, and then seeking to explain how the world functions. You characterize Corporations and those with money as “greedy” and those without something else. So a person going to work to put bread on the table must be greedy, because he or she is a participant in this economic process. The way you have posted the problem is that both corporations or unions must also be greedy and their negotiations are based entirely on self-interest. Of coarse both are self-interested and that is part-and-parcel with our economic system. It just doesn’t explain how the system works or functions.

You simply can’t make this type of generalization or simplification, because it does explain anything. This is like describing the Chairman of the Board, Royal Bank of Canada and Chairman of the Board, EnCana Corporation, David P. O’Brien,
O.C. as motivated only by greed. In addition to the boards he chairs, Mr. O'Brien's directorships include Fairmont Hotel and Resorts, Inco Limited, TransCanada PipeLines Limited, Molson Inc., and the C.D. Howe Institute.


By reducing and assigning individual characteristics would be to describe and identify Bill Gates and Microsoft and their place in the market place as a result of greed.


Don McAlpine
Aurora

jbkeh said...

And this is why I really must stop trying to hold reasoned discussions...

I make the statement, 'Corporations are not greedy - they're mindless "legal fictions". PEOPLE are both thoughtless and greedy - it's the nature of the beast. ' and you blithely fabricate that I ' characterize Corporations and those with money as “greedy” and those without something else. ' Did I say everybody was solely and simultaneously thoughtless and greedy all the time? Did I say only people with money were afflicted?

Why do I bother to ask? It will be simply ignored or twisted on its head.

As to any possible relevance of your implied libeling of Mr. O'Brien and the litany of boards of which he is a part, I would suggest you leave the man alone - what did he do to deserve this?

Gates' real contribution was the development of the FAT file system, incorporating it into the QDOS software he had purchased and selling it to IBM. His 'genius', as it were, was to reserve the right to sell the product to anyone with a non-IBM computer. IBM was confident that they could be like Apple and their ROM firmware would never be functionally duplicated. Phoenix proved them wrong and Gates reaped the rewards. After that, Microsoft prevailed through suppressing competition and vicious predatory litigation which continues to this day. Just ask the US Dept of Justice and various European countries for details of the charges that have been laid over the years.

But Gates himself is also a total irrelevancy.

I'm done here - go dangle your lure in front of another fish.

Don McAlpine said...

jbkeh: You have now entirely flipped your position. When you attribute something to greed and the problems of society to greed, as soon as it is humanised and use names, put to individual’s names into the equation, you take offence. All of a sudden these individual’s are defended as not being greedy.

It is very easy to make generalities about unnamed people and is no different than blaming or holding a prejudice based upon some belief. To explain the one per cent movement as being solely about people because they think one part of the society is motivated by greed is to misunderstand the movement. It has far more serious implications and the principle one is that it is the questioning of how our society operates and who benefits.

This is what make the movement relevant because unlike the Article indicates that it is about simple non-complicated issues, it questions the economic foundations of our system and that is happening throughout Europe, North America and the Mid-East. The struggle in the Mid-East is what started the whole thing and while it is portrayed by the press and media as being about democracy, it is nothing to do with that at all because there and here, it is about people feeding, housing, and having a way of making a living.

Don McAlpine
Aurora