Tag Archives: occupy

Business/Economics, International, U.S.

What Economic Recovery? The United States ranks as World’s 4th worst for income disparity. Another official study that proves that the Occupy movement is right! Proof the American Dream was a lie!

“The income inequality level of the United States ranks only after Chile, Mexico and Turkey in the 29 OECD countries. Inequality among working age people has risen steadily since 1980, in total by 25%.”–John Martin, OECD

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released its latest report on income disparity, and the United States came in as fourth worst, after Mexico, Chile and Turkey.

The report is called: Growing Unequal? Income Distribution and Poverty in OECD Countries.

The report says the trend for the wealth not being spread evenly within the U.S. actually began in the 1970s.

Here’s some interesting facts from the report: “The average income of the richest 10% is US$93,000 US$ in purchasing power parities, the highest level in the OECD. However, the poorest 10% of the US citizens have an income of US$5,800 US$ per year – about 20% lower than the average for OECD countries.”

“Redistribution of income by government plays a relatively minor role in the United States…effectiveness of taxes and transfers in reducing
inequality has fallen still further in the past 10 years.”

“Wealth is distributed much more unequally than income: the top 1% control some 25-33% of total net worth and the top 10% hold 71%.” 

Richard L. Trumka, chairman of the Trade Union Advisory Committee, said the growing disparity in income in the United States is not because the average person isn’t willing to work harder, but because wages and benefits for the average worker have actually been going down (when adjusted for inflation), while salaries, benefits and other forms of revenue for the top 10% have been going up!

A video presentation by the OECD says this latest study is the most detailed ever.

The study also discovered that low income families stuck in countries with high income disparities, can not expect to ever prosper in those countries: “…but what we find is that in very unequal societies they get stuck. Their incomes don’t reflect their true talents and they stay much poorer on average…”-Mark Pearson, OECD

 

Business/Economics, International, U.S.

NAZI-land & United Police States of America: Congress passes final version of National Defense Authorization Act. Obama says he approves

“This is a giant step, this should be the biggest news going right now, literally legalizing martial law…This is big. This step where they can literally arrest American citizens and put them away without trial….is arrogant and bold and dangerous.”–Ron Paul, U.S. Representative for Texas

On the evening of December 14, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the final version of the controversial National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2012.  It passed with 283 representatives voting for, and 136 against.  It will cost U.S. taxpayers $662 billion!

Officials claim they changed some provisions regarding the use of the military as police within the United States, and the detention of U.S. citizens, but still included a loophole for the President to do so by using “national security” as an excuse!

President Obama’s advisers say they’re fine with that: “…language does not challenge or constrain the president’s ability to collect intelligence, incapacitate dangerous terrorists, and protect the American people, and the president’s senior advisors will not recommend a veto.”–Jay Carney, White House Press Secretary

The bill also continues huge spending on operations in Iraq, even though the U.S. is officially getting out of Iraq.  Many of the U.S. forces leaving Iraq are still being based in the Middle East, like in Kuwait.  Also, most military troops in Iraq will be replaced by mercenaries, I mean private security contractors.  Did you know the murderous security contractor formerly known as Blackwater, formerly known as Xe Services, and now known as Academi, is about to get a big chunk of that money to continue operations in Iraq?

The spending bill shows that the United States, under Obama, has no intention of reducing military operations that drain precious tax dollars with no return on investment for the average person in the U.S.!

“Those troops stationed overseas aggravate our enemies, motivate our enemies. I think it’s a danger to our national defense, and we could save a lot of money cutting out the military expenditures that contribute nothing to our defense.”-Ron Paul, U.S. Representative for Texas

Business/Economics, International, U.S.

OWS: An Open Letter from America’s Port Truck Drivers on the Occupy the Ports

We are the front-line workers who haul container rigs full of imported and exported goods to and from the docks and warehouses every day.

We have been elected by committees of our co-workers at the Ports of Los Angeles, Long Beach, Oakland, Seattle, Tacoma, New York and New Jersey to tell our collective story. We have accepted the honor to speak up for our brothers and sisters about our working conditions despite the risk of retaliation we face. One of us is a mother, the rest of us fathers. Between the five of us we have 11children and one more baby on the way. We have a combined 46 years of experience driving cargo from our shores for America’s stores.

We are inspired that a non-violent democratic movement that insists on basic economic fairness is capturing the hearts and minds of so many working people. Thank you “99 Percenters” for hearing our call for justice. We are humbled and overwhelmed by recent attention. Normally we are invisible.

Today’s demonstrations will impact us. While we cannot officially speak for every worker who shares our occupation, we can use this opportunity to reveal what it’s like to walk a day in our shoes for the 110,000 of us in America whose job it is to be a port truck driver. It may be tempting for media to ask questions about whether we support a shutdown, but there are no easy answers. Instead, we ask you, are you willing to listen and learn why a one-word response is impossible?

We love being behind the wheel. We are proud of the work we do to keep America’s economy moving. But we feel humiliated when we receive paychecks that suggest we work part time at a fast-food counter. Especially when we work an average of 60 or more hours a week, away from our families.

There is so much at stake in our industry. It is one of the nation’s most dangerous occupations. We don’t think truck driving should be a dead-end road in America. It should be a good job with a middle-class paycheck like it used to be decades ago.

We desperately want to drive clean and safe vehicles. Rigs that do not fill our lungs with deadly toxins, or dirty the air in the communities we haul in.

Poverty and pollution are like a plague at the ports. Our economic conditions are what led to the environmental crisis.

You, the public, have paid a severe price along with us.

Why? Just like Wall Street doesn’t have to abide by rules, our industry isn’t bound to regulation. So the market is run by con artists. The companies we work for call us independent contractors, as if we were our own bosses, but they boss us around. We receive Third World wages and drive sweatshops on wheels. We cannot negotiate our rates. (Usually we are not allowed to even see them.) We are paid by the load, not by the hour. So when we sit in those long lines at the terminals, or if we are stuck in traffic, we become volunteers who basically donate our time to the trucking and shipping companies. That’s the nice way to put it. We have all heard the words “modern-day slaves” at the lunch stops.

There are no restrooms for drivers. We keep empty bottles in our cabs. Plastic bags too. We feel like dogs. An Oakland driver was recently banned from the terminal because he was spied relieving himself behind a container. Neither the port, nor the terminal operators or anyone in the industry thinks it is their responsibility to provide humane and hygienic facilities for us. It is absolutely horrible for drivers who are women, who risk infection when they try to hold it until they can find a place to go.

The companies demand we cut corners to compete. It makes our roads less safe. When we try to blow the whistle about skipped inspections, faulty equipment, or falsified logs, then we are “starved out.” That means we are either fired outright, or more likely, we never get dispatched to haul a load again.

It may be difficult to comprehend the complex issues and nature of our employment. For us too. When businesses disguise workers like us as contractors, the Department of Labor calls it misclassification. We call it illegal. Those who profit from global trade and goods movement are getting away with it because everyone is doing it. One journalist took the time to talk to us this week and she explains it very well to outsiders. We hope you will read the enclosed article “How Goldman Sachs and Other Companies Exploit Port Truck Drivers.”

But the short answer to the question: Why are companies like SSA Marine, the Seattle-based global terminal operator that runs one of the West Coast’s major trucking carriers, Shippers’ Transport Express, doing this? Why would mega-rich Maersk, a huge Danish shipping and trucking conglomerate that wants to drill for more oil with Exxon Mobil in the Gulf Coast conduct business this way too?

To cheat on taxes, drive down business costs, and deny us the right to belong to a union, that’s why.

The typical arrangement works like this: Everything comes out of our pockets or is deducted from our paychecks. The truck or lease, fuel, insurance, registration, you name it. Our employers do not have to pay the costs of meeting emissions-compliant regulations; that is our financial burden to bear. Clean trucks cost about four to five times more than what we take home in a year. A few of us haul our company’s trucks for a tiny fraction of what the shippers pay per load instead of an hourly wage. They still call us independent owner-operators and give us a 1099 rather than a W-2.

We have never recovered from losing our basic rights as employees in America. Every year it literally goes from bad to worse to the unimaginable. We were ground zero for the government’s first major experiment into letting big business call the shots. Since it worked so well for the CEOs in transportation, why not the mortgage and banking industry too?

Even the few of us who are hired as legitimate employees are routinely denied our legal rights under this system. Just ask our co-workers who haul clothing brands like Guess?, Under Armour, and Ralph Lauren’s Polo. The carrier they work for in Los Angeles is called Toll Group and is headquartered in Australia. At the busiest time of the holiday shopping season, 26 drivers were axed after wearing Teamster T-shirts to work. They were protesting the lack of access to clean, indoor restrooms with running water. The company hired an anti-union consultant to intimidate the drivers. Down Under, the same company bargains with 12,000 of our counterparts in good faith.

Despite our great hardships, many of us cannot — or refuse to, as some of the most well-intentioned suggest — “just quit.” First, we want to work and do not have a safety net. Many of us are tied to one-sided leases. But more importantly, why should we have to leave? Truck driving is what we do, and we do it well.

We are the skilled, specially-licensed professionals who guarantee that Target, Best Buy, and Wal-Mart are all stocked with just-in-time delivery for consumers. Take a look at all the stuff in your house. The things you see advertised on TV. Chances are a port truck driver brought that special holiday gift to the store you bought it.

We would rather stick together and transform our industry from within. We deserve to be fairly rewarded and valued. That is why we have united to stage convoys, park our trucks, marched on the boss, and even shut down these ports.

It’s like our hero Dutch Prior, a Shipper’s/SSA Marine driver, told CBS Early Morning this month: “If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.”

The more underwater we are, the more our restlessness grows. We are being thoughtful about how best to organize ourselves and do what is needed to win dignity, respect, and justice.

Nowadays greedy corporations are treated as “people” while the politicians they bankroll cast union members who try to improve their workplaces as “thugs.”

But we believe in the power and potential behind a truly united 99%. We admire the strength and perseverance of the longshoremen. We are fighting like mad to overcome our exploitation, so please, stick by us long after December 12. Our friends in the Coalition for Clean & Safe Ports created a pledge you can sign to support us here.

We drivers have a saying, “We may not have a union yet, but no one can stop us from acting like one.”

The brothers and sisters of the Teamsters have our backs. They help us make our voices heard. But we need your help too so we can achieve the day where we raise our fists and together declare: “No one could stop us from forming a union.”

Thank you.

In solidarity,

Leonardo Mejia
SSA Marine/Shippers Transport Express
Port of Long Beach
10-year driver

Yemane Berhane
Ports of Seattle & Tacoma
6-year port driver

Xiomara Perez
Toll Group
Port of Los Angeles
8-year driver

Abdul Khan
Port of Oakland
7-year port driver

Ramiro Gotay
Ports of New York & New Jersey
15-year port driver

Fukushima, Idaho

What Economic Recovery? Japanese nuclear disaster, dissapointing mine operations in Namibia, shutting down French company Areva. Idaho could lose jobs in 2012. Idaho leaders unrealistically optimistic

The ongoing nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan, and a bad mine operation deal in Africa, is bringing down a major player in international nuclear power; Areva.  The result will mean job losses all over the world, and possibly here in Idaho.

French government owned Areva recently announced that their revenues have crashed since the Japanese nuclear disaster began in March, and, since the French government opened an investigation into Areva’s purchase of a mining operation in Namibia, Africa.

On 13 December 2011, Areva officials unveiled a five year plan to reduce the size of the company.  This is because of a projected loss of U.S.$2.1 billion for just this year, and expected losses in the next few years.

Areva officials have already announced they will not replace French employees who retire, and they are laying off 1,500 German employees.

This is because of a negative backlash against nuclear power, as a result of the Japanese nuclear disaster.  In Germany, the government decided to end all reliance on nuclear power.  In Japan, the prefectural governments are refusing to allow nuclear power plants to start back up.  Both actions in Germany and Japan are at the demands of the majority of the citizens.

Areva’s loses also come from what is looking like a pig in a poke deal, from their purchase of uranium mines in Namibia, Africa.  Areva spent $2.5 billion on the mines, and the French government is now investigating because it turns out the mines have only half the projected uranium that Areva officials were told it had.

As part of their five year turn around plan Areva has suspended the construction of a uranium enrichment plant near Idaho Falls, Idaho.  State officials claim that Areva has agreed to keep on their payroll about 300 Idaho employees, but that’s only until the end of 2012.

The problem now is that Areva has stated that their continued operation depends on the sale of ten new generation EPR (European Pressurized Reactor) nuclear power units.  Those sales need to take place between 2012 to 2016.

 

Business/Economics, Idaho, U.S.

Bank Incompetence: As many as 28 million people in the U.S. refuse to open a bank account

“The bottomline is that about 7.7% of U.S. households have no account in an insured financial institution and an additional 17.9% are underbanked, meaning they have an account but they utilize high cost financial service providers.”– Martin Gruenberg, FDIC

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 17 million people in the United States do not have bank accounts.  According to Tom Putnam with the Idaho non-profit group, Partners for Prosperity, that number could actually be as high as 28 million!

The reasons vary from just not understanding the concept of bank accounts to people who’re fed up with getting ripped off by the banks.  The FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation) says at least half of the people who’ve stopped using banks have done so because of a bad experience.

Another factor is that with all the fees banks charge, and with declining incomes, many people say it just not worth it to put their hard earned money into a bank.

According to Tom Putnam, the percentage of people who don’t use banks here in Idaho is bout 7%.

Business/Economics, Idaho, U.S.

Government Incompetence: Construction companies say Idaho city driving down the economy with their outrageous construction fees. Is Pocatello violating state law?

“It’s gone up in a period of ten years from about $300 connection fees to about $5,000!”-Al Tetz, BCASE

The Building Contractors Association of Southeast Idaho (BCASE) says the city of Pocatello is charging outrageous, and illegal hook up fees.  And they believe it’s one of the main reasons for the drop in local construction jobs and home sales.

BCASE members also say the huge jump from $300 to $5,000 could be an attempt by city officials to try and make up for lost tax revenues, and millions of dollars generated from those fees have been placed in Pocatello’s general fund, which violates Idaho state law.

The construction organization is suing the city.

Officials with the city of Pocatello have no comment, because they haven’t been served with any notification of a lawsuit (as of December 13).

 

 

 

Business/Economics, International, U.S.

Incompetence & What Economic Recovery? NAR says U.S. housing market is in worse shape, than first thought

The National Association of Realtors (NAR) is warning that the U.S. housing market collapse is even worse than first thought.  On December 21, NAR will release new/revised data on the housing collapse going back to 2007.

Lawrence Yun, chief economist for NAR, said that real estate analysts have made incorrect assumptions when they counted existing home sales in the Multiple Listing Service (MLS).  The assumptions in counting home sales made things look better than they really are: “For the real estate business, this means the housing market’s downturn was deeper than what was initially thought.”

Yu also said the MLS, and some of the other NAR counts, were done using data from 2000, not up to date data!

Another problem is that some real estate markets overlap in reporting their sales. This means a sale in one market could, on paper, look like two sales in two markets: “Colorado Springs has their own database, but because the Denver market is nearby they may also list that home in the Denver database, so when the home gets sold, both Denver and Colorado Springs will say sales rose, so that’s genuine double counting.”-Lawrence Yu

For some reason it took until a recent meeting of NAR officials, this year, to realize the reporting mistakes.

 

Business/Economics, U.S.

What Economic Recovery? U.S. Congress & Postal Service make delay deal; no closings until May 2012

“If you don’t like what the postal service has put forward (to cut costs) by closing processing facilities and post offices and eliminating jobs, then come up with a better approach. It’s a challenge we need to accept, and this agreement with the postal service gives us that opportunity.”-Richard Durbin, U.S. Senator for Illinois

The U.S. Congress and the Postal Service has reached an agreement, that will delay closing of hundreds of processing centers and thousands of post offices.  Instead of starting that shut down in March, the USPS will wait until May.

This is because members of Congress promise they will return to negotiations regarding how to make cuts, and minimize the effects on postal employees and the economy.  Back in November Congress indicated they were shelving any discussions about the Postal Service until after elections in November 2012.  However that’s far later than the December 16 default date set by President Barack Obama.  I suppose members of Congress got an earful, about the draconian cuts looming for the USPS, from their constituents.

The Postal Service operates on money that comes from you and me buying postal products, not taxes!

Business/Economics, International, U.S.

What Economic Recovery? It’s an official record, 6.3 million U.S. citizens left the United States. 40% of young adults want to leave!

“I don’t regret leaving the States one bit!”-Matt Landau, left the U.S. six years ago

The U.S. State Department is admitting that at least 6.3 million U.S. citizens have left the Untied States, officially to find jobs or go to cheaper universities!

“There’s a feeling among more entrepreneurial Americans that if you really want to get anything done, you have to get out of country and away from the depressing atmosphere. There’s a sense of lost direction, so more people are looking for locations that offer more hope about the future.”–Bob Adams, America Wave

Blame it on a bad economy, caused by outsourcing jobs: “We’ve pretty much outsourced everything else.”-Giovanni Pinzon, laidoff aerospace technician

The U.S. State Department said Russia, China and Latin American countries are the recipients of the brain drain from the United States.

“I connected the dots and decided that I should go somewhere different and learn something new, like Mandarin, to challenge myself. I picked China because it was growing so fast.”-Derek Capo, left Florida for China

According to Bob Adams, who’s been doing surveys of U.S. citizens leaving the country, 40% of 18 to 24 year olds now want to leave the U.S.! Adams says he’s been doing the surveys for the past nine years and said the latest numbers “…have shot through the ceiling…not something I anticipated.”

 

 

Opinion, U.S.

Mitt Romney Constitutionally Incompetent. Marriage is actually UnAmerican! Religion based marriage law will violate Constitution.

“…I think that at the time the Constitution was written it was pretty clear that marriage is between a man and a woman…”-Mitt Romney, candidate for the office of President of the United States

Even if the personal opinions of the founders of the United States were against homosexual marriage, there is nothing in the Constitutional amendments that say anything about marriage!

This was intentional, after all our founders fought a war for Independence from the British Empire, which placed all kinds of qualifiers on citizenship (including belonging to the church of england).  The founders did not want any qualifiers on U.S. citizenship, other than being born here, or becoming ‘naturalized’.

The founders knew that many of the qualifiers of citizenship in the British Empire were based on the personal opinions of the holier than thou crowd.  The founders knew that, like ass holes, personal opinions should be left out of sight out of mind!

It is true that since marriage is not covered in the U.S. Constitution then it is within the States’ rights to create definitions of marriage.  But then you might have conflicts at tax time.

This brings us to the real reason why both sides are trying to push for a Constitutional amendment regarding marriage.  Both sides don’t like seeing some States for, while other States oppose.

If a anti-homosexual marriage law is passed at the Federal level then it will violate the basic reason for the creation of the United States: “We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Notice it does not say the United States was being created to promote one religion, or any religion, or for the sole purpose of 1% Elitists who want more more more money, or for control freaks and insecure paranoids!

But guess what, from my own personal experience, and witnessing others’ experiences, marriage actually conflicts with Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

But here’s why efforts by the religious front to create a anti-homosexual law at the Federal level will fail.  Amendment One: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

By creating a law that is obviously the result of religious beliefs, Congress will be in violation of the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America!

Religion freaks can argue all they want. Religion, any religion, does not jive with the Constitution. That’s what was so revolutionary about our Constitution, it created the first secular (government not controlled by religion) country in modern history!

(The modern concept of separation of church and state can be traced back to Martin Luther’s doctrine of two kingdoms)