In the post-covid era, a system where the majority
strive and the planet’s ecology is ravaged for the pointless avarice of a tiny
minority is no longer sustainable. It was never morally supportable.
Yes – what 21st century economists still
euphemistically call capitalism is
actually all-encompassing Slum Economics.
If you’ve not read The Ragged Trousered Philanthropist – now is the time. Globally,
those who work the most, in the worst conditions and for the longest hours from
the youngest ages are those living in deprivation. It is they who provide eye-watering
wealth for the few at the pinnacle of economic comfort. It has been that way
for a very long time.
Wars and the ever popular diversion of blaming foreigners
have kept the system going and kept those grinding away at the bottom of the
pile, docile. Foreigners and migrants of every description have ever been an
easy target but the system of blame is now so entrenched that those who are
poorest often have the scorn, blame and aggression of the public aimed at them
to the point of Roman colosseum type entertainment. Glance at any tabloid,
listen to the non-too subtle dog whistling of populist politicians or look at
TV shows such as Benefit Street .
You have to marvel at a structure that manages to
have the vast majority working in poverty and insecurity for the extreme affluence
and comfort of a tiny minority while blaming the very people who toil and suffer.
The most recent example of this play-off in our own country is Brexit. The
worst and most recent example of the manifestation in the US is the rise of
Donald Trump. But it’s not new.
What we have to ask ourselves is why the arrangement
that is so downside-up has been so successful for so few for so long and why
the many have gone along with it so willingly.
This is a paragraph from The Ragged Trousered Philanthropist set in 1906 when the author
was, himself, a low paid exploited worker.
“[he] saw that in the world a small class of people
were possessed of a great abundance and superfluity of the things that are
produced by work. He saw also that a very great number – in fact, the majority
of the people – lived on the verge of want; and that a smaller but still very
large number lived lives of semi-starvation from the cradle to the grave; while
yet a smaller but still very great number actually died of hunger or, maddened
by privation, killed themselves and their children in order to put a period to
their misery. And strangest of all – in his opinion - he saw that the people
who enjoyed abundance of the things that are made by work, were the people who
did NOTHING: and that the others, who lived in want or died of hunger, were the
people who worked.”
The
Ragged Trousered Philanthropist was published posthumously (1914) after the
author Robert Tressell – himself a
workman though born into some comfort and brought low through family misfortune
- died of TB in 1911 at the age 40. This work tracks the miserable lives of men
and their families exploited en-masse so that a few at the top can benefit
in-extremis – from their labour.
And while the exploitation of the world’s natural
resources for excessive profit and the labour of the vulnerable for the same is
shameful and counter-productive in the long run – the downside-up system
extends to countries too. We’ve been reminded in the last couple of days of the
staggering amount of money being paid by the poorest countries on earth to the
richest. Infamous never-ending interest payments on debts – often on ‘loans’
set up during oil crises when poor countries could not resource essential
supplies any other way or given to corrupt regimes in full knowledge funds
would never reach the needy, are still keeping poor countries poor; dependent
and unable to progress and at the mercy of exploitation. Faith leaders have
called again on the G20 – the coalition of the world’s wealthiest nations - to
cancel that debt in the light of covid-19. We won’t hold our breath but hope it
is a reminder that while we hear much about aid we seldom hear about the huge
quantities of money passing from poor nations to rich every single year on the
back of historic wrongs.
The pandemic we were always going to have, in light
of our decimation of the world’s ecology (see previous post) and disruption of
precious ecosystems, plus the anything-for-profit mentality, has changed
things.
Covid-19 has presented the world with stark choices,
a threat that you cannot buy your way out of and which causes economic
breakdown. It presents a situation which can only be alleviated with regulation
– the antithesis of what those who exploit labour and the planet want. It also
sets an immediate imperative for not just national healthcare but global universal
healthcare regardless of wealth.
For possibly the first time in history – the
self-interest of the powerful must involve a more egalitarian model. We must
behave with humanity or perish.
here are some old doodles...
