[Marxism] Crisis good for US K'ists

[J.M.P.Cloke at lboro.ac.uk]

-- 
Dr Jon Cloke
Project Officer EnergyCentral and Research Associate
Global and World Cities Group
Geography Department
Loughborough University
Loughborough LE11 3TU

E-mail: j.m.p.cloke at lboro.ac.uk
Tel: 00 44 07984 813681


On Fri, 1 May 2009 09:54:34 -0400
 brad bauerly <bbauerly at gmail.com> wrote:
> Looking over the recent data it strikes me that the 
>outcome of the crisis
> may be beneficial for US capitalists.  Nothing really 
>shocking there to us,
> however it is interesting to see how this was already 
>occurring in 2008 and
> to think about how we could use this politically.  This 
>shows clearly how
> their crisis will be paid for by working people, both in 
>the US and across
> the rest of the world.
> 
> Here are some examples: exports continued to grow 
>through 2008 by 6.2%
> (percent change over last year in constant dollars) 
>while imports shrank by
> 3.5%.  Also, nonfarm output per hour doubled its 
>increase over percent
> change from last year to increase by 2.8%, while nonfarm 
>compensation
> decreased its percent change over the last year.
> 
> In short, people are working harder for less.  All of 
>the doom and gloom
> media about the crisis is placing real pressure on 
>people to work harder in
> an increasingly competitive labor market.  The threat of 
>loosing your home,
> your retirement fund and your source of cheap credit has 
>worked to increase
> the output per worker. The problem is that this has also 
>lowered demand and
> increased the corporate bankruptcies.  Thus, we will 
>once again see a
> consolidation of capitalist power and the renewal of US 
>dynamism that is the
> root of the US empire.  Interesting to see how this 
>crisis will turn out to
> be functional to capitalism and how this process started 
>so early.  Also,
> the complete lack of discussion of how this is taking 
>place and the
> inability of the left to put this out for public 
>consumption/outrage and
> build a movement to take advantage of the situation.
> 
> Brad
> 
> -- 
> Brad A. Bauerly
> PhD Candidate
> Political Science
> York University
> Toronto, Canada
> 647-345-2072
> bauerly at yorku.ca
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