From 2000 to 2005, US American productivity increased 18.6%. Meanwhile, average family income diminished by 6.5%. Corporate profit share is at its highest level in the United States since the 1960's. And what of the employees producing these profits for their corporate masters? Salaries and wages now represent the lowest percentage of GDP since the government began tracking such statistics in the 1940's.
And for a real eye-opening statistic, consider that in 2005 the average CEO received compensation that equaled 821 times that of a minimum wage earner and 262 times that of an average employee. At that income level, the CEO accrued enough pay by noon of their first day to eclipse the minimum wage earner's annual salary. By the end of that day, the CEO racked up enough pay to surpass the yearly salary of their average employee.
Unions, the driving force behind the movement for workers' rights, continue to experience plummeting membership. From its soaring heights in 1960 (when 33% of the work force was unionized) to its pathetic low (in 2005 about 10% of the working class belonged to unions), organized labor faces the real possibility of forced extinction in the United States. Feeble enforcement of labor protection laws by the federal government coupled with abusive and illegal anti-union tactics by corporate behemoths like Wal-Mart have virtually crushed the organizational power of the US American work force.
It is not looking too robust for the rest of the working class either.
Yet We the People are not powerless. Consider some ideas for individuals or groups to pursue, implement or demand:
1. How about increasing the minimum wage to a level that would at least put a full time worker receiving minimum wage above poverty level and tying automatic increases to the consumer price index?
2. On 10/5/06, The World Can't Wait campaign is calling on workers, consumers, and students to engage in a mass strike and boycott. Participate and cripple the corporate machine!
3. Join and form unions when possible.
4. Engage in massive long-term boycotts to support striking unions and to oppose corporations that are hostile to workers' rights.
5. Push the development of an effective and efficient national health care plan back to the forefront of the domestic agenda. The United States has the most expensive healthcare system in the world but ranks 37th in terms of quality. "Capitalized medicine" is an abysmal failure to humanity. If water distribution warrants public management, so does a basic human need like health care.
6. Organize and/or participate in a mass drive to add a Constitutional amendment eliminating corporate personhood, a Constitutional amendment barring corporations from engaging in the political process, and legislation imposing heavy taxes on corporate profits (which would decrease proportionally with the distribution of corporate profits amongst ALL of a corporation's employees).
7. Buy goods and services from small entrepreneurs in lieu of corporate chains when it is feasible.
8. Drop out of the culture of mindless consumption to the extent it is possible. Don't buy much beyond what you and your family truly need.
9. Resist the lure of using easy credit to live beyond one's means.
10. Reject the lies of the corporate media. Turn off the television and educate yourself by reading a book or scouring the Internet for information.
11. Push for state and local laws to enhance the rights of working people and diminish the rights of corporations.
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