[OPE-L] Why corporations are winning and workers are losing

From: glevy@PRATT.EDU
Date: Mon Nov 21 2005 - 12:40:18 EST


The following was sent to the working-class-studies list by Sherry Linton.
The site by Palley is worth checking out./ In solidarity, Jerry
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Economist Thomas Palley has started a new blog offering political
analysis of economic policy, available at www.thomaspalley.com.  His
latest posting, "The Politics of Globalization:  Why Corporations Are
Willing and Workers Are Losing," examines the challenges we face in
changing the political landscape to better represent the interests of
workers, rather than continuing the pattern of government and
international organizations always putting the needs of corporations
first.  Among other things, he notes the problem of workers also being
consumers -- as wages decrease, so do workers' need for low prices.
Palley notes the difficulty of battling skewed representations of
economic processes and the tendency of workers to be divided along
racial and national lines.  He concludes:

"Solidarity has always been key to political and economic advance by
working families, and it is key to mastering the politics of
globalization. Developing a coherent story about the economics of
globalization around which working families can coalesce is a key
ingredient for solidarity. So too is understanding how globalization
divides labor. Such understandings can help counter deep cultural
proclivities to individualism, as well as other historic divides such as
racism."

To read the whole essay, visit www.thomaspalley.com.

Sherry Linkon


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