The budget deal passed the House today. The
proposal includes not extending the unemployment benefits for the long term
unemployed. This is an outrage. Over 220,000 California workers will lose the benefits that provide food and shelter for their families. Corporate agriculture gets bailed out,
the banks get bailed out, but the unemployed get pushed aside. The crisis was
caused by finance capital. The unemployed and their families should not have to pay
for their crisis.
In economics, austerity is the policy of reducing government spending
by cutting social services such as health care, education, food assistance, and
other welfare assistance.
Governments reduce spending by cutting money for
these and similar services. At the
federal level, Republicans seek austerity by cutting social Security and
Medicare. In the case of state governments in the U.S., public tax money is
used for police, fire fighters, park services, nurses, doctors, social workers
and health assistants. Austerity
programs cut these services.
Austerity
policies are counter-productive because reduced government spending increases
unemployment and thus cost more money for unemployment insurance, food
assistance, and other safety net programs. These cut backs made the
recession worse and last
longer.
Denying
basic survival assistance through unemployment insurance is wrong and it hurts
the economy for us all. These
cuts, along with the “sequester” and its aftermath will cost some 240,000 jobs.
Benefits have already been cut.
While
unemployment remains high and economic growth slow, the government should not
impose austerity measures that reduce essential programs that benefit the
middle and working classes and that shred the safety net for the most
vulnerable. Rather, government policy should prioritize investments in job
creation, public education and healthcare reform, while raising essential
revenues by taxing the large corporations and wealthiest citizens who can
afford to pay.
In the current
economic crisis, the governments of Ireland, Greece, Italy , Spain and Portugal
have implemented austerity programs and cut their budgets. This policy created more unemployment and made the recessions in these
countries worse.
Why do we do this?
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