Skip to main content

Switzerland & Sweden's Influence on the USA

What does the USA, Sweden and Switzerland have in common? It is the fight about the inequality between labor and the oligarchies. Today in Switzerland, one of the fighters against inequality is Marilule Wili. Years ago, many of fighters of inequality came from Sweden. In 1905, the USA had a labor hero by the name of Joe Hill, but he was born Joel Emmanuel Hägglund and also known as Joseph Hillstrom in a Gävle, a Swedish village. He came to America and first reached prominence on the West Coast while he worked to organize the International Workers of the World (IWW) Wobblies; and Hill was also a song writer and was known as the “Troubadour of Discontent." Hill was framed for murdering a grocer and his son and shot to death in Salt Lake City, Utah. After his execution thousands of Wobblies made him their martyr and his work continued on. His last famous words just before he died were, “Don’t waste any time mourning. Organize,” and it looks like the spirit is still here and in Sweden. So the wage slaves should all be watching Swiss voters. Wili belongs to the Generation Basic Income, an activist group working to amend their Constitution that guarantees every citizen $33,000 a year. The group has gotten the necessary 100,000 signatures to place the initiative on the ballot in two or three years for the country’s voters. Maybe the Swiss’ idea will catch on in the only two European countries, Italy and Greece, that don’t have a minimum wage to keep people out of poverty.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Time for an Offense

There are three phases of a general strike and unions must plan for one. Those three phases are: 1. general strike in an industry 2. general strike in a community 3. general national strike We need to move away from being on the defensive and move toward a good offensive. The American Federal of Labor (AFL) could not have held a general strike if it wanted to because they had thousands of different contracts that expired at different times of the year. This was done deliberately so that there is no consolidation of power for a general strike. Also, nowadays, there is no law agency that will support labor, except the National Labor Relations Board (NLBR), which has been under attack and in decline for years. This leaves the burden of change up to unions, and unless unions work together, little will change. We essentially have a combination of job trusts, which are not as strong as contracts, and the courts can break easily because the NLBR will be further weakened and essentially elim...
Post a Comment
Read more

If Gompers Could Do It, We Can Do It

Labor must vote for the person who will support and vote for labor’s best interests. And in turn, labor members have to support those who are running for office who support labor unions and vote down ballots. Voting down ballot gives the person at the top more power to do what’s best for us. This includes elections for city, county and state positions, as well. If you think a four day work week is wishful thinking, remember workers had to fight for an eight-hour work day and a five-day work week. We, labor members and supporters, need to find people who can fight and win. We need to clean the Congress and Senate of the old Democratic guard who have voted repeatedly to hold the working class back while enriching themselves. This would rebuild solidarity in a magnitude greater than anything either party has seen or offered in the last fifty years. If we can bring about the change in the ruling class we can improve all of our lives. This would be the start of the end of the tyranny of the...
Post a Comment
Read more

Shock Troops

Gerrymandering is the only legal form of voter theft. Workers, our long range plans should involve 1. crushing Citizens United; and 2. getting rid of the Electoral College. We have been trying to get rid of the electoral college since 1876, and we are still waiting for the revolt. Our unions need to start training some members to be our shock troops and if all unions would do this and work with our local Labor Councils, it would be a good start. Our members need to know our labor laws, local laws, and learn how to protest in the streets if necessary. The antiunion people like Trump, Musk and his billionaire friends work together to crush the working people and convince workers they’re doing them a favor and then use them as shock troops against unions and their workers. All union and nonunion working people must come together and work together to protect what we have now. Labor Councils have retired union members and they could work together to prepare to bring the movement forward....
Post a Comment
Read more