Union Perspectives

If we want to stop wars and get more jobs, we have to take the profit out of wars. We do this by nationalizing the arms production. By doing this, the government, our government, would control the so-called “military industrial complex,” as Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower called it. The U.S. Government’s military budget for 2019 is $686 billion, that is larger than the next top five countries: China at $168.2 billion, Saudi Arabia at $82.9 billion, Russia at $63.1 billion, India at $57.9 billion and the United Kingdom at $56.1 billion. The U.S. gives Israel military aid and sells armaments to Saudi Arabia. The 2020 U.S. military budget is expected to be $989 billion. Now imagine how much of this is spent on contractors, like Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, General Dynamics, and the others, and then add on the tax break trump has already given these corporations. How much of this money is actually going to protect us since the threats we face now aren’t...

Why it is so hard for the toilers to understand that capitalist system and that it is rigged against them? The system is rigged in favor of the 1 percent. Even small business owners don’t understand this. This is not to say that the toilers cannot win the war of wage and living standards inequality. In order to do this, the toilers must understand the basic rules of the capitalist system. The governor of California, Jerry Brown, explained this is a speech the other day to some labor groups. He said if the consumers are up to their eyeballs in debt, aren’t making a decent wage, how the heck are they going to buy anything? If they don’t buy anything, the economy doesn’t go forward and doesn’t work. This was well said, but he could have also said that the capitalist system is driven 67.5 percent by spending, which proves that when insufficient wages are not high enough for the toilers to have enough money left over after paying for their basic needs (rent, food, debts) to purchase some d...

If capitalism, as we know it today, is to survive the oligarchies will have to stop the war against the wage slaves. Without wage slaves there will be no capitalist system. The workers make the products, they buy the products, and use the products, which make the oligarchies rich. There are two dangers to capitalism; one is oversupply, the other is shortage of buyers, which can be remedied by higher wages for the workers or new customers from low-wage countries—and—this brings us back to wages and disposal income spent on products and other basic needs. The old International Workers of the World union workers were way ahead of the times when they sought to enlist workers from around the world as one, with no country borders, which meant that they would not fight in wars for they believed that all wage slaves were brothers and sisters. The oligarchies want to keep a way to split the work force, which makes it easier to control the wage slaves, but it is changing for now all workers ca...