“Them
that’s got shall get. Them that’s not shall lose,” as the Billie
Holiday song goes. “Yes, the strong gets more while the
weak ones fade. Empty pockets don't ever make the grade.”
It
is a tale of two cities in early twenty-first century
America. Wall Street is enjoying hefty bonuses
and corporate America
is awash in cash. Yet, all you can hear, whether inside
the Beltway or around state houses is talk of austerity,
the new buzzword that’s all the rage. Conservative politicians
in Congress and in statehouses around the country rode
a wave of Tea Party pseudo populism, funded by Republican
philanthropy, corporate lobbyists and the U.S. Chamber
of Commerce.
Austerity
is certainly not for the wealthy - those who paid for
the election and have already been awarded their extended
and possibly permanent tax breaks under the Obama-GOP
“compromise” - but rather for the folks
of meager means. And so, those who are already struggling
are told to tighten their belts even further. After all,
they’re told, it’s good for you, builds the character
and allows you to pull yourself up by your bootstraps.
And
so, the public unions replace the welfare queens as the
scapegoats of choice, the latest casualties in a
long, protracted class warfare. And as the rich
get more money, the poor, working poor, and what’s left
of a paltry middle class are given pep talks, tough love
and sermons. The GOP and their Tea party compatriots have
stepped up their austerity game of late, but you should
know that this game has been played since the 1970s, when
a conservative political backlash sought to widen the
gaps along economic and racial lines that people such
as Martin Luther King had sought to close. And yet, as
we just celebrated the man’s birthday, a man who was gunned
down while fighting for sanitation workers, the nation
fails to follow his philosophy of economic justice and
caring for the needs of the poor.
The
nonpartisan nonprofit group United For
a Fair Economy just released a report
called “State of the Dream 2011.” The report makes the
point that communities of color already had it harder
than everyone else. And although the GOP austerity programs
will negatively impact all working people, they will increase
economic inequality and the racial divide. The social
safety net programs that are under attack, such as Social
Security, are of great importance to blacks and Latinos.
For
example, 42 percent of African-Americans and 37 percent
of Latinos are unable to meet their minimal household
expenses even three months after they become unemployed.
This underscores the devastating effect that cuts in public
assistance programs will have on people of color.
Meanwhile,
the benefits to the rich are almost exclusively benefits
to whites. Blacks and Latinos have no capital gains -
they only earn 13 cents and 8 cents, respectively, for
each dollar of dividends that whites earn. And with whites
three times more likely than African-Americans to earn
$250,000 - and nearly five times more likely than Latinos
- so much for benefiting from the tax cuts for the big
money people.
“The
deficits that these tax cuts help create are being used
to justify a host of austerity measures that will harm
Americans of all races, but will hit Blacks and Latinos
the hardest,” says Brian Miller, Executive Director of
United For a Fair Economy and co-author of the report.
“With 42 percent of Blacks and 37 percent of Latinos lacking
the funds to meet minimal household expenses for even
three months should they become unemployed, cutting public
assistance programs will have devastating impacts on Black
and Latino workers.”
Miller
points out that state and federal workers such as teachers,
police officers and food inspectors are on the front line
of the budget cuts. Severe cuts to the public sector will
hinder America’s ability to meet
the needs of all citizens. But African-Americans will
bear the brunt of the layoffs, since they have been disproportionately
employed in the public sector. In fact, blacks are 30
percent more likely to work in the public sector,
and 70 percent more likely to work for the federal government.
So, austerity will only serve to erode any gains that
racial minorities have made on the economic front. And
given that the purveyors of these austerity measures are
job killers - scoffing at any suggestion that the government
should play a role in job creation - their policies will
bring disproportional suffering to disproportionally unemployed
workers of color.
This
report contains many useful though sobering statistics.
The devil’s in the details. Here is a sample:
This
new wave of austerity is a con game, and it’s racist too.
Now is the time to reverse the trend and restore equity,
justice and sanity to America’s
economic system.
BlackCommentator.com Executive Editor, David
A. Love, JD is a journalist and human rights advocate
based in Philadelphia, is a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Pennsylvania Law School. and a contributor to The Huffington
Post, theGrio, The Progressive
Media Project, McClatchy-Tribune News Service, In These Times and Philadelphia Independent
Media Center. He also blogs at davidalove.com, NewsOne, Daily Kos, and Open Salon. Click here to contact Mr. Love.