On the occasion of May 1st, union activists Bill Fletcher Jr. and Sam Ginden discuss the weakening of the labor movement and what needs to happen next.
Sadly the left hates to choose or decide priorities and tends to want to have everything at once. Now there is a chance to say poverty and inequality are giant evils that must be combatted.
Piketty provides a mainstream neoclassical explanation of worsening inequality. That creates a gattopardo opportunity whereby inequality is folded back into mainstream economic theory which remains unchanged.
The European Union was originally conceived as a major process of reconciliation between France and Germany, and became a fertile ground for unification of the continent. The post-crisis failed policies interrupted the integration path. Next election for the European parliement could hold striking surprises.
The recession is the product of the politics of austerity, aggravated, in each country, by the fact that others were pursuing the same policies. What happened in Italy, or Spain, is a replica of what happened in Portugal, and especially in Greece.
