In this age of "La Pensée Unique" and corporate control of the mass media it's rare to find articles that get through the editing control net. But this from the International Herald Tribune no less, is one of those rare ones.
Capitalism Under Fire
"The protests' ostensible purpose is to force withdrawal of a minor change in this French government's employment policy, but they have taken on a radically different significance."
"We need go no further with what I realize is a very complex matter, other than to note the classical economist David Ricardo's "iron law of wages," which says that in conditions of wage competition and unlimited labor supply, wages will fall to just above subsistence."
"There never before has been unlimited labor. There is now, thanks to globalization - and the process has only begun."
"It seems to me that this European unrest signals a serious gap in political and corporate understanding of the human consequences of a capitalist model that considers labor a commodity and extends price competition for that commodity to the entire world."
"In the longer term, there may be more serious political implications in this than even France's politicized students suspect. What seems the reactionary or even Luddite position might prove prophetic. "
read the full article at: http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/03/29/news/edpfaff.php
Sent to libcom.org by our correspondent in Marseille.
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