Dear Editor,
According to a BBC Report, three of the wealthiest families in Scotland own more wealth that the combined wealth of the lowest thirty percent of the population.
This is consistent with wealth and income distribution in several other capitalist countries including that of the United States where less than one percent of the population have at their disposal more than the combined wealth of the other ninety-nine percent of the population!
Something is fundamentally wrong with the structure of the global economy when such a tiny handful of the population has command over the aggregate wealth created by human labour. As Karl Marx pointed out over a century ago, profits are a derivative of human labour through exploitation and the creation of surplus value. Yet, workers are paid a small fraction of the wealth created resulting in a state of impoverishment of the working class. Such unequal and unfair distribution of wealth is the root cause of such widespread conflicts and social turbulence in several countries of the capitalist world including some countries in western Europe.
Bourgeois ideologists tend to downplay the significance of classes and the class struggle in contemporary society by positing that the emergence of corporate ownership and the stock market has created a situation where the dichotomy between workers and owners has become somewhat diffused. While this may be true to a point, corporate managers are paying themselves astronomical sums at the expense of workers and shareholders.
As we observe International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, it is opportune that we reflect on the root cause of global poverty which is fundamentally structural in nature and to a large extent the result of a highly skewed distribution system in which the capitalist class continue to wallow in luxury at the expense of the toiling masses.
The income gap between the rich and the poor continues to widen despite advances in science and technology which has resulted in much higher levels of production and productivity.
Yet, nearly one billion people mainly from the developing world are forced to live below the poverty threshold which is defined by the World Bank as the equivalent of roughly two United States dollar a day.
I think it is time for the World Bank to get real and come up with a more realistic assessment of what is required to survive since there is no way in which any human being in any part of the world can exist minimally at such a disgracefully low sum.
Indeed, there appeared to be some measure of disrespect for the poor on the part of the Bank to suggest that anyone can realistically live on such a paltry sum.
As the late Dr. Cheddi Jagan pointed out in his book “A New Global Human Order” there is more than enough resources in the world to feed every man, woman and child but the resources of the world are so highly skewed in favour of the rich that there is hardly enough to meet the basic needs of the poor and the downtrodden. Far too many lives are lost because of hunger, malnutrition and preventable diseases, the vast majority from the developing world.
This is why there is need to aggressively pursue the call for a new global human order which incidentally has been adopted by the United Nations General Assembly.
The idea of a new global human order was conceptualized and initiated by the late Dr. Jagan who was known for his strong advocacy for debt relief and for pro-poor programmes and policies.
This is why it is so important to ensure that the wealth and income gap between those at the bottom and at the top is kept to a minimum. In this regard, policy makers and those in positions of authority need to be sensitive and exercise restraint in the manner in which the remuneration package is configured. Every worker feels justified in a bigger basket of goods and services especially since there is no separate market for the rich and the poor or for the low and the high income earners.
The fact is that regardless of what kind of job someone does, human needs are basically the same. There can be no justification for huge income gaps especially in the context of low per capita income and an underperforming economy as in the case of Guyana. Whatever salary anomaly may have existed at the executive or other levels in the past cannot be corrected at the stroke of a pen but in a calibrated and incremental manner having regard to the state of the economy and the general price and income levels.
There is virtue in an egalitarian society in which people regardless of the kind of work they do are provided with enough to meet the basic necessities of life.
Capitalism, with its emphasis on profits for the few cannot provide the answers to the problems of humanity. There is need for a new global order in which people are placed ahead of profits and where all men are equal and not where” some men are more equal than some.”
Yours faithfully,
Hydar Ally
