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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsFighting the (U.S.-led) Shock Doctrine in El Salvador
from Dollars & Sense:
P3 Push in El Salvador
A cross-border fight erupts against a public-private partnership law.
BY HILARY GOODFRIEND | March/April 2013
Unions in El Salvador are on high alert, fighting a privatization scheme that has the full weight of the U.S. government behind it. Led by the Salvadoran Union Front, a militant coalition of public- and private-sector unions, workers are mobilizing against a proposed Public-Private Partnership (P3) Law, drafted by Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes office with U.S. Treasury Department assistance. The law is an initiative of the bilateral development agreement called the Partnership for Growth, which the U.S. Embassy in El Salvador calls a signature effort of President Obamas development policy. With everything from ports, airports, and roads to municipal services and higher education on the auction block, the P3 law threatens public-sector workers with layoffs, wage cuts, and union busting. In the face of aggressive U.S. pressure for the laws passage, Salvadoran workers are counting on international solidarity to protect their jobs and defend state services.
For us, says José Alberto Cartagena Tobias of the SITEAIES airport workers union, a public-private partnership is nothing more than privatization. Workers like him know firsthand the cost of privatization. After state banks, telecommunications, electricity, and pensions were sold off under the right-wing Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) administrations of the 1990s, labor conditions plummeted. Five thousand workers were laid off at the telecommunications company, and those remaining saw salary reductions, the loss of seniority, and their union dissolved. Nearly 1,000 workers were laid off at the Acajutla port following privatizations in 2001; dock workers daily wages dropped by 90% and their union was dismantled. At the airport, security, cargo, and cleaning services were privatized that year; these workers now earn $240/month, while the unionized airport workers earn a minimum of $552/month.
Soaring utility rates and rising unemployment soon turned public opinion against privatization. In 2003, 150,000 Salvadorans took to the streets to shut down ARENA President Francisco Flores attempt to privatize the health-care system; little has been privatized since. ...................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2013/0313goodfriend.html
xchrom
(108,903 posts)Fuddnik
(8,846 posts)It's your future folks.
http://www.ncppp.org/obama-delivers-speech-in-miami-encouraging-public-private-partnerships/
Obama Delivers Speech in Miami Encouraging Public-Private Partnerships
By ncpppadmin
April 16, 2013
Comments Off
On April 1, President Obama gave a speech in Miami, Florida at Port Miami. This stage was a perfect platform to deliver his ideas about growing partnerships in America, allowing the public and private sectors to share risks and returns. He is calling this endeavor Partnership to Rebuild America and intends to rebuild infrastructure across the entire United States. Infrastructure means transportation, energy, buildings, and all other capital assets that are in desperate need of updating and repair.
Below is an excerpt from his speech:
So today, Im expanding on a proposal I made in the State of the Union. Im calling it a Partnership to Rebuild America. Its a partnership with the private sector that creates jobs upgrading what our businesses need most - modern ports to move our goods; modern pipelines to withstand a storm; modern schools worthy of our children.
And my plan does three things. First, well set up an independent fund that will attract private investment to build projects like this one, and make sure companies share in the risk and returns. Instead of picking projects based on pork-barrel politics, well pick them based on how much good theyll actually do for the economy, how much the projects make sense. And well better finance projects that involve more than one mode of transportation, or more than one town or state, with less red tape to gum up the works. So all of this will make the process more efficient. It will help us break ground on some of the projects that our cities and states need most, and they can do it faster and better.
Second, were going to fund more projects, at less cost, by establishing a new infrastructure initiative called America Fast Forward bonds. Its going to give mayors and governors more flexibility and power to attract private investment for public projects.
Number three, well strengthen a loan program that, in recent years, has helped governors and mayors leverage four times the money Washington put into it, and that means were helping construction workers get on the job quicker, repaying taxpayers their hard-earned money faster. Thats the kind of approach we used to help PortMiami Tunnel get off the ground - or I guess underground.
(snip)
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)Obama has proven himself to be a neo-liberal champion economically.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)At least people are waking up a little to the bullshit.