Meltdown After the Meltdown

[marmar]

from Truthdig:



Meltdown After the Meltdown

Posted on Oct 7, 2009
By Marie Cocco


It would be nice to believe that things will be different next time.

“What’s the point in bailing them out if there aren’t any jobs?’’ asks one of the organizers of the Christmastime protest at Republic Windows and Doors, the Chicago company whose laid-off workers staged a peaceful, six-day sit-in at the factory last December to win back pay to which they were entitled. Scenes from the occupation are featured in Michael Moore’s new film, “Capitalism: A Love Story.”

The Republic layoffs occurred long before unemployment rose to a 26-year high of 9.8 percent, a figure that masks the depth of the jobs crisis because it doesn’t count those who’ve stopped looking for work or had worked part time, or others who don’t show up in the official tally because of the antiquated system under which we count the unemployed. The Moore film was prepared for distribution before Goldman Sachs and other Wall Street firms that received taxpayer bailouts announced that they’re doing just fine now, thank you.

The sit-in was the sort of uprising Moore has long advocated. It was a bold act of rebellion against a stacked economic system that has destroyed much of what Moore has ever believed in, from the assembly-line job his father held at a spark plug factory, to the middle-class perks of Catholic schools and family vacations, to General Motors itself—once the lifeblood of his hometown of Flint, Mich.

Now there are companies like Condo Vultures.

Moore chronicles the endeavors of this Florida enterprise as it gobbles up foreclosed apartments for a fraction of the price their former owners paid. The difference between the real estate flippers and the vultures of the animal world, an earnest company representative tells Moore, is that the Condo Vultures don’t throw up on themselves. .............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20091007_meltdown_after_the_meltdown/