As Pentagon budget takes all
Unions mobilize against cuts
By G. Dunkel
New York
Hard times are here. Every state in the union
is facing budget shortfalls, major job losses and sharp
cutbacks in services like education, health care and
sanitation.
In New York, unions of public employees are looking for
strategies to hold onto their members' jobs. Major
demonstrations are scheduled in New York and Albany, the state
capital.
This crisis has hit even before the Bush tax cuts for the
wealthy and the vast increases in military spending take huge
bites out of the income and living standards of working and
poor people in this country.
The increases in military spending are indeed major.
Congress passed an $80-billion supplemental appropriation to
pay for what the war cost to the end of March. Estimates of the
cost of occupying Iraq with U.S. forces range from $3 to $5
billion a month. That bill won't come due for a while, and no
one can know how long the occupation will last, or how hot and
expensive it will wind up being. But there are still 20,000
troops in Kosovo after six years, and 37,000 U.S. troops in
Korea after 50 years.
The Bush administration is obviously expecting to use Iraq's
oil wealth to pay for the war, the occupation and whatever
rebuilding it does of Iraq's infrastructure. The government has
published no firm figure on what it will cost to repair enough
of the damage to get Iraq shipping oil again.
Economist William Nordhauss, in a report published by the
American Acad emy of Arts and Sciences in Dec ember 2002,
estimated $30 billion as "the minimal rebuilding needs in
postwar Iraq (including the oil sector)." Other estimates range
much higher.
A good chunk of this $30 billion will have to come from the
U.S. Treasury before Iraq's oil starts to flow. Even after it
does, Iraq's debts--from the reparations it "owes" to Kuwait to
loans from foreign companies amounting to $100 billion--and its
domestic needs will keep the U.S. government from recouping all
its outlays. U.S. oil companies and military contractors,
however, will be making billions.
Yet even with all these additional expenses on top of its
$400-billion military budget, which equals the combined total
military budgets of the rest of the world, the Bush
administration is determined to give the richest millionaires
and billionaires of this country a $550-billion tax break.
This profligate military spending plus tax breaks for the
richest of the rich means more misery and harder times for the
working and poor people of this country.
Response of New York union movement
President George W. Bush told the Na tion al Governors
Association in February not to expect any significant help from
the federal government, even though it was imposing major new
burdens on the states in education and in domestic security.
"It's because we went through a recession and we're at war," he
said, neglecting to add that the war was of his own making.
The city of New York suffered major human and financial
losses on 9/11. It has lost 250,000 jobs since then, but not
all of them due to that assault. Since its economy depends on
Wall Street and the financial industry, it was already in
decline. The city is now facing a $4-billion budget shortfall
that by law it cannot carry into next year.
It's not getting much help from the state. The state of New
York is facing its own budget deficit of $11.5 billion and has
shifted the cost of some federally mandated programs onto the
city.
Millionaire New York Gov. George Pa ta ki plans on covering
the state's shortfall by reducing funds that go to local school
boards, higher education and medical care. He's cutting about
$4 billion, raising fees by $1.4 billion and borrowing $4.2
billion. Part of the fee raise would come from increasing
tuition in state-funded colleges by $1,200 a year, which would
deprive many students of their chances for higher education and
a better life.
Pataki is opposed to raising taxes and is opposed to letting
the billionaire mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg,
impose a commuter tax on the 3 million or so people who live
outside the city but work in it. Bloomberg has already raised
real estate taxes, the only tax over which the city has
control, by 18.5 percent.
Bloomberg's solution is to hit the municipal unions for big
givebacks, at least $600 million worth this year. He has
already sent out layoff notices to 5,000 city workers and put
10,000 more on notice. If the unions cave in, he will go to the
state legislature with a tough-guy victory in hand and push the
commuter tax.
But the unions have their own solution: tax the rich by
adding a surcharge on income over $100,000 and an additional
one on income over $200,000.
AFSCME DC 37, which represents about 125,000 city workers
making from $15,000 to $80,000 a year, is willing to bargain,
but feels it doesn't have to take Bloomberg's deal. During the
boom time of the 1990s, it accepted 3-1/2 years of zeroes--that
is, no wage increases.
To make its point, DC 37 has called for a major rally at
City Hall Park on Tuesday, April 29, at 5:30 p.m. It is
demanding "Stop layoffs! Stop contracting out our jobs!" and is
urging the people of New York to "Stand up with DC 37 for your
community and to stop the layoffs that hurt us all."
It is expecting 25,000 to 35,000 of its members and members
of other municipal unions to attend this rally.
On the state level, New York State United Teachers, a joint
council representing all the AFT and NEA locals in the state,
has called for a major rally in Albany on May 3 to support full
state funding for education, from pre-kindergarten to
postgraduate. Hundreds of buses have already been reserved and
three trains--two from New York City and one from Buffalo.
If there are not enough buses in the state for the teachers,
staff and their supporters, NYSUT says it will rent some in
Canada.
While the more conservative leadership of NYSUT turned down
an anti-war resolution at its April convention, the
Professional Staff Congress, a major affiliate representing
faculty and staff at the City University of New York, intends
on bringing placards saying "Money for education, not war." It
is also planning to send at least one bus from each of the 19
CUNY campuses.
The May 3 NYSUT march is intended to be the largest in
Albany's history and will make the point that education is a
right, not a privilege, as strongly as possible.
Reprinted from the May 1, 2003, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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