From The Ground Up There's Little Difference Between Bush and Obama: Thoughts on a Conversation With a Working Class Neighbor
Professor Mark Naison
Fordham University
This morning at 6 AM, I ran into my former neighbor John today getting coffee at the local general store. John a white fifty something Navy veteran who works in a local lumber yard, used to live across the Street from me in the Springs section of East Hampton, but since his divorce, he lives in a house about a half a mile away. We greeted each other warmly and began to have one of he conversations that I used to look forward to when we were neighbors
John, who drives a pickup truck, wears a cowboy hat, and is a volunteer fire fighter and a local union rep, used to love to drop by to have a beer and talk about life and love and politics. I enjoyed hearing what the world and the nation looked like from his vantage point, and it was partly because of my discussions with him that I became convinced that Barack Obama could win the presidency in 2008.
But this time, in August 2010, his message was very different. John, who hated George Bush with a passion because he thought Bush was "handing the country over to the rich" was planning to vote Republican in November. His main reason for doing this, he said, is that "he didn't want to pay more taxes," but he wasn't too confident that his vote was going to make a difference. " It probably doesn't matter who is in office," he said, " I don't think that things are going to get better for a guy like me. But I'll tell you one thing. This guy we have in there isn't doing the job"
I felt my heart sink. This is not what I hoped to hear. I was hoping that John was going to vote Democrat, or sit out the election, rather than voting Republican. But clearly he was extremely disillusioned with President Obama and since he knew I had anObama sticker on my car, he was making sure to let me know.
If this had been a conversation taking place on the porch of my house instead of by a coffee machine in a general store, I might have responded with a long explanation of all the things Obama had tried to do for working class Americans - from saving the auto industry, to extending unemployment insurance, to pumping money into the economy through the stimulus bill- but I didn't have the time to do this and if I did I am not sure it would have made a difference
Because the bottom line is that John's life hasn't improved since Barack Obama came into office. He still has a job, but his pension is down,work is slow so he's not clocking overtime, and he can't sell his old house because no one is buying.
Now if John felt a deep personal identification with President Obama, he might be willing to give him more time. But for a working class guy who drives a pickup truck and whose major recreational pastimes are hunting and fishing, President Obama is a tough sell. Not just because he's black--,which is a factor but probably not a determinative one- (John has people of color in his extended family) but because he comes off as someone to whom life has been very kind. The beautiful wife, the kids who go to private school, the vacations in Martha's Vineyard and other upscale resorts, the time spent shooting hoops with NBA players, all those things make John feel that President Obama is not someone who really understands how people like John live or what makes them tick
The way John sees it, all politicians are crooks, and the rich get richer no matter who is in office, so he has to judge any individual politician by a combination of gut instinct and a hardheaded assessment of whether they have made his life better.
And on both of those accounts, John finds President Obama wanting
From past experience, I have learned to take what John says very seriously, not only because he is so honest, but because he is a leader in his own community,
As a lifelong Democrat, I am not very optimistic about what is going to happen in the November elections. Republicans are going to pick up huge numbers of seats because working class Americans will be holding Democrats accountable for the continued deterioration of the American economy and the failure of Democratic policies to improve the lives of ordinary people in ways they can appreciate and understand
Mark Naison
August 17,2010
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Saturday, August 7, 2010
A Slow Recovery at Best- Reflections on My Latest Conversation With “Sam The Developer”
Dr Mark Naison
Fordham University
In order to really understand where the economy is going, you can’t just rely on statistics. You have to talk to real people and see what their actual situation is. I have a excellent entrée to people in many segments of the workforce through my students and former students at Fordham, who work in education, business, and health care, and through the people I work with in the Bronx, some of whom are recent immigrants who work in entrée level jobs. .
But one of most valuable barometers of economic conditions I know is a friend and tennis partner I call “Sam The Developer” an innovative businessman who specializes in developing shopping centers in immigrant, working class neighborhoods throughout the New York Metropolitan area. Sam has made an excellent living finding niches for economic development in communities of color like East New York and the Northwest Bronx, but in the process he has provided hundreds if not thousands of jobs, in construction and in retail, to residents of those neighborhoods. Sam, along with small and medium size business people throughout the country like him, was a major source of private sector job growth before the Recession hit, and was virtually “shut down” during the first two years of the Crisis. No bank would lend to him, and as a result no new project could be launched
When I asked him whether things were getting better, his answer was instructive and frankly not that encouraging. After a two year drought, Sam said, development opportunities are starting to reappear in the New York economy, at least for people like him who work in outer borough immigrant neighborhoods, but under very changed conditions. First of all he said, the construction unions in New York have been broken. No one can build paying union wages, so developers are either hiring non union workers or paying union workers way below what was once the prevailing wage. Secondly, banks are lending again, but under such restrictive conditions as to make it impossible for small businessmen like him to work with them. They are either charging exorbitant interest rates for their loans or demanding that the recipient put up all his or her personal property – including their houses- as collateral, which Sam is unwilling to do
To take advantage of the few opportunities which are there, which Sam said, are largely in building “big box” stores in Brooklyn or the Bronx, Sam has had to get loans guaranteed by government intermediaries through Stimulus Funding. Those loans will keep him in business for several years, but when they expire, Sam will have to get his funding directly from the banks, and he is not sure that they will be willing to lend at rates that will allow him to do business.
Needless to say, the picture Sam paints suggests that the “Recovery” we are in is extremely fragile. First of all, job growth in a key economic sector- construction- in so far as it has occurred at all, has been accompanied by declining wages. This is hardly the kind of economic climate to nurture “consumer confidence” Secondly, banks are so fearful of losses from toxic assets still on their books that they are taking no risks in funding new business enterprises. As a result, it is extremely difficult to get funding for new projects or new enterprises, even when the developer has an excellent track record. Finally, many of the new projects that are being launched are made financial viable by federal stimulus funds, which are likely to run out in the next two years.
Anyway you look at it, this is a grim picture. Banks not lending, new projects remaining dormant, unemployment high, wages falling, Insofar as there is job growth, it comes from industries receiving an infusion of government stimulus funding. But what is going to happen when those funds run out. Will job growth come from consumer demand? The resurgence of small business? An infusion of bank lending?
Unfortunately, if we extrapolate from Sam’s experience, none of that is likely to happen unless the government puts a new injection of Stimulus funding into the economy
An obsession with the deficit may make sense, in the long run, but it in the short run it will doom us to years and years of economic stagnation and extreme hardship for Working America.
Mark Naison
August 7, 2010
Dr Mark Naison
Fordham University
In order to really understand where the economy is going, you can’t just rely on statistics. You have to talk to real people and see what their actual situation is. I have a excellent entrée to people in many segments of the workforce through my students and former students at Fordham, who work in education, business, and health care, and through the people I work with in the Bronx, some of whom are recent immigrants who work in entrée level jobs. .
But one of most valuable barometers of economic conditions I know is a friend and tennis partner I call “Sam The Developer” an innovative businessman who specializes in developing shopping centers in immigrant, working class neighborhoods throughout the New York Metropolitan area. Sam has made an excellent living finding niches for economic development in communities of color like East New York and the Northwest Bronx, but in the process he has provided hundreds if not thousands of jobs, in construction and in retail, to residents of those neighborhoods. Sam, along with small and medium size business people throughout the country like him, was a major source of private sector job growth before the Recession hit, and was virtually “shut down” during the first two years of the Crisis. No bank would lend to him, and as a result no new project could be launched
When I asked him whether things were getting better, his answer was instructive and frankly not that encouraging. After a two year drought, Sam said, development opportunities are starting to reappear in the New York economy, at least for people like him who work in outer borough immigrant neighborhoods, but under very changed conditions. First of all he said, the construction unions in New York have been broken. No one can build paying union wages, so developers are either hiring non union workers or paying union workers way below what was once the prevailing wage. Secondly, banks are lending again, but under such restrictive conditions as to make it impossible for small businessmen like him to work with them. They are either charging exorbitant interest rates for their loans or demanding that the recipient put up all his or her personal property – including their houses- as collateral, which Sam is unwilling to do
To take advantage of the few opportunities which are there, which Sam said, are largely in building “big box” stores in Brooklyn or the Bronx, Sam has had to get loans guaranteed by government intermediaries through Stimulus Funding. Those loans will keep him in business for several years, but when they expire, Sam will have to get his funding directly from the banks, and he is not sure that they will be willing to lend at rates that will allow him to do business.
Needless to say, the picture Sam paints suggests that the “Recovery” we are in is extremely fragile. First of all, job growth in a key economic sector- construction- in so far as it has occurred at all, has been accompanied by declining wages. This is hardly the kind of economic climate to nurture “consumer confidence” Secondly, banks are so fearful of losses from toxic assets still on their books that they are taking no risks in funding new business enterprises. As a result, it is extremely difficult to get funding for new projects or new enterprises, even when the developer has an excellent track record. Finally, many of the new projects that are being launched are made financial viable by federal stimulus funds, which are likely to run out in the next two years.
Anyway you look at it, this is a grim picture. Banks not lending, new projects remaining dormant, unemployment high, wages falling, Insofar as there is job growth, it comes from industries receiving an infusion of government stimulus funding. But what is going to happen when those funds run out. Will job growth come from consumer demand? The resurgence of small business? An infusion of bank lending?
Unfortunately, if we extrapolate from Sam’s experience, none of that is likely to happen unless the government puts a new injection of Stimulus funding into the economy
An obsession with the deficit may make sense, in the long run, but it in the short run it will doom us to years and years of economic stagnation and extreme hardship for Working America.
Mark Naison
August 7, 2010
Friday, July 23, 2010
The Unbearable Whiteness of Being
The Unbearable Whiteness of Being; What Makes Low and Middle Income Whites
Feel Vulnerable in a Changing America
Reading Ross Douthat's column in the NYTimes blaming ivy league admissions for the disaffection of working class and middle class whites made me laugh. As someone who grew up with working class whites, and spent large amounts of time with working class whites during my years of coaching baseball and basketball in Brooklyn from the early 80s’ to the late 90’s, I can assure you that among working class Brooklynites, ivy league admissions NEVER CAME UP when the subject of white racial grievances were raised. That subject was and still is one that upsets white Fordham students, but in the ballfields, bars and gymnasiums of Canarsie, Bergen Beach
Marine Park and Bay Ridge, the racial fears of working class whites were overwhelmingly focused on things they experienced on the job and fears for their children’s safety as neighborhoods and schools turned from predominantly white to predominantly Black and Latino.
When my working class white friends and fellow coaches attacked affirmative action- which they did vociferously and often- it was about preferential treatment that they saw blacks and Latinos getting on the job, especially in civil service. They were convinced that in any government agency- whether it was the police department, the fire department, the bureau of motor vehicles or the board of education- they were going to be passed over for promotion by blacks and Latinos with lower test scores. When I told them that these compensatory racial preferences, which were being steadily undermined by Supreme Court decisions, were far less damaging than the discrimination that Blacks and Latinos still faced in the skilled construction trades, they listened, but were not convinced. The fact that they might have to get a higher test score than their Black or Latino co workers to get promoted to sergeant of office administrator irritated them enormously, and easily led to self pitying arguments that “a white man couldn’t get a break in America anymore” When I challenged them with a litany of things blacks went through on a daily basis - from job and housing discrimination to harassment by police- they listened, but rarely relinquished their deep sense of outrage that color conscious hiring was now official policy in many government agencies and some private employers
But resentment of affirmative action was hardly the only issue white working class people I know raised when talking about race. Their biggest concern was that their kids were going to be beaten up and/or harassed by Blacks and Latinos peers as Brooklyn neighborhoods and schools turned from majority white to majority Black and Latino.
Since this is something that happened to me when I was in high school ( see White Boy: A Memoir and) and to many kids in my Park Slope neighborhood ( see Jonathan Lethem’s novel Fortress of Solitude), I could hardly tell them that they were making these things up, even though my own children had overwhelmingly positive experiences in integrated schools and neighborhoods. When talking about race, they were prone to view the world through the prism of “the glass half empty.” Whereas I saw neighborhood change as an opportunity to create a more open and inclusive society, they saw it as a threat to the value of their only asset- their home- and something that would put their children and families at risk. Were they wrong about this? There was certainly evidence, both objectively and subjectively, that their fears had substance
Given these two sets of concerns, about fairness on the job, and safety in the neighborhood and the neighborhood school, it is no wonder working class and middle class look at the changing demographics of American society with some trepidation. As whites are in the process of becoming a minority, not only in the nation as a whole, but in the communities they live in, they wonder if their economic and physical security, which were already somewhat fragile, is going to be compromised. And when they see a Black president, they fear that their concerns will easily sacrificed in favor of some unspecified “Black” or “liberal” agenda
Their fears and concerns, when it comes to President Obama often take forms that are ugly and irrational , especially given the President's history and actual policies, but the experiences which fuel their fears are ones that must be examined critically. The racial resentments of whites of modest means are a complex mix of inherited racist attitudes, folktakes and rumors spread by the media and word of mouth, and real life experiences which lead them to fear their emerging minority status. We ignore the latter at our peril. We need to have a continuing dialogue about race with our white working class and middle class neighbors which confronts their prejudices but allows their grievances to be heard
Only through that kind of dialogue- which should take place between ALL Americans- can create the basis of a fair and just society in which everyone feels recognized and respected irregardless of racial or ethnic background
Dr Mark Naison
Fordham University
Feel Vulnerable in a Changing America
Reading Ross Douthat's column in the NYTimes blaming ivy league admissions for the disaffection of working class and middle class whites made me laugh. As someone who grew up with working class whites, and spent large amounts of time with working class whites during my years of coaching baseball and basketball in Brooklyn from the early 80s’ to the late 90’s, I can assure you that among working class Brooklynites, ivy league admissions NEVER CAME UP when the subject of white racial grievances were raised. That subject was and still is one that upsets white Fordham students, but in the ballfields, bars and gymnasiums of Canarsie, Bergen Beach
Marine Park and Bay Ridge, the racial fears of working class whites were overwhelmingly focused on things they experienced on the job and fears for their children’s safety as neighborhoods and schools turned from predominantly white to predominantly Black and Latino.
When my working class white friends and fellow coaches attacked affirmative action- which they did vociferously and often- it was about preferential treatment that they saw blacks and Latinos getting on the job, especially in civil service. They were convinced that in any government agency- whether it was the police department, the fire department, the bureau of motor vehicles or the board of education- they were going to be passed over for promotion by blacks and Latinos with lower test scores. When I told them that these compensatory racial preferences, which were being steadily undermined by Supreme Court decisions, were far less damaging than the discrimination that Blacks and Latinos still faced in the skilled construction trades, they listened, but were not convinced. The fact that they might have to get a higher test score than their Black or Latino co workers to get promoted to sergeant of office administrator irritated them enormously, and easily led to self pitying arguments that “a white man couldn’t get a break in America anymore” When I challenged them with a litany of things blacks went through on a daily basis - from job and housing discrimination to harassment by police- they listened, but rarely relinquished their deep sense of outrage that color conscious hiring was now official policy in many government agencies and some private employers
But resentment of affirmative action was hardly the only issue white working class people I know raised when talking about race. Their biggest concern was that their kids were going to be beaten up and/or harassed by Blacks and Latinos peers as Brooklyn neighborhoods and schools turned from majority white to majority Black and Latino.
Since this is something that happened to me when I was in high school ( see White Boy: A Memoir and) and to many kids in my Park Slope neighborhood ( see Jonathan Lethem’s novel Fortress of Solitude), I could hardly tell them that they were making these things up, even though my own children had overwhelmingly positive experiences in integrated schools and neighborhoods. When talking about race, they were prone to view the world through the prism of “the glass half empty.” Whereas I saw neighborhood change as an opportunity to create a more open and inclusive society, they saw it as a threat to the value of their only asset- their home- and something that would put their children and families at risk. Were they wrong about this? There was certainly evidence, both objectively and subjectively, that their fears had substance
Given these two sets of concerns, about fairness on the job, and safety in the neighborhood and the neighborhood school, it is no wonder working class and middle class look at the changing demographics of American society with some trepidation. As whites are in the process of becoming a minority, not only in the nation as a whole, but in the communities they live in, they wonder if their economic and physical security, which were already somewhat fragile, is going to be compromised. And when they see a Black president, they fear that their concerns will easily sacrificed in favor of some unspecified “Black” or “liberal” agenda
Their fears and concerns, when it comes to President Obama often take forms that are ugly and irrational , especially given the President's history and actual policies, but the experiences which fuel their fears are ones that must be examined critically. The racial resentments of whites of modest means are a complex mix of inherited racist attitudes, folktakes and rumors spread by the media and word of mouth, and real life experiences which lead them to fear their emerging minority status. We ignore the latter at our peril. We need to have a continuing dialogue about race with our white working class and middle class neighbors which confronts their prejudices but allows their grievances to be heard
Only through that kind of dialogue- which should take place between ALL Americans- can create the basis of a fair and just society in which everyone feels recognized and respected irregardless of racial or ethnic background
Dr Mark Naison
Fordham University
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Why Hip Hop
Hip Hop's Not Dead Yet- Response to a Piece on the Degeneration of Mainstream Hip Hop .
First of all, not every mainstream hip hop artist is promoting misogyny, violence and "poor on poor" crime. Recently, Eminem and Rihanna released one of the most powerful critiques of domestic violence that I have ever heard in ANY musical genre "I Love the Way You Lie." This song will be remembered long after Lil Wayne's "Bedrock" is forgotten.
Secondly, there is a powerful feminist resistance movement that operates within hip hop. For the last three years, a festival called "Mommas Hip Hop Kitchen" has attracted nearly a thousand people, most of them young, most of them women of color, to a celebration of women's power featuring women dj's, rappers, poets, and b girls.s The women who organized and participated in this festival refuse to cede Hip Hop to arists like 50 Cent and Lil Wayne.
Finally there is a thriving hip hop underground, in the US as well as other countries that contains powerful commentary on povety, war, police violence and the persecution of immigrants From Brooklyn's Talib Kwali and Hi Tek , to Harlem's Immortal Technique to the Bronx's Rebel Diaz, La Bruja, Patty Dukes and Rephstar,there are artists who use the hip hop tradition to speak truth to power in the tradition of Public Enemy and KRS-1 These artists are not promoted on mainstream radio and television, but their music is easily accessible on the internet and they perform regularly for progressive organizations and community groups.
Let's not give up on hip hop yet. The corporate interests that have ruined mainstream hip hop are the same ones that have destroyed our economy, and we have to fight them musically the same way we have to fight them politically.
First of all, not every mainstream hip hop artist is promoting misogyny, violence and "poor on poor" crime. Recently, Eminem and Rihanna released one of the most powerful critiques of domestic violence that I have ever heard in ANY musical genre "I Love the Way You Lie." This song will be remembered long after Lil Wayne's "Bedrock" is forgotten.
Secondly, there is a powerful feminist resistance movement that operates within hip hop. For the last three years, a festival called "Mommas Hip Hop Kitchen" has attracted nearly a thousand people, most of them young, most of them women of color, to a celebration of women's power featuring women dj's, rappers, poets, and b girls.s The women who organized and participated in this festival refuse to cede Hip Hop to arists like 50 Cent and Lil Wayne.
Finally there is a thriving hip hop underground, in the US as well as other countries that contains powerful commentary on povety, war, police violence and the persecution of immigrants From Brooklyn's Talib Kwali and Hi Tek , to Harlem's Immortal Technique to the Bronx's Rebel Diaz, La Bruja, Patty Dukes and Rephstar,there are artists who use the hip hop tradition to speak truth to power in the tradition of Public Enemy and KRS-1 These artists are not promoted on mainstream radio and television, but their music is easily accessible on the internet and they perform regularly for progressive organizations and community groups.
Let's not give up on hip hop yet. The corporate interests that have ruined mainstream hip hop are the same ones that have destroyed our economy, and we have to fight them musically the same way we have to fight them politically.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
“Killing Us Softly”- Political Gridlock in Washington Dooms a Generation of Young Workers
Dr Mark Naison Fordham University
At a time when economists are talking about recovery, American political leaders have been making decisions which may doom a generation of young workers to economic hardship for the next ten years.
At a time when official unemployment is 9.7 percent, and private sector job growth has ground to a halt, the Congress of the United States, with only limited opposition from the Obama administration, has placed deficit reduction over job creation as a national priority.
The results are going to be devastating for a generation of young people graduating from college and professional school, along with those leaving high school, the military, or prisons without advanced degrees. At a time when banks are still writing off toxic assets and being extremely wary of extending credit , and cash rich corporations are putting their surplus into dividends rather than job creation, virtually the only economic growth has come from government expenditures and tax incentives, but now deficit conscious politicians are determined to cut those channels of economic stimulation off
Yesterdays news from the housing front dramatized that dynamic. Last month, sales of new homes dropped 33%, to the lowest level since 1981, thanks to the ending of a program of government tax credits to home buyers.
This collapse of home sales will not only have devastating effects on the construction industry, it will lead to a further freezing of credit, as second mortgages are one of the major ways Americans fuel consumption. Yet a budget conscious Congress refuses to extend the very tax credits that prompted a modest revival of the housing market.
And that’s only one part of a larger catastrophe. Last month, Congress refused to extend unemployment benefits to the long term unemployed, a decision that will put further strain on state budgets that are approaching bankruptcy in many portions of the country, and will give yet another hit to consumer spending
Worse yet, Congress is refusing to consider even a modest extension of the stimulus package which, in many economists eyes, prevented the economy from falling into a Depression and saved many states from economic collapse
As a result of this inaction, many states will be implementing draconian cuts in key government services including health care, transportation, and especially education. During the next two years, hundreds of thousands of teachers across the country will lose their jobs, making a mockery of educational reform efforts and destroying the dreams of idealistic young people across the country who hoped to make teaching their career.
Let us make no mistake about it. If current priorities don’t change, we are going to see massive job shredding in the public sector, along with virtually no job growth in the private sector, for the next five or ten years Not only is it going to be difficult to find jobs in law, finance and real estate, it is going to be equally difficult to find full time work in education and human services.
Young people are going to be leaving college and graduate school with huge debt and few economic prospects; and as they find work in fields which require less education, they are going to push out people who have weaker credentials The result is going to be shattered dreams, crowded households, families under stress, and an economy doomed to stagnation because people have little income and less confidence in the future.
Government alone has the power to break this impasse, through deficit spending, but our politicians have decided that deficits present a greater danger to the economy than high unemployment.
To me, that not only seems to deny the lessons of history, it represents an act of gratuitous cruelty to America’s youth.
Mark Naison June 24, 2010
Dr Mark Naison Fordham University
At a time when economists are talking about recovery, American political leaders have been making decisions which may doom a generation of young workers to economic hardship for the next ten years.
At a time when official unemployment is 9.7 percent, and private sector job growth has ground to a halt, the Congress of the United States, with only limited opposition from the Obama administration, has placed deficit reduction over job creation as a national priority.
The results are going to be devastating for a generation of young people graduating from college and professional school, along with those leaving high school, the military, or prisons without advanced degrees. At a time when banks are still writing off toxic assets and being extremely wary of extending credit , and cash rich corporations are putting their surplus into dividends rather than job creation, virtually the only economic growth has come from government expenditures and tax incentives, but now deficit conscious politicians are determined to cut those channels of economic stimulation off
Yesterdays news from the housing front dramatized that dynamic. Last month, sales of new homes dropped 33%, to the lowest level since 1981, thanks to the ending of a program of government tax credits to home buyers.
This collapse of home sales will not only have devastating effects on the construction industry, it will lead to a further freezing of credit, as second mortgages are one of the major ways Americans fuel consumption. Yet a budget conscious Congress refuses to extend the very tax credits that prompted a modest revival of the housing market.
And that’s only one part of a larger catastrophe. Last month, Congress refused to extend unemployment benefits to the long term unemployed, a decision that will put further strain on state budgets that are approaching bankruptcy in many portions of the country, and will give yet another hit to consumer spending
Worse yet, Congress is refusing to consider even a modest extension of the stimulus package which, in many economists eyes, prevented the economy from falling into a Depression and saved many states from economic collapse
As a result of this inaction, many states will be implementing draconian cuts in key government services including health care, transportation, and especially education. During the next two years, hundreds of thousands of teachers across the country will lose their jobs, making a mockery of educational reform efforts and destroying the dreams of idealistic young people across the country who hoped to make teaching their career.
Let us make no mistake about it. If current priorities don’t change, we are going to see massive job shredding in the public sector, along with virtually no job growth in the private sector, for the next five or ten years Not only is it going to be difficult to find jobs in law, finance and real estate, it is going to be equally difficult to find full time work in education and human services.
Young people are going to be leaving college and graduate school with huge debt and few economic prospects; and as they find work in fields which require less education, they are going to push out people who have weaker credentials The result is going to be shattered dreams, crowded households, families under stress, and an economy doomed to stagnation because people have little income and less confidence in the future.
Government alone has the power to break this impasse, through deficit spending, but our politicians have decided that deficits present a greater danger to the economy than high unemployment.
To me, that not only seems to deny the lessons of history, it represents an act of gratuitous cruelty to America’s youth.
Mark Naison June 24, 2010
Monday, May 31, 2010
Why Republican Rants About a “Secular Socialist Conspiracy” Just Won’t Work
Dr Mark Naison
Fordham University
Lately, Republican Presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich has been in the news for saying that Barack Obama is leading a “secular socialist conspiracy” that is as dangerous to the America as Hitler or Stalin.
Rather than being alarmed, most Americans yawned.
Attacks on President Obama for being a “socialist” don’t have a lot of traction not only because they are manifestly absurd- after all this is a president who bailed out the nation’s banks and is offering huge incentives to states to partially privatize their educational systems- but because the idea of “socialism” doesn’t scare Americans like it used to
And this isn’t just because the Soviet Union collapsed and because purchases of US Debt by the “Communist” Chinese help keep our government afloat, it’s because more and more Americans, to survive economically, have to adopt some kind of communal living arrangements, be it with friends, family or total strangers.
For more and more Americans, the nuclear family, consisting of parents living with children in two generation households until those children are ready form households of their own, is becoming more the exception in the rule.
You can see this dramatically displayed in the working class neighborhood of East Hampton where I own a vacation house. Virtually all of the residential units in our area- called “The Springs”-are detached one or two story houses surrounded by lawns. There are no apartment buildings; virtually all of the houses are zoned for single family occupancy.
Yet when you drive by these homes, early in the morning, or late at night, it is not unusual to see three or four or five cars or pick up trucks parked in their driveways.
There are multiple families, or multiple groups of unrelated people, living in those houses
And I am not just talking about the homes of the Latino immigrants, who are a large and growing portion of the Springs population. The same pattern is visible among the Springs white and black population On my block, which is predominantly white, at least two thirds of the homes have some form of shared residential space beyond the nuclear family.
If this is what is going on among working class people in a relatively affluent resort area, you can just imagine what is going on in sections of the country whose economies have been hit much harder. As unemployment proliferates, peoples home values plummet, their credit card limits are frozen, and their savings evaporate, more and more people, without fanfare or ideological pronouncements, are sharing living space, child care, transportation and food to stay above water, or avoid hunger and homelessness.
Even middle class people are feeling the pinch and are giving up individual living space. I know of several formerly prosperous individuals in their thirties, unemployed for over a year, who have recently moved back in with their parents and more than a few of my students, after futile searches for full time work, have taken the same step.
Given the dynamics of shared living space which have become the lived reality for more and more Americans, it is understandable why the image of a government caring for its people- rather than nurturing individual self-reliance- doesn’t scare people the way it used to.
In an economic crisis like the one we are living through, “self reliance” just doesn’t work very well , even for people who are hard working and ambitious. A lot of people recognize that to survive these times, they not only have to ask for help, they have to help one another. And they are doing so, all over the country, in proportions which most journalists, or social scientists have failed to recognize.
This doesn’t mean that Americans are mobilizing to sign up under the Socialist banner, But it does make them receptive to the idea that it is the government’s responsibility to help people when they are in trouble, whether they have lost their jobs, or whether their livelihoods are threatened by a flood or an oil spill.
And if the Obama administration is really doing that, all the red baiting in the world from Republicans won’t make a damn bit of difference
Mark Naison
May 31, 2010
Dr Mark Naison
Fordham University
Lately, Republican Presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich has been in the news for saying that Barack Obama is leading a “secular socialist conspiracy” that is as dangerous to the America as Hitler or Stalin.
Rather than being alarmed, most Americans yawned.
Attacks on President Obama for being a “socialist” don’t have a lot of traction not only because they are manifestly absurd- after all this is a president who bailed out the nation’s banks and is offering huge incentives to states to partially privatize their educational systems- but because the idea of “socialism” doesn’t scare Americans like it used to
And this isn’t just because the Soviet Union collapsed and because purchases of US Debt by the “Communist” Chinese help keep our government afloat, it’s because more and more Americans, to survive economically, have to adopt some kind of communal living arrangements, be it with friends, family or total strangers.
For more and more Americans, the nuclear family, consisting of parents living with children in two generation households until those children are ready form households of their own, is becoming more the exception in the rule.
You can see this dramatically displayed in the working class neighborhood of East Hampton where I own a vacation house. Virtually all of the residential units in our area- called “The Springs”-are detached one or two story houses surrounded by lawns. There are no apartment buildings; virtually all of the houses are zoned for single family occupancy.
Yet when you drive by these homes, early in the morning, or late at night, it is not unusual to see three or four or five cars or pick up trucks parked in their driveways.
There are multiple families, or multiple groups of unrelated people, living in those houses
And I am not just talking about the homes of the Latino immigrants, who are a large and growing portion of the Springs population. The same pattern is visible among the Springs white and black population On my block, which is predominantly white, at least two thirds of the homes have some form of shared residential space beyond the nuclear family.
If this is what is going on among working class people in a relatively affluent resort area, you can just imagine what is going on in sections of the country whose economies have been hit much harder. As unemployment proliferates, peoples home values plummet, their credit card limits are frozen, and their savings evaporate, more and more people, without fanfare or ideological pronouncements, are sharing living space, child care, transportation and food to stay above water, or avoid hunger and homelessness.
Even middle class people are feeling the pinch and are giving up individual living space. I know of several formerly prosperous individuals in their thirties, unemployed for over a year, who have recently moved back in with their parents and more than a few of my students, after futile searches for full time work, have taken the same step.
Given the dynamics of shared living space which have become the lived reality for more and more Americans, it is understandable why the image of a government caring for its people- rather than nurturing individual self-reliance- doesn’t scare people the way it used to.
In an economic crisis like the one we are living through, “self reliance” just doesn’t work very well , even for people who are hard working and ambitious. A lot of people recognize that to survive these times, they not only have to ask for help, they have to help one another. And they are doing so, all over the country, in proportions which most journalists, or social scientists have failed to recognize.
This doesn’t mean that Americans are mobilizing to sign up under the Socialist banner, But it does make them receptive to the idea that it is the government’s responsibility to help people when they are in trouble, whether they have lost their jobs, or whether their livelihoods are threatened by a flood or an oil spill.
And if the Obama administration is really doing that, all the red baiting in the world from Republicans won’t make a damn bit of difference
Mark Naison
May 31, 2010
Friday, May 28, 2010
Rebel Diaz Arts Collective Provides Model For Activists and Young People Locked Out of a Stagnant Economy
Dr Mark Naison
Fordham Unviersity
Last night, I had the opportunity to visit the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective, an organization of activists, musicians and visual and performing artists which has transformed a former candy factory into a vibrant community space.
When I entered the building, I felt I had been transported into a hip hop community center in Berlin, or a loft in lower Manhattan that had been occupied by political activists in the late 60’s and early 70’s. There were murals and political slogans all over the walls, couches and chairs that had clearly been found on the street or donated by friends, a large room that had been transformed into a performance space, and smaller rooms that had been turned into a music studio, a computer room and the offices of an allied community organization. An outdoor sitting space was filled with graffiti art done by a combination of well known writers and neighborhood youth and a wall on the roof had a huge yellow sign, probably 70 feet long, and 10 feet high, that read “No Human is Illegal” that was easily visible from the Bruckner Expressway.
The people in the Arts Collective also had a familiar appearance. Most were people of color in their twenties and early thirties, with a scruffy, but hip look that would have made them seem at home in a meeting of Young Lords, the Black Panthers, or SDS 40 years before. My two guests and I, sixties veterans all, did a double take. It was as if we had been transported into an earlier time in the City’s history, a time when a collapsing social structure and a fierce political idealism spawned revolutionary dreams, and when the city’s faltering economy provided inexpensive spaces those dreams could be pursued in.
The three of us were so surprised by what we saw that we did a collective double take. Could this really be happening again? The political spaces we had spent our formative years in had, over time, been transformed into upscale boutiques and expensive apartments and the revolutionary dreams we once held had been rejected by three generations of young people in favor of the pursuit of wealth, security and a dynamic consumer lifestyle.
But what we saw in that abandoned factory in the South Bronx, we soon realized, was not a fluke, it was a sign of an emerging revolutionary consciousness among a generation of young people facing unprecedented economic stagnation, and a future that would soon render questionable the dreams of effortless wealth and consumption that many Americans had seen as their birthright for the last thirty years.
We all know the grim statistics about unemployment for people under the age of 30. Only a minority of college graduates are finding full time jobs following graduation a while job opportunities in law, business, education and social service are shrinking rapidly. No reputable economist that I have read thinks the economy will expand rapidly enough to absorb this huge, young surplus labor force any time soon, leaving many educated young people without the wherewithal to become economically independent, while young people with less education are being forced deeper into poverty and desperation.
There is already much pain and hardship being inflicted on young people, and their families, in both groups. But a few visionary young people, like the members of the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective, have seen an opportunity to create new forms of organization which allow people to free themselves from individualistic, acquisitive impulses which will only bring disappointment in this time of crisis
What gives this vision substance, and ultimately, more than a little practicality, is the sudden appearance of huge amounts of abandoned residential and commercial space in virtually every town and city in the country. Not only are there hundred of thousands of abandoned and foreclosed private homes in the country, they are tens of thousands of recently abandoned stores, warehouses, factories and shopping centers whose owners have gone bankrupt or closed down their operations.
Very few of these facilities are going to be rented at market rates any time soon. If they stay abandoned, nothing good is going to happen.. They are going to be stripped, vandalized, or set afire.
But if young people can seize these properties and convert them to community usage, or render them operational for less than market rent, both the original owners and the government may find this a better alternative than letting them remain vacant.
This is exactly what the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective has done. They have taken a huge abandoned space on a deteriorated block in the South Bronx and have made it into a community center by using volunteer labor, not only from the 15-20 members of the collective, but from people in the community and friends around the city and the country.
Not only have the created a space that both neighborhood people and progressive artists feel comfortable in, but they have used the facility to spawn income generating activities, whether it by selling CD’s or art works by members of the Collective, renting the space out for music video shoots, charging admission for concerts and films, or getting government grants to run summer youth programs.
What makes this income generating activity work is the communal spirit that animates the group. People in the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective share whatever income that comes in and it is this communal spirit, as well as the physical appearance of the space, that so moved the three of us Sixties veterans that came by their Center. Here are people who understand that when the meaning in your life comes from friendship, love, creative activity and commitment to social justice, than you don’t need to accumulate material possessions to mark your place in the world. I am not sure where members of the collective lived, or what they owned, or how much money they maid from other jobs, but it was clear that they felt infused with a higher sense of purpose that give them joy and happiness and allowed for the development of powerful friendships.
As I have watched this economic crisis unfold over the last four years, I have often said that young people today needed to discover the revolutionary communalism of the Sixties.
Well, based on what I saw at the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective, they have already begun to do that. I suspect that what is happening on Austin Place, right off the Bruckner Expressway, is happening simultaneously in other parts of the city and the nation, and it gives me hope that maybe, just maybe, this so called “lost generation” is not going to passively accept the economic marginalization that economists and social scientists have declared to be their fate.
If they follow the lead of Rebel Diaz Arts Collective, they can become makers of history rather than a crisis they didn’t expect.
And that is a prospect that makes this Sixties veteran break out in a smile!
Mark Naison
May 28, 2010
.
Dr Mark Naison
Fordham Unviersity
Last night, I had the opportunity to visit the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective, an organization of activists, musicians and visual and performing artists which has transformed a former candy factory into a vibrant community space.
When I entered the building, I felt I had been transported into a hip hop community center in Berlin, or a loft in lower Manhattan that had been occupied by political activists in the late 60’s and early 70’s. There were murals and political slogans all over the walls, couches and chairs that had clearly been found on the street or donated by friends, a large room that had been transformed into a performance space, and smaller rooms that had been turned into a music studio, a computer room and the offices of an allied community organization. An outdoor sitting space was filled with graffiti art done by a combination of well known writers and neighborhood youth and a wall on the roof had a huge yellow sign, probably 70 feet long, and 10 feet high, that read “No Human is Illegal” that was easily visible from the Bruckner Expressway.
The people in the Arts Collective also had a familiar appearance. Most were people of color in their twenties and early thirties, with a scruffy, but hip look that would have made them seem at home in a meeting of Young Lords, the Black Panthers, or SDS 40 years before. My two guests and I, sixties veterans all, did a double take. It was as if we had been transported into an earlier time in the City’s history, a time when a collapsing social structure and a fierce political idealism spawned revolutionary dreams, and when the city’s faltering economy provided inexpensive spaces those dreams could be pursued in.
The three of us were so surprised by what we saw that we did a collective double take. Could this really be happening again? The political spaces we had spent our formative years in had, over time, been transformed into upscale boutiques and expensive apartments and the revolutionary dreams we once held had been rejected by three generations of young people in favor of the pursuit of wealth, security and a dynamic consumer lifestyle.
But what we saw in that abandoned factory in the South Bronx, we soon realized, was not a fluke, it was a sign of an emerging revolutionary consciousness among a generation of young people facing unprecedented economic stagnation, and a future that would soon render questionable the dreams of effortless wealth and consumption that many Americans had seen as their birthright for the last thirty years.
We all know the grim statistics about unemployment for people under the age of 30. Only a minority of college graduates are finding full time jobs following graduation a while job opportunities in law, business, education and social service are shrinking rapidly. No reputable economist that I have read thinks the economy will expand rapidly enough to absorb this huge, young surplus labor force any time soon, leaving many educated young people without the wherewithal to become economically independent, while young people with less education are being forced deeper into poverty and desperation.
There is already much pain and hardship being inflicted on young people, and their families, in both groups. But a few visionary young people, like the members of the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective, have seen an opportunity to create new forms of organization which allow people to free themselves from individualistic, acquisitive impulses which will only bring disappointment in this time of crisis
What gives this vision substance, and ultimately, more than a little practicality, is the sudden appearance of huge amounts of abandoned residential and commercial space in virtually every town and city in the country. Not only are there hundred of thousands of abandoned and foreclosed private homes in the country, they are tens of thousands of recently abandoned stores, warehouses, factories and shopping centers whose owners have gone bankrupt or closed down their operations.
Very few of these facilities are going to be rented at market rates any time soon. If they stay abandoned, nothing good is going to happen.. They are going to be stripped, vandalized, or set afire.
But if young people can seize these properties and convert them to community usage, or render them operational for less than market rent, both the original owners and the government may find this a better alternative than letting them remain vacant.
This is exactly what the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective has done. They have taken a huge abandoned space on a deteriorated block in the South Bronx and have made it into a community center by using volunteer labor, not only from the 15-20 members of the collective, but from people in the community and friends around the city and the country.
Not only have the created a space that both neighborhood people and progressive artists feel comfortable in, but they have used the facility to spawn income generating activities, whether it by selling CD’s or art works by members of the Collective, renting the space out for music video shoots, charging admission for concerts and films, or getting government grants to run summer youth programs.
What makes this income generating activity work is the communal spirit that animates the group. People in the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective share whatever income that comes in and it is this communal spirit, as well as the physical appearance of the space, that so moved the three of us Sixties veterans that came by their Center. Here are people who understand that when the meaning in your life comes from friendship, love, creative activity and commitment to social justice, than you don’t need to accumulate material possessions to mark your place in the world. I am not sure where members of the collective lived, or what they owned, or how much money they maid from other jobs, but it was clear that they felt infused with a higher sense of purpose that give them joy and happiness and allowed for the development of powerful friendships.
As I have watched this economic crisis unfold over the last four years, I have often said that young people today needed to discover the revolutionary communalism of the Sixties.
Well, based on what I saw at the Rebel Diaz Arts Collective, they have already begun to do that. I suspect that what is happening on Austin Place, right off the Bruckner Expressway, is happening simultaneously in other parts of the city and the nation, and it gives me hope that maybe, just maybe, this so called “lost generation” is not going to passively accept the economic marginalization that economists and social scientists have declared to be their fate.
If they follow the lead of Rebel Diaz Arts Collective, they can become makers of history rather than a crisis they didn’t expect.
And that is a prospect that makes this Sixties veteran break out in a smile!
Mark Naison
May 28, 2010
.
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