Nothing to fall back upon

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A survey showed that many of its respondents have little in reserve to weather a long recession. The findings include:



—22% of homeowners don’t have enough in savings to cover one month’s mortgage.







—Almost half of renters surveyed reported having less than $500 set aside for emergencies. A similar amount said their savings wouldn’t be enough to cover one month’s rent.



—30% of homeowners had less than $1,000 reserved for emergencies. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates the average homeowner spends just under $6,000 per month, and recommends homeowners have between $17,300 and $35,600 squirrelled away for expenses over 3-6 months in case they have no active income.





—12% of homeowners are already behind on mortgage payments due to the coronavirus crisis. About 27% are worried about defaulting on their mortgages.



—More than half of both renters and homeowners say they are racking up credit card debt to pay bills. Federal stimulus checks of up to $1,200 should provide some relief, but the respite is likely to be temporary.

https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Survey-50-say-all-their-savings-will-be-wiped-15188178.php

Humanity in Peril

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We must be more condemnatory about how much capitalism has failed us in our preparation for the pandemic. We need to do a better job at acknowledging class interest in various public health policies. The major media outlets are trying to construct the various post-coronavirus possibilities. Some say COVID-19 will create a world that is less open, less prosperous, and less free. Others argue that it is unlikely that the world will return to the idea of mutually beneficial globalization. While a few suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic will not fundamentally alter global economic directions but will only accelerate a change that had already begun: a move away from US-centric globalization to a more China-centric globalisation. Environmentalists emphasise the fact that the lockdowns and the reductions in industry and transport, has raised hopes that it might not be too late for Planet Earth after all and feature photos of clear blue skies over Delhi and the clean clear canals of Venice.
For socialists the pandemic anticipate that it has got working people thinking about an alternate form of society, beyond the nation-state, a society of global solidarity and cooperation based on the democratic will of the people. The future will bring about change. It ought to. It must. Because the status quo is simply unsustainable. The dehumanisation of humanity must not be allowed to become an everyday occurrence. For that better, more equitable future to arrive, our understanding of it must place the Marxist class struggle within broader and more global terms. It would be simplistic to believe the pandemic alone can produce change but there is no denying that the current crisis has got us all thinking differently about the world we live in. There is no longer an accepted consensus. Without working people propelling social change, the status quo will constantly reinvent itself, retaining its dominance, hegemony and power. It is us, the people, must rise up to redefine the way we wish to live on our planet.
We are living in a “new normal”. COVID-19 may help spark action to build a new fair sustainable world for all of us. The Socialist Co-operative Commonwealth will save the planet and its peoples.
 To give up hope now is to perish.



The Wealthy Dictators

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Dubbed the “Butcher of Hama,” Syria’s Rifaat Assad holds millions in European real estate.  The uncle of Syrian President Bashar Assad is reported to have a European fortune that includes two Paris townhouses — one of them 3,000 square meters (32,000 square feet) — a stud farm, a chateau and more than 500 properties in Spain.







A former Syrian vice president and military leader, Rifaat Assad is also known as the “Butcher of Hama” for allegedly commanding troops to brutally crush a 1982 uprising in central Syria.



On Thursday, a French court will decide whether he diverted at least €90 million ($98 million) of Syrian state funds to buy some of that real estate. In November, Spanish prosecutors accused him of stealing €600 million from Syrian coffers. He has denied both charges.



Several members of the Makhloufs, Bashar’s close cousins and advisers, have sunk $40 million into the glittering glass and steel of Moscow’s “City of Capitals” twin skyscrapers in recent years, according to the UK corruption-focused NGO Global Witness.



The infamously wealthy family is reported to have been key in maintaining Bashar’s violent grip on power and their Russian investment may be a way for them to channel regime funds past EU sanctions, the NGO says.
When Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak regime fell in 2011, his family wealth was estimated to be between $5 billion and $70 billion at the time, including luxury properties across London, Paris and Spain. Some of those were held by his sons through shell companies, according to the Panama Papers investigation.
When  Gadhafi was toppled in the same year, Libyan officials estimated he had $200 billion in accounts, investments and real estate under his personal control around the world. A £10 million (€11.5 million, $12.5 million) London mansion belonging to his son Saadi Gadhafi, was handed back to Libyan authorities in 2012.
The assets of both of their immediate families and some of their entourages remain frozen under EU sanctions. Gadhafi’s close associate Ali Dabaiba, who was part of an elite circle known as “companions of the leader,” reportedly squirreled away $7 billion while on a salary of only £12,000 and a 2018 investigation alleged he invested some of it in prestigious property across the UK. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project said that included Scotland’s most significant stately home still in private hands, Taymouth Castle.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman hasn’t been as secretive about his wealth but kept his 2015 purchase of the $300 million Chateau Louis XIV in France. The 17th century replica, featuring a gold leaf fountain and hedged labyrinth amid expansive gardens, was revealed to be owned by the crown prince by the New York Times in 2017.



Qatar’s Al Thani royal family bought Paris Saint-Germain football club in 2012, after already plowing many billions of state funds into property across Europe. That included a 95% stake in London’s The Shard, Europe’s tallest building at the time.

In 2018 former Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim Al Thani bought what was thought to be London’s most expensive home — a 20-plus-bedroom home near Buckingham Palace for $465 million, after renovations.
That same year, Amnesty International reported that foreign laborers in Qatar, who make up the overwhelming majority of the workforce, worked in abusive conditions on the country’s FIFA World Cup 2022 sites for a minimum wage of $200 a month. 
United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan personally owned $1.2 billion in London property, while deputy Prime Minister Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan owns British football club Manchester City. Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum’s European portfolio includes a £75 million Surrey Estate and £45 million thoroughbred stud farm. Said to be a close friend of Queen Elizabeth II, Maktoum has faced a storm of controversy in his home-away-from-home. Last month a British court ruled that he had abducted two of his adult daughters and waged a campaign of “fear and intimidation” against his youngest wife, Princess Haya.







Racial Disparity in the USA

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In February 2020 when the overall unemployment rate was 3.5%, a 50-year-low, the black unemployment rate was 5.8%. The white unemployment rate was 3.1%. William Rodgers, former chief economist at the US Department of Labor, has estimated that the real unemployment rate for African Americans may have reached 19% in March. 



“The reason why African Americans bear the brunt of downturns more is that when firing decisions start to occur the least educated and those with the least experience tend to be let go first. There is also continued discrimination in the workplace,” Rodgers said.



Economists who focus on race have long said that this “last hired, first fired” phenomenon dramatically affects black Americans more than any other group in the US due to the country’s history of racism and segregation of black Americans in the work sector.



Workers of color, particularly black Americans, have long been over-represented in the lowest-paying service and domestic occupations, such as taxi drivers and restaurant servers. Working in these fields leads to lower wages – black Americans have the lowest median wage of any racial group in the US – and the jobs are often seen as the most expendable during an economic downturn.



Those who got to keep their jobs during the last recession saw little relief even after the recession’s recovery period. Even with a low unemployment rate, wage growth for low-wage workers, especially for black workers, has been slow. Black Americans have seen the slowest wage growth compared with other groups of Americans, reaching a growth rate that was four times slower at certain wage distribution levels, according to a 2018 Economic Policy Institute report.

“Even though overall on aggregate we were in a better position, many of the underlying weaknesses of our economy were still there – inequality both on class and race,” said Valerie Wilson, director of the Economic Policy Institute’s program on race, ethnicity and the economy.



Low wages have a ripple effect on a family’s ability to save money and build wealth. 



Black families are especially vulnerable to economic downturns because they lack the savings that can act as a buffer against unexpected layoffs or lost wages. And during the last recovery they lost ground against their white peers.

The median net worth of black families is $17,600, compared with $171,000 for white families. A white family is likely to have $10 for every $1 a black family has. The percentage of black families that have a net worth at or below zero dollars is 10 points higher than the percentage of white families in the same financial situation – 19% compared with 9%, respectively. And the black homeownership rate is the lowest of any racial group in the US and has consistently been about 30% lower than the white homeownership rate over the years, even as the economy was getting stronger.



“Wealth allows you to respond to that unexpected health emergency, that broken hole in the tire you have to replace. It also allows you to buy a home, put your kids through school,” said Danyelle Solomon, vice-president of the race and ethnicity program at the Center for American Progress.



Having less wealth also has some dire health consequences. Experts agree that being poor has costly effects on a person’s health: for adults living in extreme poverty, being poor can cost up to 15 years of life expectancy. 
It is no surprise, then, that black Americans – who are less likely to be insured and more likely to have existing health conditions than their white counterparts – have seen higher death rates due to Covid-19 compared with any other group in the US. Black Americans made up 25% of deaths from Covid-19 in the US though they make up a little under 13% of the US population.
“National emergencies, pandemics, epidemics, what they do is they spotlight inequality,” Solomon said. “What we see in Covid-19 is no different. It’s highlighting racial disparities at every single level that have been with our society for a very long time.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/apr/28/african-americans-unemployment-covid-19-economic-impact

Protect the Vulnerable

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Home Office immigration policies are “compounding” health inequalities during the coronavirus pandemic, creating destitution and encouraging discrimination against non-British communities, London mayor, Sadiq Khan, has said.

He calls on the department to lift certain restrictions on migrants in response to the virus outbreak, saying he is “deeply concerned” that some policies are risking Londoners’ public health.





“I am concerned that health inequalities are being compounded by immigration policies that can create destitution and perversely encourage discrimination against BAME and migrant Londoners,” he warns.  Khan urged Priti Patel to suspend NHS charging regulations and data sharing with the Home Office, which he said were “undermining” efforts to stop the spread of Covid-19 and leaving many key workers and their families exposed and unable to afford the treatment and care they need. “We are now seeing evidence that they are failing Londoners who are fearful of coming forward for support during a global pandemic and hearing devastating reports of people dying in their homes or suffering in silence,” the letter states.

He also calls on the Home Office to extend all non-UK national visas for those working in the frontline and offer full citizenship rights to NHS and care workers, who he said had ”risked — and continue to risk on a daily basis — their lives during the COVID-19 crisis”. The London mayor said he was “extremely concerned” to hear that there had already been confirmed cases of Covid-19 in immigration removal centres, and called on Ms Patel to consider that those held in detention who aren’t any danger to the public should be released “without delay”.

Khan also urged the department to suspend both the habitual residence test and the no recourse to public funds (NRPF) condition — which prevents people on certain visas from accessing state benefits — to enable people to get the support they need and to help stop the spread of the virus by those who feel they have no choice but to go out to work.



He adds in the letter: “I recognise and welcome some of the changes your department has already made to meet the needs of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers in the UK, however, I remain deeply concerned that some policies are risking Londoners’ public health and I am writing today to ask you to go further.”



It comes after the Home Office was accused last week of causing foreign doctors and nurses in the NHS “unnecessary distress” after declaring they would have their visas extended free of charge — only to apparently narrow the group that would benefit to just those on Tier 2 visas. 



https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/coronavirus-sadiq-khan-home-office-immigration-policies-a9488966.html

ILO – Depressing Future

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Almost half the global workforce – 1.6 billion people – are in “immediate danger of having their livelihoods destroyed” by the economic impact of Covid-19, the International Labour Organization has warned.



Of the total global working population of 3.3 billion, about 2 billion work in the “informal economy”, often on short-term contracts or self-employment, and suffered a 60% collapse in their wages in the first month of the crisis. Of these, 1.6 billion face losing their livelihoods, the ILO warned .



“It shows I think in the starkest possible terms that the jobs employment crisis and all of its consequences is deepening by comparison with our estimates of three weeks ago,” the UN agency’s director general, Guy Ryder, told a briefing, foreseeing a “massive” poverty impact. “For millions of workers, no income means no food, no security and no future. Millions of businesses around the world are barely breathing,” said Ryder. “They have no savings or access to credit. These are the real faces of the world of work. If we don’t help them now, they will simply perish.”

North and South America were the worst affected regions following the rapid spread of the virus through the US and Brazil, but self-employed and contract workers in Europe were also in imminent danger of seeing their livelihoods disappear. n the Americas, the loss of working hours in the second quarter is expected to reach 12.4% compared with the pre-crisis level. In Europe and central Asia, the decline is estimated at 11.8%.



This translates into a drop in the incomes of informal workers of 81% in Africa and the Americas, 21.6% in Asia and the Pacific, and 70% in Europe and central Asia.



The deepening crisis in many other parts of the world left more than 436m businesses facing high risks of serious disruption, the ILO said. These employers are operating in the hardest-hit economic sectors, including 232m in the wholesale and retail sectors, 111m in manufacturing industries, 51m in accommodation and food services, and 42m in real estate and other business activities.
Ryder said he hoped governments would recognise that they needed to reconstruct their economies around better working practices and “not a return to the pre-pandemic world of precarious work for the majority”.



He said: “The pandemic has laid bare just how precarious, just how fragile, just how unequal our world of work is. It is commonly said that this pandemic does not discriminate, and in medical terms that is right. We can all be struck by the pandemic. But in terms of the economic and social effects, this pandemic discriminates massively and above all it discriminates against those who are at the bottom end of the world of work, those who don’t have protection, those who don’t have resources and the basics of what we would call the essentials of a normal life.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/29/half-of-worlds-workers-at-immediate-risk-of-losing-livelihood-due-to-coronavirus

Boom Times for Some

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Amazon’s market capitalization has ballooned by over $90 billion to record highs since mid-February, adding $5 billion to the fortune of founder and Chief Executive Jeff Bezos. Reflecting changes caused by the coronavirus, the average analyst estimate for Amazon’s quarterly revenue has increased by over $1 billion since the end of January. Analysts on average expect Amazon’s March quarter revenue to have jumped 23% to $73.61 billion, with adjusted earnings of $6.25 per share, according to Refinitiv.



With hand sanitizers, groceries, office chairs, home exercise equipment and other products selling out on its website as millions of people around the world shelter at home.



Critics, including New York Attorney General Letitia James, have accused Amazon of taking inadequate measures to protect warehouse workers from catching the illness. 



Overall, about 50 S&P 500 stocks are up since Feb. 19, a few of them directly because of the coronavirus outbreak and related changes in consumer behaviour. Some of those have risen more on a percentage basis than Amazon.



  Gilead Sciences, which on Wednesday gave an encouraging update on a potential COVID-19 treatment, has jumped 25% since Feb. 19, adding $21 billion to its market capitalization. 



 General Mills and Conagra Brands have both climbed 15% as consumers stocked up on food and other consumer staples. 



https://www.reuters.com/article/us-amazon-stocks/amazon-is-wall-streets-biggest-winner-from-coronavirus-idUSKBN22B2ZU

Will COVID-19 Change the World?

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CAPITALISM’S CORONAVIRUS CRISIS How is it possible that countries with the largest economies in the world can’t even organise enough protection to safeguard their nurses and doctors in the frontline? How have food manufacturers and retailers build food supply chains that are so fragile and inadequate that the slightest hint of panic-buying leaves supermarket shelves empty or diminished for weeks or months? How have we allowed ourselves to become so detached from reality and addicted to all sorts of superficial distractions such as Netflix?



 Without transformative change humanity is at risk. Let’s rebuild the new society that we need. Let us construct a fairer and less destructive world. We can build better and stronger. After coronavirus, there should be no return to ‘normal’. When we say no going back to business–as–usual this time, we must really mean it. Whatever happens, our future world must be profoundly different. Communities are helping each other out in this pandemic. At every level, neighbourhood and city, let’s encourage and support this powerful spirit and create funding for communities to rebuild together. A plethora of hard-working community project groups have been created, unlocking stimulus and energy. Greedy capitalists and sociopathic politicians have all the power in the modern world. We can do more to publicise the capitalist and market-driven roots of these issues.Instead we can make life the central raison d’être. Socialists speak of the reinvention of society. Socialists want more equitable future to arrive and a more humane world for ourselves and for others.



It would be simplistic to assume that an outbreak of a pandemic in itself could automatically could propel and produce change but there is no denying that the current crisis has laid bare the numerous fault-lines within the capitalist system. The COVID crisis has magnified a reality of capitalism’s failures. For example, one of many examples of the failure of the profit driven system is health care.  COVID-19 exposes the fact that essential workers who provide food, healthcare, and deliveries to our homes are mistreated and underappreciated. Workers are underpaid and are not being provided with protective equipment or allowed sick leave. The COVID-19 rescue laws have given trillions in funding to investors and Big Business.



We must help mobilise people. When people are in the movement, a union, or an organisation, they are ready to be part of a mass action in achieving change. It’s a stupidity and arrogance that allows us to believe that we can continue to plunder our environment and devour non-renewable resources.



Workers are thrown to the wolves by politicians and an economic system. For those people who live in countries where there is no social security system whatever, the COVID-19 pandemic threatens consequences infinitely worse and condemns a whole families to deprivation, because wages are so low, that daily life is a relentless struggle to survive as it is without the added complications of COVID-19.



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