Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor

Political events this week have again illustrated the stark divide between the affluent few at the top and the majority of the population who struggle to remain above water. Whilst the government seeks to create a finite universal benefit, the pay of financial executives – often underpinned by the public purse – continues to soar.

As George Monbiot said in a recent column arguing for the introduction of a maximum wage:

The income of corporate executives ... is a form of institutionalised theft, arranged by a kleptocratic class for the benefit of its members. The wealth which was once spread more evenly among the staff of a company, or distributed as lower prices or higher taxes, is now siphoned off by people who have neither earned nor generated it.

Over the past ten years, chief executives’ pay has risen nine times faster than that of the median earner. Some bosses (British Gas, Xstrata and Barclays for example) are now being paid over 1000 times the national median wage.

At the same time, companies such as Vodafone, Topshop and British Home Stores have had huge tax bills written off whilst banking chiefs have continued to pocket huge bonuses, despite many being heavily subsidised by tax payers’ money.  For instance, following the bailout of RBS, the UK government owns an 84% stake in the company. Yet in 2010, the RBS CEO Stephen Hester was paid a staggering £7.7m of which £2m was a ‘bonus’. I wonder how many people on Jobseekers’ Allowance or Employment Support Allowance received a state-sponsored ‘bonus’ for Christmas.

Vince Cable’s attempt to harness executive pay – through increasing transparency and shareholder influence – represent nothing more than impotent posturing. As Monbiot notes, pay transparency could “create the perverse result that executives discover how much their rivals are getting, and use the information to demand more”.

This highlights a structural paradox between how we conceptualise the public and private sectors. Executive pay in the private sector always seeks to level-up pay and benefits to ensure that companies remain competitive and can attract the best talent. Conversely – as demonstrated by the public sector pensions dispute – the debate around the lower end of the labour force always focuses on eroding public sector pay and conditions in line with the private sector. Both arguments – consistently forwarded by business, media and politicians – are mutually exclusive.  

It is frightening that political and media rhetoric – which habitually demonises benefit claimants as feckless scroungers – can be so weak when challenging the power and influence of big business.  The media is all too eager to attack ‘parasitic’ benefit claimants, but is less vehement in its pursuit of private sector leeches gorging on the public purse.

One of the key reasons for the rising benefit bill – neglected by most mainstream media – has been the cost of subsidising private landlords through housing benefit. It’s time to stop bankrolling private sector sponges – from landlords to banking executives – and use the money to build affordable social housing and create real employment opportunities. 

To paraphrase Slavoj Zizek, John Pilger and Noam Chomsky, it’s socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor.

The privileged whites are playing divide and rule again

It has been a week of remarkable media synergy as 18 years of ongoing injustice has reached partial closure with the sentencing of Gary Dobson and David Norris for the murder of Stephen Lawrence. Newspapers from across the political spectrum – from the Morning Star and Socialist Worker to the Daily Mail and Daily Express – have rightfully rejoiced at the guilty verdict handed down to Dobson and Norris – but it is wrong to think the adjudication represents anything other than an incomplete victory. Furthermore, the fragile coalition of media consensus and sombre introspection has been blown apart by the furore surrounding Diane Abbott’s innocuous – if clumsily worded – Tweet that "White people love playing 'divide & rule'. We should not play their game"

Dobson's and Norris's sentencing is not testimony to a society which defends equality and justice, instead it indicates a society which continues to struggle with corruption, scape-goating and racism. Until systemic problems of institutional racism within the police – as identified in the Macpherson Report – have been resolved then racism will continue to blight our society. As police continue to disproportionately target black youths – in 1999 a black person was six times more likely to be stopped and searched by police; in 2006/7 it was seven times – hatred and bigotry will be reinforced.

Furthermore, as the Daily Mail has ridden the wave of public ignominy, it is wrong to view the paper which often makes Mein Kampf look moderate, as anything other than part of the problem. The xenophobic bile which the Mail gushes forth – and the moral indignation it has mustered to condemn Abbott – serves only to reinforce divisions and prejudice.

As Jyoti Bhojani argued on Labour List: 

So it saddens me that in a momentous week, where whilst 18 years too late we saw Gary Dobson and David Norris convicted and sentenced for the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence, we are not talking about race relations. Instead the media are obsessing over Diane Abbott’s tweet

The media is abdicating from its core purpose to provide thorough objective analysis by resorting to crass sensationalism rather than investigating the underlying power structures which engender and perpetuate racism.

People of black and minority ethnic communities remain hugely underrepresented within parliament, the police force and business – if the vilification of Diane Abbott is anything to go by, it’s no wonder they are unable or unwilling to reach these positions. I guess it’s just a group of privileged white people playing ‘divide and rule’.