[Translator's note: In June of 1997 the following analysis of neoliberalism appeared in a European publication. Cecilia Rodriguez of the NCDM]

Date: Tue, 15 Jul 1997 18:46:30 -0700 (PDT) From: Cecilia Rodriguez

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FIRST PIECE:

The Concentration of Wealth and the Distribution of Poverty

The first figure can be constructed by drawing a dollar sign.

In the history of humanity, different social models have fought to hoist the absurd as a distinctive world orders. Surely, neoliberalism will have a place of privilege at the time of the awards, because its "distribution" of social wealth does no more than distribute a double absurdity of accumulation: the accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few, and the accumulation of poverty in millions of human beings.

In the actual world, injustice and inequality are distinctive characteristics. . Planet earth, third of the solar planetary system, has 5 billion people. Of them, only 500 million live with comfort while 4 1/2 billion live in poverty and levels of subsistence.

Doubly absurd is the distribution among rich and poor: the rich are few and the poor are many. The quantitative difference is criminal, but the balance between the two extremes is secured with wealth: the rich supplement their small numbers with millions upon millions of dollars.

The fortune of the 358 wealthiest people of the world (thousands of millions of dollars) is superior to the annual income of 45% of the poorest inhabitants, something like 2 1/2 billion people.

The gold chains of the financial watches are converted into a heavy chain for millions of beings. Meanwhile the "total number of transactions of General Motors is larger than the Gross National Product of Denmark, that of Ford is larger than the GNP of South Africa, and that of Toyota far surpasses the GNP of Norway" (Ignacio Ramonet, In LMD 1/1997 #15). For all workers real salaries have fallen, in addition to having to survive the personnel cuts in companies, the closing of factories and the relocation of workplaces. In the so called "advanced capitalist economies" the number of unemployed has arrived at a total of 41 million workers.

Little by little, the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few and the distribution of poverty among many begins to trace the profile of modern global society: the fragile equilibrium of absurd inequalities.

The decadence of the neoliberal economic is a scandal: "The world debt (combining that of all companies, governments and administrations) has surpassed 33 trillion dollars, or 130% of the global GNP, and grows at a rate of 6 to 8% per year, more than 4 times the growth of the global GNP" (Frederic F. Clairmont. "Ces deux cents societes qui controlent le monde", in LMD, IV/1997.

The progress of the great transnationals does not imply the advancement of developed Nations. To the contrary, while the great financial giants earn more, poverty sharpens in the so-called "rich nations".

The chasm between the rich and poor is brutal and no tendency appears to the contrary, indeed it continues. Far from lessening, we won't say eliminating it, the social inequality is accentuated, above all in the developed capitalist nations: in the United States,1% of the wealthiest Americans have conquered 61.6% of the total national wealth between 1983 and 1989. 80% of the poorest Northamericans share only 1.2% of the wealth. In Great Britain the number of homeless has grown; the number of children who survive on social welfare has gone from 7% in 1979 to 26% in 1994, the number of British who live in poverty (defined as less than half of minimum wage) has gone from 5 million to 13,700,000; 10% of the poorest have lost 13% of their purchasing power, while 10% of the richest have gained 65% and in a period of the past 5 years the number of millionaires has doubled (statistics from LMD,IV/97).

At the beginning of the decade of the 90's "...an estimated 37,000 transnational companies held, with their 170,000 subsidiaries, the international economy in its tentacles." Nevertheless, the center of power situates itself in the most restrictive circle of the first 200: since the beginnings of the 80's, they have had an uninterrupted expansion through mergers and "rescue" buy-outs of companies.

In this way, the part of transnational capital in the global GNP has gone from 17% in the middle of the 60's to 24% in 1982 and more than 30% in 1995. The first 200 are conglomerates whose planetary activities cover with distinction the primary, secondary, and tertiary sectors: great agricultural exploitation, manufacturing production, financial services, commercial, etc. Geographically, they are divided amongst 10 countries: Japan (62), the United States (53), Germany (23), France (19), United Kingdom (11), Switzerland (8), South Korea (6), Italy (5), and others (4)". (Frederic F. Clairmont, Op.Cit.).

Continue on...

Second piece: "The Globalization of Exploitation"