Britannia Radio

Obama declares war on auto workers
31 March 2009
This article is available in PDF.

President Barack Obama's speech on the auto industry Monday was
nothing less than a declaration of war against the working class. In a
statement dripping with class arrogance and cynicism, he rejected the
cost-cutting proposals of General Motors and Chrysler as insufficient
and demanded more concessions from auto workers.

No one could be unaware of the blatant double standard that has
governed the administration's response to the economic crisis. Up to
$10 trillion has been handed over to the giant banks and hedge funds.
These sums have been turned over, with no restrictions, to
institutions whose reckless speculation was a critical factor in
creating the economic crisis.

These vast funds are not going toward the production of socially
useful goods and real value, but rather to bolster the bank accounts
and investment portfolios of the financial aristocracy. Just this past
week the administration came out in opposition to any attempt to
reclaim bonuses to executives at AIG and other institutions bailed out
by the government.

The sum of money involved in the bailout of the banks dwarfs the
amount involved in the auto industry by a factor of several hundred.
But when it comes to the auto industry, Obama declares that the
companies must not become "wards of the state" and demands massive
cost-cutting measures-all of which are directed against the workers.

When Obama declares that the proposals submitted by GM and Chrysler
are inadequate, the principal object of his attack is the working
class. To carry out a "fundamental restructuring," Obama said, "will
require unions and workers who have already made extraordinarily
painful concessions to do more."

The impact of these further concession demands on workers will be
devastating. Already, 400,000 jobs have been lost in the auto industry
over the past year and tens of thousands more are on the chopping
block. Workers will be thrown out of work amidst the worst job market
in generations.

Wages will be slashed further; work rules will be gutted to increase
exploitation; health coverage, pensions and other benefits will be
slashed or eliminated. Immediately targeted are the medical benefits
of hundreds of thousands of retirees.

Not only the Big Three companies, but a significant section of
dependent industry, from suppliers to dealers, is threatened.

Before the assault is over, workers still employed in the industry
will be subjected to sweatshop conditions, with virtually no benefits
and no job security.

The administration has all but signed a death warrant for Chrysler and
its 26,000 hourly workers, giving it a mere 30 days to reach a merger
agreement with Fiat or forfeit further government aid. Obama is
likewise pushing GM and its 62,400 workers toward the bankruptcy
courts, which would be used as a "mechanism to help them restructure
quickly and emerge stronger," he said. This is code language for
shredding union contacts and imposing near-poverty wages by judicial
fiat.

Obama concluded his remarks with an utterly cynical assurance of
"support" for workers who are being devastated by his own policies.
These declarations deserve nothing but contempt.

The measures announced Monday confirm once again that the Obama
administration is a government of, by and for the financial elite
which exerts a stranglehold over the economy and controls the entire
political establishment.

The investment bankers represented by Obama are using the economic
crisis as an opportunity to fundamentally restructure class relations
in America. Culminating a three-decade offensive against working
people, they are destroying whatever remains of the gains made by
previous generations of workers so as to intensify the exploitation of
the working class.

The attack on auto workers will become the spearhead for similar
attacks against workers throughout the country and internationally, in
every sector of the economy. Wage cuts, layoffs and cuts in benefits
and social programs will be implemented across the board. The Obama
administration has already made clear that it is targeting basic
entitlement programs such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

Obama's announcement once again exposes the bankruptcy of the United
Auto Workers union. It has played a critical role in pushing through
concessions year after year and suppressing opposition from the
workers. In the process, it has ever more closely integrated itself
with corporate management. There can be no doubt that the UAW will
capitulate once again. It is concerned solely with the perks and
privileges of the bureaucrats who control the union.

After the auto companies received government loans last year, the UAW
promoted the lie that the Obama administration would take a pro-worker
position and the union bureaucracy enthusiastically backed his
campaign. This, just as every other policy of the union, has proven to
be a trap and betrayal of the workers' interests. In the naked
instrument of Wall Street that is the Obama administration, one sees
the culmination of the decades-long effort of the UAW and the entire
trade union bureaucracy to subordinate workers to the Democratic
Party.

If a disaster is to be averted, auto workers have no choice but to
take matters into their own hands and assert their independent class
interests. The Socialist Equality Party and the World Socialist Web
Site propose the following steps:


1. Form independent rank-and-file committees to revive direct forms of
working class struggle!


If further concessions are to be successfully opposed, workers must
move to form organizations completely independent of the UAW. Rank-and-
file factory, workplace and neighborhood committees should be formed
to revive the militant traditions of the working class. Workers should
prepare now for demonstrations, strikes and factory occupations to
prevent plant closings. An appeal must be made to all workers to take
up a common struggle in defense of their basic needs-for jobs,
housing, health care and education.

2. Break with the Democratic and Republican Parties!


Industrial action must be infused with a new political strategy based
on the independent interests of the working class. The actions of the
Obama administration clearly show that if workers are to defend their
interests, they must build their own political party.

3. Reject the capitalist system and revive an international socialist
movement of the working class!


The economic crisis has exposed all claims that the "free market" is
the highest form of social organization. Workers in the United States
and throughout the world are facing the devastating consequences of
the collapse of capitalism, an economic system based on the pursuit of
private profit.

The Socialist Equality Party fights for the socialist reorganization
of the economy. This includes the nationalization of the major
corporations and banks under the public ownership and democratic
control of the working class. These productive forces must be
organized on the basis of social need, not private profit. The world
economy can no longer be subject to the blackmail of a money-mad
financial aristocracy.

What is happening in the United States is a severe expression of
conditions all over the world, and workers can defend themselves only
through their international unity. The corporations and banks-together
with their accomplices in the trade unions-will seek to defend their
own interests by pitting workers of different countries against each
other. These efforts must be rejected. Workers in Europe, Asia, Canada
and Mexico are impacted by the crisis in the American auto industry,
and there is no region of the world that is not suffering from the
economic collapse.

The Socialist Equality Party is sponsoring regional conferences under
the title "The World Economic Crisis, the Failure of Capitalism, and
the Case for Socialism" in Ann Arbor, Michigan (April 25), New York
City (May 3), and Los Angeles, California (May 10). These conferences
will examine the causes of the economic crisis and develop a program
that meets the needs of working people. They will initiate a fight-
back against the ruling class offensive on the basis of the
independent industrial and political mobilization of the working
class. We urge auto workers and workers throughout the country to make
plans to attend today.

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