Richard Boyd Barrett: Workers Subsidise Billionaire Profits

People power works. That's the lesson of the protests. When people get out and protest and organise and mobilise, they can force a government that is failing them to make concessions. Trump's war means every single working person in the world is paying an economic price for Trump's bloodlust, for his imperialism and for his support for the Israeli regime. We're all paying now. People who supported Trump a couple of years ago and thought he was a friend of the little person should hang their heads in shame. He's revealed himself for what he always was. A billionaire, property speculator, in with big business, out, willing to slaughter people for profit and for the billionaire class. Ordinary people now in Ireland and across the world are paying the price. The wholiers showed how you have to respond when you are screwed by the consequences of this and a system that more generally favours the rich. That is the fact. The government made concessions to one group but the widespread sympathy for the wholiers was because huge numbers of other people who got nothing from the government's concessions have been crucified with the cost of living and housing crisis and are angry about it. They are right to be angry because the fact of the matter is that this government, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, represent the bosses and the rich. I decided to get a few figures on the distribution of income and tax in this country at the moment. It really tells its own story. All of the workers in this country, there are 3.3 million of them, combined earn €130 billion. That's the total income of 3.3 million workers. They pay in total €32 billion in tax. That's 25% of their income. There are 170,000 employers in this country. Guess how much they earn? €318 billion. Between them, 170,000, more than twice what all the workers earn. How much do they pay in tax? Remember, the workers who earn a lot less pay €32 billion. The bosses who earn €318 billion in profits and it's rising every year pay €23 billion. About 8% of their income. So the workers are subsidising the obscene profits of the rich, the obscene lifestyles of the rich. These people are profiteering off the cost of living misery and the housing misery that ordinary working people are suffering. And that's why workers need to take the lesson of the whole years and get out on the streets. Starting with May Day tomorrow, the Trades Council march, but building up to the budget next year. We need to do what was done in the tax marches in the late 70s and early 80s when the working class of this city and across this country mobilised and fought and demanded tax justice because they're certainly not getting it from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. There's a list as long as my arm of workers who are being screwed. School caretakers. I got messages from them this week. The first into the school, last out. They are let go at Easter, at the summer holidays, at Christmas. They have no pensions. The Oireachtas TV workers, who I'll mention again, the people who film these proceedings, they are let go. Even though they're working for the Oireachtas, they're let go at Easter, they're let go every time the doll is off, they're let go during the summer, they're let go through Christmas. Their average earnings are €12,000. And because they've got organised into unions fighting for their rights, they're now being victimised and taken off the roster. I've been highlighting over the recent weeks the Northside home care workers who provide home care to vulnerable sectors of our society who are out on strike because their wages were slashed in austerity in 2009 and they still haven't had their incomes restored. They're fighting for a 9% pay increase and they're being victimised as well. Shop stewards were suspended this week for organising trade union action. Workers need to get on the streets to fight back. We need to get on the streets to fight back.