Let Them Eat Cake!

The Economic Collapse Blog has a good article on the growing, impoverished working poor that is worth reading
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/the-working-poor

Then read Marshall Auerback on "Drinking the Austerity Cool Aid"
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/01/auerback-drinking-the-austerity-kool-aid-in-2011.html

It is unbelievable what we are witnessing. The banks, insurance companies, defense contractors and sundry other corporations have stolen trillions upon trillions from the U.S. population.

And the reaction is "Austerity," which translates into massive cuts for education, social welfare, the elderly, the disabled, etc.

Simultaneously, public workers are being held personally responsible for America's fiscal woes and the solution to their supposed greed is to take away their pensions.

This is wrong. Public workers have for decades been underpaid in relation to private sector workers of equal education. Pensions have been a bargaining issue and many unions gave up raises for better pensions. Underfunding of pensions by cities, states, and other public entities was not the unions' fault!

Now it may be necessary to defer the age at which some retirees receive pensions--from 50 to 60 years old for example--but eliminating or cutting pensions is simply wrong.

Additionally, there are good reasons why some professionals such as firefighters need to retire earlier because of the nature of their work and/or shortened life expectancy.

Full disclosure: I will recieve no public pension. I am a public worker but I am not vested in the Arizona State Pension Retirement system.

"Let them eat cake!" is the new mantra of the elite. They would do well to remember what happened to previous elite groups that expressed this sentiment...