Gordon Gekko's America

By Sean Posey

On October 19, 1987, a worldwide stock market crash-dubbed Black Monday in the States-interrupted the go-go 1980s. Only weeks after that panic-filled day, Oliver Stone's meditation on the decade of greed, Wall Street, hit the theaters. The story of Bud Fox, a wannabe master of the universe, and his Machiavellian mentor Gordon Gekko, served as a morality tale that America did not want to hear at the time. (The film proved to be far more popular in later years than it was in 1987.) And many who did see the film deeply misunderstood its central lessons.

A generation of future brokers and investment bankers cited the movie as a central influence in their decision to go to work on Wall Street; however, Gordon Gekko, the flashy, glib, and dangerous corporate raider, became a lasting symbol for the economic and moral transition America has undergone over the past few decades. [1] The character's ruthless worldview is now the norm, and not just for Wall Street where the "21st century children of Gordon Gekko," as Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd referred to them in 2007, rule, but for society as a whole.[2] Gekko and Gekkoisms have penetrated the political, economic, and cultural fabric of America. The age of Gekko is a terrifying world where the winners "make the rules" and the losers "get slaughtered."[3]

The late 1980s represented an intoxicating time in American life. Larger than life millionaires and billionaires penetrated the popular imagination like never before. Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, Ivan Boesky (the crooked Wall Street insider), Michael Milken (who partially inspired the Gekko character), Donald Trump (who is bringing the spirit of the 1980s back to the presidential stage), and even John Gotti, who brought a flashy 1980s sensibility to the New York Mafia, all represented the fabulous wealth that accumulated to a lucky few. But the machinations of Wall Street's elite in particular, captured the spirit of the era.

Wall Street emerged as a cautionary tale during a time when caution went right out the window. New economic experiments in the realm of government and finance (supply side economics, the deregulation of thrifts, etc.) led to great crises: rapidly increasing inequality and the savings and loan scandal. Stone's film targeted the exotic world of high finance, complete with well-dressed corporate raiders and fortunes accumulated through the destruction of companies.

In the film, Bud Fox (played by Charlie Sheen) comes from blue-collar roots and is looking to leapfrog from the world of a junior broker to the esteemed realm of investment banking. His prospective mentor is Gordon Gekko (portrayed by Michael Douglas), a flashy executive who symbolizes the worst aspects of both Wall Street and American capitalism. Although Gekko is framed as the villain, many audiences responded positively to the charming greenmailer. Both Stone and Douglas later remarked that they met numerous individuals who readily admitted that Gekko inspired them to pursue a career on Wall Street. [4]

Gekko did not just symbolize an era, however; he proved to be a prescient philosopher, introducing America to what would soon be its future. Late in the film, Bud Fox, in a crisis of conscience, begins to turn away from his amoral idol. Gekko, sensing his hesitation, explains to Fox how the world of the 1980s really works:

"It's all about bucks, kid. The rest is conversation… It's not a question of enough. It's a zero-sum game, somebody wins, somebody loses. Money itself isn't lost or gained-it's simply transferred from one perception to another."

"The richest 1 percent of this country owns half our country's wealth, five trillion dollars… You got 90 percent of the American public out there with little or no net worth. I create nothing. I own. We make the rules, pal: the news, war, famine, upheaval, the price of a paper clip. We pick that rabbit out of the hat while everybody sits out there wondering how the hell we did it."

"Now your not naïve enough to think we are living in a democracy, are you, Buddy? It's the free market." [5]

Gekko's speech was far ahead of its time. The share in national income going to the top decile in the U.S., after dropping sharply following the Great Depression, returned to a rate of 50 percent by the turn of the century.[6] In 2005-2006, a leaked series of reports by analysts at Citigroup described an emerging "plutonomy," that is an economy driven by the spending of a small plutocratic class. [7] In many ways, America has returned to the Gilded Age, and it is once again a zero-sum game where those in the oligarchic plutocracy make the rules.

Government played a central role in the transition to a Gekko-esque economy. While Gekko pined for "the days of the free market" in Wall Street, President Reagan proclaimed, "Government is the problem."[8] This approach led to widespread efforts to deregulate the economy at almost every level, which coincided with reducing top tax rates on the wealthy.

Remarkably enough, the Clinton administration in the 1990s echoed Reagan and Gekko's sentiments: "The era of big government is over," Clinton declared. [9] The deregulation of the financial system proceeded apace with the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999, which repealed part of the New Deal-era Glass-Steagall Act, and the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, which largely freed OTC derivatives from significant regulation. Economic bubbles began to emerge, and the sordid culture of Wall Street continued to thrive.

The days of the corporate raiders waned after the decade of greed, but with the Stock Market reaching new highs in the 1990s, a new generation of Wall Streeters looked to Gekko as a figure to emulate. Boiler Room, released in 2000, tells the story of a misguided young broker (Giovanni Ribisi) who goes to work for a shady chop shop firm during the height of the market. These young wannabes lack any of the charm of Gekko, but they emulate him all the same. When Ribisi's character goes to the home of the firm's head recruiter (Ben Affleck), he encounters a group watching Wall Street, which several characters recite from heart as it plays. And like down-market versions of Gekko, the employees of J.T. Marlin rip-off their clients with aplomb on their way to obscene riches. "There's no honor in taking that after school job at Mickey Dee's, honor's in the dollar, kid," Ribisi's character intones. "So I went the white boy way of slinging crack-rock: I became a stockbroker."[10]

Wall Street began to be used in ethics classes in business school, but judging by the behavior of the financial industry in the first decade of the 21st century, the moral lessons of the film apparently fell on deaf ears. Journalist Philip Delves Broughton describes how he remembers students at Harvard responding to Gekko's speeches: "At my old business school, Harvard, Gekko's speech electrified a snoozy morning class on leadership. By the time Gekko was done berating the board of Teldar Paper, the entire class was grinning and alert. For most MBA students that speech is less a parody than a guiding philosophy."[11]

"Gekko was merciless, but if he were on the Street today, the hedge fund guys would eat him alive," Fortune joked in a cover story on the old character in 2005.[12] The ruthlessness of the new Wall Street was confirmed by the events of 2007-2008. The children of Gordon Gekko brought the financial industry and indeed the country itself to its knees. Just as newly elected President Obama began bringing Wall Street scions like Lawrence Summers and Timothy Geithner into his new administration during the darkest days of the Great Recession, Oliver Stone readied Gordon Gekko for another appearance on the big screen.

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps introduces audiences to an aged Gekko, recently released from prison after a laughable eight years. (Michael Milken only served two years in prison, and no major figures served prison time as a result of the financial meltdown of 2007-2008.) A free man, Gekko goes on a speaking tour in support of his memoirs. Addressing an auditorium of college students, he exclaims that, "Someone reminded me I once said 'Greed is good'. Now it seems it's legal." [13]

Indeed, the extreme views of Gordon Gekko circ. 1987 had been firmly baked into the culture by 2010. The titans of the financial industry knowingly drove their own companies into the ground in the name of short-term (personal) gain. And far from being punished, they were allowed to collect enormous bonuses while millions lost their homes and their livelihoods in a recession that continues to be a haunting reality for much of the country. Once again, a seemingly contrite Gekko plays the prescient sage in the sequel: "The system is insolvent. No one knows what to do next except repeat the insanity until the next bubble blows. That'll be the one, the big one."

Six years after Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, little has changed. According to economist Emmanuel Saez, the top 1 percent of earners received 95 percent of the income gains between 2009-2012.[14] Conspicuous consumption is back on the rise, and Donald Trump, one of the most well known figures from the era of the original Wall Street, is the Republican candidate for president. In a fitting twist, Trump actually appears in a barbershop scene alongside Gekko in deleted scenes from Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.

In 2013, Martin Scorsese released The Wolf of Wall Street, another well-timed tale of "greed is good" for post-Great Recession America. The center of the story is Jordan Belfort, one of the most notorious figures in the financial industry during the 1980s and 1990s. Leonardo DiCaprio's portrayal of Belfort represents a 21st century Gordon Gekko reborn as a "financial bro." Belfort, who made a large fortune on the backs of poorly informed blue-collar investors, comes across in an almost glamorous light-one of the chief criticisms of the film. During an advanced screening at the Regal Battery Park Theater in New York City, audiences cheered Belfort's on-screen exploits, including efforts to procure cocaine and prevent the feds from ensnaring criminal members of his own firm.[15]

The blame does not rest solely with Scorsese or the cast of the film, however. Lionizing the lifestyles of the rich and ruthless has become an American pastime. Even though movements like Occupy Wall Street have emerged to challenge the narrative of 'Greed is Good,' the Gekkos of the world continue to remain appealing characters to an American public inculcated into a mantra of success at any cost. Reality television shows are but one of the myriads of ways that a zero-sum society of Hobbesian dimensions is impressed upon us. Considering this, it is no surprise that America appears to be lurching toward accepting a modern day Leviathan, Donald Trump, as president. For a world where the ethics of Gordon Gekko dominate is a world where fear is bred by insecurity, and insecurity followed perhaps by authoritarianism.

Notes

[2] Kevin Rudd, Edited extract of the speech, "The Children of Gordon Gekko," October 6, 2008, The Australian. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/archive/news/the-children-of-gordon-gekko/story-e6frg7b6-1111117670209 (accessed May 24, 2016).

[3] Wall Street , directed by Oliver Stone, 20th Century Fox, 1987.

[4] Philip Delves Broughton, "Gordon's Back," London Evening Standard, September 14, 2009.

[5] Ibid.,

[6] Thomas Piketty, Capital in the Twenty-First Century (Cambridge: Bellknap Press, 2014), 334.

[7] Ajay Apur, Niall Macleod, Narendra Singh, 'The Plutonomy Symposium - Rising Tides Lifting Yachts," Citigroup, Equity Strategy, The Global Investigator, September 29, 2006.

[8] "Inaugural Address," Ronald Reagan, Washington, D.C., January 20, 1981.

[9] "State of the Union Address," Bill Clinton, Washington D.C., January 23, 1996.

[10] Boiler Room , directed by Ben Younger, New Line Cinema, 2000.

[11] Broughton, "Gordon's Back."

[12] Andy Serwer, Fortune, "Is Greed Still Good?" June 2005.

[13] Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps , directed by Oliver Stone, 20th Century Fox, 2010.

[14] Emanuel Saez, "Striking it Richer: The Evolution of Top Incomes in the United States, " UC Berkeley, September 3, 2013.

[15] Steve Perlberg, Business Insider, "We Saw 'Wolf of Wall Street' with a Bunch of Wall Street Dudes and it was Disturbing," December 19, 2013.

American Cartel: How America's Two Major Parties Helped Destroy Democracy

By Frank Castro

Cartel: An association of manufacturers or suppliers with the purpose of maintaining prices at a high level and restricting competition.

A little over two decades ago, on December 2, 1993, the principle engineer of Colombia's infamous cocaine empire, Pablo Escobar, was killed while fleeing police on the barrio rooftops of his hometown, Medellin. Before he died he had amassed an organization of state-like power, challenging, in fact, the government of Columbia itself over the question of its extradition policies-and winning. Dubbed the Medellin drug cartel, his international cocaine operation grew to prominence functioning similarly to the corporations which dominate today's global economy. Escobar knew, by controlling every possible link in the drug chain from production to retail, he could corral suppliers under a single umbrella, dictate the price of his product, and severely limit any would-be competitors from challenging his power.

Escobar was not alone in learning from the strategies of corporate giants. If anything he was late. Few organizations have pervasively and durably monopolized a market as well as America's Republican and Democratic parties. The two dominant machines steering the U.S. electorate have consistently diminished the potential for a freer America. That's because the reality is, rather than arch rivals, liberals and conservatives are two factions of the same team. Both are capitalist. Both are imperialist. Both are white supremacist surrogates. And both are controlled by a plutocratic elite who have discovered what Escobar learned in his early twenties, that competition is best neutralized by eliminating all possible outliers. We merely perceive the two parties as markedly different because of the degree to which the spectrum of possibilities has been narrowed.

American Cartel

Politics, at its barest, is a market characterized by power-and the struggle for how power will be distributed. As CrimethInc illustrated some time ago, in this market ideas function similar to currency. Delineated by ideas which can build capital enough for the acquisition of more power, and those which might unbind power, political parties are tethered to the same basic operating principles of any capitalist enterprise. They must solidify market share in the realm of ideas and grow, wherever and whenever possible, or go bankrupt. Incubated within this constant power play, self-preservation becomes the party's central priority; and it does not matter if the ideas which accomplish this outcome are beneficial to the electorate or detrimental, so long as it achieves the imperative to survive.

Political organizations which maintain growth long enough to survive often do so by normalizing their ideological framework. When they have obtained a disproportionate amount of influence over their immediate surroundings, they can metastasize into monopolies and control large swaths of the idea-economy. New ideas about how society ought to function can enter the market to contest old ideas, but usually encapsulated within reforms incapable of unseating the dominant paradigm. Characteristic of any capitalist system, once market monopolies are established "power tends to flow upward to the top of a hierarchy, from which the masters, the ones qualified to employ it, decide matters for everyone else."

Remember the age-old question, what do all those with power want? More power. As such, two monopolies have dominated American politics for over 150 years-the Democratic Party, founded in 1828, and the Republican Party, founded in 1854. Together, they form a political cartel, or an association of political parties with the purpose of maintaining concentrated power and restricting or repressing competition. Throughout the past century its loosely managed agreements, often wholly unofficial, but embedded deep within its standard operation, have been the quasi-coordinated production, distribution, and enforcement of a set of normalized choices which reflect only the range of needs of private corporate power.

Essentially, to solidify and gain greater control, the two parties staked out a set of positions within a predetermined and standardized framework which express the basic ideas of the status quo. This way any "new" solutions about what might be possible tend toward ideas which pose no serious danger to the framework itself, which produce reforms only capable of gutting radical resistance while leaving the underlying problems intact. Any outliers are assimilated or positioned to enhance the strength of current institutions. In other words, all ideas must first be filtered through the umbrella of the Democrat-Republican cartel, which dictates the pedigree of ideas both old and new, and therefore severely limiting any competition from threatening its hegemony.

American Sicarios

Central to the project of any cartel is control. And within most drug cartels there is an armed group responsible for carrying out violence in an effort to maintain it. In Colombia they were called sicarios. Though the violence is systematically different, American sicarios are most accurately found in state institutions like the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Such an observation should not be seen as hyperbole. Even the most marginally informed American should know their government frequently has been involved in shameful acts of violence, whether it was the assassination, framing, and political neutralization of black, brown, indigenous, and left-radical movements and their leaders, or organized coups in the Middle East, Africa, and Central or South America.

Without enforcers America's political cartel simply could not exist. As I wrote in Gangs Of The State: Police And The Hierarchy Of Violence , our society operates on a clearly defined, yet often unarticulated, hierarchy of violence; and the function of politicians and police agencies is to normalize and enforce that violence. As an institution, these agencies act as state-sanctioned gangs, or, in this instance, the sicarios of America's political ideology, charged with the task of upholding the violent, racist hierarchy of white supremacist capitalism. Wherever and whenever possible, they are tasked with solidifying a monopoly of power where all violence from/by those higher on the hierarchy upon those lower can be normalized into business as usual. Any deviation from the status quo, any resistance whatsoever, is met with brutal repression.

For those familiar with United States history, the record of repression against anti-capitalist groups has been a source of considerable alliance between Democrats and Republicans. In A People's History of the United States, recounting America's anti-leftist atmosphere after Russia's Bolshevik Revolution, Howard Zinn wrote:

"In early September 1917, Department of Justice agents made simultaneous raids on forty-eight IWW [International Workers of the World] meetings across the country, seizing correspondence and literature that would become courtroom evidence. Later that month, 165 IWW leaders were arrested for conspiracy to hinder the draft, encourage desertion, and intimidate others in connection with labor disputes. One hundred and one went on trial [en masse] in April 1918; it lasted five months, the longest criminal trial in American history up to that time… [T]he jury found them all guilty. The judge sentenced [IWW president William "Big Bill"] Haywood and fourteen others to twenty years in prison; thirty-three were given ten years, the rest shorter sentences. They were fined a total of $2,500,000. The IWW was shattered."

Commonality between the United States' two major political parties has been most visible when viewed through its historically imperialist and anti-communist foreign policy. Beginning with the expansion of Soviet influence, the relationship is best described by a popularized euphemism of the Cold War Era: Partisanship ends at the water's edge, meaning, if the two factions of the cartel could ever totally agree, it must be on the dismembering of communism everywhere. As the growth of nationalist and anti-colonialist movements abroad strengthened in concert with labor movements in America, a fierce need for bipartisan crackdown to preserve the dominant regime emerged. Zinn once again lends clarity:

"The United States was trying, in the postwar decade [of World War II], to create a national consensus-excluding the radicals, who could not support a foreign policy aimed at suppressing revolution-of conservatives and liberals, Republicans and Democrats, around the policies of the Cold War and anti-Communism. Such a coalition could best be created by a liberal Democratic President, whose aggressive policy abroad would be supported by conservatives… [I]f the anti-Communist mood became strong enough, liberals could support repressive moves at home which in ordinary times would be seen as violating the tradition of liberal tolerance."

Repressive moves were exactly what happened. Imperialist consensus not only generated cohesion on issues of foreign policy, it refined a coordinated relationship of narrowed domestic power between Democrats and Republicans, providing the groundwork to enact an increasingly clandestine police-state. Repression of previous magnitude would continue against not only anti-capitalists, but against movements for self-determination throughout the '60s and '70s among black people, Puerto Ricans, Chicanos, and indigenous populations, most notably through the FBI's COINTELPRO operations. The tactics for gutting competing political currents pioneered by police agencies then became standard operating procedure, evolved into pervasive surveillance apparatuses, and have been deployed in both recent uprisings against Occupy Wall Street and Black Lives Matter protesters.

American Crime Lords

If there is a position within the cartel's classic hierarchy embodied by most liberal and conservative politicians, it would not be the rank of crime lord, but rather that of lieutenant, the second highest position. Lieutenants are responsible for supervising the sicarios within their own territories-in our case, their respective states. They are allowed discretion to carry-out the day-to-day operations of the cartel, to ensure its smooth operation. Crucial duties include voting on legislation filtered through existing idea-monopolies, which remain firmly rooted within the sanctioned political spectrum, and policing the spectrum's established borders by criminalizing outliers, especially ones that cannot be assimilated and must be repositioned to reinforce the existing framework. If they perform well enough, they become the focus of investigative inquiry and obscure the higher authority they serve.

The rank of real crime boss goes to richest of the rich. The multi-billionaires of America who-in recent years-have given up to 42 percent of all election contributions, and captured the state in the process. Brothers Charles and David Koch, owners of Koch Industries, the second largest privately owned company in the United States, are known for funding the Republican political machine, giving over one hundred million dollars to far-right causes. But the Kochs are no more alone in their policy purchasing than Republicans are in begging the super wealthy for campaign funds. Democrats have increasingly relied on it too. Money awarded to Democrats from corporate PACs now far outstrips what used to come from labor unions and trial lawyers. For instance, corporate PACs donated $164.3 million to Republicans during the 2010 election season and $164.3 million to Democrats also. Unions gave $59-$79 million.

Owning a cartel may not seem cheap, but it pays dividends. It accomplishes this not only through generating enormously disproportionate wealth, or even through buying elections, but by imposing upon the impoverished a set of values which ensure their continued exploitation. Karl Marx himself pointed this out, explaining that "the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force." For the poor American voter this means individuals are made to develop in such a fashion that their development fosters the strength of the capitalist state. At their core, working class people are constantly being sold and resold their own disempowerment, until finally we sell it to ourselves-over and over again. It is a sinister, but brilliant, stroke of genius-what better way to destroy the possibility of expropriation than to make disparity gold.

Michel Foucault described this process of perpetually re-inscribing within ourselves, and each other, the relation we have to power as the effect of unspoken warfare, a war where we build within our social institutions, and our very bodies, an ultimate disequilibrium. We self-police so thoroughly that when power's effects upon us begin self-reproducing "there is no need for arms, physical violence, [or] material constraints," just an inspecting gaze, "which each individual under its weight will end by interiorisation to the point that he is his own overseer, each individual thus exercising this surveillance over, and against, himself." In short, we become our own worst enemies. The rules and values of the rich become the self-inflicted rules and values of the poor. But they never benefit us. And we quit asking why.

American Plutocracy

Democracy describes today's America by only the most facile standards. It has never really described America anyway. Plutocracy is the accurate word. And our plutocratic overlords keep us in a hamster-wheel choosing which lieutenant we will take orders from next for practical reasons. It gives them, and the political parties they own, a sort of object permanence. We understand the prescriptions of those in power even when we cannot observe them directly; because we have been inundated by their surrogates and transformed into a passive body meant only to ratify our subjugation. Imagine waking up in a prison cell with the choice to continue sleeping on an unpadded iron bench or a concrete floor. No matter what "decision" you make, neither can destroy the cage. This is the reality of our political climate, a series of non-decisions masquerading as choice.

Ultimately, the emergence of plutocracy has not been the fault of the working class. Even though we have internalized many of the mechanisms used to exploit us, we constantly have been outpaced, outgunned, and outright demoralized. And in our attempts at democracy we have fundamentally failed to understand that political freedom cannot exist in the absence of economic freedom. They are inextricably linked, like a tree to its roots. Now that many Americans are beginning to see how capitalism has been the physical incarnation of inequality, we must move forward in this moment and reconcile with another unassailable truth: That capitalism's relation to democracy will always be characterized by adversary, not coexistence. In such an environment, America's major political parties remain henchmen to a perverse and morally bankrupt distribution of power.

On the Front Lines of Class War: Why the Fight for a Livable Wage is Everyone's Fight

By Colin Jenkins

"There's class warfare, all right, but it's my class - the rich class - that's making war, and we're winning."

- Warren Buffett (2006)

In the spring of 2004, amid the thaw of a frigid New York City winter, a brave group of Starbucks baristas began organizing. Like most service-sector employees in the United States, they were faced with the daunting task of trying to live on less-than-livable wages. Inconsistent hours, inadequate or non-existent health insurance, and less-than-dignified working conditions paled in comparison to their inability to obtain the most basic necessities. Apartment meetings, backroom discussions, and after-hours pep talks - all fueled by a collective angst - culminated into a sense of solidarity, the natural bond that occurs when workers take the time to realize their commonalities and shared struggle. On May 17, 2004, they officially announced their affiliation with the Industrial Workers of the World, an all-encompassing union with an impressive history of labor activity in the US. A petition for unionization followed suit. Their demands were simple: Guaranteed hours with the option for fulltime status, an end to understaffing, a healthier and safer workplace, and increased pay and raises.

"Solidarity Unionism," Grassroots Organizing, and the Formation of a New Front

It is only fitting that such a daring endeavor would fall under the banner of the IWW. Proudly asserting itself as "One Big Union" and "A Union for All Workers," the "Wobblies" shun hierarchical and highly-bureaucratic union models that have dominated the American labor scene for much of the past half-century, instead promoting and utilizing direct action that is member-run and member-driven. Deploying what they refer to as "solidarity unionism," as opposed to "business unionism," the preamble to the IWW's constitution echoes an old-school, militant, trade-union tone, boldly (and correctly) proclaiming, "The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of the working people" - a far cry from the timid and capitulating modus operandi of the modern adaptation. However, it is not just a much-needed infusion of labor militancy that makes the IWW attractive, it is its grassroots approach to labor organizing. In a post-industrial landscape that is overrun with underemployment, the IWW's model represents accessibility and a sense of empowerment for disconnected workers who find themselves on virtual islands - outside the potentially radical confines of a traditional shop floor. And when considering that wages have either dropped or remained stagnant in the midst of ever-growing costs of living over the past 30 years, it is no surprise that American workers are reaching their collective breaking point and seeking refuge in the form of a shared struggle.

After decades of a disastrous neoliberal agenda that has placed the American working class in an all-out sprint to the bottom, the growing needs of low-wage workers coupled with the "wobbly way" to create a perfect storm. As such, the Starbucks Union captured a vibe and sparked a movement. 2007 saw the arrival of Brandworkers, "a non-profit organization bringing local food production workers together for good jobs and a sustainable food system." Following a similar grassroots blueprint, the NYC-based organization was founded "by retail and food employees who identified a need for an organization dedicated to protecting and advancing their rights," and stands on "a simple principle: that working people themselves, equipped with powerful social change tools, were uniquely positioned to make positive change on the job and in society." Their direct-action, "Focus on the Food Chain (FOFC)" initiative specifically targets "the rapid proliferation of sweatshops among the food processing factories and distribution warehouses that supply the City's (NYC) grocery stores and restaurants" and that of which "increasingly relies on the exploitation of recent immigrants of color, mostly from Latin America and China." In an unprecedented effort, FOFC "creates space for the immigrant workers of NYC's industrial food sector to build unity with each other, gain proficiency in the use of powerful social change tools, and carry out member-led workplace justice campaigns to transform the industry." Ultimately, "Focus members and their allies are using organizing, grassroots advocacy, and legal actions to build a food system that provides high-quality local food and good local jobs."

Groups like the Starbucks Workers Union and Brandworkers created momentum. In 2010, six years after baristas came together in Manhattan, a band of sandwich makers gathered 1,200 miles westward, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Thus, the next wave of grassroots, low-wage labor activity - this time stemming from the fast-food industry and, more specifically, the corporate brand of Jimmy John's sandwiches - took hold. Sporting T-shirts that read, "Wages So Low You'll Freak" - a mockery of JJ's corporate slogan, "Subs So Fast You'll Freak" - JJ workers, also under the direction of the IWW, embarked on the first ever unionization drive for fast-food workers. Emily Przybylski, a bike delivery worker at the restaurant chain, captured the spirit of the moment. "A union in fast food is an idea whose time has come," she told reporters. "There are millions of workers in this industry living in poverty, with no consistent scheduling, no job security and no respect. It's time for change." As Labor Day 2010 approached, JJ workers at one Minneapolis store filed for a union election, and actions such as leafleting and picketing were coordinated at stores in 32 states, "from Clovis, California to Miami, Florida."

The embryo created by baristas in NYC, and nurtured over the better part of a decade by the likes of the Brandworkers and Jimmy John's workers in Minneapolis, came to a head in 2012. On Thursday, October 4th, 2012, the spread of low-wage discontent struck the epicenter of corporate exploitation, as "more than 70 Los Angeles Wal-Mart workers from nine stores walked off the job." These walkouts accompanied over "20 charges of unfair labor practices" filed with the National Labor Relation Board. A week later, Wal-Mart workers across 28 stores in 12 states, staged labor protests in the form of strikes and walk-outs. The first workers' strike in the company's 50-year history spread to stores in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Dallas, Miami, Washington, D.C., and Orlando. This movement, much like its predecessors, was largely formed out of grassroots organizing efforts that were over a year in the making. In June 2011, "OUR Walmart," a workers advocacy organization supported by and coordinated with store associates from across the country, dispatched "nearly 100 Associates representing thousands of OUR Walmart members from across the United States to the Walmart Home Office in Bentonville, Ark., and presented a Declaration of Respect to Walmart executive management." The Declaration included a list of requests: Listen to us, the Associates; Have respect for the individual; Recognize freedom of association and freedom of speech; Fix the Open Door policy; Pay a minimum of $13/hour and make full-time jobs available for Associates who want them; Create dependable, predictable work schedules; Provide affordable healthcare; Provide every Associate with a policy manual, ensure equal enforcement of policy and no discrimination, and give every Associate equal opportunity to succeed and advance in his or her career; and provide wages and benefits that ensure that no Associate has to rely on government assistance.

In November of 2012, merely weeks after Wal-Mart workers took a courageous stand, fast-food workers from McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King, Taco Bell and KFC staged protests in various locations around New York City, "demanding $15 an hour in pay and the right to form a union." A few months later, in the spring of 2013, fast food strikes gained momentum with numerous walk-outs across the country. In April, NYC workers - backed by labor, community and religious groups - staged protests at more than five dozen restaurants. Over the course of the next month, similar actions were carried out in Pennsylvania and Chicago. In Chicago, the actions spread from the fast-food industry to retail, with low-wage workers from Macy's, Sears, and Victoria's Secret also participating. On Friday, May 10th, "400 workers at more than 60 fast-food restaurants in the Detroit metro area walked off the job" in what may have been "the largest fast food strike in American history." The Detroit event was significantly effective as it "shut down multiple restaurants entirely, including multiple McDonald's outlets, a Long John Silver's, a Burger King, two Popeye's restaurants, and a KFC." "One McDonald's worker, Jay Robinson, told reporters that when he started at McDonald's over two years ago, he was paid $7.40 an hour,"writes Aaron Petkov for Socialistworker.org. "Robinson has gotten raises since then - and now makes $7.48 an hour." In his efforts to care for himself and a 2-year-old daughter, "It's a day-to-day struggle," he told reporters. "And the owners make millions." At another McDonald's restaurant, "management attempted to avert a shutdown by bringing in replacement workers, but those replacement workers (in a moment of incredible solidarity) then promptly joined the strike." This wave of low-wage labor militancy continued through the summer. On Thursday, August 29th, workers at numerous fast-food chains participated in coordinated strikes in nearly 60 cities nationwide. Citing poverty wages and the need for more rights in the workplace, "a dozen workers didn't show up for their shift at a McDonald's on 8 Mile Road (in Detroit), forcing the closure of the dining room." In Raleigh, N.C., about 30 workers picketed outside a Little Caesars location. One employee, Julio Wilson, expressed the discontent of his peers, saying the $9-an-hour he was paid was not nearly enough to support himself and his 5-year-old daughter. "I know I'm risking my job, but it's my right to fight for what I deserve," Wilson said. "Nine dollars an hour is not enough to make ends meet nowadays." In Indianapolis, "several employees walked off the job from a McDonald's outlet at 16th and Meridian streets." "Most people here have a family to support, and most people here barely make enough to make ends meet,'" employee Dwight Murray said. "We're here today because we feel like McDonald's is a $6 billion entity and it's not unfeasible for them to pay $15 an hour.

Corporate Greed, Propaganda, and Union-Busting

Despite the obvious needs for livable wages, there is much opposition. Union-busting has become a staple of employee orientations throughout the corporate landscape, with retail giants like Target and Wal-Mart regularly unleashing "aggressive anti-union push (es), and distributing pamphlets and other propaganda to employees." Corporations like Target have become notorious for making employees watch dramatized "training videos" on the so-called "dangers" of unionization in an attempt to convince workers that higher wages, more benefits, and an overall sense of dignity at the workplace would somehow not be good for them. This concerted effort to maintain a grip on poverty wages has led to the formation of intricate networks of union-busting firms that employ corporate lawyers and "anti-union strategists" to offer "continuing education" for business owners and executives. "At these seminars," writes Kim Phillips-Fein, "lawyers and labor relations consultants from the nation's top union-busting law firms come to speak to rapt, intimate groups of executives, advising them on how to beat union election drives, do end runs around the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), and decertify unions, all the while hawking their own firms' services." Of course, "union members are expressly banned." To complement this behind-the-scenes movement, corporate mouthpieces like Fox News have taken up the propaganda charge against unions by referring to them as "monopolies" that prevent non-union workers from securing jobs, coining terms like "union thugs" as a fear tactic, displaying video snippets of supposed "union violence," utilizing doublespeak like "right to work" to suggest that accepting low wages is somehow a right that should be fought for, and airing modern-day snake oil salesmen to convince its working class viewers that unions are given extra benefits at their expense. In addition to ideological propaganda, special interest groups, wealthy donors, and Super PACs fueled by the Supreme Court's infamous Citizens United decision - such as Koch Industries PAC - have placed virtual ATMs in Governor's mansions and Congressional offices to ensure political opposition to workers' needs while remaining corporate (and thus profit)-friendly.

Starbucks' corporate response to the organizing efforts made by those fateful NYC workers in 2004 was fierce. "Faced with the first serious effort in decades to unionize one of its stores, Starbucks launched what a former worker called 'a scorched-earth campaign' against pro-union employees," reported Josh Harkinson. "The union busting has just been absolutely relentless," says the worker, Daniel Gross, who was fired in 2006 due to his involvement in the initial organizing efforts at the Manhattan store where he worked. The Minneapolis Jimmy John's workers were met with similar tactics, which included bizarre personal attacks from store owners and management through social media. On March 22, 2011, after lobbying for sick days from the restaurant chain, six workers - all of whom were "key figures" in the union organizing efforts - were fired for "defaming the brand and disloyalty to the company." Shortly thereafter, another "pro-union" employee was berated and humiliated on social media by owners and managers, some of whom went as far as posting the employee's personal telephone number on a public Facebook page and asking people to text the employee to "let him know how they feel." An Assistant Manager then posted disparaging personal comments about the pro-union employee, making fun of his appearance and including a picture of the employee for all to see. In addition to these reactive measures deployed by some companies, corporate behemoths like Wal-Mart have relied on proactive union-busting programs for years. In 2007, Washington-based Human Rights Watch released an extensive report accusing the retail giant of "routinely flouting its workers' human rights through a sophisticated strategy of harassing union organizers, discriminating against long-term staff, and indoctrinating employees with misleading propaganda." The report includes examples of "workers forced into unpaid overtime and an alleged strategy of squeezing out long-serving staff who are more costly than low-wage, temporary, younger workers," highlights "elaborate tactics to stop staff from coming together to fight for better conditions," and even describes detailed measures such as "focusing security cameras on areas where staff congregate and shifting around loyal workers in 'unit packing' tactics to ensure votes for union recognition are defeated." The report also found that each store manager, as a part of their training, receives a "manager's toolbox" manual which instructs them on "how to remain free in the event union organizers choose your facility as their next target," and that managers are also given access to and instructed to call a 'union hotline' if they suspect staff are discussing unionization - an action that would deploy corporate specialists from the company's headquarters to "address the situation."

The reasons for such opposition are clear. Corporate profits remain at an all-time high because companies are able to pay poverty wages to their employees and rely on government welfare programs to cover the rest (ironically, while also enjoying historically low corporate tax rates ). Additionally, the economic storm that has lingered over the heads of the American working class for the past five years has equaled a virtual paradise for corporate America. Three simple facts highlight this current economic landscape:

• Corporate profit margins just hit another all-time high as companies are making more per dollar of sales than they ever have before.

• Wages as a percent of the economy just hit another all-time low as companies are paying employees less than they ever have as a share of GDP.

• Fewer Americans are working than at any time in the past three decades as companies don't employ as many workers as they used to. As a result, the employment-to-population ratio has collapsed.

Maintaining this environment has become a top priority for wealthy investors, the corporations themselves, and the politicians who are funded by both. By gutting the middle class through the destruction of unions (as of 2011, only 11.9% of the American workforce was unionized - a 70-year low) over the past three decades, corporations have enjoyed a relatively clear path towards establishing these beneficial conditions of today - where 20% of the population owns 89% of all "privately held wealth;" and where the top 1% of the population owns 42.1% of all "financial wealth (total net worth minus the value of one's home)." In addition to corporate-friendly policies that became commonplace starting with the Reagan years and continuing through both Bush', Clinton, and now Obama, the emergence of globalization has allowed for the replacement of American workers through the process of offshoring and the subsequent exploitation of extremely impoverished populations of workers abroad. Therefore, this latest surfacing of labor militancy from within the ranks of the domestic, low-wage, service-sector workforce represents the biggest threat - not only in its tangible fight for economic justice in the form of a livable wage, but also in its potentially revolutionary orientation which identifies with the modern working class and, most notably, the working poor - that corporate hegemony has faced within the geographic confines of the U.S. in decades. "If these guys are seen to succeed, it could really light a fire, because the dissatisfaction is unquestionable," labor historian Peter Rachleff explains. "The corporation knows that, and they have a lot of resources [and] plenty of lawyers" to combat these working class movements.

Workers' Victories and Building Momentum

Despite a well-funded and highly-coordinated opposition, there have been many victories and positive developments along the way. The mere emergence of a new labor resistance - let alone the fact that it has developed from within the low-wage service-sector and from one of the most disenfranchised demographics of the working class - is very encouraging. While some have questioned the roots of the movement and the extent of the involvement of more traditional, hierarchical unions like SEIU (Service Employees International), there is no denying the politicization and sense of empowerment that is being internalized by the involved workers themselves. Considering the near-death of working class consciousness in the U.S., this development simply cannot and should not be underestimated. The infusion of a direct-action model that insists on a worker-controlled approach to labor battles (i.e. the IWW) is certainly a leap forward. And this method has proven effective in more ways than one. On Tuesday, December 28, 2008, NYC Starbucks baristas were vindicated by National Labor Relations Board judge, Mindy E. Landow, when she ruled that Starbucks had "illegally fired three workers and otherwise violated federal labor laws in seeking to beat back unionization efforts at several of its Manhattan cafes" and ordered Starbucks "to pledge to end what she said was discriminatory treatment toward workers who supported the union at four of its Manhattan shops: 200 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, 145 Second Avenue at 9th Street, 15 Union Square East and 116 East 57th Street." Two years later, the IWW Starbucks Workers Union, following a "determined campaign of grassroots actions in Starbucks stores and communities all over the country," secured another victory when the company's corporate office gave in to demands for workers to receive time-and-one-half pay for working on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. "We're deeply moved to have been able in our modest way to increase respect for Dr. King's legacy while ensuring that Starbucks employees who work on his holiday are fairly compensated," said Anja Witek, a Starbucks barista and SWU member in Minnesota. "This is a great example of what baristas and all low-wage workers can achieve by getting organized and taking direct action in support of workplace justice issues." In February of 2012, after a long and drawn-out battle with Jimmy John's, a federal judge ruled the company illegally fired the six employees who had campaigned for sick time, and ordered the company to "reinstate the workers with back pay within 14 days." In a spirited testimony, Erik Forman, one of the fired employees, remarked:

"It has already been over a year since we were illegally fired for telling the truth. For all the hard work and dedication of the NLRB's civil servants, employers like Jimmy John's prefer to break the law and drag cases through the courts for years rather than let workers exercise their right to win fair pay, sick days, and respect through union organization. The dysfunctional U.S. labor law system gives Mike and Rob Mulligan (JJ franchise owners) and their cronies in the 1% carte blanche to trample on workers' rights. Jimmy John's workers, and the rest of the 99%, will only be able to win a better life by taking our fight from the courtroom back to the shop floors and the streets."

The latest low-wage workers strike, which took place on December 5th across "100 cities through the day," signified, according to the Guardian's U.S. affiliate, "a growing clamour for more action on income inequality." In front of a Walgreen's in downtown Chicago, nearly 200 protestors chanted, "We can't survive on eight-twenty-five…Walgreen's, Walgreen's, you can't hide. We can see your greedy side!" In Washington, D.C., dozens of workers carrying signs singing loudly, "Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way, it's no fun, to survive, on low low low low pay." "In New York City, about 100 protesters blew whistles and beat drums as they marched into a McDonald's chanting "We can't survive on $7.25." This collective outrage has empowered workers while also placing the problem of income inequality back on the public agenda. Major media sources that had barely uttered a word about such inequality in recent decades have now begun to showcase it. The Catholic Church's latest Pope, Francis, has made waves during a near-month-long tirade exposing the flaws of capitalism, recently asking, "How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market drops 2 points?" and referring to the "widening gap between those who have more and those who must be content with the crumbs." And calls for a federal minimum wage increase have gained steam with U.S. Labor Secretary, Thomas Perez, writing on his blog, "To reward work, to grow the middle class and strengthen the economy, to give millions of Americans the respect they deserve - it's time to raise the minimum wage." Though, of course, the Democratic Party's proposal to raise the current rate from $7.25 to $9.00, or even $10.10 in other proposed legislation, would hardly equal a significant change for tens of millions of working poor. Still, despite reformist-based rhetoric from politicians, the agenda is being shaped by the brave workers who have risked all to take a stand.

The battle cry "Fight for $15" has stuck. Numerous small and localized labor organization like Detroit 15 - a group of fast-food and retail workers from the Detroit area fighting "for fair wages and the right to form a union without interference" - and Fast Food Forward - a movement of NYC fast-food workers coming together to "build community engagement, hold corporations and their CEOs accountable, and to raise wages so that all Americans can prosper" - have sprung up amidst the movement-at-large, helping to form collaborative efforts with community and religious organizations which possess built-up social capital to be used, and to make the collective decision-making process more accessible to the workers themselves. Socialist candidate, Kshama Sawant, who made the "Fight for $15" cause a key part of her election campaign, made history by winning a seat on the Seattle City Council in November. Sawant's victory was significant not only for working class interests that have been in dire need of a true "left wing" for decades, but also for the fact that her platform was able to pull local Democrats toward a more authentic (though still reformist), left-wing, working-class agenda. As Seattle Times columnist, Danny Westneat, reported:

"You can't look at the stagnant pay, declining benefits and third-world levels of income disparity in recent years and conclude this system is working. For Millennials as a group, it has been a disaster. Out of the wreckage, left-wing or socialist economic ideas, such as the 'livable wage' movement in which government would seek to mandate a form of economic security, are flowering."

The Future of the American Working Class

If you're reading this article, chances are you are a member of the working class - not because the article specifically pertains to your interests but because, by definition, a large majority of us are compelled to work for a wage or salary to survive. The Occupy slogan which may seem a bit hyperbolic on the surface - breaking society into two camps: the 99% and the 1% - is actually not far off. The 99% essentially refers to the working class - those of us who are underemployed, unemployed, making minimum wage, making an hourly wage, working multiple jobs, earning a salary, working as "salaried professionals," working "under-the-table," etc.. In other words, if you weren't born with enough privilege and generational wealth to carry you through life, you are likely working for a wage in some form or another, or would be compelled to do so if left to your own means.

Jay Robinson, Julio Wilson, Dwight Murray, and their fellow employees are correct in their estimation: Multi-billion dollar corporations can and should pay their workers a livable wage. Considering how far removed we are from the age-old concept of workers "enjoying the fruits of their labor," a seemingly minimal expectation of earning a livable wage for fulltime work has become a revolutionary notion. But it shouldn't be. This issue is not just a low-wage problem - it's a working class problem. It's a middle class problem. It's a societal problem that destroys living standards for everyone outside of elite circles. And, while it is nowhere near the end-all, be-all of solutions to a toxic system, the premise of "a chain being only as strong as its weakest link" is certainly an improvement over the neoliberal, "greed is good" mantra which has dominated monetary and governmental policy over the past thirty years. For low-wage workers themselves, besides allowing the dignity of "earning a living," a livable wage infuses more expendable income into the economy while allowing for the opportunity to live without a chronic reliance on public assistance. "If you earn your money through wages (unlike many of the 1 percent, who earn through things like investments and a tax system biased in favor of capital gains over income) then a higher wage, minimum or otherwise, would mean that you'd spend the additional dollars, creating jobs for other workers," explains market analyst Marshall Auerback. "You'd pay down your mortgages and car loans, getting yourself out of debt. You'd pay more taxes - on sales and property, mostly - thereby relieving the fiscal crises of states and localities. More teachers, police and firefighters would keep their jobs. America would get a virtuous cycle toward higher employment and, more importantly, the cycle would be based on a policy which creates higher incomes, not higher debt via credit expansion." Furthermore, the establishment of livable wages eases the burden placed on the rest of the working class, which has contributed approximately $7 billion per year to fund public assistance programs that serve as a form of subsidization for Fortune 500s. That figure, from an October 2013 report by UC Berkeley's Labor Center, includes four major social benefits programs that low-wage workers are forced to use in order to provide basic necessities for themselves and their families. Specifically, the amount is broken down to Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program ($3.9 billion), the Earned Income Tax Credit ($1.9 billion), food stamps ($1 billion), and Temporary Aid for Needy Families ($200,000), and doesn't include other publicly funded programs like child care assistance, WIC, or section 8 housing, among others.

For those who see low-wage workers protesting for higher pay and think, "why don't they just get a better job" or "why don't they go to college, like I did, and earn a degree?" - think again. In 2012, nearly 300,000 Americans with college degrees were working minimum wage jobs. Furthermore, nearly one-half of all recent college graduates with jobs are underemployed. "Of 41.7 million working college graduates in 2010, about 48 percent of the class of 2010 work jobs that require less than a bachelor's degree, and 38 percent of those polled didn't even need high school diplomas." Even worse yet, 40% of recent college graduates are unemployed. In other words, the idea that earning a degree guarantees a livable wage is exactly that - an idea, no longer based in reality. For those who see low-wage workers striking for a livable wage and think, "what do they expect, they're working at McDonald's" or "these aren't careers we're talking about" - think again. Fact is, since the arrival of globalization, American manufacturing companies - the traditional suppliers of a livable wage - have jumped ship, moving their operations overseas to exploit impoverished workforces that are compelled to labor for next-to-nothing. Since this shift, America's working class has become largely reliant on the service industry. In other words, low-wage, service sector jobs are now careers - not by choice, but by necessity. The 2008 economic crisis and subsequent "recovery" only intensified this shift as "mid-wage occupations ($13.84 to $21.13 per hour) constituted 60 percent" of job losses during the 2008 recession, but only 22 percent of the job gains during the recovery. In contrast, "low-wage occupations ($7.69 to $13.83 per hour) constituted 21 percent" of job losses during the recession, while representing 58 percent of new jobs created during the aftermath. This is a staggering displacement that has seen once-livable employment virtually replaced by now-unlivable wages. As a result, the "characteristics of minimum wage workers" are changing, as 75 percent of them are now adults, many of whom have dependents to care for, and 70 percent of who have at least a high school degree.

The American working class has found itself in a breakneck "race to the bottom" during the corporatist era. However, recent developments stemming from "solidarity unionism," low-wage worker revolts, and a backlash against neoliberal policies and the extreme income inequality which they have bred have shown that American workers are, in fact, beginning to "rise like lions after slumber." If the thundering wave of low-wage labor militancy that has swept the country is any indication, the slumber is officially over. And if the "dramatic actions by and on behalf of workers" in places likes Seattle the past few months - including a "defeat of concessions at major grocery chains, Boeing workers' big 'no' vote on concessions, a $15 minimum wage voted in for airport workers, and election of a socialist (a candidate who made a city-wide $15 minimum wage the centerpiece of her campaign) to city council" -represent a microcosm of things to come, the proverbial race to the bottom - whether it has struck bedrock or not - is over. Because of their emergence as a viable sector of embedded labor, courageous, low-wage workers in the service industry now represent the front lines of an ongoing class war. They represent, as Dave Frieboth notes, "a general uprising of young, displaced workers trapped in low-wage jobs;" people who "looked at the wage disparities and saw that, as a simple matter of fact, the system isn't working." The further they can be kept down in terms of wages, benefits, and overall standards of living, the more effectively their lowly presence may be used as leverage to drive all working Americans' standards down. Thus, their status affects the status of the working class as a whole. They are not only fighting for themselves - they are fighting for all of us. In this sense, "an injury to one" truly is "an injury to all." Their fight is everyone's fight.

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