Let them eat of the cake of despair

[hawkwing_lb]

The unemployment rate in this country is at approximately 14.2%. Latest estimates indicate that it will remain roughly stable at that level, with perhaps a .5% drop partly attributable to emmigration, through to the end of 2014. ESRI. Meanwhile, the tax burden on the ironically-named "coping classes" has increased significantly over the last couple of years, and will increase still more. Money quote:

"The biggest burden has fallen on those earning €17,542 to €20,000, who have collectively paid three times more tax in 2011 than they did in 2010 -- or a shocking 215 per cent increase.

Those earning €20,001 to €30,000 are paying 36 per cent more tax than they did in 2010 and those earning between €40,001 and €50,000 are paying 23 per cent more...

...the 118 people in the country who earn more than €2m paid 0.3 per cent less in tax in 2011 than they did in 2010; the 1,148 who earned between €400,001 and €450,000 paid just 1.1 per cent more in tax.

"If you look at the group earning between €17,543 and €20,000, the tax take tripled for that group between 2010 and 2011. But for those earning between €100,000 and €125,000, the tax take only marginally increased," [Dowds] said.

(Independent, 12 Feb 2012.)

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I'm terrified, guys. I am not supposed to be this afraid about the future, to the point where I'm lying awake at night, thinking how the fuck do I make it next year if there's no funding?

Or what if I make it all the way. Become Me, PhD. And no one will hire me. And I have no money, because I have had no funding, and no work experience, because I have been doing research.

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Fun fact. If you are unemployed, the government thinks you should work a 40-hr week for 238 euro, on the so-called "National Internship Scheme." Which is about 6 euro per hour. The minimum wage is 7.20 euro.

Go here and look at the listing of "internships." Now tell me. How much "internship" training do you think a salesperson, bookkeeper, or IT support person will receive? Tell me that most of them aren't real jobs, which would be better filled by real hires at a living wage. Tell me that making these positions into government-supported "internships" is better for the country than having six- or nine-month contract employees.

Go on. I dare you. Tell me.

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A monthly rail ticket costs in the region of a hundred quid. That's twenty-five quid a week. Our two-person household doesn't eat extravagantly, but we can't seem to keep our food and sundries shopping much under a hundred quid. (And shopping for two is not that much more expensive, on the whole, than shopping for one.) Now add in lighting, heating, telephony. The occasional purchase of work-appropriate clothes or shoes.

I say this for the purposes of information. But the difference between 238 euro per week (NIS) and 288 euro per week (minumum wage) is rather large, in perspective. Fifty euro is a fortune if you don't have it.

You can live with dignity on minimum wage if you're not responsible for anyone other than yourself. If you can share a bedsit rental, you might even be able to save - but most people in Ireland, even most unemployed people, have responsibilities and families. Debts taken on while they were in employment and had every expectation of remaining employed.

So this?

This is not fucking good enough, dear government. Fail better, assholes.

Comments

[green_knight]

238 Euro a week? In the same situation in Britain, the income is £54, or rought £1.50 per hour.

Not that I approve of the Irish government, but ours are the bigger bastards by far :-(

(The situation here is bad enough that I have an employment agency who want to give me work and can't find any, and they're professionals at this and people come to them and say 'please find me an employee').

[hawkwing_lb]

Conservatives are the worst.

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

I know. The whole system is corrupt, backwards and riddled with unfairness. I can only hope that more and more people will realise this and push for change. If there are enough of us, even the governing classes eventually have to listen.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

For the salary of, say, the Taoiseach, ten people could be employed at 20K euro per year. Which is a living wage. For a ministerial salary, ten people at 16K per year.

The unemployment rate in my local area is significantly above the national average. I've heard estimates from between 25% to 40% unemployed/underemployed. But what the NIS and suchlike schemes do is work to depreciate the value of labour - which affects everyone in the workforce. If you can replaced by an "intern" on JSA, what's to stop your boss from doing just that? It's another way to erode labour protections.

Honestly, the only way it could be reasonably fair is if the companies using the "interns'" labour were paying you minimum wage = benefits. Otherwise, this is just another way for governments to subsidise corporate profits at the expense of the ordinary worker, who is now denied the time and energy (let us not forget to factor in commuting!) to search for a better job/start a co-op/work for the SVdP. Welcome to the poorhouse! Pick more hemp!

The reason we have benefits in the first place is because we as a society decided that letting people starve in the street because of bad luck was generally a bad idea. So what happens if you go on this "internship" and your manager decides to be an abusive asshole to you because you're one of the undeserving poor jobless? If the stress of looking for work is driving you into depression and suicidal ideation and you spend weeks staring at the wall and wondering if you should just kill yourself? Will they stop your benefits if you walk away from an "internship" you hate? Is that what's next?

(At least if you have a job you hate you at least have some agency.)

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

The more I look at the way most western capitalist states are now being run, the more I find myself heading back towards my socialist roots, I have to say. Because this system is broken.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

I weep. And I'm still one of the lucky ones.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

Also, I am sorry. The whole thing makes me absolutely ragey. Were it not for the ideology of capitalism, we could feed, clothe and house every single human on the globe in reasonable if not excessive comfort. Instead, we get national governments saying AUSTERITY SAVES LIVES and killing any chance of actual recovery.

(Invest! Invest in your people, governments)

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

You have every right to your anger: I share it.The whole thing is rooted in selfishness, greed and the advantage of a tiny minority.

[jennygadget.livejournal.com]

(Invest! Invest in your people, governments)

THIS. a thousand times: this.

[puddleshark.livejournal.com]

'Internships'? What a weird distortion of language... The posts listed all look like 'jobs' to me. It's hardly job creation if the government is arranging for unpaid or underpaid workers to take the place of real workers.

Paying people the minimum wage to work for not-for-profit organisations, at projects that benefit the community, that might sting a bit less... The wages might be crap, but at least you'd have the satisfaction that you weren't lining someone further up the foodchain's pockets.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

This! This is my point!