Thinking

When the royal wedding took place in April and the whole country was shut down for a day no one said it would ruin the economy, despite the fact that taxpayers in the UK subsidised it. So why does a public-sector strike for one day bring up predictions of scuttling the economy? Strikers today are in public services (teachers, firefighters, nurses, construction workers), and all in areas which the current UK government has threatened with ‘austerity measures’. Basically, this means that these workers would get less money when they retire–and have to work to an older age, and pay in more each year, to get it. This is how the UK government wants to save money. Not by asking the financial sector to clean up its act, or asking people who make, say, over £60000/yr (the City is London’s financial district) to take a pay cut. By asking people who make these figures to lessen their pension. How fair is that? To me it is not right that a nurse might–at her peak–make less than half of what a banker does. But beyond my personal valuation of a nurse’s work over a banker’s, it doesn’t seem right to me that someone–anyone–should have to give up their post-retirement security (or have to work longer or pay more than other people to get it). I am sure there are people who would argue their own willingness to work til they are 70, or to work 80-hour weeks, or whatever it is. And someone else has already answered them better than I could. But I don’t want those things. I don’t want them for anyone else, either. I would like to live in a world where people can work until a reasonable age–maybe 60?– and then retire, and be taken care of. I don’t think that’s impossible. There doesn’t seem to be a shortage of money. There does seem to be a lack of equitable ways to share it. So that’s why I’m in solidarity with the strikers here today. This isn’t only about the actual effects of these potential cuts. It’s also about the kind of society those cuts symbolise. I don’t want to live in that society.