English

25/7/2019

[Editorial] The final stretch

Activity in the pedestrian walkway of San Martín. The two weeks remaining until the primaries will strengthen the mobilization to dispute each workers' and popular vote for the par

With only two weeks left until the primaries, the two blocks that are looking to polarize the election have reinforced their message to the businessmen to gain their support. The agenda imposed by big local and international capital finds its way to both sides of the ‘rift’. After all, both Macrism and PJ-Kirchnerism share the main point: to maintain the IMF's guardianship over Argentina, with all that that implies. First, of course, the payment of a usury debt that is already around 90% of GDP, denominated mostly in foreign currency and with short-term maturities. Whoever assumes the presidency will have to face payments of over 150,000 million dollars during the four years of his term, a third of which is with the IMF. As this is an impossible figure, a reprogramming of payments is already being openly debated, which would only be accepted in exchange for the application of a furiously anti-labor program, which contemplates labor, pension and tax reforms first. In summary, the program that Macri wanted and could not carry forward after his 2017 electoral victory, because he was partially blocked by the popular mobilization of December 14 and 18.


Given this pressure from capital, whose spokespersons demand without euphemism to be able to fire workers without paying a peso, 'lower labor costs' by ignoring collective bargaining agreements and advancing in the elimination of capital taxes to replace them with new consumer taxes, Macrism has been excited with a rebound in the polls, since it appears as the force that, in a more open way, embraces this program. If it is an operation mounted by media close to them or a reality, we will only know on August 11. But what we do know now is that if this trend turns out to be false, the period going from the primary to the general elections will be one of greater crisis. It is that a negative result for Macrism will produce the exit of all the capitals that have entered over the last few weeks to take advantage of the usury interest rate that Argentina pays, which has no correlation with the other countries of the region. Thus, the ‘pax of the exchange rate’, which is already creaking these days, could plummet at the speed of sound. Anticipating this situation, the BCRA (central bank) has just announced new measures that reward banks, such as a higher remuneration for reserve requirements. The self-defined students of the monetarist school have no qualms about emitting a scandalously high monetary issue, if it serves to feed the benefits of the banking system. But even a close election for Macrism does not remove this scenario altogether, because the bankruptcy of the country is above and beyond the electoral results. The IMF's tutelage over Argentina has aggravated its vulnerability, to the point that any change in the international trend can trigger massive capital outflows and new devaluations.


CFK, Capitalist


The duo Fernández-Fernández has taken note of the possibility of an uptick of Macrism in the polls and is attempting to neutralize it by making itself, in its own way, the program of big capital. In her recent public appearances, Cristina Kirchner defined herself as more capitalist than Macri and even accused him of being "Soviet", showing a high dose of McCarthyism in her political discourse. Already in the past, when she was president, Cristina Kirchner attacked the “red flags” on March 24 and accused the workers who defended their jobs of wanting to “storm the Winter Palace”. The lesson that must be taken into account is that an open struggle on the part of the workers is sufficient for the fascist that all nationalist leaders have inside of them to come into the open.


The message directed by Cristina to the employers also goes to the workers, in the old story of the tendencies towards conciliation of classes that affirms that if the employer is doing well, the worker is also doing well. According to Cristina Kirchner, what would unite the interests of both social classes would be the impulse to consume, since the workers want to consume and the capitalists cannot obtain the benefit they seek if consumption does not materialize. It is a populist vision of capitalism, which does not take into account its real dynamics.


The thing is that capital gets its benefit from unpaid work to the worker, and therefore must apply pressure to increase the rate of exploitation. This leads to the labor force being paid below its true cost (the cost of living). And low wage levels reduce consumption. If capitalism could harmonize private benefit with popular consumption, it would have found the formula for its eternity, because it would have overcome its recurring crises of overproduction. Cristina Kirchner knows it from her own experience. His government ended in 2015 with workers having average salaries well below the cost of living, with 35% of the workforce employed as casual labor and 30% of the population below the poverty line.


Alberto Fernández, on the other hand, has repeated until he got tired that the current price of the dollar is undervalued, anticipating that if he is elected president, he would begin with a new devaluation of the peso. The social pact that they promote would thus begin with an even greater confiscation of workers' wages.


Let them pay for the crisis


Defining herself as "more capitalist than Macri," Cristina Kirchner has made a contribution to the political clarification of the electoral campaign. She has made it clear that her strategy is exactly the opposite to that of the Left Front, which states "let the capitalists pay for the crisis." That this is not about mere slogans is shown by the whole program proposed by them and proposed by us. While they propose to pay the debt and maintain the IMF's protection over Argentina, we propose to repudiate the debt and break with the International Monetary Fund; while they propose to advance in labor reform either by means of a law or by the modification of the collective bargaining agreements (as  is ocurring right now with the pacts sealed by the PJ union bureaucracy), we propose the rejection of any reform, the defense of the collective bargaining agreements, a minimum wage equal to the cost of living and the distribution of available working hours among all. While they defend charity-level pensions and want to move forward with pension reform similar to Bolsonaro's in Brazil, we propose the paying back of all employer taxes, the validity of 82% mobile for all retirees and the management of the Anses (state pension fund) by active and pensioned workers, while they defend submission to the Vatican, we propose the legalization of the right to abortion and the implementation of the law of integral sexual education in all educational establishments under the direct control of teachers and students.


At stake in the two weeks remaining until the primaries is the need for the workers and the left to bolster their mobilization in order to dispute each workers' and popular vote to the parties of the regime. The Partido Obrero is mobilized all over the country to call for a vote for the Left Front-Unity  to put an end to the IMF regime, so that the crisis be paid by the capitalists and for a solution for the workers and the left.


With these slogans, voted by our XXVI Congress, we will organize our rally of July 27 in Argentinos Juniors indoor stadium, which will be cloned throughout the country at simultaneous rallies. We call on all workers and the left to attend as a show of force for a political solution to the national crisis in favor of the workers.





Spanish version