On 1st May, 1886: a great day of mobilisation in all the factories of Chicago (United State) to demand the 8-hour working day. This strike set the basis for the struggle to change the labour and living conditions of workers all over the world, which is still going on today.
In fact, activists of WMCW movements find today with many workers and their families who experience very difficult living conditions due to the precarious work and low wages. Some do not eve have the bare minimum to survive. In some countries, such as Dominican Republic, the social security system only serves to enrich the intermediaries known as “Administrators of Health Hazards” and the Pension Funds which do not guarantee any illness coverage or a fair income in retirement or unemployment. The poorest are excluded from the system.
The economic policy, combined to the post pandemic situation, benefits only one group, while the most of the population can only cover a minimum of the basic family basket of goods. According to UN, the economy in the differente regions in the planet, is not all favourable. It states that for Latin America and the Caribbean, the economic outlook is complicated by the external international conditions that are normalising the macroeconomy, and by a high persistent inflation.
New technologies cause the suppression or devaluation of certain types of jobs, pushing many peopel into the informal economy without any kind of protection or security.
At present, the consequences of COVID-19 pandemic persist, and the war between Russia and Ukraine worsens further the living conditions of the poorest: scarcity of first need goods and rising prices. More and more caravans of migrants in search of a better life are heading for other countries that reject them.
The globalization of so-called “free” market promotes the destruction of planet through the exploitation and natural resources mainly by mining companies, as it happens in Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Chile, Brazil, among others. This model is based on the state corruption and impunity. Thus in our countries, after the fall of a government, we sometimes see those who leave, brought to justice by corruption. But waht is stolen is never returned. This accomplice and ineffective state system breeds poverty and its procession of criminality and macho communal violence.
I came so that they might have life and have it more abundantly. Jesus’s words resound many times in the emptiness. In WMCW we ask ourselves, did those who designed this economic model take into account the workers and their families?
John Paull II called to this economic model “savage capitalism” that damages the life of people, because it fragments the working class, because it promotes the accelerated destruction of natural resources of the planet, because it generates despair, because it traps us in consumerism and anaesthetesis our abilities of reaction.
Pope Francis expresses that “A new economy, inspired in Francis of Assisi, today can and must be an earth-friendly economy, an economy of peace. It is about transforming an economy that kills into an economy of life, in all its dimensions.
It is necessary an economy that creates opportunities for a decent work, that it does not exploit the worker through degrading working conditions and exhausting working hours”.
Work that does not care, that destroys the creation, that endangers the survival of future generations, does not respect the workers’ dignity and it cannot be considered decent.
The Gospel and Social Doctrine of Church urge us to face this reality and to renew our Christian commitment: denouncing injustice and announcing messages of hope, the Good News.
May the sacrifice of workers in 1886, touch us, call us to organise and fight.
As organised Christian workers we are joined in a same aim: making a more just world for everyone, especially for the poorest.
Together, we must march and mobilise all over the world for a decent social security, so that everybody is guaranteed a basic income, enough to cover their family needs. Trade unions must work together, in solidarity, as one family, as one body.
Job securtiy, enough incomes for family, improved health services and a decent social security are inmediate objectives, because they are matters of life.
It is a challenge to involve more young people in the struggle for social and working rights, to foster and to demand an economic order aimed at the comprehensive development that lead to the elimination of poverty.
For an economy for the common good, for an economy of life
Long life to men and women in the world of work!
For a strong and united 1st May!
LONG LIFE A STRONGER, MORE UNITED AND IN SOLIDARITY WMCW!
MCW Dominican Republic
