De world ain’t level

One of the many things I always try to do when abroad is to scour foreign newspapers for news items that indicate trends and developments in the world which can or do impact on our daily lives. Far too many of us are so consumed by the minor things around us that we often fail to take the wider picture into consideration. It is vital that we not lose sight of the global perspective.{{more}}

However before we take a glimpse at a couple of these issues, permit me to again dwell on a issue of primary relevance to Vincentians, that is the burning issue of air access. Vincentians have been perhaps the most faithful Caribbean people in terms of our support for the regional air carrier, LIAT. In spite of being shafted so many times, in spite of the bitter experiences in Barbados, we have never abandoned LIAT, not even when our own former Prime Minister encouraged us to do so in support of Carib Express, not even Stanford and Caribbean Airlines seemed to be a realistic alternative.

Our support is not only on an individual level, as LIAT customers, our taxpayers money is heavily involved too. We are subsidising this airline as no other nation in the Caribbean. One would therefore think that Vincentians would get, no not priority treatment we are requesting, just decent, proper treatment as loyal customers and prime shareholders. Regrettably, that is yet to be realized. On Monday of this week I got a first-hand experience of the LIAT treatment.

Travelling from London with BA, several of us had checked through our baggage straight to St. Vincent as in the norm in seamless international travel. Lo and behold, on our arrival in Barbados we made our way to the LIAT Connections desk. Next to it, the Connections personnel for Mustique Airways, Grenadines Airways, Caribbean Airlines and BA (to London) were busy servicing passengers. Not so LIAT. After 40 minutes, no one turned up so we were all forced to go to the Airport Information Desk. There we were told ‘the person” who should have been at the Connections Desk, was “not there today”, that LIAT sent an apology and asked us to check through Immigration, collect our luggage and then go and check in at the LIAT desk.

As if all this were not enough inconvenience, at the LIAT desk, our seamless checked-through luggage was re-weighed, tags were changed and we were charged overweight. This is nothing but HIGHWAY ROBBERY, DOWNRIGHT EXTORTION. The excuse about “the person” not being at the Connections Desk “today”, is obviously a ruse, to allow LIAT to fleece passengers. Because it did not just happen on Monday, it is happening all the time. If this is how LIAT is treating us, we will have to let Prime Minister Gonsalves know that we will tolerate it no longer. If we cannot get proper service, then NOT A DAMN CENT FOR THEM!

RICHISTAN

Now for the news items. One which grabbed my attention was a newspaper review of a book written by a reporter from the Wall Street Journal, one Mr. Robert Frank on the super-rich in the US. He calls it “RICHISTAN” and it portrays the life of the more-than rich, if not always famous. You wouldn’t believe his findings of the life of profligacy by this elite. There are now over 1000 billionaires in the US, as against 13 in 1985 and the number of millionaires is swelling, 227,000 more were added in 2005. The total wealth of these American millionaires is estimated at US$30 trillion, that is more than the combined. Gross Domestic Products of China, Japan, Brazil, Russia and the European Union, combined.

The excesses flow from this. Thus there are social clubs like Solstia with a joining fee of US$875,000 and annual fee of US$42,000, giving access to super luxury homes worldwide, private yachts in the Caribbean, helicopter excursions etc. There is the Triangle in Beverly Hills, where houses have to be over the US$10 million value qualification, the Jewel Coast on Madison Avenue in New York for exquisite (and expensive) jewelry, and the Met Circle Society (you have to be worth over US$100 million to quality). Conspicuous consumption is at an unprecedented height. So these Super Rich shun Rolex watches, you can buy a Frank Miller instead for a cool US$736,000. No normal pens for them, the jewel-encrusted Mont Blanc at a mere US$700,000 is the go. And as for restaurants and bars, you can have a martini on the rocks at the Algonquin Hotel in New York for only US$10,000 (there’s a diamond at the bottom of the glass), there are US$50 burgers and, omelettes for US$1000. In LA (Los Angeles) you can have Bling mineral water, just US$90 per bottle. All this in a country where 36 million people live below the poverty level. Worse, the richest hardly pay taxes. In the fifties corporate tax in the US made up 33 per cent of federal income in 2003 it was a tiny 7.4 per cent. Over 80 per cent of the largest US companies paid no tax in at least one of the first three years of George W. Bush’s administration. It has become so bad that even some of the super billionaires are virtually saying “we can pay more”. Warren Buffett, the 3rd richest man in the world has openly confessed that his taxes amount to 17.7 per cent of his income while his secretary has to pay 30 per cent of hers in tax.

That is the unfair world of capitalism misery for workers, for Africans in Chad, Darfur and Bunkina Faso, hunger in Bangladesh and Nicaragua, undermining the livelihood of banana farmers in Dominica, St. Lucia and St. Vincent, all so that a few could live a life of luxury. And then they tell us that “rising oil prices” are to blame for our hardship. Yes prices keep going up as the speculators and the oil giants continue to fleece us. There are even predictions that oil could rise to US$95-100 per barrel soon. You know what’s the other side of the coin?

Shell has just announced profits of US$13.7 billion for the first six months of 2007. This mean that Shell is making profits of over EC $2300 per second. Another oil giant BP, is complaining of falling profits. It made only US$9 billion for the same period, approximately EC $1560 per second.

You see why donkey say, “De world ain’t level.”