He national strike of this May 9th he had a historical impact. The enormous social unrest was expressed from below in the face of the adjustment measures of the Government and the IMF against the working majorities. The activity was practically paralyzed in factories, transportation, banks, airports, public administration, among many sectors, with the exception of some businesses and few activities. The images spread through the media and social networks and left no doubt about the strong compliance.
According to the Government’s estimate, what was stopped being produced on this business daywhich they call the “cost” of unemployment, reached a magnitude of US$520 millionan estimate close to that published by the Argentine Business University (UADE), of US$ 544 million.
“The calculation taking the estimated monthly GDP as of today and making adherence assumptions that we consider reasonable would give about USD 520 million per day in cost,” the economic team stated.
#YoParo: “that everywhere you see / the power of the working class” pic.twitter.com/soIyMImFo4
— La Izquierda Diario (@izquierdadiario) May 9, 2024
“According to the preliminary estimate of the UADE Institute of Economics, the economic cost of the general strike on May 9, 2024 would be $489,272 million or USD 544 million. This figure is equivalent to 1.1% of May’s GDP or 24.3% of what would have been produced on the day. This calculation assumes that not all sectors and regions will lose equally during the strike, and that even 20.1% of what was initially lost is recovered within the month,” they explained from that study center.
The Government seems very concerned about the “losses” caused by the stoppage of activity for a single day. But His real concern is that the working class is aware of its strength and stands up. He points out the US$500 million of unemployment, but he cares little about the US$ 2,000 million than April 30 (just 9 days ago) disbursed to the International Monetary Fund regarding maturities of debt interest. This is equivalent to 90% of the reserves that the Central Bank had accumulated last month.
Total strike at the Dock Sud Petrochemical Pole. Informa @Lucho_Aguilar2 for La Izquierda Diario pic.twitter.com/Qh1WIO3TuV
— La Izquierda Diario (@izquierdadiario) May 9, 2024
The working class is the producing class. The one that, with its work applied to the means of production, produces the goods and services that are consumed every day, the class that moves the world. Without entrepreneurs the world works, but without workers it doesn’t. It is no coincidence that the powerful cry for one day of unemployment, but then for the remaining 364 days they say that it is the businessmen who “produce”, those who “give jobs” and those who produce wealth. A deception. It is the businessmen who make their profits at the expense of other people’s work.
Unemployment and its “costs” reveal the strength that workers havepublic and private, salaried and self-employed, from the countryside and the city, from the south to the north, because they are the “essential”, those who with their work generate the value of the entire economy. That is the force that, mobilized and in action, could put in place a plan of struggle and a general strike until the adjustment is defeated.
With the forcefulness of the measure workers highlighted the need to face layoffs, loss of pensions and salaries and the different attacks in favor of economic power and financial capital. Despite this, the leaders of the union centers called the strike in isolation and did not propose giving it any continuity to defeat the Bases Law and the entire Milei and IMF plan.
The working class makes the world move ✊🏾✊🏾✊🏾#YoParo for the reinstatement of dismissed colleagues in the state and against the labor reform#TodxsAlSenado with a new strike and mobilization when the basic law is discussed pic.twitter.com/dkW0RSaPcn
— Lorena Itabel (@Lorenaitabel) May 9, 2024
The 9M strike is a blow to the Milei government despite the limits imposed by union bureaucracies, and as such, it is a very valuable starting point to defeat in the streets the attempt to impose a profound change in the coordinates of the country with the Bases Law and the regressive tax reform. This attacks workers and their working and living conditions and grants enormous benefits in favor of big businessmen, landowners, banks and international financial capital. That’s why you have to follow it.
It is necessary to demand from the CGT and the CTA that on the day the laws in the Senate is summoned to a new strike and mobilization to reject them and prepare the way of general strike that destroys the entire adjustment plan of Milei, the IMF and the big employers.
Source: www.laizquierdadiario.com
