On Italian Workfare

(Letter)

4 December 2018

Comrades,

In WV #1144: Italian Government Steps Up Racist Attacks, the translation states the “‘guaranteed minimum income’ would only undermine the unions”…

Perhaps it’s the translation but surely the ICL would not oppose a guaranteed minimum income for workers. Perhaps that needs to be clarified.

Red Greetings
Lawrence

WV replies:

Lawrence refers to an edited translation of an article from Spartaco No. 82, October 2018, the paper of our comrades of the Lega trotskista d’Italia, which explained the anti-working-class measures of the new coalition government of the far-right, racist Lega (formerly Lega Nord) and nationalist Five Star Movement. The promise of a “guaranteed minimum income” (or “Citizens’ Income”) had been understood by many as a government subsidy to keep people’s income over a certain miserable threshold.

In fact, the Citizens’ Income is a cage for the poor and a threat to organized labor. Recipients must work up to 16 hours a week for free in the public sector (undermining union jobs) and accept one of their first three job offers, no matter how unsuitable. As its name indicates, the program pits Italian citizens against immigrants, most of whom are entirely excluded from it.

The bourgeois opposition Partito democratico (PD) and elements of the trade-union bureaucracy have claimed that the Citizens’ Income would be a “waste” of money on the poor and a “disincentive” to work. In response, Five Star Movement head Luigi di Maio underlined the punitive nature of the program, saying, in an interview last October: “Those who lounge around at home on their couch will not receive a single euro as everyone’s days will be filled with training and public works…. And whoever cheats will get up to six years in jail.” The derisory level of the Citizens’ Income and eligibility for it were further slashed after the Italian government implemented the demands of the European Union (led by German imperialism) to make heavy budget cuts. The International Communist League opposes the imperialist EU on principle, and our comrades of the LTd’I seek to win the Italian working class to fight for Italy out of the EU and its euro currency.

It’s a joke that this scheme will open up decent employment options to millions of people in Italy, given the huge unemployment in many areas, especially the South. Moreover, when recipients take a job, their Citizens’ Income will be paid to their new employer, effectively subsidizing the bosses to replace existing workers. Another reactionary aspect of this scheme, in a country where many adults still live with their parents, is that eligibility is based not on an individual’s situation, but on that of a family unit. This measure further oppresses women and youth by tightening the ties that bind women to husbands, and children to their parents.

Our Italian comrades oppose the Citizens’ Income as an attack on unions and the poor, just as the SL/U.S. opposes anti-union workfare schemes here. Many reformists have been critical of the Citizens’ Income for falling short of the “Universal Basic Income” touted by social democrats (and some libertarian techies). Such fake socialists peddle the myth that capitalism can be reformed to serve the interests of working people and the poor. In reality, no welfare system can eliminate the misery that afflicts broad layers of the population in capitalist society.

We Trotskyists do not accept the unemployed being kept in misery at the margins of society; we aim to link their fate to the struggles of the working class. Only class struggle can defend the working class from the pauperization that is integral to the system of production for private profit. Bring the unemployed into the ranks of labor by fighting for jobs for all at union pay and conditions! Spread the work among all—for a shorter workweek at no loss in pay! For a massive program of public works at union wages and under workers’ control! These demands, which are vital for the proletariat, show the necessity of overthrowing the decaying capitalist system and establishing a workers government.