workers | Terry Bell Writes

Browsing All posts tagged under »workers«

Middle class is not defined by income alone

March 11, 2020

Beware the anger of those individual workers, who finding themselves jobless, realise they were conned into believing that they had ascended to middle class status and supposedly shared greater interests with the owners of capital than with the other sellers of labour, the working class majority.

Declarations of war & pie in the sky

February 28, 2020

South African finance minister Tito Mboweni's 2020 Budget was a classic example of pie in the sky and it therefore — and unsurprisingly — triggered declarations of war from the labour movement. The only fulsome support seems to have come from from those at the top of the financial pile.

SA — still awaiting a workers’ party

May 21, 2019

South Africa’s May 8 national and provincial poll effectively demolished an enduring myth, beloved of many bosses and union-bashing free marketeers: that union bosses call the shots and members blindly follow, doing exactly what they are told.

What about the workers?

May 8, 2019

Much has changed on the South African political scene since the transition from apartheid in 1994. In the sixth national election since then, the votes of more than 2 million unionised workers could be crucial to the final outcome.

A classic case of economic ill health

November 3, 2018

The gap between the 16% of South Africans who have private health insurance and the 84% who rely on the crumbling public health system, has grown by another R20 billion. Small wonder that there is increasing anger being expresed.

A wage to fuel the fires of discontent

October 14, 2017

The South African government intends to introduce a minimum wage of R3,500 a month in March next year. But, given the reality of the cost of living and the level of existing poverty pay, this seems likely to fuel further the fires of discontent.

As Brexit looms, London’s migrants keep building

September 6, 2017

Immigrant Irish “navvies” (labourers) are credited with much of the construction work of the last century that made London the city it is today. And now once again, it is the sweated labour of migrant workers that is changing the face of Britain's capital.

The painful reality of junk status

July 1, 2017

More pain is on the way for South Africa as a result of the junk status credit rating given to the country. But such pain will be passed on — by government and business — to the consumers. Expect resistance.