THE MAGAZINE OF THE DEMOCRATIC SOCIALISTS OF AMERICA • SUMMER 2020 • VOL. XLVIII NO. 1 • dsausa.org

SAFE WORKING CONDITIONS FREE PUBLIC COLLEGE INCOME SECURITY

MEDICARE FOR ALL FREEDOM FOR DETAINEES MORATORIUM ON EVICTIONS everywhere creating lists of people From the National Director and organizations to call on when your friends, neighbors, or someone you don’t know strikes for their safety or 'risis equals opportunity hazard pay. Because the strikes are &= 1%6-% 7:%68 condo work sites or UAW workers coming. They have already started. back to make cars that no one can buy. Here is a brief sampling of what nly a Police will continue violence as always your fellow DSAers are doing across crisis— in communities of color. And the virus the country to build grassroots working actual “O will spread, with a hospital system class power. or perceived—pro- decimated by decades of Republican duces real change. NEW ORLEANS DSA built a coali- and Democratic austerity cuts and re- When that crisis tion of unions and community structuring to maximize profi ts and a occurs, the actions groups to demand the conven- growing pool of patients without health that are taken de- tion center spend $100 million insurance— including 27 million who pend on the ideas for laid off hospitality workers. lost it since COVID-19 struck. that are lying The stage is set for a crisis of legiti- NORTH JERSEY DSA organized around. That, I believe, is our basic macy. It could allow us to build a new “phone zaps” and car caravan function: to develop alternatives to ex- world on the rubble of the old, if we protests demanding the local isting policies, to keep them alive and make the choice to fi ght for socialism. ICE detention center release de- available until the politically impossible But it will not happen naturally. tainees while also doing mutual becomes the politically inevitable.” Friedman’s ideological descendents are aid to provide food for hundreds This quote is not from Italian Marx- hard at work manufacturing consent. of families. ist philosopher Antonio Gramsci, but They say relief makes workers lazy, that LOS ANGELES DSA Ƽ lmed a di- rather our late arch nemesis, neoliberal we want to be the canaries in the coal rect action stunt at the Ritz Carl- economist Milton Friedman. He and his mines, that half measures are enough, ton with its 900 empty rooms acolytes were responsible for the mur- and that the government cannot afford and $270 million in taxpayer der of our comrades abroad and built to save our people, though it was able subsidies to highlight how the think tanks and astro turf operations at to hand trillions of dollars to corporate mayor made ultimately empty home for the same reason DSA has long interests. And when we cannot “save” promises to move unhoused fought to bring socialist ideas back to the global economy through sacrifi cing residents into hotels during CO- the center of political conversation in lives, hawks in both parties will defl ect VID-19. this country: Ideas have power. With the blame and push for war with China. help of Bernie Sanders and his millions From CHICO, CA to NYC, many Socialists have two tasks: to envi- of supporters, socialists are back. chapters are doing aid work sion the alternative world we can build Now a crisis is upon us, the scale of directly or via Solidarity Funds together, and to organize. which is almost unimaginable. Will we to raise and distribute relief. A vision of safety and abundance, of move in the direction of democratic so- TWIN CITIES DSA effectively in- cooperation and care means lifting up cialism, or barbarism? tegrated its aid work as a tactic workers demanding to make ventilators, I write this piece as the govern- to support those in need while farmers giving their produce and dairy ment is on the cusp of forcing millions also enlisting people to pressure to hungry people, and hospital workers of people back into danger, absolv- their local and statewide govern- providing care—all by printing money ing bosses of liability and accepting ments to halt evictions. the way most politicians seem happy to the coming deaths. In fact, the choice do for the already fi lthy rich. PHILADELPHIA and PHOENIX they prefer we make is between dying A fi ght to build that world means DSA organized call-Congress at work or starving at home. Donald joining mutual aid networks rooted in phone banks to push for the Trump’s horrifi c handling of the pan- our communities, organizing tenants to Emergency Health Care Guaran- demic will be compounded by a global withhold rent, fi nding creative ways to tee Act, empowering Medicare economic crisis whether or not we force pressure politicians for relief, or build- construction workers back to luxury ing support for our candidates. It means CONTINUED ON PAGE 15

Executive Editor: Maria Svart Founding Editor: Michael Harrington Editor: Maxine Phillips Democratic Socialists of America promotes a Editorial Team: Laura Colaneri, Christine humane international social order based on equitable Lombardi, Stephen Magro, Don McIntosh, distribution of resources, meaningful work, a healthy Christine Riddiough environment, sustainable growth, gender and racial Democratic Left (ISSN 1643207) is published quarterly at equality, and non-oppressive relationships. Equality, NPC Liaisons: Marianela D’Aprile and solidarity, and democracy can only be achieved through P.O. Box 1038, New York NY 10272. Periodicals postage paid at Tawny Tidwell international political and social cooperation aimed New York, NY (Publication No. 701-960). Cover Art: Val Ross, primroseworkshop.com at ensuring that economic institutions beneƼ t people. Subscriptions: $25 regular, $30 institutional. We are dedicated to building truly international social Postmaster: Send address changes to P.O. Box 1038, New Layout: Don McIntosh movements—of unions, environmentalists, feminists, York NY 10272. (212) 727-8610. Signed articles express the Book Review Editor: Stephen Magro and people of color—which together can elevate opinions of the authors and not necessarily the organization. Online Editor: Christine Lombardi global justice over brutalizing global competition.

4%+) 2 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 7911)6 2020 )pidemics are powerful agents of change Yellow fever, cholera, and smallpox left behind improvements in government and health.

&= J9(-8H ;%0Z)6 0)%:-88 %2( 0);-7 %. 0)%:-88 s it true that some clouds have silver linings? When it comes to epidem- Iics, the answer is yes. With a few notable exceptions, epidemic infectious diseases, even as they caused suffering and death, have enhanced government’s ability to control future outbreaks and protect the public’s health. The traditional examples of positive and long-term public health responses are yellow fever and cholera. These two diseases brought intermittent terror and death to U.S. cities in the 18th and 19th centuries. They also successfully stirred Boston Red Cross workers making anti-inƽ uenza masks in 1918. (National Archives) cities to spend money for needed, yet In 1947, when smallpox threatened ics wreaked in the past. COVID-19 has expensive, projects to tame the un- New York, the health commissioner exposed cracks in our public health sanitary urban environment, which was embarked on a public information cam- system that cannot manage disease test- thought to cause disease, such as sewer- paign that combined isolation of cases ing or even provide protective gear for age and water-supply systems and gar- with free vaccination for all New York- health workers. bage disposal works. Without the high ers. Frequent and honest multilingual As with past outbreaks, the corona- degree of fear engendered by the sud- messaging and equity in vaccine distri- virus epidemic exposes opposing social den onset of epidemics (as opposed to bution, with help from the U.S. Public and political forces. COVID-19 has endemic diseases such as tuberculosis), Health Service, led to public trust and produced a public health crisis in the lethargic city governments would never a just and effective intervention. People United States, which is ripe for positive have spent such large sums of money on waited patiently in long lines that reform, but it has also produced some projects of such magnitude. Epidemics wound around city streets, and within of the fi nger pointing toward Asians also increased the power of public of- weeks, 6,350,000 city residents were that could signal insidious inequities. fi cials to control infectious diseases by vaccinated and the epidemic averted. If historical precedent holds, we have allowing them to forcibly place patients The history of epidemics teaches us a chance to use this crisis for sweeping deemed dangerous to the public health two important lessons. First, because changes in public health institutions. We in isolation hospitals. It took the shock epidemics elicit fear and focus the pub- must seize this opportunity to mount of epidemics to force the changes. lic’s mind, they can energize govern- a concerted effort to use the public’s This power was not always used pos- ment actions. But second, those govern- fears and the focus generated by them to itively. During a smallpox epidemic in mental actions can elicit ethnic, class, promote new, fair, and just investments Milwaukee in 1894, for example, health and racial strife as “others” are identi- in public health programs. As we work offi cials forcibly seized children from fi ed as carriers of infection, as in the to create robust and equitable public their mothers’ arms in the immigrant Milwaukee example or when gays and health, we could fi nd a silver lining. sections of the city while allowing mid- Haitians were blamed for HIV/AIDS. dle-class, native-born families to harbor A movement to promote public health Judith Walzer Leavitt, professor their sick children in their own homes. benefi t must take advantage of the fi rst Coercion under such unfair condi- emerita of the history of medicine lesson and address the second. Fair- at the University of Wisconsin- tions led to month-long rioting in the ness and public trust, as the New York streets and the impeachment of the Madison, is the author of The smallpox example demonstrates, are the Healthiest City: Milwaukee and the health commissioner. A confl uence of indispensable conditions for developing ethnic-group mutual mistrust and politi- Politics of Health Reform. Lewis A. robust public health institutions. Leavitt, M.D., is professor emeritus cal party competition building on this During the past few decades, despite mistrust led to the diminution of health of pediatrics at the University of SARS, MERS, and H1N1 scares, our Wisconsin-Madison. department powers and budgets that government has neglected public health, lasted for years. forgetting the devastation that epidem-

7911)6 2020 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 4%+) 3 The headline promised a lot: ‘Major unrest is going to “The Coronavirus Pandemic Demonstrates the Failures have to happen’ of Capitalism.” What fol- lowed wasn’t in Jacobin, /%2(-78 Dissent or In These Times, 1%00)88 but TeenVogue.com. The 8%0/7 83 article, by Kandist Mallett, lives up to the title: “Sell- 'H6-78-2) ing your labor in a capital- 031&%6(- ist marketplace just so you don’t end up on the street is horrible and unnatural, and we shouldn’t have to live this way,” she tells readers, before looking at how to respond to this moment of crisis. Democratic Left edi- torial team member Chris- tine Lombardi interviewed Mallett by phone and email.

How does someone who has writ- Occupy! Where you saw police creat- As someone with a background in ten for Teen Vogue and Blavity.com ing riots out of street art. community organizing, do you see (“serving the multifaceted lives of Occupy L.A. was probably one of the your writing as organizing? black millennials”) turn out to be longest-lasting occupations, and I got in No! [Long pause.] Yes! I do. such an anticapitalist? Was it growing very deep. The greatest thing about Oc- Many of us have been admiring Teen up in Southern California? cupy for me was the relationships I was Vogue’s lefty turn over the past few I went to California State University at able to build. From those relationships, years; your work there includes a Long Beach, where I majored in politi- we could work to either organize direct smart take on Iran and sanctions, and cal science and studied community or- actions or to share space when sponta- they have a labor editor talking about ganizing. The prof who was my mentor neous actions were happening in L.A. a general strike! What does it look was a low-key anarchist. I was kinda (for instance, in response to the killings like from the other side? liberal, getting jaded with the two-party of Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown). Their politics editors are very open to system. Then came the fi nancial crash, There was a lot of internal struggle, leftist ideas, to be sure. But I have to during my senior year. I guess you because there were so many ideas of laugh sometimes: [after that coronavirus could say I’ve been anticapitalist since what people thought Occupy should piece] some guy Tweeted it, writing then. I spent the next few years teaching mean. In the end, the destruction of “Teen Vogue goes full Marxist.” English in Vietnam, living in Ho Chi Occupy wasn’t from the state but from I don’t understand how someone can Minh City. The year I got back to the the inability of a lot of the white par- say they’re a capitalist these days, with States, Occupy happened. ticipants to deal with race. I think that’s the damage all around us. important to note, because a lot of DSA people came from Occupy.

4%+) 4 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 7911)6 2020 Your piece was partly about seizing the locals can best support the struggle? my Venmo.” Furthermore, I think it’s possibilities of this moment, when ev- Whiteness doesn’t just exist as an identity important for non-white, especially black eryone’s suddenly semi-socialist. In this but as a power structure. I think often it’s DSA members to have their own organiz- transformational/dangerous moment, easy to look at the Right and say they’re ing space and for the larger DSA network what organizing do you think needs to white supremacist, and their political ide- to fi nancially support those efforts. happen? als are guided through their whiteness. There’s been a wave of headlines about The failures of the government have been But the same exists on the Left or with COVID-19’s disproportionate impact exposed. I would love to see some uni- liberals. There’s been this trend with a on African American communities. As fi ed effort to respond. And I want to see lot of leftist platforms to romanticize Charles Blow just wrote in the New social movement outside the Democratic the white working class and to push this York Times, “the devastating effects of Party. Because Ohio happened, because class-fi rst analysis. But any class analysis this virus may be as much about pre- Wisconsin happened. Even the new wave that doesn’t also include a racial analysis existing social conditions as pre-existing of legislators we elected are in danger of is a white supremacist one. If we look at medical ones.” What does that mean seeing their work erased. DSA on a local level, I’m curious to see for you as a writer, as an activist? I really think we need a global effort, what’s the racial makeup of its members It’ll be important to continue to report on one that builds our own sort of safety or how many of those white members are how the pandemic has impacted black net. We need to push for debt forgiveness participating in gentrifi cation of black or communities as well as how much the across the board, for a universal basic brown communities. The issue of white states’ recovery efforts have reached those income (and not just the [Andrew] Yang ness exists in all political organizing communities. We also have to consider $1,000 a month). where white people are included. Inevi- that black people disproportionately make tably, white people’s ideas, words, senses What inspires you and gives you hope? up people at the absolute lowest rung of of humor, shared history and cultural When people hit the streets, I’m inspired. society: homeless people, incarcerated references, and so on end up taking vast The culture’s shifting, and people are talk- people, people with chronic illnesses and amounts of space, generating a sense of ing about general strike! Though we need substance use issues, and so on. These are discomfort and ultimately self-censorship to look closely: If everyone’s at home, all markers of poverty, hence why Stuart among people who implicitly know what constitutes a strike? I’m inspired by Hall says, “Race is the modality through they’re on the outside. It’s not just Chapo all the networks that are protecting peo- which class is experienced.” ple’s homes against eviction. I love it that Trap House, it’s also the wider white at- tention economy—one that uplifts so What do you see as your own role in community gardens, mutual aid systems, helping imagine a better tomorrow? are all political now. Direct action, unify- many redundant white platformists. And The elite were all expecting us to riot, ing that strength and collective energy: here’s where it matters for materialists: and there’s no doubt that major unrest is That’s how we win. That attention brings in real income. That income becomes wealth, which perpetu- going to have to happen. I’ll keep writing When I asked in our fi rst conversation ates white supremacy across decades and about ways we can live outside the current what you hope DSA members learn generations. We must understand that paradigm, and focus where our attention from this piece, you responded diplo- class redistribution also means racial is most needed. My next piece is about matically that at least in SoCal DSA redistribution of material wealth. And if prisons, whose populations are super-vul- meetings, “A lot of these spaces—not a there’s no chance of the state doing that, nerable. The way the state treats people at lot of black people.” Many of us in DSA then at least among the Left, reparations the bottom of the society should inform recognize its whiteness as a real prob- along intersecting class and race lines the counter demands of any revolution we lem. How do you think DSA and its must be a constant practice, e.g., “Here’s hope to incite.

In this time of COVID-19, DSA is Our list at dsausa.org/calendar is updated offering more national programming regularly with at least one call a week, to support your organizing. whether political education, organizing training, or national campaign strategy. Design by Alan Duda; artDesign by Jon Stachewicz by

7911)6 2020 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 4%+) 5 Blue Delliquanti 8he pandemic that brought us together AIDS revealed indifference of those lost to the pandemic and cel- political constituency in national poli- to LGBTQ lives … and led ebrating the health care workers, fi rst tics. Congress fi nally passed legislation, responders, and community volunteers such as the Ryan White Care Act and the community to organize. who risk their own health to provide the Americans with Disabilities Act, necessary services to the ill. During the that acknowledged the need to respond &= J3H2 (’)1-0-3 AIDS epidemic, the media barely ac- to AIDS. Homophobia and oppression he COVID-19 pandemic has ex- knowledged the spread of AIDS until a are still with us, of course, but we can posed the inadequacy of a health well-known celebrity—Hollywood icon see positive changes as a result of that care system pounded by decades Rock Hudson—was revealed to have epidemic. T AIDS. When media did cover the topic, These long-term effects of the AIDS of alternating Republican and neoliberal Democratic rule in Washington—the they tended to do so in ways that placed epidemic reverberate as I think about lack of access that many people have, blame on people with AIDS, as in the the current health crisis. So many is- New York Post the insuffi cient capacity to treat pa- headline of October 6, sues—guaranteeing access to health tients during an emergency, the extreme 1987: “The Man Who Gave Us AIDS.” care, the right to at least a basic fi nan- shortage of needed supplies. And it has In the early years of the AIDS epidemic, cial security, and the need of workers demonstrated the fi nancial insecurity of stories circulated within the LGBTQ to have a collective voice—have sur- a signifi cant portion of the population. community of hospitals and medical faced with urgency. And the efforts of But it also has shown how people can staff who would have nothing to do with protesters in many places around such Newsweek come together, and especially how those someone who had AIDS. A issues as canceling rent payments and on the front line are prepared to work cover announced that “fears are grow- preventing evictions suggest that some beyond the limits of what seems pos- ing that the AIDS epidemic may spread are ready to take action. Can a virus that sible in order to save lives. beyond gays … to threaten the public at infects—pardon the expression—“the As a gay man who lived through the large.” public at large” have the power to bring AIDS epidemic of the 1980s and 1990s But the AIDS epidemic also pro- people together to effect permanent, (I do not remember the word “pan- duced a transformative response from progressive change? Will this pandemic demic” being used in those years), it is the LGBTQ community. Massive give legislative agendas like the Green impossible for me not to draw dramatic numbers of people came out, joined New Deal more plausibility? It will not and enraging contrasts between the re- organizations, and engaged in politics be until the results come in from the fall sponse to AIDS and the response to CO- and protest. The budgets of community elections that we will know whether the VID-19, and not to see how much the organizations, both service-oriented and pandemic will have raised a broad and former has infl uenced the latter. When activist, grew dramatically. Paid staff deep enough dissatisfaction with the Donald Trump began his daily briefi ngs, became far more common. The resourc- Trump White House and the Republican there were perhaps 400 deaths in the es available to LGBTQ people-of-color Senate to open some doors to a progres- nation. By contrast, Ronald Reagan did organizations reached an unprecedented sive agenda. We must make sure that the not give his fi rst public speech about level. By the end of the 1980s, the ma- answer is yes. AIDS until almost six years into the jor story about AIDS had become the epidemic, at which point the death toll direct-action protests occurring across Chicago DSA member John D’Emilio exceeded 25,000 in the United States. the country as ACT-UP (AIDS Coalition is a historian of sexuality and social Within weeks of the fi rst COVID-19 To Unleash Power) groups took to the movements, the author of Lost Prophet: streets. By the beginning of the 1990s, The Life and Times of Bayard Rustin and, death, media outlets overfl owed with with Estelle Freedman, Intimate Matters: coverage commemorating the lives the LGBTQ community had become a recognized, though still controversial, A History of Sexuality in America.

4%+) 6 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 7911)6 2020 )mpty shelves and zombie fracking Ƽ rms Having left no fat for the Zombie Ƽ nancing: the only) example of what the Bank for famine, U.S. capitalism 8he costs of fracking International Settlements calls “zom- bies”— companies that cannot meet in- is uniquely vulnerable to In 2000, the United States was the world’s largest importer of petroleum, terest payments on their debt, much less COVID-19. sucking in over 10 million barrels a day. pay off the principal. Bankruptcies and We consumed a quarter of the world’s job losses have already begun. &= &-00 &%6'0%= petroleum output while producing less ;ho gets what e don’t yet know the long- than 10%. In 2019, the United States By early May, Congress had authorized term signifi cance of CO- was a net exporter of petroleum and pe- over $2.2 trillion to fi ght COVID-19. WVID-19 for the United troleum products—and the world’s larg- For working people: a one-time $1,200 States, but it has already exposed some est producer. We were chasing the holy check; four months of a $600/week underlying fault lines in our political grail of energy independence. increase to unemployment benefi ts; economy and, of course, in class power. plus, for the fi rst time, unemployment The biggest cracks to date are the costs benefi ts to gig workers. Lose your job, of the “lean manufacturing” model, the “There is a Magic join the more than 30 million others un- perils of zombie fi nancing in the fossil employed and seeking help, and wait in fuel industry, and the enduring power of Money Tree. lines at overwhelmed food pantries. fi nance. It blooms whenever But the bulk of the spending is for there is the political businesses, big and small. The process ;hat’s with the shortages? for receiving this largesse is faster and The United States is still the second will for it to bloom. easier than navigating the rickety un- largest manufacturing nation, after Chi- We must demand employment systems of various states. na. So why do we fi nd ourselves short And there are no constraints on execu- of ventilators, masks, Personal Protec- that the Tree tive pay or dividend payouts. All of this tive Equipment, and so on? continue to is to be expected: We live in a capitalist Over the past four decades, U.S. political economy with a very high con- manufacturers of everything from bloom—for all of centration of wealth. iPhones to drugs have adopted a “lean our needs.” manufacturing” model: just-in-time -s there an opening for the 0eft? supplies, outsourced component pro- The other day a (non-economist) friend duction, and global supply chains. Our What happened? asked me, “Where is all this money global supply chains are geographically In two words: hydraulic fracturing. coming from?” Taxes? No. The Federal concentrated in China and rely on only Or in one word, fracking. Reserve and Treasury simply created one or two sources (that is, no redun- The environmental problems with it in response to congressional legisla- dancy). Single-sourced supply chains fracking are well documented. But little tion. There is a Magic Money Tree. It reduce costs and increase profi ts, pleas- attention has been paid to the fi nances blooms whenever there is the political ing banks and investors, but leave us of the industry. Fracking wells have a will for it to bloom. We must demand vulnerable to disruptions in the global relatively short life. Companies must that the Tree continue to bloom—for trade system. Consider these examples: constantly be drilling new ones. And all of our needs. This is crucial in the this doesn’t come cheap. So money fi ghts ahead, because another zombie is 80% of active pharmaceutical must be borrowed—many billions over ingredients used in drugs manu- emerging into the light: austerity. You the last decade. know the message: We have been profl i- factured in the United States are Well, you may say, so what? The produced abroad; gate, and now we must pay—by cutting companies will pay it back out of their public services and jobs. Already some 97% of antibiotics used in the profi ts. But fracking companies are not governors of low-wage states are threat- United States are produced in profi table. Instead, companies have ening to deny unemployment benefi ts to China; paid off old debt by issuing new debt. workers who stay off the job because of (A rolling loan gathers no loss, as they 95% of surgical masks used in health concerns. say in banking.) The bulk of this debt the United States are produced Oh, and we’ve probably gotten rid is BBB-rated, one notch above junk. abroad; and of fracking—at a cost of about 2.5 mil- Investors, including pension funds, have lion jobs, with no replacements planned. 70% of N95 (and other tight- bought this new debt because it paid Green New Deal, anyone? Ƽ tting respirator masks) are higher rates. imported from other countries, COVID-19 has changed these cal- primarily China. culations. Plunging prices and a glut of Bill Barclay is a member of the oil have illuminated the reality: Frack- Chicago Political Economy Group ing companies are a perfect (but not and DSA Ventura County CA.

7911)6 2020 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 4%+) 7 Illustration by Megan Ganey:ADAPT protesters in Las Vegas, 1993 (Photo: Tim Olin) Image viaɸLives Worth Living,ɸa 2011 PBSɸdocumentaryɸƼ lm directed by Eric Neudel and produced by Alison Gilkey. 7helter in place? ;elcome to our world When the epidemic is over, saved the Affordable Care Act in 2017 Missing” virtual rallies to highlight the will disabled people again by staging a sit-in in the halls of Con- invisible population of people who are gress. homebound due to chronic illness. be treated as expendable? Now, as we craft a socialist response COVID-19 has thrown back the to the pandemic, it’s essential that we curtain on our healthcare system, which &= 'H6-78-2) 031&%6(- %2( include the voices of disabled people is really a patchwork of unstable parts, 7927H-2) 19+6%&- and those with chronic illness. Not only unaffordable for many. A morning scan is it the right thing to do, it will make of pandemic headlines brings an assault n the Netfl ix documentary Crip us smarter and stronger as a movement. of numbers: infection rates, death tolls, Camp, we meet a group of teenag- For those of us who are chronically shortages of protective equipment. We ers hanging out together in a camp I ill and disabled, “sheltering in place” watch as COVID-19 slams prisons, in the Catskills during the 1960s. Like and “social isolation” describe our lives nursing homes, group homes—any- most teens, they’re into pairing off to before the pandemic. We know what where people live in close quarters, make out, party, and play sports. it’s like to be cut off from the world tended by low-wage people now tagged The difference? They’re all disabled. and stuck at home. Through this, we’ve as “heroes.” In a dramatic turn of events, the teens developed ways to build coalitions and Whether we are in one of those grow up and take on the U.S. govern- community. We share resources and populations or not, we can see the ment, staging protests that pave the help each other through the struggles harsh light those numbers throw on our way to the passage of the Americans we must face. We organize. society’s foundational inequities: The With Disabilities Act (ADA). We’re already casualties of our disease hits harder in communities of One camper, Judy Heumann, went failed healthcare system. Our lives have color, made vulnerable by centuries of on to lead a 25-day sit-in in San Fran- been treated as separate and unequal by deprivation. It also disproportionately cisco demanding rights for the disabled the government. We’ve been locked out harms anyone who is sick, disabled, or in 1977. Of her camp experience, she of the job market thanks to prejudice elderly—especially if they’re institu- told the New York Times, “[W]e could and inaccessibility. Yet, we go on. tionalized. be ourselves and it absolutely helped us We fi ght for our rights even when Disability justice isn’t separate from formulate our futures.” we can’t physically show up to do so. racial and economic justice. It’s a key Heumann and her peers laid the For example, long before the corona- component. At a mid-April panel on groundwork for the next wave of ac- virus crisis, ME Action held “Millions “Grounding Movements in Disability tivism. This includes ADAPT, which

4%+) 8 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 7911)6 2020 Justice,”Azza Altiraifi pointed out that Now, we’re even more vulnerable, as Central NJ is working closely with ableism has capitalism at its heart: “A as many of us have underlying condi- ADAPT, these battles are best fought in bodymind that isn’t ‘productive’ to tions that make us more susceptible to partnership with the disability/chronic capital is categorized as disposable.” In COVID-19. And far from protecting us, illness community. the 19th century, Talila Lewis elaborat- many states are trying to enact laws that Its activists have worked hard to de- ed, scientists created disease categories put disabled people at the back of the velop cures and shed a light on even the with which to make black bodies less line if it comes to healthcare rationing, rarest of illnesses. On Twitter, Smith able. They came up with pseudoscien- responded to concerns about personal tifi c terms: drapetomania made blacks care aides: “Those who rely on PCAs try to escape the plantation, and work for survival aren’t getting what we stoppages were due to dysaesthesia ae- “For those of us need. [Having to fi ght for someone to thiopica, which caused a black worker bathe you, for example—or administer to act “like a person half asleep.” who are chronically your daily medications—benefi ts no To this day, chronically ill people ill and disabled, one.] A rubric tool at the state level, are subjected to seemingly arbitrary ‘sheltering in and bureaucratic “one size fi ts all” red disease categories: neurological dis- tape is leaving people at risk and vul- orders, pain syndromes, somatoform place’ and ‘social nerable. Help the disability community disorders, functional disorders, the list isolation’ describe get healthcare justice and their needed goes on. All have the gloss of science care coverage.” but are often meaningless and can be our lives before Such expertise will be even more infused with prejudice. Many more the pandemic. We crucial as we approach a post-COVID women than men are diagnosed with period, which could come with its own fi bromyalgia, for example—especially know what it’s like chronic-illness crisis. There is ample black women. Because there’s no one to be cut off from evidence that the virus attacks neuro- test for it, anyone with pain can be logical systems and organs, and we branded with it. the world and know that post-viral chronic fatigue In the relentless placing of profi ts stuck at home. illnesses are likely. When the headlines before people, we no longer have health have disappeared, will those affected care, but the healthcare “industry.” Through this, we’ve again be treated as expendable? Care is organized around procedures developed ways to Disabled activists remind us that we (tests, surgeries), not the health of any build coalitions and are all one illness or one accident away one consumer or patient. That health from disability. Those who survive to may require ongoing care, but that’s of- community.” old age even without illness or accident ten seen as prohibitively expensive. will experience disability. Most of us For example, one of us (Mugrabi) are, at best, temporarily able. saw her neurologist celebrate her di- such as deciding who gets a ventilator. COVID-19 has thrown the situation agnosis of dystonia, which was “treat- Those who rely on ventilators to sur- into sharp focus. This crisis challenges able.” She was happy at fi rst, until she vive are in danger of having them taken all of us to fi ght for a world where discovered that the illness was also away. This is based on abled people’s one’s life is not dependent on how incurable, which he hadn’t mentioned. ideas about what constitutes quality of useful one is, a place where we are all The system rewarded the doctor for life, rather than on anything objective. creating communities of the heart. The performing a procedure that turned out You’ve heard about states fi ghting most vulnerable hold a mirror up, and not to work, but didn’t reward him for for protective equipment and ventila- show we have to do better than this. taking time to consider the many symp- tors. But how many chronically ill and toms that didn’t fi t that diagnosis. It disabled people have lost their home Sunshine Mugrabi is an author, tech was years before she got a better treat- care, which they need for tasks of daily industry consultant, and chronic ment. life? This is thanks to a perfect storm— illness advocate. After years of This has been the reality for de- caregivers fearing infection, public going from doctor to doctor, she cades for disabled and chronically ill transportation shutting down, and states now has a dual diagnosis of two people. We’re lucky to get a diagnosis being unwilling to step in and help keep rare diseases, cervical dystonia and at all. And even if we do, we don’t fi t these protections in place. Parents of Stiff Person Syndrome. into the system, which is designed to chronically ill children have been pres- squeeze profi table procedures out of sured to sign DNRs (do-not-resuscitate Christine Lombardi, Democratic its “products”—not help and support orders) that might deny them access to Left web editor, has suffered from people with long term and complex a ventilator. multiple sclerosis for over 35 years health issues. This explains the seeming Some DSAers are already in the and has won awards for consumer paradox of overtaxed ICUs and hospital fi ght. Central New Jersey DSA’s Dis- health journalism. closings and layoffs as hospitals go un- ability Solidarity Working Group der because they have to treat the sick is chaired by Kristen Smith, former rather than focus on elective surgeries staffer at ADAPT, the fl agship organi- that yield big profi ts. zation of disability direct action. Just

7911)6 2020 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 4%+) 9 %re public colleges Ƽ nished? COVID-19 could topple public universities, which have been targeted by neoliberals since the 1970s.

&= &)2J%1-2 &%08H%7)6 ow did you go bankrupt?” a character in The Sun Also “HRises asks over drinks. “Two ways,” the friend replies, “gradually, then suddenly.” As we watch public university systems furlough staff and threaten to shut their doors, we might ask the same question. In just the last few weeks, states from Missouri to Nevada to New Jersey have announced double-digit cuts to their higher education budgets, Vermont threatened to close all but its fl agship Alton campus, and the University of Ohio has UCLA, one of the ƽ agship public universities in the country, has been a target of the announced layoffs in the hundreds and Right for decades. the shuttering of whole programs, from calculated her hourly pay at under $3. any other. Often one of the last wall-to- African American studies to Women, In short, low-wage temporary faculty wall union employers, it attracted the Gender, and Sexuality studies. teach highly indebted students, staffed likes of Angela Davis, Herbert Marcuse, For state colleges and universities, often by outsourced food and service and Naomi Klein. While public universi- trouble has been a long time coming. workers. ties are engines of economic growth, they They have been in the cross hairs of Yet the question remains: Why is the are purposely designed not to adhere to neoliberalism since the late 1970s. Once- university such a site of neoliberal trans- market effi ciencies. Writing papers, read- robust institutions offering free education formation? One needs to remember that ing literature, learning differential equa- to millions of students and stable, often the political rise of the New Right began tions, speaking foreign languages, engag- unionized employment to hundreds of not only as an assault on unions and af- ing in long discussions about history and thousands of faculty and staff across the fi rmative action, but as an attack on the philosophy—these are not activities that country, state colleges have seen their crown jewel of the public university sys- generate revenue. Nor are they meant to. budgets go down sometimes by as much tem—the University of California. Ron- Their purpose is to turn students into as 90% since the Reagan years. In the last ald Reagan ran for governor of California thinking people, and more important, into decade alone, states slashed $9 billion against the “hippies” and Black Power critical citizens. Higher education is by from their higher education budgets. protesters of Berkeley and UC San Di- defi nition a social good, not something to Cost is perhaps the most visible sign ego. In a press conference two weeks af- be engaged in solely for private gain. In of the years of austerity. When my mom ter he introduced tuition for UC schools, other words, it is designed as the opposite attended UCLA as a working-class, fi rst- he stated that making students pay for of an entrepreneurial society. generation student in the mid-1960s, she higher education would, “get rid of un- That vision of the university remains, paid nothing. Tuition and fees at UCLA desirables. Those there to agitate and not like democracy itself, as a half-fi nished now run over $10,000 a year. Student to study might think twice before they promise, never having been available for debt nationwide last year topped one tril- pay tuition—they might think twice how everyone. Yet it is clear that the assault lion dollars, with the average student loan much they want to pay to carry a picket on the public university was no accident. burden around $30,000. sign.” In an infl uential document written Democratic and Republican legislatures The other crisis is far less visible. at the same time, Reagan adviser and fu- alike converged to imagine a public uni- Until the mid-1980s, three-quarters of all ture Supreme Court justice Lewis Powell versity entirely privatized, funded solely faculty were tenured or tenure-track. To- characterized higher education not as a through tuition (albeit often with subsi- day, two-thirds of university instruction is means to democratize society or for class dies for low-income students), private done by lecturers and adjuncts. These are advancement for lower- and middle-class foundations, and research grants, in ways faculty with no free-speech protections students, but rather as an epic struggle that refl ected governments’ general turn who are often on short-term contracts. between social norms and radical student away from welfare (as in for the common Most adjuncts are paid between $2,000 and faculty culture. good) to a predatory state. As perhaps the and $5,000 per course, which works Although the Left may discount this as most dramatic illustration of this, money out to just above minimum wage. One rhetorical posturing, the public university taken from the UC and California State adjunct in my own department said she is, or at least was, an institution unlike University system was diverted directly

4%+) 10 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 7911)6 2020 into the boom of prison building in the 1980s and 1990s. COVID-19 may be the fi nal blow. The (iary of a 0etter 'arrier model in which the “student is the ATM,” Saving the U.S. Postal Service about is infecting my customers with as one UC administrator put it, is no has gone from a no-brainer issue COVID-19. If people knew what we longer viable. Students can neither afford to a DSA campaign. Below, a DSA touch during the day, they’d be horri- an expensive degree nor will they sign member shares what it’s like fi ed. Furthermore, most of the public up for classes that will, out of necessity, to deliver during the epidemic. doesn’t seem to understand that we do be online. I expect that we will see many Because postal employees may not have enough masks and gloves to more public colleges threatened with clo- face retaliation if they speak out, protect ourselves and our customers. sure, or perhaps worse, running as ghost we’re not publishing his name. Our branch—one of the larger ones in ships, with skeleton crews of non-tenured my state—only received cloth masks faculty and highly leveraged students. ince the outbreak of COVID-19, two weeks ago. Purdue University’s decision to re-open my day begins an hour and a half Since there are so many parcels in the fall, and put students, community Searlier than normal. these days, we usually get a text on our members, and staff at risk, only displays After punching in, several of us go scanners from management asking us the fatal logic of neoliberal institutions outside and check our trucks. This is to come back around 1 p.m. in order that must run like for-profi t businesses. the normal morning procedure, except to get the rest of our packages. It’s like Yet it doesn’t have to be this way. for the fact that we now take an odd starting your route all over again. And Bernie Sanders’s proposal for free public mixture of water and bleach with us this means no more eight-hour work- college and reinstatement of tenure is to clean the parts of our trucks that we days. Many of us are putting in 10+ exactly the kind of vision we need. What touch most often during our routes. hours a day 10 days straight before we is remarkable about Sanders’s proposal The mixture we use smells awful, and get a day off. We do it because it’s the is precisely that it is framed as a public God only knows what it’s doing to our right thing to do, and we do it for our good, available to all. Like water, and, we lungs. We have to use this homemade customers. Having said that, we’re all hope, housing and food, we should have a mix because there isn’t enough sani- exhausted. And as my union steward right to it because we are alive. tizer available. Indeed, several local says, “Exhaustion is a safety issue.” It is no accident that it is at public breweries make sanitizer for us because Does management always understand universities that we see movements by we cannot fi nd something so basic as this sentiment? No. Many of us often students and faculty demanding that Lysol or Purell. feel as if the numbers are more impor- universities be more inclusive, respect After checking and cleaning our tant than our lives. If it weren’t for the students of color, and offer staff a living trucks, we go back into the offi ce and union [National Association of Letter wage. The university can be an incubator start casing our mail. As is normal Carriers], I can’t imagine what this job and reservoir of the values we need now for this time of year, there’s not much would be like. As one postal employee that capitalism is in ruins around us, of mail. But we are currently receiving put it, “We aren’t essential; we’re sac- life not lived for profi t. Or it can be an- more parcels than we receive during rifi cial.” other piece of the wreckage of neoliberal- the Christmas season—especially from On a personal note, my wife is ism, abandoned by the rich as they run Amazon. The consensus around the working from home these days. She for their bunkers. offi ce is that Jeff Bezos lied when he constantly worries about what I’m As I write in early May, faculty said Amazon would only ship essential bringing home with me. Am I asymp- unions, AAUP (American Association items during this crisis. tomatic and spreading COVID-19 of University Professors) chapters, and It feels like Bezos is making billions without knowing it? Is she asymptom- student organizations have been issuing off of this crisis, while those of us on atic? Her fears are justifi ed, because petitions, organizing online union meet- the frontlines are working longer hours I know people at our branch who’ve ings, and in some cases even reversing and making the same rate of pay. tested positive for COVID-19. Basi- some of these cuts, as in the University of Once on the road, our routes provide cally, everyone I work with errs on the Vermont system’s recent announcement some challenges. People aren’t stay- side of assuming we’ve been exposed it will not close three campuses after ing in their houses, nor are they social to this virus. But, none of us who are all. They need our support if we are to distancing. I can’t tell you how many “healthy” can get tested because there emerge from this pandemic with anything parents let their children come up to are not enough testing kits. It seems resembling a notion of our collective our trucks and ask for the mail. People ridiculous to us that essential federal good. fl ag us down on the streets trying to employees who are in constant contact give us return packages for something with the public can’t get tested. they bought at J.Crew that doesn’t Chicago DSA member Benjamin fi t. We’re not supposed to take these Balthaser is Associate Professor of packages, but people don’t seem to Multi-Ethnic U.S. Literature at Indiana Find out about the Democratic understand why we don’t want to inter- University, South Bend. Socialist Labor Commission’s act with them. Honestly, I’m not con- campaign to save the USPS at cerned about contracting COVID-19 labor.dsausa.org/DSAforUSPS from customers; what I’m concerned

7911)6 2020 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 4%+) 11 6eparations: 2ot just for descendants System-wide legal shackles didn’t end with slavery.

&= &-00 *0)8'H)6, J6. here are two debates about repa- rations for African Americans: Twhether it is a legitimate demand, and who should be eligible. This latter argument has been tinged with African American nativism and, ironically, has drawn the support of some white, right- wing populists. Reparations is a legitimate domestic and international demand for compensa- tion and repair for the damages associated with slavery, genocide, and colonialism. I would go further and argue that it is a legitimate demand in response to the hor- The comedic short Ƽ lm Sixteen Thousand Dollars looks at what could happen if near- rors committed by the United States over- future America paid reparations for slavery. Visit twitter.com/16kƼ lm for more on the seas since its foundation. Ƽ lm, which was backed in part by the DSA Fund. Photo: Yellow Laces Productions. That said, there is the specifi c ques- tion of reparations for African Americans. 1) How much blood? Latin America, who began arriving with Some argue that reparations for African What proportion of one’s “blood” needs the end of the U.S. war against Mexico Americans should be reserved for those to be derived from the period of 1619: (1848). If one restricts the defi nition who can trace a direct line to slavery. All 1865? 50%? 80%? 15%? Any determi- of African American—and, therefore, others who fall within the rubric of “Black nation becomes exceedingly subjective. those who can receive reparations—to America” are to be excluded. And what does it mean to have been those who can trace their lineage to The argument for reparations for slav- raised with a “Black identity”? What slavery, that means that Malcolm X’s ery is a sound one. The theft of millions if someone was raised in a family that family is called into question because in order to build capitalism needs little passed for white but then one realized his mother was from Grenada. clarifi cation. The challenge in the repara- that one was African-descendant? tions debate, however, is not so much 4) -ndividual, or collective? when the “clock” starts, but, rather, when 2) ;hy 1865? All this assumes a “check” made out does it stop. Yes, slavery ended in 1865, at least to individuals, rather than collective Africans were brought to the West- formally. But racist and national oppres- reparations. Foreclosing the idea of col- ern Hemisphere in chains in the 1500s. sion of African Americans did not. The lective reparations means dismissing Though there were some Moors from Reconstruction period was followed by the need for the reorganization of the Spain who came voluntarily, the over- what W.E.B. Du Bois called the “coun- United States and the introduction of whelming majority were brought as slaves ter-revolution of property,” with which dramatic changes in the social, political, to what we now know as Latin America. Jim Crow segregation was associated. and economic conditions faced by peo- Africans who were captured and brought This was a period of intense oppression ple of African descent. Even if the prop- to North America came as both inden- and the super-exploitation of the Afri- er calculation can be made regarding tured servants and as slaves. As part of the can American worker. Why would the what individuals who can trace some of instituting of social control over the labor- “clock” time out in 1865? their lineage back to the plantation are ing classes of the 13 British colonies, the entitled to, would receiving that check British elite implemented the construction 3) ;ho is “&lack %merica”? mean that white capitalist America was of “race” and racist oppression, which in- Even if one leaves aside post-1965 off the hook? Is that the vision we have cluded instituting slavery-for-life for those African immigration to the United been fi ghting for? States, African Americans, as a people, who had African blood. The debate continues. And the stakes have multiple sources, including Cape Formal slavery in the United States can are high. be said to have ended in 1865 with the de- Verdeans (who began to arrive in the 19th century); African descendants of feat of the Confederacy in the U.S. Civil DSA member Bill Fletcher, War. For some proponents of reparations, slavery imposed by the British in North America; African Caribbean descen- Jr., is the executive editor of the story apparently ends there. The argu- globalafricanworker.com, past ment is that only the victims of U.S. slav- dants who began migrating to the Unit- ed States in the fi rst decade of the 20th president of TransAfrica Forum, and ery should receive compensation. There a long-time leftist trade unionist. are problems with this line of thought. century; and African descendants from

4%+) 12 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 7911)6 2020 '3:-(-19 makes reform more possible Non-reformist reforms can to advance “non-reformist” reforms. change the rules of the Such reforms might include “Medicare Extra” and a robust public option. These game. could lead to Medicare For All and cer- tainly would be central to the long pro- &= 78):) 8%6Z=27/- cess of repairing the devastation caused OVID-19 has exposed the long- by the pandemic. standing disparities and inef- In this arena of struggle, democratic fi ciency of the U.S. healthcare socialists must keep in mind four strate- C gic considerations: system to a degree never imagined, and opened up major avenues for change. Make healthcare a public good, The human and social costs of fl aws not a commodity. It must be in the system have brought unnecessary managed as a public good, death and suffering, global economic moving Ƽ rst, as Ezra Klein has devastation, and historic levels of gov- written, from a private system ernment debt. Our public health infra- with fractured public options structure has been hollowed out, and to a public system with highly our healthcare workforce has been sent regulated private options. This into battle without the armor and weap- is a “non-reformist” reform, and ons it needed to fi ght the virus. presumptive Democratic candi- The crisis has accelerated a decades- date Joe Biden must be pushed long transformation of the U.S. health- to support a program such as care system from one centered on pa- Medicare Extra, which would be tient care and social responsibility to a far beyond the tinkering he cur- business model driven by the profi t mo- “We would never rently proposes. tive and dominated by corporate values. Move quickly to universal cover- The slow train wreck of U.S. healthcare have chosen this age and unlink health insurance has become a runaway disaster. pandemic as a from employment. There are There is some good news. The only two ways to do this: (1) sell training and altruism of our frontline means to create healthcare on the open market healthcare workers have been highly a different history, or (2) set up a uniƼ ed system of effective. Solidarity with CDC (Centers public Ƽ nancing such as Medi- for Disease Control) public health di- but we can use it.” care for All. rectives has beaten back the pandemic and saved lives, and there is determined Increase system capacity by increasing international coop- global cooperation to fi nd treatments defense of democracy; and that respect eration and coordination among and a vaccine. for democratic process is essential. governments. So, where do we go from here? André Gorz wrote of “non-reformist Three extremely diffi cult and com- reforms” that simultaneously change the Channel the anger of the young- plex things must happen to vanquish rules of the political game while playing er generation of physicians COVID-19. First, we need an effective it and expand the political power of the and other healthcare workers vaccine. Second, we need effective working class. emerging from their COVID-19 treatments for all phases of the disease. In this context, the 2020 presidential experience. They’ve seen the Third, we need to reverse four decades campaign opens prospects for health- failures. Now they must see the of radical libertarian control and deter- care system reform. Gramsci reminds us alternatives. mined destruction of our government. that class struggle runs through all the The only path to that goal is through Democratic socialists working within institutions of civil society and the state a broad coalition for meaningful reform a Democratic presidential victory, apparatus itself, and that socialists must Democratic control of the Senate, and have their work cut out for them. We never abandon any political terrain. For would never have chosen this pandemic retention of Democratic control of the Gramscians, including this author, the House. as a means to create a different history, DSA convention’s refusal to endorse but we can use it. Let us start now. Where does this place democratic anyone but a democratic socialist for socialists? Antonio Gramsci said that president was a misreading of the situ- revolution in western democracies is not ation. A Democratic presidency along Steve Tarzynski is a founding a convulsive event but a long complex with Democratic control of both houses member and former national leader process; that the Left in these countries of Congress would not be the enemy. of DSA. He is a physician and a long has always fought for the expansion and Rather, it would be an arena of struggle time healthcare reform activist.

7911)6 2020 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 4%+) 13 FURTHER READING 8ax justice means taxes for the rich &= Z3) 7H)61%2 TRIUMPH OF the tax code, Saez and Zucman sug- INJUSTICE: gest that the interests of the wealthy y late Great Aunt Ruth, who should carry no weight whatsoever. was born into tenement How the Rich Dodge Taxes and When designing tax policy, they write Mpoverty more than a century that “we should not concern ourselves ago, and who raised her own two How to Make Them Pay with the monetary interests of the children in a middle-class co-op, re- rich. We should care only about how counted a telling anecdote that show- (W.W. Norton & Company, 2019) taxing them affects the rest of the cased her attitude about taxes. Both population. The goal should not be of Ruth’s children grew up to become to ‘make the rich pay their fair share’ lawyers. An acquaintance commented (a somewhat nebulous concept), but to Ruth that her lawyer children to ensure that the great wealth of would be helpful to her in fi guring some benefi ts the least well off.” If out tax loopholes so she could avoid rich government is a crisis of national moral character and of democracy we design tax policy to maximize paying. Ruth was deeply offended. To tax revenue, which they suggest her, this sounded like an assumption itself. Saez and Zucman have done a nec- would require a top marginal tax rate that she was a freeloader. She enjoyed of about 75%, and we are serious the use of public goods. She lived in essary public service by undertaking an enormous amount of careful data about enforcement, they estimate the modest comfort. Why should anyone amount collected from the wealthy think that she would shirk her respon- work documenting the distribution of income and tax burden over the last could increase, “by about four per- sibilities as a taxpayer? In my mind’s centage points of national income, or ear, I can still hear the shocked indig- century. Furthermore, the book is ac- companied by a nifty online tool to $750 billion a year in 2019.” nation in her tone. What of the risk that confi sca- Contrast this with the anecdote help inform our democratic delibera- tion over tax policy. Using the calcu- tory tax rates disincentivize valuable that opens Emmanuel Saez and economic activities? What if the tax The lation methods employed in the book, Gabriel Zucman’s new book is such a disincentive and the rich Triumph of Injustice they have made a tax simulator that . They revisit the cut back so much on their economic 2016 presidential debate in which can be used to test the likely effects of various tax policies on aggregate activities that tax revenues actually Hillary Clinton highlighted Donald fall? As long as tax revenues are fall- Trump’s tax avoidance. Confronted government revenues and distribution of the tax burden across different in- ing because of real reductions in top with the documentation that he had incomes and not because of tax dodg- paid no federal income tax in the few come levels. It is freely accessible on the website taxjusticenow.org. ing, that’s OK with them. Reducing years for which his tax returns were top incomes to compress the income publicly available, Trump responded, Saez and Zucman document the history of tax policy (what the tax distribution is so worthwhile a goal “That makes me smart.” No indigna- that we may reasonably choose to tion. (Also, no dignity.) Just shame- code on the books says) and tax inci- dence (who actually pays how much sacrifi ce some tax revenue for it. Con- less smugness. centrations of wealth are inescapably Saez and Zucman argue that the in practice). “Looking at most of the great retreats of progressive taxation,” also undemocratic concentrations of tax system is “the most important political power, causing a degradation institution of any democratic society,” they write, “we fi nd the same pattern: fi rst, an outburst of tax dodging; then, of the social environment. “Extreme not just because of the practical mat- wealth, like carbon emissions, im- ters of fi nancing public goods but governments lamenting that taxing the rich has become impossible and poses a negative externality on the because it is an expression of interde- rest of us. The point of taxing carbon pendence and collectivity. “Without slashing their rates.” They are right to be outraged. Why should we reward is not to raise revenue but to reduce taxes,” they write, “there is no coop- carbon emissions. The same goes eration, no prosperity, no common moral bankruptcy with swollen bank accounts? Where is the tough-on- for high tax rates on the very highest destiny.” The book is suffused with incomes: They are not aimed at fund- the principle that tax policy is not a crime, law-and-order crowd when we need them? ing government programs in the long puzzle with one right answer to be run. They are aimed at reducing the determined by technocratic expertise; Instead of giving up on even pretending to collect adequate taxes income of the ultra-wealthy.” it is a matter for democratic delibera- Although Saez and Zucman focus tion over desired ends and appropriate from the rich and making ever greater concessions to the interests of the much more on collecting taxes than means. Tax evasion pursued by the on public spending, we could inten- rich and enabled by lapdog-of-the- wealthy with each new change in

4%+) 14 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 7911)6 2020 sify our outrage over tax dodgers who ting away with murder, but they are Yet how often have we heard calls for suffer no consequences by drawing a getting away with theft. more generous social welfare benefi ts contrast with the treatment of anyone Despite rampant fraud, rich people and less degrading distribution mech- trying to avail themselves of the so- claiming tax deductions are not anisms dismissed with the charge that cial safety net benefi ts due to them. treated with suspicion. They are not poor and unemployed people will de- Once a tax law is passed defi ning the tested for drugs. A social worker will fraud the system and do stupid things tax obligations of the rich, the amount not show up to check for the presence with the money, so we’d better not defi ned in the law rightfully belongs of a de facto domestic partner not ac- give it to them at all? in the public coffers. The rich resist. knowledged in the fi ling. Once a law Don’t shrug and say possession is These days, the resource-starved is passed defi ning the welfare obliga- nine-tenths of the law, urge Saez and Internal Revenue Service waves the tions of the state to its citizens, the Zucman. Allowing tax evasion is a white fl ag, and the rich keep our amount defi ned in the law rightfully choice. When the wealthy respond to money. In 2018, the wealthiest 400 belongs to the qualifi ed benefi ciaries. the tax code by saying, “You and who Americans evaded about 25% of their Try to collect unemployment insur- else are going to make me pay?” we tax obligations, with the rest of the ance or Supplemental Nutrition Assis- don’t have to mumble that the public top 0.1% nearly matching their lead- tance Program benefi ts or Temporary can make do without, after all. We ers’ evasion rate. Assistance to Needy Families and see can make—and at times have made— Enforcement of estate taxes in what happens. Of all the arguments a different choice. We can make them particular has collapsed. “The capitu- I’ve heard made in favor of estate pay. lation has been so severe that if we taxes, none of them have seriously take seriously the wealth reported on emphasized the risk that heirs will Zoe Sherman is an Associate estate tax returns nowadays, it looks make stupid choices with their mon- Professor of Economics at like rich people are either almost ey, blowing it on drugs or frivolous Merrimack College. Her writing nonexistent in America or that they indulgences like manicures or making appears regularly in Dollars & Sense. never die.” Perhaps they are not get- unhealthy choices at the supermarket.

*rom the (7% national director CONTINUED FROM PAGE 15 to cover all healthcare costs for the uninsured and all out-of- pocket expenses for those with insurance for the duration of the coronavirus crisis. NYC, NORTH TEXAS, and other chapters are organizing against Milwaukee DSA caravan police violence and detention practices, including collecting FRANCISCO, PHILADELPHIA, and projects. The Emergency Work- letters for a community board LOS ANGELES are all supporting place Organizing Committee, safety meeting demanding ac- nationally endorsed candidates in partnership with the UE, sup- countability for disproportionate for local, state, and federal of- ports workers anywhere Ƽ ghting and violent policing of social dis- Ƽ ce, Ƽ nding creative new ways for improved conditions under tancing in black communities. to raise money and contact vot- COVID-19. The Restaurant Or- DENVER, CHICAGO, NYC and ers despite social distancing. ganizing Project organizes res- many other DSA chapters are Dozens of DSA members in of- taurant workers to Ƽ ght for im- organizing tenants for #Rent- Ƽ ce released a joint letter laying mediate relief and also a longer Freeze, #CancelRent, and #Rent- out demands for a just local, term vision to reshape the entire Strike campaigns at the state state, and national response to industry. And it just launched a level as well as pressuring their COVID-19 and lifting our vision Campaign to Save the USPS! Congress members to support of an alternative to disaster cap- I welcome the thousands of people the Rent and Mortgage Cancel- italism during the pandemic. who joined DSA in the last few months lation Act to create a national and encourage you to look up your local And nationally, our DEMOCRATIC mortgage and rent suspension. chapter at dsausa.org/chapters and sign SOCIALIST LABOR COMMISSION up for an upcoming call. You’re in the LOUISVILLE, METRO WASHING- has three worker organizing TON D.C., TACOMA, NYC, SAN right place.

7911)6 2020 ()13'6%8-' 0)*8 4%+) 15 DSA BY THE NUMBERS

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