Jobless in Cuba? Communism faces the unthinkable

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At a state project to refurbish a decaying building in Old Havana, one worker paints a wall white while two others watch. A fourth sleeps in a wheelbarrow positioned in a sliver of shade nearby and two more smoke and chat on the curb.

President Raul Castro has startled the nation lately by saying about one in five Cuban workers may be redundant. At the work site on Obispo street, those numbers run in reverse.

It's a common sight in communist Cuba. Here, nearly everyone works for the state and official unemployment is minuscule, but pay is so low that Cubans like to joke that "the state pretends to pay us and we
pretend to work."

Now, facing a severe budget deficit, the government has hinted at restructuring or trimming its bloated work force. Such talk is causing tension, however, in a country where guaranteed employment was a building block of the 1959 revolution that swept Fidel Castro to power.

<snip>

More at: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100718/ap_on_bi_ge/cb_cuba_too_many_workers

does not fit my political worldview and therefore it must not be true, and the people who have anything to do with it are the subject of my personal ridicule.

/DU LA Forum.

Maybe your post characterizes your feeling about the article, or some other posters here (sarcastically), but few here have any real application of a political world view when it comes to a place they've never been to - in this case, Cuba.

Mr fletcher, take some time and spend it in Cuba and then report back to us on how Cuba really fits into your personal world view.


Cheers

And I would like very much to go to Cuba. I have no doubt that the daily existence is better than I thought it was before I started posting on this forum. My problem is I travel too much as it is but I will be in Latin America in November or December and will try to get in a quick trip and I promise I'll have an open mind and will report back.

I have gone as a tourist and have to admit that it's hard to get a picture of Cuban life in a short period. The best times I've had there was when I was working (I'm an audio/electronics engineer), getting shoulder to shoulder with the nitty gritty and then spending time including staying at the homes with their families and friends. I worked on some infranet distribution node design and installations and then later doing some audio engineering work on some large recording studio installations. Techie stuff that the Cubans were totally on top of. It was always a pleasure working with motivated and genuinely nice people. I love the food and the real rum. The climate. The real music. The real people.

Did Ms Garcia get permission from the US gov't to visit Cuba? She seems to have a lot of views about what is going on there. The OP doesn't really explain who she is, except she seems to be an AP "writer".

It points out that the government is being proactive in job retraining and alternatives. I think it's a good thing to reassign idle workers to agriculture or construction - these are two areas of Cuba's domestic economy and infrastructure that need bolstering.

Good to see a government working on "shovel ready" projects and productive jobs.

Notice that there's no mention of teachers getting laid off. Same thing for doctors and medical professionals. Because they haven't been reducing the much needed infrastructure, instead Cuba is expanding it.

Article seems to focus more on the Cuban government's push for productivity of all workers, not a push to increase unemployment (which seems to be the author's solution).

Aside from the feeble attempts at negative spin, the article reveals a lot about Cuba's impetus, and it's good.


Thanks for posting it.

"President Raul Castro has startled the nation lately by saying about one in five Cuban workers may be redundant".

If one is going to claim the nation is "startled" one ought to provide some evidence of generally prevalent startlement. But it is just bullshit.

The Cubans, as the quote she provides shows, already know that what is called "efficiency" here in the USA is not what matters most in Cuba, i.e. that their well being matters more than profit for the already well-off. The "story" tries to purvey the idea that somehow neocon economic dogma has caught up with Cuba after all these years, which is ludicrous. It implies that the Cuban government is in financial difficulties because of it's "social programs", etc. It is transparent neocon babble. If you believe those sorts of things, that sort of economic dogma, then you will find this tripe congenial. It is the sort of thing I have come to expect from AP when it is in propaganda mode.

No personal attack intended.

I did not post it.

You have to ignore about 95% of the article, and read between the lines of the other 5%.

:shrug:

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Every Cuban program the neocons attack represents a successful program that the people support.

:hi:

This writer suggests that AT is soft pedaling "bad" news from Cuba.

AP Three Months Late to Story of Cuba's Self-Admitted 1 Million 'Unproductive' Workers
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blumer/2010/07/18/ap-three-months-late-story-cubas-self-admitted-1-million-unproductive--0#ixzz0u8XzFIOB

It's not a stretch to believe that the folks at the Associated Press would rather not report bad news from that communist workers' paradise known as Cuba.

Just look at how the wire service has dealt with clearly significant news about the island nation's economy. Though the news, carried originally at the Miami Herald, is three months old, the AP as best I can tell finally got around to writing a story about it late Friday, the beginning of a summer weekend when few are following the news closely. How convenient.

Here is some of what the Herald's Juan O. Tamay reported on April 19:

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blumer/2010/07/18/ap-three-months-late-story-cubas-self-admitted-1-million-unproductive--0#ixzz0u8XzFIOB

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