Commentary: Caribbean Breaking Stones – History Repeats

CAYMAN ISLANDS – It was once a thing of the past, centuries ago, that desperate women and men would break stones on the side of the road, all day, for building material as their only means of income. It was a despicable form of labour, despised by people who recently emerged from slavery to not much more. Photographs exist of that terrible time when families depended on their existence from the solitary hammering of large stones to small ones.

Hunger without it.

There was no trade union, safety rules, wage negotiation or even the slightest resemblance to modern employment. To have come from that great darkness to present day was only a partial achievement as much is undone to including proper housing, free medical, education at every level, the payment of arrears of wages without interest or realistic cost of living increases. Maybe even water without cost for what is normal and rational, not free.

It is as if governments are conspiring to send their people back to stones.

Middle and Upper Class

The Caribbean must become realistic in their acceptance that many people are poor, without access to services easily used by the middle and upper class. Writ large the profusion of ghetto or garrison communities in Jamaica as well as inferior housing throughout the Caribbean. Once there is acceptance, correction policies can begin to be implemented. Not the socialist or communist policies but the ism of access, especially by school leavers.

Conditions in Jamaica of much needed jobs should not be dictated from wealthy enclaves like Beverly Hills or other parts of Upper Saint Andrew where much largesse regularly arrives or is sent to the well known tax haven, the Cayman Islands. That government would be willing to provide full details upon request by this government to help militate the dreaded minimum wage insufficiency.

Unlikely to ever happen.  Too many snouts in the trough.

Private Sector Employment

Governments cover up their failing to provide substantial employment by the rising government jobs that do not require innovation for private sector employment. It is unhelpful to pack cabinet with integrity problems while ignoring the private sector.

Confidence in the future becomes absent.

Put another way, it is easier to mask job creation failure by incompetent leadership in government hires. They simply do not try hard enough. Existing sectors are now old chestnuts. It is the new that is needed. Spinning the old sectors can only go so far until workers begin to receive a part of the pie.

No one speaks of the missing sovereign fund.

There should be no more substantive reliance on tourism or the offshore industry but a push to seek out other sectors lest we all perish. Politicians are resting their laurels on the past without any attempts to create other income sources. We are surrounded by the Caribbean Sea.

Send a message. Stop the remittances for one day, one week or one month.

The recurring decimal must stop.

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