The Australian Government, since before the 1970's, has gleefully jumped on the globalisation bus. The only problem is that the bus didn't tell them where they were going. The push, of course, was led by the big industrial juggernaughts from the USA with vested interests in seeing this form of "economic freedom" expand. The "promise" was that free trade and globalisation is supposed to lift everyone out of poverty. The reality is that in the 50 years since globalisation has become a seemingly unstoppable burden the world has even MORE poverty than ever before, and it is getting worse as I sit here typing away!
The USA has reaped the greatest benefits of globalisation and these benefits are not being shared (as if we didn't already know!). Interestingly, in 2001 the average worker in the US was earning 10% less (adjusting for inflation) than he/she did in the early 1970s (ref: Take it Personally, by Anita Roddick). Globalisation exacerbates this trend by setting workers against each other all over the world to keep wages low. And who wins? Mutli-national companies who are able to pay CEOs 100s times the salary of the workers they employ and still make massive profits!
Late last year I left the company I was working for because they said they couldn't afford to give me a pay rise (even though I saved the company a couple of 100 thousand dollars). "That's fine", I said. The next day I found out that one of the executives recieved a bonus worth more than my annual salary - I put in my resignation. This is not the first time I have done such a thing. People think I am crazy but I am a man of my convictions. I couldn't work for a company who say they value their employees and care for their customers when this is clearly false - the reality is in this world of globalisation - Profits and Share Price are joint Kings. Too many examples in Australia show this to be true and we have federal governments to thank for perpetuating this situation at the expense of the people who elect them.
