Bernanke says we're not poor enough

Bernanke prays to his gods of destruction.

US Fed Chairman Bernanke demands austerity

In remarks Monday to a conference on Asia and the global economic crisis held by the San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank in Santa Barbara, California, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke called for austerity policies to rein in US budget deficits and the ballooning national debt.

In the name of reducing global economic imbalances between debtor countries with large trade deficits, such as the US, and creditor nations with large trade surpluses, such as China and Japan, Bernanke demanded that the US government adopt policies in the medium-term to cut domestic consumption and reduce social spending. At the same time, he called on China and other export-oriented Asian countries to reduce their trade and current account surpluses by encouraging a growth in domestic demand.

Bernanke declared that Asia was leading a world economic recovery, but warned that the recovery could not be allowed to produce a renewed growth of “unsustainable” imbalances in trade and capital flows. While couched in diplomatic and technical terminology, his remarks had definite and ominous implications for the working class, above all in the United States.

Reflecting the consensus within the American ruling elite, and the class policy of the Obama administration, the central bank chief was implicitly insisting that the economic crisis be used to carry through a drastic and permanent lowering of the wages and living standards of the American working class. In essence, the United States is to be transformed into a cheap-labor center for the export of industrial and other goods to the world market. The living standards and conditions of American workers are to be brought more closely into line with those of super-exploited workers in Asia.

He neglected to note that the major factor in the explosive growth of the federal deficit is the multi-trillion-dollar bailout of Wall Street, which he and the Obama administration are carrying out.
{more - Barry Gray at wsws}

Austerity = slavery