An Attempt to Explain the Purpose of OWS (Particulalry for Those Who Don't Get It)

If you don’t identify with the Occupy Wall Street movement, it might seem a bit strange or silly to you.  A bunch of people marching around the streets of cities all across the country, camping out, protesting . . . and for what?  It would certainly be understandable to feel a bit confused by this.  You might even feel frustrated, angry, or nervous.  

I admit I was a little confused by what the movement was about when I first heard about this group of folks pitching tents in some park in lower Manhattan.  What good was that doing?

But I, along with millions of others, have been persuaded that, at its core, this is a movement that expresses feelings most of us have, and champions causes that all of us will benefit from. 

Specifically, I think the Occupy movement is essentially about getting back to an America that truly values work and provides the opportunity for anyone to use their talents and efforts to their best advantage (which, in turn, is to our collective advantage).    

Chances are that this goal sounds pretty good to you, whatever your attitude about the Occupy movement is. It’s a quintessentially American idea.   Ironically, a number of deep-pocketed folks in the media have attempted to portray the Occupy movement as being *against* the idea of rewarding hard work.  If that was the case, I certainly wouldn’t support the cause.  And if you took the word of these media figures at face value, you would understandably think the Occupy movement contradicts the American ethos at a deep level.

But it doesn’t.  The reason I support the Occupy movement is precisely because it is providing a voice that calls for a true valuing of work and for the creation of a society that offers greater promise and opportunity to its citizens.

Consider the following:

• Since 1980, average Americans have become the hardest workers in any major economy, putting in more hours per year than their Japanese, German, or British counterparts.
• Since 1980, American workers have increased their productivity by a factor of four.
• Since 1980, average Americans have seen their median income rise less than 20%
• Since 1980, the top 1% of Americans have seen their after-tax income go up 280%
• Since 1980, corporate CEOs have gone from getting roughly 40 times the salary of the average American worker to getting 270 times the salary of their typical employee.

So, the average American is working harder and producing more, but has little to show for it.  The result?  We are in danger of becoming a nation that no longer values hard work.   Increasingly, work ethic does not translate into tangible rewards.  Social mobility (the ability of people to improve their socio-economic status through work) is now lower in the U.S. thanin any other industrialized country.

If we continue down this road, I fear fewer Americans will feel they have a stake in the well-being of their own nation.  I fear fewer Americans will feel it’s worth putting in the overtime, going back to school to improve job skills, or starting their own small business.  I fear fewer and fewer Americans will have more and more of the nation’s wealth, and this lopsided distribution of income will capsize the nation.

Most Americans feel the same way.  Research shows that we collectively feel there should be a greater sharing of the wealth of our nation than there currently is.   And while both members of the Occupy movement and the Tea Party would recoil at the thought, both groups share the same anxiety and hope: the anxiety that the powers-that-be increasingly work for their own narrow interests rather than those of the nation, and the hope that the American people themselves will demand a change.

It shouldn’t surprise us that people who come from such disparate points of the political spectrum would be in agreement (even if they don’t fully realize it) on this issue.   They grasp the fact that what’s at stake is not the fate of the small business owner, the middle class, or even the 99%.  It’s the fate of the 100%--all of us—that hangs in the balance.  The irony is that even those in the 1% will be better off in the long run if we return to truly valuing the American work ethic.  In the end, we are all allies in this fight, and our only enemies are our collective short-sightedness and apathy.

How we get there is a matter we can have reasonable debates about.  Some nations with greater social mobility and economies that reward work more robustly do so through tax policy (e.g., Scandinavia).  Others do so through low taxes, but greater equality in salaries (e.g. Japan).  The methods, however, are less important than the goal.  We may well find our own peculiarly American way of solving the problem. 

 But solve it we must—for the good of the 100%.

Peace.