A striking example of a global crisis

During my first term as state representative of Pernambuco, in the 1980s, I spoke frequently with rural workers belonging to the main church communities, from which I received support in the campaign.

I have been able to collect real pearls from the way of thinking of the simple country man, who has been conditioned to have his feet on the ground due to the harsh reality.

“Do you want a sample?”, some have said when defending their arguments about a particular problem.

Because a “sample” of the difficulties and dilemmas facing the global capitalist system these days can be extracted from a column by Martin Wolff – of the Financial Times, reproduced in the newspaper Folha de São Paulo – on the economic recession in the United Kingdom, one of the four major economies in The European Union, along with Germany, France and Italy.

The writer cites data collected from a book published by the Decision Foundation entitled “Ending the Recession” to show the impasse that the British have reached.

One of these reasons is very important: between 1993 and 2007, hourly output in the UK increased by 33%, while between 2007 and 2021 it rose by only 7%.

He predicts that “economic dynamism in the UK has evaporated.”

As a by-product, social inequalities are exacerbated and there seems to be no return.

The qualified writer leaves the solution up in the air, unanswered. A way to underscore the impasse of the system, which, although it shows a variety of changes in the pattern of capital accumulation, in the pursuit of survival, resolves neither the systematic and progressive decline in the average rate of profit, nor the increasing exclusion from human labour.

It is worth warning for Brazilians who are now committed to national reconstruction, which will only become possible through the resumption of significant public and private investments in productive activities.

Because in the land of Martin Wolf, one of the pillars of failure is precisely underinvestment in fixed capital, under the pressure of “very short-term financial demands.”