From rich@math.missouri.edu Mon Sep 24 18:25:22 2001
Date: Sat, 22 Sep 2001 10:28:23 -0500 (CDT)
From: rich@math.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel)
Subject: MM: Against the Workers: How IMF and WB Policies Undermine
Organization: PACH
Article: 126810
To: undisclosed-recipients:;
After a decade of economic reform
along lines advised by the
International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, Argentina has
plunged into a desperate economic crisis.
The economy has been contracting for three years, unemployment is shooting up, and the country is on the brink of defaulting on its foreign debt payments.
To avoid default, Argentina has negotiated for a new infusion of foreign funds to pay off the interest on old loans and obligations, and to forestall a pullout by foreign investors.
Traveling down that road took Argentina to the gatekeeper for such loans: the IMF. In August, the IMF agreed to provide a new $8 billion loan for Argentina, intended to forestall default. That followed a nearly $40 billion January bailout package with a $14 billion IMF loan as its centerpiece.
But like the loans Argentina has negotiated with the IMF and World Bank over the last decade—and like all other such loans from the IMF and Bank—the new monies came with conditions.
Among them are requirements that Argentina: promote labor
flexibility
—removing legal protections that inhibit
employers from firing workers; revamp its pension system to generate
new savings
by cutting back on benefits for retired workers;
slash government worker salaries; privatize financial and energy
operations of the government.
These requirements, and others, infuriated the Argentine labor movement, which responded in March with general strikes that stopped economic activity in the country. In August, with the latest loan package, tens of thousands of workers took to the streets in protest.
That the IMF would demand such terms is no surprise. A Multinational Monitor investigation shows that the IMF and World Bank have imposed nearly identical mandates on dozens of countries. Based on reviews of hundreds of loan and project documents from the IMF and World Bank, the Multinational Monitor investigation provides detailed evidentiary support for critics of the international financial institutions who have long claimed they require Third World countries to adopt cookie-cutter policies that harm the interests of working people.
Multinational Monitor reviewed loan documents between the IMF and World Bank and 26 countries. The review shows that the institutions’ loan conditionalities include a variety of provisions that directly undermine labor rights, labor power and tens of millions of workers’ standard of living. These include:
The IMF and Bank say these policies may inflict some short-term pain, but are necessary to create the conditions for long-term growth and job creation.
Critics respond that the measures inflict needless suffering, worsen poverty and actually undermine prospects for economic growth. The policies reflect, they say, a bias against labor, and in favor of corporate interests. They note as well that these labor-related policies take place in the context of the broader IMF and World Bank structural adjustment packages, which emphasize trade liberalization, orienting economies to exports and recessionary cuts in government spending—macroeconomic policies which further work to advance corporate interests at the expense of labor.
Perhaps the most consistent theme in the IMF/World Bank structural adjustment loans is that the size of government should be reduced.
Typically, this means that the government should spin off certain functions to the private sector (by privatizing operations), and that it should cut back on spending and staffing in the areas of responsibility it does maintain.
The IMF/Bank support for government downsizing is premised, first, on the notion that the private sector generally performs more efficiently than government. In this view, government duties should be limited to a narrow band of activities that either the private sector cannot or does not perform better, and to the few responsibilities that inherently belong to the public sector.
In its June draft Private Sector Development Strategy,
the
World Bank argues that the private sector does a better job even of
delivering services to the very poor than the public sector, and that
the poor prefer the private sector to government provision of
services.
A second rationale for shrinking government is the IMF and Bank’s priority concern with eliminating government deficits. The institutions seek to cut government spending as a way to close and eventually eliminate the shortfall between revenues and expenditures, even though basic Keynesian economics suggests that slow-growth developing nations should in fact run a deficit to spur economic expansion.
In most countries, rich and poor, the government is the largest employer. In poor countries, with weakly developed private sectors, the government is frequently the dominant force in the nation’s economy. Sudden and massive cuts in government spending can throw tens or hundreds of thousands out of work, and contribute to a surge in unemployment, and to a consequent reduction in the bargaining power of all workers.
In Nicaragua, for example, the Chamorro administration that followed the revolutionary Sandinista government worked with the IMF to slash the public sector. In the first three years of the new regime, the number of government employees plummeted from 290,000 to 107,000 (resulting in loss of employment for more than 9 percent of the Nicaraguan labor force). Through 1999, the government eliminated more than 18,000 additional jobs.
The closure or downsizing of state-owned banks yielding a total
reduction from 9,100 employees in 1990 to 3,500 in 1993
was the
first in a series of financial sector reforms resulting in smaller
government payrolls and greater foreign ownership of Nicaraguan
businesses, according to a Nicaraguan report to the IMF.
The dramatic two thirds reduction in the size of government was driven
in part by a concerted government effort to strip out the
Sandinistas from government jobs,
according to Marie Clarke of the
Quixote Center, but was also directed and required by the IMF and
World Bank in a series of loan agreements through the 1990s and in the
present decade. A 1991 World Bank Economic Recovery Credit was
designated to assist with downsizing and restructuring the public
sector.
Continually reducing the size of government has been a
consistent benchmark criteria included in IMF and World Bank loans,
with specific cutbacks designated as evidence of Nicaragua’s
adherence to structural adjustment conditions.
Nicaragua is presently undergoing a second generation
of
structural reform programs, including yet another round of government
cutbacks. Unemployment now stands at 14 percent, but combined
unemployment and rampant underemployment totals 50 percent.
Other countries have witnessed similar emaciation of the public sector under IMF and World Bank tutelage:
The civil service downsizing included in IMF and World Bank conditionalities is frequently bound up with privatization plans: under IMF and Bank instruction, governments agree to lay off thousands of workers to prepare enterprises for privatization. But privatization itself is frequently associated with new rounds of downsizing, as well as private employer assaults on unions and demands for wage reductions.
Privatization is a core element of the structural adjustment policy package. Blanket support for privatization is an ideological article of faith at the IMF and Bank.
The range of IMF and Bank-supported or -mandated privatizations is
staggering. The institutions have overseen wholesale privatizations in
economies that were previously state-sector dominated—including
former Communist countries in Central and Eastern Europe, as well as
many developing countries with heavy government involvement in the
economy—and also privatization of services that are regularly
maintained in the public sector in rich countries, such as water
provision and sanitation [see Privatization Tidal Wave,
page
14], healthcare, roads, airports and postal services:
virtually all public services and federally owned enterpriseshave been privatized, including postal services.
outsourcing, privatization or liquidation of specific services and agencies of the four largest ministries (Health and Population, Education, Transport and Public Works, and Agriculture and Irrigation,according to a government submission to the IMF, and
the government also intends to increase private sector participation in the roads sector.
Labor unions do not offer blanket opposition to all privatization. Particularly in the case of Central and Eastern Europe, but also in many developing countries, unions have agreed that privatization of some government operations may be appropriate. But they have insisted on safeguards to ensure that privatization enhances efficiency rather than the private plunder of public assets, and insisted that basic worker rights and interests also be protected.
But those safeguards by and large have not been put in place.
Unfortunately, trade unions’ proposals regarding the form of
privatization, the regulatory framework and treatment of workers were
usually not listened to during the massive privatization wave in
Central and Eastern Europe,
notes the International Confederation
of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) in a report published in advance of the
fall 2001 IMF and World Bank meetings. The IMF and Bank acknowledge
some of their mistakes in Central and Eastern Europe, ICFTU notes, but
similar mistakes may well be repeated in Central and Eastern Europe
and in other regions.
The ICFTU report highlights the case of Pakistan, where the military
government is planning, with World Bank assistance, a major
privatization initiative. The Bank’s support for the initiative
comes despite the potential for abuse in privatizing natural
monopoly services, especially given the lack of democratic control,
and the refusal of the authorities to negotiate with trade unions
affected by the privatization program,
ICFTU notes. The Bank
does candidly admit that a risk exists that Pakistan’s
economic reform and devolution plan `could be hastily implemented and
captured by powerful interest groups,’ but makes no suggestion
as to how to avoid such an eventuality.
Another core tenet of IMF and Bank lending
programs is the promotion of labor flexibility
or labor
mobility,
the notion that firms should be able to hire and fire
workers, or change terms and conditions of work, with minimal
regulatory restrictions.
The theory behind labor flexibility is that, if labor is treated as a commodity like any other, with companies able to hire and fire workers just as they might a piece of machinery, then markets will function efficiently. Efficient functioning markets will then facilitate economic growth.
Critics say the theory does not hold up. Former World Bank chief
economist Joseph Stiglitz described the problem to Multinational
Monitor: As part of the doctrine of liberalization, the Washington
Consensus said, `make labor markets more flexible.’ That greater
flexibility was supposed to lead to lower unemployment. A side effect
that people didn’t want to talk about was that it would lead to
lower wages. But the lower wages would generate more investment, more
demand for labor. So there would be two beneficial effects: the
unemployment rate would go down and job creation would go up because
wages were lower.
The evidence in Latin America is not supportive of those
conclusions,
Stiglitz told Multinational Monitor. Wage
flexibility has not been associated with lower unemployment. Nor has
there been more job creation in general.
Where labor market
flexibility was designed to move people from low productivity jobs to
high productivity jobs,
according to Stiglitz, too often it
moved people from low productivity jobs to unemployment, which is even
lower productivity.
Indeed, some of the IMF and Bank documents treat labor flexibility
almost as code for mass layoffs. For example, a structural
benchmark
in Nicaragua’s dealings with the IMF is that the
country continue to implement a labor mobility program aiming at
reducing public sector positions.
But the essence of the problem from the point of view of labor is that
the IMF and Bank’s version of labor flexibility is synonymous
with stripping away legal protections for workers. In Honduras, more
labor flexibility is being introduced because collective contracts
at large enterprises often act as straightjackets,
according to a
World Bank document. In Ecuador, the use of temporary contracts is
touted in an IMF document as a means to improve labor flexibility.
In its recommendations to the new Mexican government of Vicente Fox, the World Bank has spelled out just how far-reaching its promotion of labor flexibility is. The Bank encourages Mexico to phase out a wide array of worker rights and protections:
the current system of severance payments;
collective bargaining and industry-binding contracts;
obligatory union memberships; compulsory profit-sharing;
restrictions to temporary, fixed-term and apprenticeship contracts; requirements for seniority-based promotions;
registration of firm-provided training programs; and liability for subcontractors’ employees.
Few things more clearly run contrary to
workers’ interest than wage reductions. Wage freezes, wage cuts
and wage rollbacks are all commonplace in IMF and World Bank lending
programs, as is wage decompression
—increasing the ratio
of highest to lowest paid worker.
These initiatives usually occur in the public sector, where the government has authority to set wages and salaries, and where the rationale is to reduce government expenditures. (A different logic is applied to managers, however, where the assumption is that higher salaries are needed to attract quality personnel and to provide incentives for hard work.)
Sometimes the IMF and World Bank-associated wage freezes or reductions do apply to the private sector, as in cases where the minimum wage is frozen or reduced.
Sometimes the overarching policy is referred to as wage
flexibility
and is undertaken in connection with labor market
reforms.
liberalizingthe labor market in order to
increase the flexibilityof wages, particularly at state-owned enterprises.
had been partially rolled back.
top upcivil service salaries and expand the ratio to 17:1.
The institutions have elaborate justifications for opposing wage supports. An April 2001 World Bank policy working paper, for example, concludes that minimum wages have a larger effect in Latin America in the United States—including by exerting more upward influence on wages above the minimum wage—and promotes unemployment.
Pension and social security reform has emerged as a high priority of the IMF and Bank in recent years, with the World Bank taking the lead.
The thrust of the World Bank and IMF’s proposals in this area has been for lower benefits provided at a later age, and for social security privatization.
In Nicaragua, for example, one of the performance criteria for continued IMF support has been the adoption of drastic pension reforms, including raising the retirement age, increasing the minimum contribution period to receive benefits, and upping the level of employee contributions.
A 1999 informal World Bank report on Nicaragua’s social security
system concluded, The parameters of the system need to be
re-defined and a mandatory, defined contribution system based on
individual capitalization accounts introduced.
The Bank
recommended these accounts be managed by private companies determined
through an international competitive bidding process.
Drawn up under World Bank supervision, Nicaragua’s new pension
system is designed to increase contribution rates, raise the
retirement age, standardize eligibility requirements, reduce
replacement rates, increase collection efficiency and tighten
eligibility for disability benefits.
Under the new system, Nicaragua has satisfied its IMF performance criteria: payroll contributions have nearly doubled, mandatory length of service to receive a pension has been increased by nearly 10 years, and the retirement age has been raised by nearly a decade.
Again, the policies foisted on Nicaragua have been pushed around the world:
a sweeping reform of the social security system is obviously needed,and detailed Turkish plans to raise the minimum age for retirement, extend the minimum contribution period to receive a pension, and increase the level of contributions required.
In a 1999 IMF report, Turkey indicated its new social security law achieved all of these goals, surpassing even the proposals in the 1998 document. The 2000 report announced a plan to undertake a new round of reforms, involving social security privatization.
The ICFTU reports that the World Bank has been involved in pension reform efforts, increasingly driving toward privatization, in over 60 countries during the past 15 years.
Dean Baker, co-director of the Washington, D.C.-based Center for
Economic and Policy Research, says the Bank’s support for social
security privatization is not based on the evidence of what works
efficiently for pension systems. The single-mindedness of the World
Bank in promoting privatized systems is peculiar,
he says,
since the evidence—including data in World Bank
publications—indicates that well-run public sector systems, like
the Social Security system in the United States, are far more
efficient than privatized systems. The administrative costs in
privatized systems, such as the ones in England and Chile, are more
than 1500 percent higher than those of the U.S. system.
Baker adds that the extra administrative expenses of privatized
systems comes directly out of the money that retirees would otherwise
receive, lowering their retirement benefits by as much as one-third,
compared with a well-run public social security system. The
administrative expenses that are drained out of workers’ savings
in a privatized system are the fees and commissions of the financial
industry, which explains its interest in promoting privatization in
the United States and elsewhere.
Few labor advocates argue that privatization should never occur, or that no government lay off is ever necessary, though many would argue in almost all cases against certain IMF and Bank policies, such as reductions or mandated freezes on the minimum wage, and privatization of Social Security.
But among the most striking conclusions from the Multinational Monitor investigation of IMF and World Bank documents is the near-perfect consistency in the institutions’ recommendations on matters of key concern to labor interests.
None of the documents reviewed by the Monitor show IMF or Bank support for government takeover of services or enterprises formerly in the private sector; they virtually never make the case for raising workers’ wages (except for top management); they do not propose greater legal protections for workers.
And on-the-ground experience in countries around the world shows little concern that implementation of policies sure to be harmful to at least some significant number of workers in the short-term is done with an eye to ameliorating the pain.
Worker safeguards under privatization, for example, repeatedly requested by labor unions around the world, are rarely put into force.
For former Bank chief economist Joseph Stiglitz, as well as unions and worker advocates, the IMF/Bank record makes it imperative that basic worker rights be protected. If there are to be diminished legal protections and guarantees for workers, and if IMF and Bank-pushed policies are going to run contrary to worker interests, they say, then workers must at the very least be guaranteed the right to organize and defend their collective interests through unions, collective bargaining and concerted activity.
But the Bank has stated that it cannot support workers’ freedom of association and right to collective bargaining.
Robert Holzmann, director of social programs at the World Bank, told a
seminar in 1999 that the Bank could not support workers’ right
to freedom of association because of the political dimension
and the Bank’s policy of non-interference with national
politics.
Holzmann also raised a second problem
with freedom of
association. While there are studies out—and we agree with
them that trade union movements may have a strong and good role in
economic development—there are studies out that also show that
this depends. So the freedom by itself does not guarantee that the
positive economic effects are achieved.
Shortly after the 1999 seminar, labor organizations met with the World
Bank and IMF. According to a report from ICFTU, World Bank President
James Wolfensohn reiterated Holzmann’s point, saying that while
the Bank does respect three out of the five core labor rights
(anti-slavery, anti-child labor and anti-discrimination) it cannot
respect the other two (freedom of association and collective
bargaining) because it does not get involved in national
politics.
ICFTU reports that this statement was greeted with stunned
disbelief by many present.