Delroy Chuck
A significant feature of PNP administrations is their inability and abject failure to grow the economy. The seventies were a colossal social and economic disaster. For the past 15 and more years, the economy is not only flat, it has deteriorated and caused every area of national life to decline and disintegrate. We just don't get it - it is the economy, stupid.
If the economy is weak, everything else will be weak. When businesses fail and workers lose their jobs, nothing but misery follows. Alternatively, when businesses prosper, economic transactions multiply, and more people are in active employment, there will be money to pay school fees, get adequate health care, take toll roads, tithe, improve church collections, and generally provide for a better quality of life.
Still, a strong economy does not come by chance, it has to be envisioned, planned and carefully nurtured. From as far back as 1991, I could easily foresee and my early columns so reflected that the economy would stagnate under this government, or any other government that puts politics, instead of economics, at the centrepiece of national life.
Jamaican economy fears
My fears about the Jamaican economy grew when during a national television debate in 1997 prior to the general elections, I posed an argument to Dr. Omar Davies that under his policies, factories were closing and thousands of workers, especially in the garment industry, were losing their jobs. His response was simply that they were low-paid, or stitch work, jobs. I retorted that, at least, the workers were taking home a weekly salary. I recognized then that this government did not appreciate how important it is for people to have regular pay cheques. I was reminded of this simple fact when I visited an English women's prison in Woking, Sussex, and heard the cries of women who lost their lowly paid jobs in the garment factories and, out of desperation, had resorted to carrying drugs.
A job, any decent job, however lowly paid, is better than sitting idle daily on corners or starving at home, which is the misery of thousands of young men and women around Jamaica. The economic policies that caused the closure of thousands of factories and businesses, stifled production, and destroyed jobs, need a complete reversal. It is these same policies that caused our indebtedness to be at 135 per cent of GDP this year. It is these same economic policies that failed to grow the economy by even one per cent average for the past 15 years, in spite of an inflow of over US$15 billion in remittances. It is these same economic policies that caused Dr. Omar Davies to fail every single economic target he has set himself during his tenure in office.
While this government scorns lowly paid jobs and gains political capital by increasing the minimum wage periodically, China and India, in particular, are attracting millions of manufacturing and productive jobs that pay an average of less than US$100 per month, which is less than J$1,700 per week. The average Indian and Chinese worker earns less and probably produces twice as much as the average Jamaican worker. In a nutshell, Jamaica has priced itself out of the international investment market and is no longer competitive, productive or attractive. Without production and work, we have to beg and borrow, which have become the main pursuits of the Ministry of Finance.
Yes, the Jamaican economy must grow again, but it needs economic policies that induce production and create work. It needs economic policies that will make Jamaica competitive and attractive to investors. It needs economic policies that make it far more beneficial for businessmen to put their money into business expansion and increase economic activity instead of placing their surplus in treasury bills and bonds. A strong and growing economy demands a government that has business sense, which is clearly lacking in this PNP government.
Delroy Chuck is an attorney-at-law and Member of Parliament. He can be contacted by email at delchuck@hotmail.com.
