By Stephanie Dearing
Briarpatch Magazine
November/December 2009
If widely adopted, the Global Jobs Pact could represent a major step forward for working people, the economy and the environment.
Various talking heads have proclaimed that the worst of the global recession may be over, but the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) maintains that “employment is the bottom line of the current crisis,” which has the potential to turn “into a long-term unemployment crisis.” The International Labour Organization (ILO) has also warned about an employment crisis. ILO director-general Juan Somavia this summer estimated that not only will there be about 239 million job losses globally due to the recession, but another 200 million people will be forced into deeper levels of poverty. Unless there is a concerted job-creation push by governments, the ILO estimates it will be between 2017 and 2020 before the world sees an end to the employment crisis.
The ILO answer to this disaster in the making is the Global Jobs Pact, which, if widely adopted, could represent a major step forward for working people, the economy and the environment.
