Huelga General

Spanish unions today held a general strike, "huelga general," calling for all workers to not work today to force the government to withdraw efforts to deal with the huge economic problems facing Spain. (Without going into detail, suffice it to say that Spain's problems make those of the U.S. look puny.) The news media are now reporting the results of the Huelga General. The unions have announced that 70% of Spanish workers observed the strike, while the government reports that 7% of government workers failed to show up for work.

Our response here in Segovia: it was neither 70% nor 7%. Maybe 0.07%. There were about 50 strikers in the Plaza Mayor this morning and after milling around smartly for half an hour, they marched down the main commercial street, going into stores urging employees to join them, with a notable lack of success. An hour later, the only evidence of the General Strike here was the litter from all the leaflets the strikers threw as they walked.

By the way, some of the measures the strikers are protesting are government efforts to make it easy for Spanish companies to hire workers (and fire them - companies don't hire as much if they can't fire or layoff a worker). The government wants to reduce the amount of severance pay a laid-off or fired employee gets; as of now, it's 45 days(!) pay for every year worked. That's right; if you work for a year and get laid off, you get 9 weeks of severance pay. The government also wants to make it easier for employers to fire a worker for not showing up at his/her job; now, only if a worker misses 20% of the workdays over 2 months - not counting sick leave or vacation days - can the employer start the firing process.

Now, this may not be as bad as France, where the unemployed once went on strike (try to figure that out), but it seems crazy that in a country with 20%+ unemployment, anyone would think it was a good idea to go on strike. Especially over those oppressive conditions. And it seems that the huge majority of Spanish workers agreed.

P.S. There was another rally here in Segovia in support of the General Strike. About 100 people showed up. The funny part is that it was held after the workday so people could support the general strike without, you know, actually going on strike themselves.

Location:Calle de San Frutos,Segovia,Spain