8/2/2019 Handout for the Occupy Wall Street Movement

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The Occupy Wallstreet movement

Slogan: The official slogan of the Occupy Wallstreet movement is We are the 99%.

That means that the protesting people belongs to the 99% of the American people which had an

declining life-standard in the last 2 decades, in the same time the richest 1% of the Americans hasbecome already richer. On this page the slogan was born: http://wearethe99percent.tumblr.com/

Reasons for the creation of the OWS movement:

Here are the (in my opinion) most important facts, you need to know, if you want to understand why

an movement like the OWS can start in a country like the USA.

1) In the last 20 years the real income was shrinking and is already equal to the late 60s or early 70

years of the last century.

2) Right now 50million Americans need food stamps or go to soup kitchens. Every fourth children in

America has not enough food!

8/2/2019 Handout for the Occupy Wall Street Movement

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Last autumn even the Muppet show maced a special show about this sad fact:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhJ6hfbn4x8&

3) On the 21st September 2011 the Forbes magazine printed his yearly listing of the 400 richest

Americans. These 400 super rich persons owned 12% more capital than in the last year. Very eye-

catching is that 96 persons of the 100 richest are investors which speculate on the finance markets,

and only 4 persons come from the producing industry.

4) In the moment nearly 90% of all capital in the USA is owned by the richest 20% and 40% of all

capital by 1%.

5) The costs for academic studies had increased since1982 by 439% so that many people can not start

study or have later so much debts that it is nearly impossible to pay them back.

6) The unemployment rate has doubled since the start of the finance crises in October 2008.

7) Obama was not able to start a change in the American system. Most people do not longer believe in

his promises of change.

Activater of the OWS protests and movement:

The starting moment of the OWS was a article in the magazine Adbuster released on the 13th July

2011: http://www.adbusters.org/blogs/adbusters-blog/occupywallstreet.html

Here is the most important part of the article:

On September 17, we want to see 20,000 people flood into lower Manhattan, set up tents, kitchens,

peaceful barricades and occupy Wall Street for a few months. Once there, we shall incessantly repeat

one simple demand in a plurality of voices.

The protests have spread across whole America and even to other countries.Intentions of the OWS movement:

There is no official list of demands from the protesters.

But the 3 mostly verbalized demands are:

1) Higher taxes for rich people.

2) The implementation of a "transaction tax".

3) The president should create a agency to find out what influence money has on US-politics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhJ6hfbn4x8&http://www.adbusters.org/blogs/adbusters-blog/occupywallstreet.htmlhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhJ6hfbn4x8&http://www.adbusters.org/blogs/adbusters-blog/occupywallstreet.html