This economy is unsustainable. One of its two pillars, the garment industry, was here for a quick buck. CNMI leaders knew that when they allowed more factories to do business here. As early as 1995, they could have begun the process of weaning the CNMI from this dead-end industry. Instead, they brought in 15,000 more nonresident garment workers and paid D.C. lobbyists millions of dollars in hush money so that the Republican leaders of the U.S. House would look the other way.
It’s as if a junkie, finally realizing that his addiction is killing him, resolves to end it — by going on one last drug binge.
In 1995, the CNMI decided to deepen its dependence on an industry that was scheduled to be gone in 2005. CNMI leaders repealed the gradual wage hike law and, to provide cover to their U.S. House Republican allies, passed other labor and immigration “reforms”…that they would eventually either water down or scrap altogether.
To protect the factories that gave Saipan the international label of “island of sweatshops,” CNMI leaders aligned the commonwealth with one of the two major U.S. political parties, knowing there was such a thing as election cycles and that the other party, the one that the commonwealth was openly antagonizing, would one day be the majority party once again.
The CNMI leaders, with the hearty approval of CNMI voters, hired more employees, created more unfunded entitlements and assured the public that every day would be Christmas as long they’re in office.
The entire system was a pyramid scheme, as this newspaper repeatedly pointed out in the past. The garment industry had an expiration date while the other industry, tourism, was vulnerable to unforeseen international events over which the CNMI had no control — the Asian financial crisis, SARS, 9-11, rising fuel costs, a worldwide recession…
But CNMI politicians, in every election year, continued to promise more funding for education, more scholarships, more medical referrals, more homesteads, more retirement benefits, more government jobs, more pay hikes, more basketball or baseball courts, more of everything — for nothing.
A private sector that can’t afford to hire local residents and a government that considers itself Santa Claus — this is the unsupportable and unhealthy socio-economic setup that federalization will happily kill.
Starting this year, the local economy will shrink further. There will be more business shutdowns. This will reduce the nonresident population — and the government’s revenue base, which will force elected officials to reduce government payroll and personnel. A smaller population will lighten the burden on key public services — PSS CHC, DPS, CUC and the courts.
The economy will return to what it was in the 1970s. More locals will fish or farm. They will learn the trade skills that their grandfathers had to know in simpler times. Younger locals, for their part, will move to Guam or the states from where they will remit money to their parents who want to remain in the CNMI. Perhaps there will still be a need for guest workers — for construction projects or healthcare services — but their number will be significantly fewer compared to the days when they outnumbered locals.
The Marianas Variety, born when the islands still had no economy, will still be around — leaner, but still providing the community with relevant information, still as fair, balanced and independent as it is now.
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