Uruguay, workers proposed a 1% tax on the wealthy to fight child poverty

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Uruguayan workers proposed to apply a 1% tax to the richest 1% of the population to fight child poverty. Our correspondent Mateo Grille with the report. teleSUR

Transcript

00:00Uruguayan workers propose to apply a 1% tax to the richest 1% of the population to fight

00:06child poverty. Our correspondent Mateo Grille with the report.

00:11It was one of the strongest announcements of the May 1st Act and now the workers are doubling the

00:18bet. Uruguay's Unified Trade Union Center of Workers proposed to the government the creation

00:23of a special 1% tax for the richest 1% of the country, which concentrates half of the

00:27national wealth. The aim is to allocate these funds to public policies to combat child

00:31poverty. The proposal has again generated debate in the last hours.

00:41For us, there is an ethical commitment to find tools to solve child poverty because child poverty

00:50is the expropriation of rights. It is mortgaging the future and in a country that also has

00:55difficulties in its demographic growth, it is shooting itself in the foot.

01:02In Uruguay, child poverty affects 32.2% of children between the ages of 0 and 6. These rates are

01:13double or even triple those of the adult population. If the tax were applied, it would raise close to

01:18$800 million a year, which would make it possible to address this injustice. Workers' representatives

01:23met with President Uruguay, but he reiterated that no new taxes would be created. According

01:28to the latest polls, nearly two-thirds of the population supports the proposal.

01:32I believe that 1% would be fine for large businessmen or people who have large amounts of money. I believe

01:48that 1% would not affect them.

01:49I think it is a good measure. In fact, 1% for the richest population of the country is nothing,

02:01not very significant for them, and it can have a very important impact on public policies for children,

02:06adolescents, and infants.

02:07I see it well, I see it well. In fact, it was enough of taking away, in quotation marks,

02:19from those who work, from the population that are also vulnerable. Whether you like it or not,

02:23and I believe that in some way a balance can be generated, it seems to me the fairest thing possible.

02:28Despite the government's response, workers are coordinating with social organizations

02:38and academics to carry out an in-depth study on inequality and its causes.

02:46Child poverty leads to problems in the learning process. It leads to problems in social insertion.

02:51it leads to problems in economic performance. It is a concatenation. It is like a snowball that grows

02:58bigger as time goes by and that also ruins steel's lives. So for us the 1% tax for the richest 1% is

03:06going to be a central element of the political process of the trade union movement.

03:10In Uruguay, 25,000 people concentrate half of the wealth. A fact that it is a

03:21policy that calls for urgent decisions to break inequality.

03:24Mateo Grille, TELESUR, Montevideo, Uruguay.

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